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 central government. Due to the division of powers between the federal government and the individual states, Americans hold dual citizenship. In their official state names, Commonwealth states like Kentucky, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia distinguish themselves from other states by using the term "commonwealth."

A state is the basic administrative unit of the USA. They have all the authority that is not given to or prohibited by the federal government in the United States Constitution. In most cases, state governments are responsible for overseeing activities that affect only their respective territories, such as intrastate commerce regulation, election administration, municipal formation, public school policy, and the building and upkeep of roads that are not funded by the federal government. Each state has a government that includes an executive, legislative, and judicial branch, and a constitution based on republican principles. [2]

The United States Congress is a bicameral legislature made up of the Senate and the House of Representatives, and it includes representatives from every state and every citizen. Every state has two senators and at least one representative in the House of Representatives, with the size of each state's delegation in the House determined by the population of the state 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 Constitution specifically gives Congress the power to Union" target="_blank">admit new states into the Union in Article IV, Section 3, Clause 1. From its original thirteen in 1776 to its current fifty, the United States has undergone tremendous growth since its inception. New states have been admitted on an equal footing with the rest. [5]

There is a table below that details the dates of statehood for each of the 50 states. After signing on to the United States Declaration of Independence in July 1776, the first 13 states formally became independent nations in their own right in July 1777 and July 1781, respectively, and formally joined the Union of States by ratifying the Articles of Confederation, the country's first constitution, in each of those years. (See below for a separate table detailing the ratification dates of the AoC.) Each state is listed in the order in which it ratified the Constitution in 1787 and thus became a part of the newly formed (and still existing) federal government. The admission date shown for each succeeding state is the legally mandated date. [a]

List of U S states [ edit ]

State Date
(accepted or approved) Composed of 1   Delaware Dated: December 7th, 1787 [8]
(ratified) Delaware [b] Colony. 2   Pennsylvania Friday, December 12th, 1787 [10]
(ratified) Province of Pennsylvania that is under Proprietary Rule 3   New Jersey On this day in 1787: [11]
(ratified) New Jersey, the former Crown Colony 4   Georgia On this day in 1788 [8]
(ratified) Georgia, a British Crown Colony 5   Connecticut January 9th, 1788 [12]
(ratified) New England's Crown Colony 6   Massachusetts 6 February 1788 [8]
(ratified) The Province of Massachusetts Bay, a British Colony 7   Maryland April 28, 1788 [8]
(ratified) The Maryland Colony was a private colony. 8   Carolina del Sur May 23, 1788 [8]
(ratified) South Carolina, a Crown Colony 9   In the state of New Hampshire1 June 21, 1788 [8]
(ratified) The New Hampshire colony was a crown colony. 10   Virginia June 25, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Virginia, Dominion of the Crown and Proud Colony 11   New York July 26, 1788 [13]
(ratified) New York, the Queen's Colony 12   State of North Carolina1 The 21st of November, 1789 [14]
(ratified) North Carolina, a former British colony 13   Specifically, the state of Rhode Island1 May 29, 1790 [8]
(ratified) Province of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations 14   Vermont March 4, 1791 [15]
(admitted) The Republic of Vermont 15   Kentucky June 1, 1792 [16]
(admitted) Nine counties in Virginia's Kentucky District[d] 16   Tennessee June 1, 1796 [18]
(admitted) State located in the South-Western part of the United States 17   Ohio March 1, 1803 [19][e]
(admitted) Canadian Region of the Northwest 18   Louisiana April 30, 1812 [21]
(admitted) Orleans Territory 19   Indiana On this date in 1816:
(admitted) The State of Indiana 20   Mississippi Wednesday, December 10, 1817 [22]
(admitted) Where the Mississippi River Meets the Gulf of Mexico 21   Illinois As of today, December 3rd, 1818 [23]
(admitted) Regional Illinois 22   Alabama Yesterday, on the 14th of December, 1819 [24]
(admitted) Alabama State 23   Maine March 15, 1820 [25]
(admitted) Province of New Hampshire 24   Missouri Tenth of August, 1821 [26]
(admitted) A Portion of Missouri Territory 25   Arkansas June 15, 1836 [27]
(admitted) The Arkansas Valley 26   Michigan Friday, January 26th, 1837 [28]
(admitted) Province of Michigan 27   Florida March 3, 1845
(admitted) The State of Florida 28   Texas Sunday, December 29th, 1845 [29]
(admitted) Texas Republic 29   Iowa It's the 28th of December, 1846
(admitted) A Portion of Iowa Territory 30   Wisconsin May 29, 1848 [30]
(admitted) A Section of Wisconsin 31   California Nine September, 1850 [31]
(admitted) A portion of Mexico's Cession to the United States that is still disorganized. 32   Minnesota May 11, 1858 [32]
(admitted) A Section of Minnesota 33   Oregon A Date: 14 FEBRUARY 1859
(admitted) It's true that Oregon only makes up a portion of the territory. 34   Kansas On this day in 1861, January 29 [33]
(admitted) Section of Kansas Territory 35   "West Virginia1" June 20, 1863 [34]
(admitted) Fifty counties in Virginia's Trans-Allegheny area. 36   Nevada Last Updated: 31 October, 1864
(admitted) This is Nevada Country. 37   Nebraska March 1, 1867
(admitted) Frontier State of Nebraska 38   Colorado On this day in 1876, the world changed. [37]
(admitted) Territory of Colorado 39   To the north: North Dakota1 On this day in 1889, November 2 [38][i]
(admitted) A Section of the Dakota Territory 40   Dakota (State) Tuesday, November 2, 1889 [38][i]
(admitted) A Portion of Dakota Territory 41   Montana November 8th, 1889 [41]
(admitted) Territory of Montana 42   Washington Sunday, November 11th, 1889 [42]
(admitted) State of Washington 43   Idaho July 3, 1890
(admitted) The Idaho Panhandle 44   Wyoming July 10, 1890
(admitted) The State of Wyoming 45   Utah On this day in 1896: [43]
(admitted) That Part of the Country Known as Utah 46   Oklahoma November 16th, 1907 [44]
(admitted) The Indian and Oklahoma Territories 47   New Mexico This day in 1912, on January 6
(admitted) Places in New Mexico that Are Not in Texas 48   Arizona 14 February 1912
(admitted) This is Arizona State Land 49   Alaska The date was January 3, 1959.
(admitted) Alaskan territory 50   Hawaii Friday, August 21st, 1959
(admitted) Hawaii's Home Islands

Moments in time when the Articles of Confederation were ratified [ edit ]

On November 15, 1777, the Articles of Confederation were approved for ratification by the states by the Second Continental Congress. After being ratified by all 13 states, the Articles of Confederation took effect on March 1, 1781. The current federal government, established under the Constitution, succeeded the general government under the Articles on March 4, 1789. [45]

State Date 1 Virginia Time: Tuesday, December 16, 1777 2 Carolina del Sur 05 Février 1778 3 New York Sunday, February 6th, 1778 4 Here in Rhode Island The Nineteenth of February, 1778 5 Connecticut 12 February 1778 6 Georgia The date was February 26, 1778. 7 This New Hampshire March 4, 1778 8 Pennsylvania March 5, 1778 9 Massachusetts March 10, 1778 10 It's in the Tar Heel State, or North Carolina April 5, 1778 11 New Jersey When: Tuesday, November 19, 1778 12 Delaware Starting on February 1st, 1779 13 Maryland The date was February 2, 1781.

See also [ edit ]

• One of the acts included in the "Compromise of 1850" legislation package guaranteed that California would be admitted to the Union.
• During the years of 1854–1861, just before Kansas became a state, anti-slavery and pro-slavery groups engaged in a series of violent conflicts in Kansas Territory.
• 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.
• The Oklahoma Enabling Act gave 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
• On January 3, 1959, Alaska officially became a state thanks to the Alaska Statehood Act.

Notes [ edit ]

References [ edit ]

Internet resources [ edit ]

• Various Videos Relating to Individual States in the USA History com
• "Independence Day" 50states com