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The United States of America is a federal republic [1] consisting of 50 states, a federal district (Washington, D.C., the capital city of the United States), five major territories, and various minor islands. [2] [3] Both the states and the United States as a whole are each sovereign jurisdictions. [4]
The earliest known use of the name "America" dates to 1505, when German poet Matthias Ringmann used it in a poem about the New World. [2] The word is a Latinized form of the first name of Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci, who first proposed that the West Indies discovered by Christopher Columbus in 1492 were part of a previously unknown landmass, rather than the eastern limit of Asia.
The name "United States Minor Outlying Islands" started to be used in 1986. [124] Previously, some of the islands were included in a group called " United States Miscellaneous Pacific Islands ". Baker Island was named for Michael Baker in 1832.
The following table is a list of all 50 states and their respective dates of statehood. The first 13 became states in July 1776 upon agreeing to the United States Declaration of Independence, and each joined the first Union of states between 1777 and 1781, upon ratifying the Articles of Confederation, its first constitution. [6]
The following is a set–index article, providing a list of lists, for the cities, towns and villages within the jurisdictional United States. It is divided, alphabetically, according to the state , territory , or district name in which they are located.
In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50.Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sovereignty with the federal government.
The following is a list of the 3,143 counties and county-equivalents in the 50 states and District of Columbia sorted by U.S. state, plus an additional 100 county-equivalents in the U.S. territories sorted by territory. [1] [2]
As early as October 1831, the United States Postal Service recognized common abbreviations for states and territories. However, they accepted these abbreviations only because of their popularity, preferring that patrons spell names out in full to avoid confusion.