Since its formation, North Rhine-Westphalia has been a controversial state. It was created by the British occupying authorities as an amalgamation of Westphalia, the northern part of the Rhineland province - the Köln, Aachen and Düsseldorf governing districts - and the Free State of Lippe. It was by all measures a very large and powerful state; upon the creation of the Federal Republic, North Rhine-Westphalia accounted for a full quarter of its population and contained several of its largest cities - Cologne, Düsseldorf, Duisburg, Dortmund, and Essen. Perhaps even more importantly, it united both halves of Germany's economic and industrial powerhouse, the Ruhr region, which had until this point been administratively separated. Such a concentration of people and power in one state, while a far cry from the dominance of Prussia in the past, nonetheless dissatisfied many. Proposals to divide the state were common in the early years of the Federal Republic, but as with almost all ideas about reorganisation of the states, they never went anywhere. Thus, North Rhine-Westphalia remained a juggernaut within the new Germany, and only became more important during the economic miracle as the Rhine-Ruhr greater metropolitan area truly boomed.
After it became clear that the states would stay as they were for the forseeable future, administrative changes went on the backburner for a while. Going into the 1960s, however, more attention started to be paid to the issue. Since the unification of Germany in 1870, the country had been in a near-constant struggle to keep its borders up to date with a rapidly growing population and, in particular, rapidly growing cities. Nowhere was this more true than in the Rhine-Ruhr area, which had experienced extraordinary growth around the turn of the century. However, these changes came to a screeching halt with the rise of the Nazi regime. The Nazis preferred to utilise their internal party structures over existing administration, and as a result few border changes were made outside of a handful of reforms such as the expansion of Hamburg. By the mid-60s, the last revision of administrative boundaries in the area of North Rhine-Westphalia had taken place in 1929.
The state comprised a total of 57 rural districts and a whopping 38 independent cities. Many of these were within the Ruhr urban area, lacking clear delineation from their neighbours where urban development had long since overgrown city boundaries. Meanwhile, historically independent provincial towns like Siegen, Lüdenscheid, and Bocholt retained their status despite having been far surpassed by the large urban centres. In general, development all across the state had become awkwardly detached from existing administrative structures, making coordination and planning difficult.
The first law reforming administration was passed in 1965, merging a number of municipalities in the Unna district. For now, the reforms would be limited largely to the municipal level - but they were much-needed here as well. Numerous changes were made in the following years, codified by a raft of laws passed by the Landtag in 1968-69, merging and reforming municipalities all across the state. Most of these were made on a voluntary basis, with the authorities involved agreeing to the changes. After this point, however, larger-scale changes started to be drafted with a wider vision in mind - and the municipal and district governments were not always pleased.
Several major laws were passed between 1969 and 1975 which radically remodeled the administrative map of the state. Firstly, in the 1969, the
Bonn-Gesetz dramatically enlarged the boundaries of the national seat of government. The cities of Beuel and Bad Godesberg were incorporated alongside six other municipalities. Further, the Landkreis Bonn was also abolished and absorbed into the former Siegkreis district, now renamed Rhein-Sieg-Kreis. The
Aachen-Gesetz of 1971 was even more far-reaching, reorganising the entire area of the Aachen
Regierungsbezirk, including a major expansion of the city of Aachen and mergers of several districts. However, it was here that the first hurdles began to be encountered. Constitutional complaints were filed against some of the changes, and one succeeded - the incorporation of the town of Heimbach into Nideggen was ruled unconstitutional and reversed. In 1972, the
Bielefeld-Gesetz merged districts, abolished the independence of Herford, and expanded the boundaries of Bielefeld to absorb its entire surrounding district.
The entire Ruhr was tackled in one go with the
Ruhrgebiet-Gesetz in 1974. Substantial changes were made. A number of areas on the left bank of the Rhine were incorporated into Duisburg. In the first draft, this included Moers, but the city successfully avoided such a fate by itself incorporating nearby towns to increase its prominence. Legislators took an axe to the array of small cities, aiming to ensure every independent city in the Ruhr had at least 200,000 inhabitants. Wattenscheid, a small city squished between Essen and Bochum, was entirely incorporated into the latter. Herne and Wanne-Eickel were merged; though they were of almost equal size, the new city took the name Herne. The cities of Bottrop and Gladbeck were also merged alongside the municipality Kirchhellen. At the same time, a number of cities lost their independent status: Castrop-Rauxel and Recklinghausen were incorporated into Landkreis Recklinghausen, while Witten was incorporated into Ennepe-Ruhr-Kreis. The Unna district also expanded substantially to the north and incorporated the city of Lünen. Finally, small incorporations were made to Essen, Dortmund, and Mülheim.
All other parts of the state were also revised in 1974. The
Niederrhein-Gesetz affected the northern part of the Düsseldorf Regierungsbezirk and involved mostly municipal changes and district mergers; the
Münster/Hamm-Gesetz substantially expanded both eponymous cities, abolished the independence of Bocholt, and merged districts. The
Düsseldorf-Gesetz revised the southern part of the Düsseldorf region. The city of Rheydt was incorporated into Mönchengladbach along with a small amount of other territory - and not for the first time! Rheydt and München-Gladbach (its current name was given in 1960 to avoid confusion with Munich) were originally merged in 1929 to form Gladbach-Rheydt, but divided again in 1933 on the order of Hermann Göring, who was born in Rheydt and simply wanted it to be independent. The city of Neuss was expanded but simultaneously lost its independence to the new district of Rhein-Kreis Neuss (fun fact: with a population of 150,000 and ranking 55th nationally, Neuss remains the largest non-independent city in Germany). Düsseldorf incorporated several areas to its north and east. Small additions were made to Wuppertal, Solingen, and Remscheid. The slimmed-down Düsseldorf-Mettmann district was renamed to just Mettmann. Meanwhile, the Rhein-Wupper-Kreis was abolished and its territory mostly divided between Mettmann and two new districts established by the next law.
The
Köln-Gesetz was passed about two weeks after the
Düsseldorf-Gesetz and addressed the Regierungsbezirk of the same name. It significantly expanded the already-large city of Cologne, incorporating the cities of Porz and Wesseling as well as a bunch of other municipalities to the south and west of the city. The independent city of Leverkusen incorporated Opladen, former seat of the Rhein-Wupper-Kreis, and some other territory. This particular decision was proposed by the government but not endorsed in the bill as approved by the Landtag committee, who recommended expanding Opladen and incorporating both it and Leverkusen into the new Rheinisch-Bergischer-Kreis district. However, during the course of the bill's passage, the SPD and CDU agreed to restore the government's proposal. The Oberbergischer Kreis expanded northward with territory from both the abolished Rhein-Wupper-Kreis and the Rheinisch-Bergischer-Kreis; the latter took in new area from the Rhein-Wupper-Kreis and now straddled the eastern side of Cologne. Finally, the Bergheim and Landkreis Köln districts were merged into the new Rhein-Erft-Kreis.
The
Sauerland/Paderborn-Gesetz was the final part of the administrative revision, affecting the southern part of Westphalia. Hagen was expanded, while the cities of Iserlohn and Lüdenscheid lost their independence and were incorporated into the new Märkischer Kreis. Lippstadt and Soest districts were merged, as were Siegen and Wittgenstein, and Hochsauerlandkreis was formed from Arnsberg, Meschede, and Brilon. Here we also see one of the areas least affected by the reforms: the Olpe district remained essentially the same apart from a minor expansion to its area.
All these changes were finalised with the Neugliederungs-Schlussgesetz which set out budgeting, planning, and administration.
The entry into force of most of these laws at the start of 1975 wasn't the end of things, however. You may have noticed that some of the changes I mentioned are not reflected on the map above - most noticeably the merger of Bottrop and Gladbeck. That particular change was one of the most controversial. The new city was referred to colloquially as
Glabotki (Gladbeck, Bottrop, Kirchhellen) and ultimately lived a very short life of less than twelve months. The city of Gladbeck sued against the merger and succeeded, with the Constitutional Court ruling in its favour in December, voiding the incorporation. The court stated that such a merger did not achieve its stated aims, namely greater citizen-orientation and administrative efficiency. Gladbeck and Kirchhellen thus reverted to their previous legal status in December 1975. However, all three continued to be administered jointly since the old municipal authorities had already been disestablished. This created a difficult situation for the state government, since Bottrop, with only 100,000 inhabitants, was too small to justify its continuing status as an independent city in the Ruhr. They did not want to incorporate it into Recklinghausen district, since this would push the district to an excessive 750,000 inhabitants, and they did not believe they could find sufficient rationale to divide the district. They instead proposed the awful solution of merging Bottrop into Essen, which was rejected by all relevant stakeholders (but embraced by Gelsenkirchen, for some reason.) In the end, Bottrop retained its independence, incorporating Kirchhellen, while Gladbeck became part of Recklinghausen district.
Another legal drama surrounded the municipality of Meerbusch, located between Krefeld, Düsseldorf, and Neuss. All three cities wanted to incorporate parts of it. The original drafts of the
Düsseldorf-Gesetz proposed no changes to Meerbusch, but late in the legislative process the Landtag committee proposed its partition between the aforementioned three cities, with the lion's share going to Düsseldorf. Despite substantial opposition, this made it into the final bill. However, the Constitutional Court suspended the clauses affecting Meerbusch pending a legal challenge which ultimately succeeded, owing to issues with the legislative process. A new bill was then put forward to implement the partition of Meerbusch, which this time narrowly failed to win majority support in the Landtag, saving the town from oblivion. A similar saga unfolded concerning the Rhein-Wupper-Kreis town of Monheim, and its proposed merger with Langenfeld, which also fell to a legal challenge and was then defeated during a second legislative effort.
Finally, the incorporation of the city of Wesseling into Cologne was also reversed by the Constitutional Court effective on 1 July 1976. Interestingly, the loss of Wesseling meant that Cologne fell below the milestone of one million inhabitants and, despite Wesseling's relatively small size of about 35,000, it took the city almost 35 years to surpass the one million mark again, only doing so in 2010.