Statehood admission dates are listed in order for the 50 United States.

The 50 individual states that make up the United States are co-sovereign entities with the central government. As a result of the division of powers between the federal government and the individual states, all U.S. citizens hold dual citizenship. [1]The full official names of the states of Kentucky, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia all include the word commonwealth rather than state.

Each of the 50 states constitutes the main 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. 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. Each of the fifty states has a government that consists of 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. Each state is guaranteed 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. Each state has the right to send a number of electors to the Electoral College, the body that votes for President and Vice President, equal to the sum of its congressional deputies. [4]

The Constitution specifies 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. All new states have been given full voting rights, just like the others. [5]

The table below details the dates of statehood for each of the 50 US states. After signing on to the United States Declaration of Independence in July 1776, the first 13 states formally entered the Union of States between 1777 and 1781 by ratifying the Articles of Confederation. (The dates of each AoC ratification are listed in a separate table below.) 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. Each subsequent state's admission date is a legally mandated deadline. [a]

List of U S states [ edit ]

State Date
accepted; approved Consisting of 1   Delaware When: 7 December 1787 [8]
(ratified) [b]The Colony of Delaware. 2   Pennsylvania Wednesday, December 12th, 1787 [10]
(ratified) Pennsylvania, a Crown Colony 3   New Jersey Tuesday, December 18th, 1787 [11]
(ratified) New Jersey, a Crown Colony 4   Georgia Initially published: January 2, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Georgia, a British Crown Colony 5   Connecticut Wednesday, January 9th, 1788 [12]
(ratified) New England's Crown Colony 6   Massachusetts 6 February 1788 [8]
(ratified) New England's Original Colony and the Site of Boston 7   Maryland April 28, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Province of Maryland that is currently under private ownership 8   Columbia, South Carolina1 May 23, 1788 [8]
(ratified) The Province of South Carolina as a Crown Colony 9   This New Hampshire1 June 21, 1788 [8]
(ratified) New Hampshire, a Colony under the Crown 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, a Colony Held in the Name of the Crown 12   Carolina del Norte On this day in 1789 [14]
(ratified) North Carolina, a former Crown colony 13   In the state of 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) (The Commonwealth of Kentucky[d] has a District in Virginia that encompasses nine counties.) 16   Tennessee June 1, 1796 [18]
(admitted) The Southwestern Region 17   Ohio March 1, 1803 [19][e]
(admitted) Northwest Territories (portion of) 18   Louisiana April 30, 1812 [21]
(admitted) Orleans Territory 19   Indiana Thursday, December 11th, 1816
(admitted) A Landmark in the History of the United States: Indiana 20   Mississippi Dated: 12-10-1817 [22]
(admitted) In the Mississippi Territory1 21   Illinois December 3rd, 1818 [23]
(admitted) Section of Illinois Territory 22   Alabama Dated: 12/14/1819 [24]
(admitted) The State of Alabama 23   Maine March 15, 1820 [25]
(admitted) (Maine F District) Massachusetts 24   Missouri Wednesday, August 10, 1821 [26]
(admitted) This portion of Missouri Territory 25   Arkansas June 15, 1836 [27]
(admitted) The Arkansas Valley 26   Michigan Wednesday, January 26th, 1837 [28]
(admitted) The State of Michigan 27   Florida March 3, 1845
(admitted) Affirmative: Florida's Home State 28   Texas Dated: December 29th, 1845 [29]
(admitted) Texas Republic 29   Iowa Dated: 12/28/1846
(admitted) An Area of Iowa 30   Wisconsin May 29, 1848 [30]
(admitted) An Area of Wisconsin 31   California Nine September, 1850 [31]
(admitted) Frontiers without government oversight / Mexican Cession (Part)[g] 32   Minnesota May 11, 1858 [32]
(admitted) A Section of Minnesota 33   Oregon Today in History (February 14th, 1859)
(admitted) A Section 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 Monday, October 31st, 1864
(admitted) A Land Named Nevada 37   Nebraska March 1, 1867
(admitted) The State of Nebraska 38   Colorado First of August, 1876 [37]
(admitted) Region of Colorado 39   The State of North Dakota1 This day in 1889, November [38][i]
(admitted) Part of Dakota Territory 40   Dakota (State) On this day in 1889, November 2 [38][i]
(admitted) A Portion of Dakota Territory 41   Montana Tuesday, November 8th, 1889 [41]
(admitted) It's in Montana! 42   Washington 11 November 1889 [42]
(admitted) Territorial Government of Washington 43   Idaho July 3, 1890
(admitted) The State of Idaho 44   Wyoming July 10, 1890
(admitted) Places in Wyoming 45   Utah On this day in 1896: [43]
(admitted) The State of Utah 46   Oklahoma Friday, November 16th, 1907 [44]
(admitted) The Indian and Oklahoma Territories 47   New Mexico Monday, January 6th, 1912
(admitted) The State of New Mexico 48   Arizona Thursday, February 14th, 1912
(admitted) State of Arizona 49   Alaska On this date in 1959:
(admitted) Province of Alaska 50   Hawaii On this date in 1959:
(admitted) The Hawaiian Islands as a Territorial Unit

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. The Articles of Confederation were ratified by the required number of states (13) and went into effect on March 1, 1781. The Articles of Confederation were abolished and the present Constitution ratified on March 4, 1789, ushering in the modern federal government. [45]

State Date 1 Virginia On this day in 1777 2 The State of South Carolina. 05 Février 1778 3 New York Thursday, February 6th, 1778 4 This is the state of Rhode Island. Dated: February 9th, 1778 5 Connecticut Wednesday, February 12th, 1778 6 Georgia February 26th, 1778 7 It's in the Granite State, 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 November 19th, 1778 12 Delaware The First of February, 1779 13 Maryland Dated: February 2nd, 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.
• Between 1854 and 1861, when Kansas was still part of the territory, a series of violent conflicts broke out between pro- and anti-slavery groups that came to be known as "Bleeding Kansas."
• 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 Oklahoma Enabling Act gave the people of Oklahoma and the Indian Territory the right to organize a state government and gain admission to the Union as a single state. The New Mexico and Arizona Admission Act did the same for the people of those territories. call 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 member of the United States on January 3, 1959.

Notes [ edit ]

References [ edit ]

Internet resources [ edit ]

• U.S. State Videos History com
• ''Early states'' 50states com