Arrondissement de Cologne

The Arrondissement de Cologne, a structured into cantons administrative district of the Département de la Roer, which existed from 1798 to 1814, was a short episode in the history of Cologne.

Genesis

Occupation, annexation and incorporation recognized

The occupation of the left bank of the Rhine area by French revolutionary troops took place in late autumn in 1794. This annexation was recognized provisionally and then finally closed in the peace of Luneville (1801 ) in the Treaty of Campo Formio (1797 ).

The lying in this interval, structural area regulations were essentially based on the plans and proposals for a restructuring of the conquered territories that had been developed by the Government Commissioner and Judge of the Court of Cassation François Joseph Rudler. The then sent to the Rhine Alsace Rudler divided the territories of the Republic of France to be incorporated along the lines of the French provinces ( after 1789 ) in departments, nullifying the previous forms of feudal territory administrations and gradually brought about an approximation of the Rhine to the French legal system.

The peace treaty of Luneville in 1801 brought the international legal requirements for on September 23, 1802 formally consummated equality of the new Rhenish departments with the old French administrative units.

Administrative structures and reforms

Among the main features of the restructuring was the introduction of the Department Constitution in 1798. Conquered the land had been divided into four departments, their management consisted of five members of a Board specially formed, from which one was chosen by them to the presidency in annual rotation. Below this level of administration were the cantons, which were the (preliminary) next administrative divisions with their municipalities. At the top of the Munizipalverwaltungen Munizipalagenten who was recruited from the respective communities were. Both levels of government, departments and cantonal administrations were monitored by government commissioners.

The Napoleonic reform of February of the year, which came into force in May 1800, formed the administrative structure to a centralized and hierarchically dominated organization. At the head of the departments whose territory definition remained unchanged, were prefects, those assisting more Prefecture and General Councils were set aside. The latter was under the jurisdiction of the administrative jurisdictions and for the interests of the tax system.

The department now received a further breakdown and were divided into arrondissements, which were led by sub-prefects, which district councils have been allocated.

Even at the local level made ​​changes. In the cantons was the large number of communities, which often consisted also of very small concentrations, reduced by order of the prefecture in number and large mayors, who were called mairies pooled. The respective Maire, where a municipal council was attached to was the sub-prefect ( sous- préfet ) was assumed as this the Prefect.

Law and order

Just as the structure of the administrative structure was the organization of the court system. You certain as the lowest instance in each canton an occupied with a judge justice of the peace, which was responsible for the Bagatellgerichtsbarkeit in civil and criminal matters.

A tribunal established in the arrondissements Tribunal was equipped with three to five judges and was responsible for all disputes and criminal matters which do not fall within the competence of the courts of justice. In addition, the Tribunal took as a court of appeal on the case brought against decisions of the courts of justice revisions.

Against a decision before the tribunals appeal judgments could be appealed to the appeal courts. For all linksrheinischen dishes in Trier was until 1805 the only court of appeal, then the appellations walked out of the Rurdepartement to the Court of Appeal in Liege. The local, equipped with twelve jurors and twelve professional judges court was the last possible instance. Against a decision handed there no revision was possible, only that application ( Coram nobis ) the cancellation of the Court of Cassation ( Cour de cassation ) in Paris.

In the areas of law the achievements of the Revolution took place in the " Cinq codes" of the Napoleonic Empire, its completion with the Civil Code ( called "Code Napoléon " in civil law ) of 1804, the Civil Procedure Law of 1807, the Commercial Law of 1808, the Criminal Procedure Law of 1809 and the criminal Law of 1811.

Specification of the arrondissements

The district comprised 290 municipalities with a total of about 137,000 inhabitants. Situated in the structured into five sections Mairie Cologne the administrative capital of Cologne comprised the cantons Cologne, Bergheim, Brühl, Dormagen, Elsen, Jülich, Kerpen, Lechenich, pastures and Zuelpich.

Since the new rules adopted in February under the prefects were now, like their counterparts in the French departments directly Parisian ministries. Several subsequent amendments concerned only for the schedule within the prefectures.

The sub-prefect

Following the decision of the consuls from July 22, 1800 on the appointment of prefects, the prefecture councils and sub-prefects of Roerdepartements, took over after his swearing in as the first sub-prefect of the arrondissement Cologne A. Sybertz, who had previously acts as Section President of the Civil Tribunal of Roerdepartements be Office. This he held until November 7, 1804.

Successor of A. Sybertz was established in November 1804, the former alderman and mayor of Cologne, Josef Reiner Klespé. He was the one who had in 1794 the French General Jean- Étienne Championnet symbolically handed over keys to the city at the barrier of the gate valve.

Administrative tasks of the arrondissements

• Taxation, leasing the domain goods Listings estates and income of the Church factories in the district, recording the auctions, sales and leases, lease fees revenue and the rights to the flying bridge, capital, overview Gemeindewaldungen their income and expenses, debts of the municipalities, facility the Cologne Chamber of Commerce, listing of the richest merchants in the district and the highest taxed in the cantons with their tax benefits, election of members of the Commercial Court, detection of crop yields in the district; Formation of the Commercial Court and election of members, listing the manufacturer, maintenance of cranes and shipyards in Cologne, establishment of a free port, laying the customs line at the Cologne harbor in 1802, monitoring of the introduced Rhine customs duty, the freedom of trade, checks on uniform weights and measures, care of forests and timber sales, leasing of hunting, fishing and mills

• Surveys in Arrondissement by surveyors, salaries, detection of the population of the cantons of the arrondissement, listing the " patent worthy Jews ", selling and leasing of community assets, public charity, entertainment of the local police and the arrest houses, the naming of streets, squares and the numbering of the houses in Cologne, the award of public works (repairs, construction, demolition, etc.) within and outside Cologne, dikes, Rhine ferries in the Arrondissement, bridges and roads, watercourses, water mills, water mills, construction of cemeteries outside the residential areas

• Creation of lists of names of practicing physicians, surgeons, midwives and authorizations to practice, dispositions to diseases and epidemics such as smallpox vaccinations, conversion of some religious institutions in hospitals or hospitals, reports the hospital administration about their institution, acquisition of hospitals in the district and occupancy values ​​, listing of health personnel, establishment of central charity offices in the cantons, appointment of members of the charity offices, registration of foundlings and orphans in the district

• List of annual conscripts ( levée en masse ) in the arrondissement, documentation of Fouragelieferungen for magazines or cash payments, fitting-out of veterans camps in the district

• File systems of sub-prefecture, investment letter of the other registers, transfer of archive files of the old archives and accommodation, storage of the old court archives, employments, listing the mayors and adjuncts, lists of proposed appointment of Munizipalräten, Budget and Accounts. Further information about secularization, domain goods, taxes, elections, population schedules, Agriculture and Livestock

• For the district, a number of other tasks and operations were listed: recruitment of teachers in primary schools (very incomplete), establishment of a secondary school in Canton Brühl, in the canton Elsen, in the canton of Jülich, in the canton of Cologne ( Köln = Mairie ). Establishment of a normal school and a lyceum, establishment of secondary schools, appointment of professors and members of the school management fee, salary, refurbishing of the former Jesuit High School (Cologne) than high school 2nd degree, administration of estates and income of Central School ( successor of the old University of Cologne) and of the two secondary schools.

Details about the layout of the former convent Weis to school purposes, the construction of a school building with school for girls in the parish of St. Columba and the retention of the Ursuline School in Cologne for the teaching of female youth.

End of the arrondissement

With the onset of the French in Cologne the centuries of domination of the Council had been interrupted. Since then, the Cologne City Hall was owned by the French state. The imperial court in Vienna, who in 1801 agreed to the cession of the Rhineland to France with a " Peace of Luneville " with the signature of Francis II should again be important for Cologne's history. With the arrangements of the Congress of Vienna in 1815 the city of Cologne then belonged to Prussia and the Town Hall was again the Council seat.