How did the US expand its borders to include 48 of todays 50states?

Answer 1

This is a complicated issue, and there really is not room here to do it justice. There is a link below to an article on the Territorial Evolution of the United States, which is particularly useful because it contains a very good set of maps showing what all the changes were.

Link below.

Answer 2

The 13 original colonies expanded into the 50 states we have today through many ways. The first was through settlements past the Appalachian Mountains to the shores of the Mississippi. This was land ceded to the US by the British as a result of the peace treaty ending the Revolution. As more people settled there, they formed territories and then applied for statehood. Then, there was the Louisiana Purchase. At the time, France was under the rule of Napoleon, and he needed money to fund his wars against Britain and the rest of Europe. What do you do when you're a cash-strapped nation with land assets just sitting there? You sell 'em off. President Thomas Jefferson offered to buy the land from Napoleon for $15 million ($230 million in 2012 dollars), and part of that offer was paying off what we owed France for their generosity in the American Revolution. France agrees to the sale, and the US gets a HUGE amount of land to expand into. The next big expansion came after the war with Mexico; we got California, Utah, Nevada, most of Arizona, a bit of New Mexico and smidges of Colorado and Wyoming, Then the US annexed what was the Republic of Texas, adding Texas and parts of other Mid-Western states. There was the Gadsden Purchase in 1853 which added the rest of Arizona. Secretary of State William H. Seward was instrumental in negotiating the purchase of Alaska from Russia, although people thought it a folly at the time because Alaska was thought to be a frozen wasteland.

Answer 3

A Statehood bill for Alaska and Hawaii was passed by the US Congress and signed into law by President Eisenhower in 1959.

Answer 4

What makes up the culture of a group of people