Rhode Island Has Counties but No County Government. 5 Other Quirks Rhode Islanders Take for Granted
On the second Monday of August, Rhode Island closes its state offices for Victory Day.
It’s the only state that does, and locals don’t think anything of it.
Here’s why Rhode Island has counties but no county government, and the other quirks Rhode Islanders take for granted.
What the Five Counties Still Do
A map of Rhode Island shows five counties, but the state legally abolished them as governmental units.
The Census Bureau still uses them as geographic subdivisions.
If you head to Superior Court, you’ll find the work sorted by county, with Providence and Bristol sharing one of four jurisdictions.
Kent, Newport, and Washington counties each have a Superior Court clerk, too.
Courthouse security, though, runs through a division of sheriffs that works statewide.
The same division moves prisoners between courthouses, correctional institutions, and police departments across the state.
1. Royal Charter as Constitution
King Charles II granted Rhode Island a royal charter in 1663, and that charter served as the state’s governing document.
You’d expect a state to write a constitution soon after the Revolution, but Rhode Island didn’t adopt a constitution until decades after the war ended.
The People’s Convention and the Dorr Rebellion eventually led to a new constitution.
Two rival governments tried to take power in early May 1842, and the armed fight that followed ended with Dorr fleeing to New Hampshire.
Voters ratified the new constitution in November 1842, and it took effect in May 1843.
2. Life Terms for Justices
Rhode Island’s five Supreme Court justices serve life terms, and a 2024 Brennan Center analysis found no other state high court does the same.
You won’t find a mandatory retirement age on that bench, either.
Forty-seven states set fixed terms of six to 14 years instead.
How Other New England Courts Compare
Rhode Island’s Supreme Court isn’t the only New England court without a fixed term.
Massachusetts and New Hampshire justices serve until age 70, when state law requires them to retire.
Since 1970, justices in both states have served an average of 14 years, the same analysis found.
3. Victory Day
On the second Monday of August, Victory Day closes Rhode Island’s state offices.
Rhode Island is the only state that closes its public offices to observe Victory Day.
If you try to reach a state or municipal office that day, expect it to be closed.
The holiday dates to 1948, three years after World War II ended, when a law set it for August 14, the day Japan surrendered.
Lawmakers changed that in the late 1960s, moving it to the second Monday in August.
Arkansas had the holiday too, but it dropped Victory Day in 1975.
Sponsors of a 2025 House bill proposed renaming it Peace and Remembrance Day, arguing that the holiday focuses only on World War II.
As of August 2026, efforts to rename it have failed to pass at the State House.
4. Chicken as State Bird
You might expect a songbird, but Rhode Island’s official bird is the Rhode Island Red.
Yes, a chicken.
Rhode Island adopted the breed as its state bird on May 3, 1954.
The Livestock Conservancy says the breed was developed in Massachusetts and Rhode Island in the 1880s and 1890s, and its ancestors include Malay, Shanghai, Java, and Brown Leghorn chickens.
Members of the Rhode Island Red Club put up a monument to the breed in Adamsville in 1925.
It sits on land donated by Deborah Manchester and recognizes Little Compton’s role in developing the breed.
A Rhode Island Red lays up to 300 brown eggs a year.
5. Carousel as Folk Art
The Charles I.D. Looff carousel, also called the Crescent Park carousel, is the state symbol of American folk art.
Looff designed and built it in 1895, and it’s one of the few handmade carousels still in use.
The carousel has 62 hand-carved figures and four chariots.
A handful of residents saved it in the 1970s, and it went on the National Register of Historic Places in 1976.
Rhode Island made it the state’s folk-art symbol on May 28, 1985, and the General Assembly proclaimed it the State Jewel of American Folk Art.
The National Park Service designated it a National Historic Landmark in 1987.
Psst! How much do you know about Rhode Island? Take our quiz and see if you can ace it.
Quiz
Rhode Island IQ
Answer nine questions on Rhode Island’s firsts, landmarks, and laws. We bet you can’t get them all right. Prove us wrong?
Rhode Island is among the states that never ratified which amendment to the U.S. Constitution?
The Former State Name at the State House
Rhode Island voters dropped Providence Plantations from the state's official name in November 2020, the Boston Globe reported.
Question 1 passed with 52.8 percent of the vote in the early count, after about 78 percent of voters rejected a similar change in 2010.
Governor Gina Raimondo's executive order removes the words from official documents and other state materials.
A year after the 2020 vote, the old name was still written in marble near the State House dome and on bronze plaques in the entryway.
The state seal with the full former name was on the rotunda floor, the elevator doors, door numbers, and directional signs.
In the Department of Administration building, the old seal was on the front desk and on the directory of rooms.
The old name was even on the rug in front of George Washington's portrait in the state room.
