Ordered list of when each state joined the United States

The 50 individual states that make up the United States are co-equal in sovereignty with the central government. Due to the separation of powers between the federal government and the individual states, all U.S. citizens hold dual citizenship with the federal republic and the state in which they reside. Commonwealth is used in the official names of Kentucky, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia rather than state.

The 50 states are the main political divisions of the USA. They have all the authority that is not specifically given to or forbidden to the federal government by the United States Constitution. Concerns such as intrastate commerce, elections, the formation of local governments, public school policy, and non-federal road construction and maintenance fall under the purview of state governments. Generally speaking, republican principles form the basis for each individual state's constitution and government, which is made up of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches. [2]

The United States Congress is a bicameral legislature made up of senators and representatives from all 50 states. Two senators and one representative are guaranteed to each state by the Constitution; the number of representatives each state has in the House of Representatives is determined by the population of the state as of the most recent decennial census. 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 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. There are now fifty states, up from the original thirteen that existed when the United States was founded in 1776. New states have been admitted on an equal footing with the rest. [5]

Statehood dates for each of the 50 U.S. states are listed 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.) The order in which these states are listed reflects the order in which they ratified the Constitution in 1787 and thus became part of the newly formed (and still existing) United States of America. Legislative action determined the dates of admission for each succeeding state. [a]

List of U S states [ edit ]

State Date
(approved by allowing it to stand) Made up of 1   Delaware When: 7 December 1787 [8]
(ratified) Originally, this was a British colony called Delaware. 2   Pennsylvania Dated: 12 December 1787 [10]
(ratified) Pennsylvania, a Crown Colony 3   New Jersey On this day in 1787: [11]
(ratified) Royal New Jersey Colony 4   Georgia On this day in 1788 [8]
(ratified) Georgia, a British Crown Colony 5   Connecticut 9 January 1788 [12]
(ratified) The State of Connecticut, a Colony of the British Crown 6   Massachusetts Day of the Frog, February 6, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Massachussetts Bay Colony, a Crown Colony 7   Maryland April 28, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Maryland, a colonial possession 8   Carolina del Sur May 23, 1788 [8]
(ratified) King George III's Original Colony 9   Specifically, the state of New Hampshire1. June 21, 1788 [8]
(ratified) New Hampshire, a Colony under the Crown 10   Virginia June 25, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Virginia, Dominated Colony of the Crown 11   New York July 26, 1788 [13]
(ratified) New York, a Royal Colony 12   A Place Called North Carolina1 Thursday, November 21st, 1789 [14]
(ratified) North Carolina was a colony established by the British Crown. 13   Here in Rhode Island1 May 29, 1790 [8]
(ratified) Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Royal Colony 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) Lands to the West of the Mississippi 17   Ohio March 1, 1803 [19][e]
(admitted) Canada's Northwest Territories 18   Louisiana April 30, 1812 [21]
(admitted) District of Orleans 19   Indiana Instance created: December 11, 1816
(admitted) The State of Indiana 20   Mississippi The date was December 10th, 1817. [22]
(admitted) Where the Mississippi River Meets the Gulf of Mexico 21   Illinois When: Wednesday, December 3, 1818 [23]
(admitted) Regional Illinois 22   Alabama Tuesday, December 14, 1819 [24]
(admitted) In the State of Alabama 23   Maine March 15, 1820 [25]
(admitted) (Maine F District) Massachusetts 24   Missouri Tenth of August, 1821 [26]
(admitted) Split Missouri Territory 25   Arkansas June 15, 1836 [27]
(admitted) State of Arkansas 26   Michigan January 26th, 1837 [28]
(admitted) Geographical Region of Michigan 27   Florida March 3, 1845
(admitted) Location of Florida as a Separate Political Entity 28   Texas On this day in 1845, December 29th, [29]
(admitted) Texas Republic 29   Iowa Dated: December 28th, 1846
(admitted) A Portion of Iowa Territory 30   Wisconsin May 29, 1848 [30]
(admitted) A Section of Wisconsin 31   California The Nineteenth Day 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 Thursday, February 14, 1859
(admitted) This portion of Oregon Territory 34   Kansas On this day in 1861: [33]
(admitted) A Portion of Kansas 35   "West Virginia1" June 20, 1863 [34]
(admitted) Fifty counties in Virginia's Trans-Allegheny area. 36   Nevada As of today, October 31, 1864
(admitted) The State of Nevada 37   Nebraska March 1, 1867
(admitted) The State of Nebraska 38   Colorado The First of August, 1876 [37]
(admitted) The Colorado Region 39   Dakota Dunes State On this day in 1889, November 2 [38][i]
(admitted) A Portion of Dakota Territory 40   Dakota (State) Tuesday, November 2, 1889 [38][i]
(admitted) Area Including the State of Dakota 41   Montana Friday, November 8th, 1889 [41]
(admitted) The State of Montana 42   Washington It all started on November 11th, 1889. [42]
(admitted) In the State of Washington 43   Idaho July 3, 1890
(admitted) The State of Idaho 44   Wyoming July 10, 1890
(admitted) State of Wyoming 45   Utah A Date: January 4, 1896 [43]
(admitted) State of Utah 46   Oklahoma November 16th, 1907 [44]
(admitted) The Indian and Oklahoma Territories 47   New Mexico January 6th, 1912
(admitted) To the East, the New Mexico Territory1 48   Arizona Sunday, February 14th, 1912
(admitted) Territory of Arizona 49   Alaska Starting on January 3rd, 1959
(admitted) Anchorage, Alaska 50   Hawaii On this date in 1959:
(admitted) Hawai'ian Acquired Territory

Dates of 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. After the 13 states ratified the Articles of Confederation on March 1, 1781, they became law. The Articles of Confederation were formally abolished on March 4, 1789, and the present federal government under the Constitution took their place. [45]

State Date 1 Virginia It was on December 16th, 1777, that 2 A State in the Southeastern United States 05 Février 1778 3 New York Sunday, February 6th, 1778 4 Place Name: Rhode Island Sunday, February 9, 1778 5 Connecticut 12 February 1778 6 Georgia The 26th of February, 1778 7 This New Hampshire March 4, 1778 8 Pennsylvania March 5, 1778 9 Massachusetts March 10, 1778 10 To the State of North Carolina April 5, 1778 11 New Jersey When: Tuesday, November 19, 1778 12 Delaware The First of February, 1779 13 Maryland Two-Fourths of February, 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.
• The years 1854–1861, just before Kansas became a state, were marked by a string of violent conflicts in the Kansas Territory between anti-slavery and pro-slavery groups.
• The Enabling Act of 1889 gave the people of the Dakota, Montana, and Washington territories the right to organize their own governments and seek admission to the Union as individual states (the Dakotas were to be split in half).
• Authorizing the people of the Indian Territory and the Oklahoma Territory to organize themselves into a single state and to seek admission to the Union as a single state via the Oklahoma Enabling Act; also authorizing the people of the New Mexico and Arizona Territories to organize themselves into a state government and to seek admission to the Union as a single state. which calls for a vote on whether or not the two areas should be united as a single state.
• The Alaska Statehood Act, which officially made Alaska a state on January 3, 1959.

Notes [ edit ]

References [ edit ]

Internet resources [ edit ]

• YouTube playlist titled "States of the USA" History com
• "Independence Day" 50states com