American state membership timeline

A state is one of the 50 individual entities that make up the United States and share sovereignty with the federal government. Due to the division of powers between the federal government and the individual states, Americans hold dual citizenship. [1]In their official state names, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia all use the term commonwealth rather than state.

The fifty states are the main administrative divisions of the USA. They have all the authority that isn't specifically given to or forbidden to the federal government by the United States Constitution. As a rule, it is up to the individual states to handle matters that affect its citizens directly, such as intrastate commerce, elections, the formation of municipalities, public education policy, and the building and upkeep of roads not funded by the federal government. Each state's government is structured similarly to the federal government, with an executive, legislative, and judicial branch. However, each state's constitution is based on republican principles. [2]

The United States Congress is a bicameral legislature made up of senators and representatives from all 50 states. Each state has two senators and at least one representative, with the size of each state's delegation in the House of Representatives determined by the state's population as of the most recent decennial census required by the Constitution. The Electoral College is the body that votes for President and Vice President of the United States. [3] Each state has the right to send a number of electors to the Electoral College equal to the sum of its congressional deputies and senators. [4]

The power to Union" target="_blank">admit new states into the Union is delegated to Congress by Article IV, Section 3, Clause 1 of the Constitution. Originally consisting of 13 states, the United States now includes 50. All new states have been granted full voting rights alongside all others. [5]

A timeline of statehood for each of the 50 states is provided below. After signing on to the United States Declaration of Independence in July 1776, the first 13 states formally entered the Union of States in the years between 1777 and 1781 by ratifying the Articles of Confederation. (See below for a separate table detailing the ratification dates of the AoC.) These states are listed in the order in which they joined the new (and current) federal government upon ratification of the Constitution in 1787. Each subsequent state's admission date is a legally binding statute. [a]

List of U S states [ edit ]

State Date
(accepted or confirmed) Developed from 1   Delaware When: 7 December 1787 [8]
(ratified) The State of Delaware as a Colony[b]. 2   Pennsylvania Dated: 12 December 1787 [10]
(ratified) Pennsylvania, a Crown Colony 3   New Jersey On this day in 1787: [11]
(ratified) New Jersey, a former British colony. 4   Georgia Two Hundred and Eighty-Eighth Day of the Year [8]
(ratified) Royal Georgian Colony 5   Connecticut 9 January 1788 [12]
(ratified) Connecticut, a former British colony 6   Massachusetts 6 February 1788 [8]
(ratified) Royal Colony of Massachusetts Bay 7   Maryland April 28, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Maryland, a colonial possession 8   In the state of South Carolina1 May 23, 1788 [8]
(ratified) British possession in the American colony of South Carolina 9   Element: New Hampshire1 June 21, 1788 [8]
(ratified) New Hampshire, a Colony under the Crown 10   Virginia June 25, 1788 [8]
(ratified) The Commonwealth of Virginia, British Dominions 11   New York July 26, 1788 [13]
(ratified) New York, the Queen's Most Favored Colony 12   Cary, North Carolina1 On this day in 1789 [14]
(ratified) Originally, North Carolina was a British colony. 13   A Place Called Rhode Island1 May 29, 1790 [8]
(ratified) The State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, a Colony of the British Crown 14   Vermont March 4, 1791 [15]
(admitted) The Republic of Vermont 15   Kentucky June 1, 1792 [16]
(admitted) (Kentucky is represented by nine counties in Virginia) 16   Tennessee June 1, 1796 [18]
(admitted) South-Western Part of the Country 17   Ohio March 1, 1803 [19][e]
(admitted) Area of the Northwest Territories 18   Louisiana April 30, 1812 [21]
(admitted) Orleans Territory 19   Indiana On this date in 1816:
(admitted) The State of Indiana 20   Mississippi Sunday, December 10th, 1817 [22]
(admitted) The Mississippi Delta Region 21   Illinois The date was December 3, 1818. [23]
(admitted) This is a section of Illinois Territory. 22   Alabama Dated: 12/14/1819 [24]
(admitted) State of Alabama 23   Maine March 15, 1820 [25]
(admitted) District of Maine (Massachusetts) 24   Missouri Tuesday, August 10, 1821 [26]
(admitted) Extent of Missouri Territory 25   Arkansas June 15, 1836 [27]
(admitted) The Arkansas Valley 26   Michigan January 26th, 1837 [28]
(admitted) Land of Michigan 27   Florida March 3, 1845
(admitted) The Florida Peninsula 28   Texas On this day in 1845, December 29th, [29]
(admitted) Texas Confederate States 29   Iowa On this day in 1846:
(admitted) Partial Iowa Territory 30   Wisconsin May 29, 1848 [30]
(admitted) An Area of Wisconsin 31   California The Nineteenth of September, 1850 [31]
(admitted) Disordered Lands / The Mexican Cession, Part (g) 32   Minnesota May 11, 1858 [32]
(admitted) Its portion of Minnesota 33   Oregon 14 February 1859
(admitted) A portion of Oregon Territory 34   Kansas On this day in 1861, January 29 [33]
(admitted) Part of Kansas Territory 35   In the state of West Virginia1. June 20, 1863 [34]
(admitted) 50 counties in the state of Virginia that are located in the Trans-Allegheny region. 36   Nevada As of today, October 31, 1864
(admitted) This is Nevada Country. 37   Nebraska March 1, 1867
(admitted) Its Name for the State of Nebraska 38   Colorado The First of August, 1876 [37]
(admitted) Specifically: The State of Colorado 39   The State of North Dakota1 On this day in 1889, November 2 [38][i]
(admitted) Pieces of Dakota Territory 40   Dakota (State) November 2, 1889 [38][i]
(admitted) Area Including the State of Dakota 41   Montana The Date of November 8, 1889 [41]
(admitted) The State of Montana 42   Washington On this date in 1889 [42]
(admitted) Washington State 43   Idaho July 3, 1890
(admitted) Territory of Idaho 44   Wyoming July 10, 1890
(admitted) State of Wyoming 45   Utah On this day in 1896: January 4 [43]
(admitted) Territorial Claims in Utah 46   Oklahoma When: Tuesday, November 16, 1907 [44]
(admitted) Indian Territory and Oklahoma Territory 47   New Mexico On this day in 1912, January 6
(admitted) This is the New Mexico Territory1. 48   Arizona As of today (14 February 1912)
(admitted) The State of Arizona 49   Alaska On this date in 1959:
(admitted) Alaskan territory 50   Hawaii Those words were first spoken on August 21st, 1959.
(admitted) Hawaii's Home Islands

Times of Articles of Confederation ratification [ edit ]

On November 15, 1777, the Articles of Confederation were approved by the Second Continental Congress for submission to state legislatures for ratification. Once all 13 states ratified the Articles of Confederation, they became effective on March 1, 1781. When the Articles of Confederation were ratified on March 4, 1789, the new federal government under the Constitution took over from the old. [45]

State Date 1 Virginia The date was December 16, 1777. 2 This is the state of South Carolina. Friday, February 5th, 1778 3 New York On this day in 1778, February 6 4 In the state of Rhode Island It was February 9th, 1778. 5 Connecticut Dated: February 12th, 1778 6 Georgia On this date in 1778, February 26th, 7 This New Hampshire March 4, 1778 8 Pennsylvania March 5, 1778 9 Massachusetts March 10, 1778 10 State of North Carolina April 5, 1778 11 New Jersey On this day in 1778, November 19 12 Delaware The First of February, 1779 13 Maryland The date was February 2, 1781.

See also [ edit ]

• This was made possible by the Compromise of 1850, a set of legislative acts passed by Congress, one of which included a clause authorizing California's entry into the Union.
• Conflicts between anti-slavery and pro-slavery groups in Kansas Territory escalated into bloody clashes in the years leading up to Kansas's statehood in 1861, a period known as "Bleeding Kansas."
• The Enabling Act of 1889 gave the people of the Dakota, Montana, and Washington territories the legal right to organize themselves into states (with Dakota being split into two separate states) and to apply for admission to the Union.
• The Oklahoma Enabling Act granted the people of Oklahoma and the Indian Territory the right to organize a state government and seek admission to the Union as a single state. The New Mexico and Arizona Admission Acts did the same for the people of those territories. calling for a vote on whether or not the two areas should be united as a single state
• State of Alaska officially joined the Union on January 3, 1959, thanks to the Alaska Statehood Act.

Notes [ edit ]

References [ edit ]

To other sites [ edit ]

• The United States of America Video Archive History com
• The "Birth of a Nation" 50states com