Ordered list of when each state joined the United States

The 50 individual states that make up the United States are co-sovereign entities with the federal government. As a result of the division of powers between the federal government and the individual states, all U.S. citizens hold dual citizenship. The full official names of the states of Kentucky, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia all include the word "commonwealth" rather than "state."

The United States is divided primarily into individual states. They have all the authority that is not specifically given to or prohibited to the federal government by the United States Constitution. Local matters, such as intrastate commerce, elections, the formation of local governments, public school policy, and non-federal road construction and maintenance, are typically under the purview of state governments. Republican principles form the basis for each state's constitution and government, which is made up of an executive, legislative, and judicial branch. [2]

Congress is a bicameral legislature made up of the Senate and the House of Representatives, and it includes representatives from all 50 states and the District of Columbia. 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. There's also the Electoral College, which votes for the President and Vice President of the United States, of which each state gets a certain number of representatives and senators to represent it. [4]

The Constitution clearly states that Congress has the power to Union" target="_blank">admit new states into the Union in Article IV, Section 3, Clause 1. There are now fifty states, up from the original thirteen that existed when the United States was founded in 1776. Each newly admitted state has been given full voting rights alongside the rest. [5]

The table below details the dates of statehood for each of the 50 US states. After signing on to the Declaration of Independence in July 1776, the first 13 states formally became independent nations in their own right and, between 1777 and 1781, ratified the Articles of Confederation to form the first United States of America. (See below for a separate table detailing the ratification dates of the AoC.) Here is a list of the states in the order in which they joined the new (and current) federal government after ratifying the Constitution in 1787. For each subsequent state, the listed admission date is the legally mandated date established by legislation. [a]

List of U S states [ edit ]

State Date
(accepted or approved) Constructed from 1   Delaware On this day in 1787: [8]
(ratified) The State of Delaware, a British Colony[b] 2   Pennsylvania On this day in 1787, December 12 [10]
(ratified) Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, a Crown Colony 3   New Jersey Today in 1787, on December 18th, [11]
(ratified) New Jersey was a royal colony. 4   Georgia On this day in 1788 [8]
(ratified) Royal Georgian Colony 5   Connecticut Tuesday, January 9, 1788 [12]
(ratified) Connecticut, a former British colony 6   Massachusetts Saturday, February 6th, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Boston, Massachusetts, a Royal Colony 7   Maryland April 28, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Province of Maryland that is currently under private ownership 8   Carolina del Sur May 23, 1788 [8]
(ratified) South Carolina, a Crown Colony 9   It's in the Granite State, New Hampshire1 June 21, 1788 [8]
(ratified) State of New Hampshire, a British Crown Colony 10   Virginia June 25, 1788 [8]
(ratified) State of Virginia, Dominion of the Crown 11   New York July 26, 1788 [13]
(ratified) New York, a Royal Crown Colony 12   Carolina del Norte On this day in 1789 [14]
(ratified) North Carolina, a British Colony 13   Providence, Rhode Island1 May 29, 1790 [8]
(ratified) Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Royal Colony 14   Vermont March 4, 1791 [15]
(admitted) There is a republic in Vermont. 15   Kentucky June 1, 1792 [16]
(admitted) A total of nine counties in the Commonwealth of Virginia's District in the state of Kentucky[d]. 16   Tennessee June 1, 1796 [18]
(admitted) States Constituting the South-Western Region 17   Ohio March 1, 1803 [19][e]
(admitted) The Northwest Territories, Fractional 18   Louisiana April 30, 1812 [21]
(admitted) Province of Orleans 19   Indiana On this day, December 11th, 1816
(admitted) The State of Indiana 20   Mississippi Dated: 12-10-1817 [22]
(admitted) The Mississippi Delta Region 21   Illinois When: Wednesday, December 3, 1818 [23]
(admitted) Territory in Illinois, Part 22   Alabama Dated: 12/14/1819 [24]
(admitted) State of Alabama 23   Maine March 15, 1820 [25]
(admitted) District of Maine (Massachusetts) 24   Missouri Tenth of August, 1821 [26]
(admitted) Part of Missouri Territory 25   Arkansas June 15, 1836 [27]
(admitted) The Arkansas Valley 26   Michigan January 26th, 1837 [28]
(admitted) Region of Michigan 27   Florida March 3, 1845
(admitted) The State of Florida 28   Texas The 29th of December, 1845 [29]
(admitted) Texas Republic 29   Iowa Dated: December 28th, 1846
(admitted) Regional Iowa 30   Wisconsin May 29, 1848 [30]
(admitted) Area of Wisconsin That Was Once Called the Wisconsin Territory 31   California Nine September, 1850 [31]
(admitted) Ungoverned land / Mexican Cession (part)[g]. 32   Minnesota May 11, 1858 [32]
(admitted) Its portion of Minnesota 33   Oregon 14 February 1859
(admitted) A Section of Oregon Territory 34   Kansas On this day in 1861: [33]
(admitted) A Portion of Kansas 35   The Mountain State, or West Virginia1. June 20, 1863 [34]
(admitted) Fifty counties in the state of Virginia that are part of the Trans-Allegheny metropolitan area. 36   Nevada After midnight on October 31, 1864
(admitted) The State of Nevada 37   Nebraska March 1, 1867
(admitted) State of Nebraska 38   Colorado The First of August, 1876 [37]
(admitted) The Colorado Region 39   The Great Plains State of North Dakota1 The date was November 2nd, 1889. [38][i]
(admitted) This portion of Dakota Territory 40   "South Dakota1" On this day in 1889, November 2 [38][i]
(admitted) Section of Dakota Territory 41   Montana November 8th, 1889 [41]
(admitted) This is Montana Country. 42   Washington 11 November 1889 [42]
(admitted) State of Washington 43   Idaho July 3, 1890
(admitted) The State of Idaho 44   Wyoming July 10, 1890
(admitted) Geographical Region Called Wyoming 45   Utah Thursday, January 4, 1896 [43]
(admitted) The State of Utah 46   Oklahoma The Date Was Tuesday, November 16, 1907 [44]
(admitted) The Indian and Oklahoma Territories 47   New Mexico 6 January 1912
(admitted) Places in New Mexico that Are Not in Texas 48   Arizona 14 February 1912
(admitted) The State of Arizona 49   Alaska Three days into 1959
(admitted) Alaskan territory 50   Hawaii Dated: August 21st, 1959
(admitted) Hawaiian Home Islands

Ratification of the Articles of Confederation [ edit ]

On November 15, 1777, the Articles of Confederation were approved by the Second Continental Congress and sent to the individual states for ratification. On March 1, 1781, after being ratified by all 13 states, the Articles of Confederation entered into force. It was on March 4, 1789, that the Articles of Confederation were formally dissolved and the present Federal Constitution came into effect. [45]

State Date 1 Virginia On this day in 1777 2 Citing South Carolina The date of February 5, 1778 3 New York Thursday, February 6th, 1778 4 The Ocean State: Rhode Island Sunday, February 9, 1778 5 Connecticut Twelve days after Valentine's Day, 1778 6 Georgia February 26th, 1778 7 This New Hampshire March 4, 1778 8 Pennsylvania March 5, 1778 9 Massachusetts March 10, 1778 10 Carolina del Norte April 5, 1778 11 New Jersey Thursday, November 19th, 1778 12 Delaware Starting on February 1st, 1779 13 Maryland The date was February 2, 1781.

See also [ edit ]

• The admission of California to the Union was a part of the Compromise of 1850, a set of legislative acts passed by Congress.
• Kansas Territory was the site of a series of bloody conflicts between anti-slavery and pro-slavery groups known as Bleeding Kansas from 1854 to 1861.
• This was made possible by the Enabling Act of 1889, which gave the people of the Dakota, Montana, and Washington territories the right to organize themselves into states (with Dakota being split into two separate states) and apply for admission to the Union.
• With the passage of the Oklahoma Enabling Act, residents of the Indian Territory and the Oklahoma Territory were granted permission to unite under a single state government and were admitted to the Union as a single state. calling for a vote on whether or not the two jurisdictions should be united into one state.
• Upon passage of the Alaska Statehood Act on December 2, 1958, Alaska was officially admitted to the Union as the 49th state on January 3, 1959.

Notes [ edit ]

References [ edit ]

Web Resources [ edit ]

• "Videos of the 50 States of the USA" History com
• "Birth of the States" 50states com