States in the United States, listed by their official admission to the Union.

One of the 50 individual entities that make up the United States and share sovereignty with the federal government is known as a state. Due to the division of powers between the federal government and the individual states, Americans hold dual citizenship. Four U.S. states—Kentucky, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia—have commonwealth in their official names instead of state.

The 50 states make up the main 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 the construction and maintenance of non-federal roads are generally under the purview of state governments. Each state's government is structured similarly to the federal government, with an executive, legislative, and judicial branch. However, each state's constitution is based on republican principles. [2]

The United States Congress is a bicameral legislature made up of the Senate and the House of Representatives. At least one senator and one representative are elected from each state, with the number of representatives each state has in the House of Representatives determined by that 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 Constitution specifically gives Congress the power to add new states 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 newly admitted states have been given full voting rights. [5]

You can find the official statehood dates for all 50 states in the table below. 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. (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. Listed for each subsequent state is the legally mandated date of admission. [a]

List of U S states [ edit ]

State Date
(accepted; confirmed) Originating from 1   Delaware Tuesday, December 7th, 1787 [8]
(ratified) Delaware [b] Colony. 2   Pennsylvania Dated: 12 December 1787 [10]
(ratified) Pennsylvania, a Proprietary Province 3   New Jersey This day in 1787, on the 18th, [11]
(ratified) New Jersey was a royal colony. 4   Georgia Initially published: January 2, 1788 [8]
(ratified) Georgia, a British Crown Colony 5   Connecticut January 9th, 1788 [12]
(ratified) Connecticut, a Colony under the Crown 6   Massachusetts 6 February 1788 [8]
(ratified) Massachusetts Bay Colony, a Crown Colony 7   Maryland April 28, 1788 [8]
(ratified) The Province of Maryland as a Private Property 8   Citing South Carolina1 May 23, 1788 [8]
(ratified) South Carolina, a Crown Colony 9   That State of New Hampshire1 June 21, 1788 [8]
(ratified) New Hampshire, a Crown Colony 10   Virginia June 25, 1788 [8]
(ratified) The Commonwealth of Virginia, British Dominions 11   New York July 26, 1788 [13]
(ratified) The New York Crown Colony 12   Carolina del Norte On this day in 1789 [14]
(ratified) North Carolina, a former British colony 13   The Ocean State: Rhode Island1 May 29, 1790 [8]
(ratified) Providence Plantations and Rhode Island, a Royal Colony 14   Vermont March 4, 1791 [15]
(admitted) State of Vermont Republic[c] 15   Kentucky June 1, 1792 [16]
(admitted) (Kentucky is represented by nine counties in Virginia) 16   Tennessee June 1, 1796 [18]
(admitted) The Southwestern Region 17   Ohio March 1, 1803 [19][e]
(admitted) Area of the Northwest Territories 18   Louisiana April 30, 1812 [21]
(admitted) Orleans Territory 19   Indiana On this date in 1816:
(admitted) Hoosier State 20   Mississippi Wednesday, December 10, 1817 [22]
(admitted) Location of the Mississippi River and Its Surrounding Lands 21   Illinois December 3rd, 1818 [23]
(admitted) The Illinois Territory, Part 22   Alabama Instance created: 14 December 1819 [24]
(admitted) State of Alabama 23   Maine March 15, 1820 [25]
(admitted) [f]Maine District, Commonwealth of Massachusetts 24   Missouri Tenth of August, 1821 [26]
(admitted) This portion of Missouri Territory 25   Arkansas June 15, 1836 [27]
(admitted) The Arkansas Valley 26   Michigan January 26th, 1837 [28]
(admitted) The State of Michigan 27   Florida March 3, 1845
(admitted) The State of Florida 28   Texas This day in 1845, on December 29th, [29]
(admitted) Texas Republic 29   Iowa Wednesday, December 28th, 1846
(admitted) Region of Iowa 30   Wisconsin May 29, 1848 [30]
(admitted) A Section of Wisconsin 31   California Nine September, 1850 [31]
(admitted) Partially Organized Lands / Cession to Mexico[g] 32   Minnesota May 11, 1858 [32]
(admitted) Partial Minnesota Territory 33   Oregon Day of the Week: 14 FEBRUARY 1859
(admitted) Piece of Oregon Territory 34   Kansas On this day in 1861: [33]
(admitted) Separate Section of Kansas Territory 35   Western Virginia June 20, 1863 [34]
(admitted) Fifty counties in Virginia's Trans-Allegheny area. 36   Nevada The thirtieth of October, 1864
(admitted) This is Nevada Country. 37   Nebraska March 1, 1867
(admitted) State of Nebraska 38   Colorado As of today, August 1, 1876 [37]
(admitted) Aspects of the Colorado Territory1 39   State of North Dakota1 The date was November 2nd, 1889. [38][i]
(admitted) Regional portion of Dakotas 40   Dakota (State) On this day in 1889, November 2 [38][i]
(admitted) It's a piece of Dakota Territory. 41   Montana Tuesday, November 8th, 1889 [41]
(admitted) Territory of Montana 42   Washington On this date in 1889 [42]
(admitted) Washington State 43   Idaho July 3, 1890
(admitted) The State of Idaho 44   Wyoming July 10, 1890
(admitted) In the state of Wyoming. 45   Utah On this day in 1896: January 4 [43]
(admitted) A Land Named Utah 46   Oklahoma November 16th, 1907 [44]
(admitted) The Indian and Oklahoma Territories 47   New Mexico 6 January 1912
(admitted) Aspects of New Mexico State and Territory 48   Arizona Tuesday, February 14, 1912
(admitted) The State of Arizona 49   Alaska On this date in 1959:
(admitted) The Alaskan Territories 50   Hawaii Today in History (August 21st, 1959)
(admitted) Kingdom of Hawaii

Ratification of the Articles of Confederation [ edit ]

On November 15, 1777, the Second Continental Congress voted to send the Articles of Confederation to the individual states for ratification. After being ratified by the required number of states (13 in this case), the Articles of Confederation took effect on March 1, 1781. The Articles of Confederation, which governed the states, were abolished on March 4, 1789, and the present Constitution, which governs the federal government, was adopted. [45]

State Date 1 Virginia On this day in 1777 2 Carolina del Sur The date of February 5, 1778 3 New York It was February 6th, 1778. 4 This is the state of Rhode Island. On this day in 1778, February 9: 5 Connecticut 12 February 1778 6 Georgia February 26th, 1778 7 To the State of 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 This day in 1778, November 19 12 Delaware Initially, on February 1, 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 collection of acts passed by Congress.
• During the years 1854–1861, when Kansas was still considered part of the territory rather than a state, a series of violent conflicts broke out in the territory between anti-slavery and pro-slavery groups.
• It was the passage of the Enabling Act of 1889 that allowed the people of the Dakota, Montana, and Washington territories to organize their own governments and eventually join the Union as individual states (the Dakotas were split in half).
• 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 Acts did the same for the people of those territories. calling for a vote on whether or not the two jurisdictions should be united into one state.
• On January 3, 1959, Alaska officially became a state thanks to the Alaska Statehood Act.

Notes [ edit ]

References [ edit ]

Internet resources [ edit ]

• U.S. State Videos History com
• Constitutional ratification and statehood formation dates 50states com