Ordered list of when each state joined the United States

Each of the 50 states in the United States is a separate sovereign nation that shares power with the federal government. Due to the division of powers between the federal government and the individual states, Americans hold dual citizenship. Only four states—Kentucky, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia—have commonwealth in their official names rather than state.

The fifty states are the most basic political units in America. They have all the authority that isn't given to or taken away by the federal government in the United States Constitution. To a large extent, the federal government does not intervene in matters that are properly handled at the state level, such as intrastate commerce, elections, the formation of local governments, public school policy, and non-federal road construction and maintenance. In a republican system of government, each individual state has its own constitution outlining the roles of the executive, legislature, and judiciary. [2]

Congress, the United States' bicameral legislature, consists of the Senate and the House of Representatives, and all states and their citizens are guaranteed a voice there. 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 last 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 power to Union" target="_blank">admit new states into the Union is vested in Congress by Article IV, Section 3, Clause 1 of the Constitution. The United States' total number of states has grown from the original 13 in 1776 to the current 50. All newly admitted states have been given full voting rights. [5]

The table below details the dates of statehood for all 50 US states. Each of the original 13 states ratified the Articles of Confederation, the first constitution of the United States, and thus became a state in July 1776 after agreeing to the United States Declaration of Independence. (See below for a separate table detailing the ratification dates of the AoC.) The order in which these states are listed indicates 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. Each subsequent state's admission date is a statutory deadline established by Congress. [a]

List of U S states [ edit ]

State Date
accepted; 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) Colony of the British Crown in North America 4   Georgia On this day in 1788 [8]
(ratified) Kingdom of Georgia 5   Connecticut January 9th, 1788 [12]
(ratified) Conn., a former British colony and now a state 6   Massachusetts Sunday, February 6th, 1788 [8]
(ratified) The Massachusetts Bay Colony, a British Possession 7   Maryland April 28, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Maryland, a colonial possession 8   An Acronym for the State of South Carolina1 May 23, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Kingdom of the South Carolina Colonies 9   A New England State: June 21, 1788 [8]
(ratified) State of New Hampshire, a British Crown Colony 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   Carolina del Norte Tuesday, November 21st, 1789 [14]
(ratified) North Carolina, a British Colony 13   The Ocean State: 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[c]. 15   Kentucky June 1, 1792 [16]
(admitted) Northern Virginia (including nine counties in its District of Kentucky[d]) 16   Tennessee June 1, 1796 [18]
(admitted) Southwest Area 17   Ohio March 1, 1803 [19][e]
(admitted) Province of the Northwest 18   Louisiana April 30, 1812 [21]
(admitted) New Orleans Area 19   Indiana On this day in 1816 (December 11)
(admitted) Hoosier State 20   Mississippi Dated: 12-10-1817 [22]
(admitted) Specifically, the Mississippi Delta region 21   Illinois A Date Certain: December 3, 1818 [23]
(admitted) Part 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 Sunday, August 10th, 1821 [26]
(admitted) Section of Missouri Territory 25   Arkansas June 15, 1836 [27]
(admitted) The Arkansas Valley 26   Michigan Dated: January 26th, 1837 [28]
(admitted) A Territorial Statement for Michigan 27   Florida March 3, 1845
(admitted) State of Florida 28   Texas On this day in 1845, December 29th, [29]
(admitted) Texas Republic 29   Iowa Yesterday, on the 28th of December, 1846
(admitted) An Area of Iowa 30   Wisconsin May 29, 1848 [30]
(admitted) Section of Wisconsin 31   California This day in 1850, on September 9 [31]
(admitted) Disordered Lands / The Mexican Cession, Part (g) 32   Minnesota May 11, 1858 [32]
(admitted) Split off of Minnesota 33   Oregon On this day in 1859 — February 14
(admitted) Partial Oregon Territory 34   Kansas Earlier this month, on January 29th, 1861, [33]
(admitted) Separate Section of Kansas Territory 35   "West Virginia1" June 20, 1863 [34]
(admitted) Virginia (all fifty counties in the Trans-Allegheny area[h]). 36   Nevada October 31st, 1864
(admitted) The State of Nevada 37   Nebraska March 1, 1867
(admitted) The State of Nebraska 38   Colorado When: August 1st, 1876 [37]
(admitted) Region of Colorado 39   The State of North Dakota1 The Date Is Tuesday, November 2, 1889 [38][i]
(admitted) A Portion of Dakota Territory 40   Location: South Dakota1 Earlier today, on November 2nd, 1889, [38][i]
(admitted) A Section of Dakota Territory 41   Montana Friday, November 8th, 1889 [41]
(admitted) Location: Montana, USA 42   Washington It all started on November 11th, 1889. [42]
(admitted) State of Washington 43   Idaho July 3, 1890
(admitted) Places in Idaho that are technically part of the United States 44   Wyoming July 10, 1890
(admitted) This is Wyoming Country. 45   Utah Monday, January 4th, 1896 [43]
(admitted) The State of Utah 46   Oklahoma November 16th, 1907 [44]
(admitted) State of Oklahoma and Native American Lands 47   New Mexico January 6th, 1912
(admitted) There's a lot of new territory in New Mexico. 48   Arizona Wednesday, February 14th, 1912
(admitted) The State of Arizona 49   Alaska Wednesday, January 3, 1959
(admitted) Arctic Alaskan Territories 50   Hawaii When: 21 August 1959
(admitted) Hawaiian Home Islands

Timeline of the Ratification of the Articles of Confederation [ edit ]

On November 15, 1777, the Articles of Confederation were approved for submission to state legislatures for ratification by the Second Continental Congress. On March 1, 1781, after ratification by all 13 states, the Articles of Confederation entered into force. The current federal government, established under the Constitution, succeeded the general government under the Articles on March 4, 1789. [45]

State Date 1 Virginia Friday, December 16th, 1777 2 Specifically, the state of South Carolina. Sunday, February 5th, 1778 3 New York On this day in 1778, February 6 4 The Ocean State: Rhode Island 9 February 1778 5 Connecticut A Precise Date: February 12, 1778 6 Georgia Tuesday, 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 Dated: November 19th, 1778 12 Delaware The First of February, 1779 13 Maryland On this day in 1781, February 2

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.
• There were a number of violent conflicts in Kansas Territory between anti-slavery and pro-slavery groups in the years 1854-1861. This period is known as "Bleeding Kansas."
• The Enabling Act of 1889 granted the people of the Dakota, Montana, and Washington territories the right to organize themselves into new states and join 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.
• With the passage of the Alaska Statehood Act on December 21, 1958, Alaska was officially admitted to the Union as the 49th state on January 3, 1959.

Notes [ edit ]

References [ edit ]

Internet resources [ edit ]

• US State Videos History com
• "Independence Day" 50states com