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Metrication in the United States. A shampoo label from the U.S. that shows a round metric quantity taking secondary status in parentheses next to non-integer U.S. customary quantity. Metrication (or metrification) is the process of introducing the International System of Units, also known as SI units or the metric system, to replace a ...
Countries using the metric (), imperial, and US customary systems as of 2019. United States customary units form a system of measurement units commonly used in the United States and most U.S. territories, [1] since being standardized and adopted in 1832. [2]
The US Customary system of units was developed and used in the United States after the American Revolution, based on a subset of the English units used in the Thirteen Colonies; it is the predominant system of units in the United States and in U.S. territories (except for Puerto Rico and Guam, where the metric system, which was introduced when ...
The Metric Conversion Act of 1975 is an Act of Congress that was signed into law by U.S. President Gerald Ford on December 23, 1975. [ 1] It declared the metric system "the preferred system of weights and measures for United States trade and commerce", but permitted the use of United States customary units in all activities.
The use of the metric system was made legal as a system of measurement in 1866 [165] and the United States was a founding member of the International Bureau of Weights and Measures in 1875. [166] The system was officially adopted by the federal government in 1975 for use in the military and government agencies, and as preferred system for trade ...
The metric system is a decimal -based system of measurement. The current international standard for the metric system is the International System of Units (Système international d'unités or SI), in which all units can be expressed in terms of seven base units: the metre (m), kilogram (kg), second (s), ampere (A), kelvin (K), mole (mol), and ...
However, apothecaries' weight has now been superseded by the metric system. One important difference is the widespread use in Britain of the stone of 14 pounds (6.350 293 18 kg) for body weight; this unit is not used in the United States, although flour was sold by a barrel of 196 pounds (14 stone) until World War II.
The first practical realisation of the metric system came in 1799, during the French Revolution, after the existing system of measures had become impractical for trade, and was replaced by a decimal system based on the kilogram and the metre. The basic units were taken from the natural world. The unit of length, the metre, was based on the ...