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This may be a trick question. The state of Delaware often claims (as on its license plates) to be "the first state", because it was the first state that voted to ratify the U.S. Constitution in 1787, and that may be what you are expected to answer. In fact, it is the common way of listing the "order of the states", including in the recent state coins. But Delaware was not the first state settled or organized as a colony nor (later)as a state (with its own state as opposed to colonial government). And even when it comes to the Constitution, the claim is confused because: a) the 13 colonies were already ALL "states" before the Constitution was drawn up to replace the Articles of Confederation. In one sense, all 13 became states of the U.S. (as opposed to individual, independent states) at the SAME TIME when they together declared independence in July 1776. This was different from the formation of all the later states added and "admitted" to the Union in later years. b) the U.S. Constitution of 1787 itself provided for the document's going into effect only when 2/3 (that is, initially, nine) of the states had ratified it. Thus the "first to ratify" would not come under the Constitution one moment sooner than the next eight. So, the first COLONY founded was Virginia (1607), which was also first organized with a charter (and government)as a colony (1624). If the test is the establishment of a new government, not answerable to the King or Parliament, the first colony/state to adopt such a charter was New Hampshire,which completed its first constitution on January 5, 1776. (Seven other colonies drafted state constitutions later that year.) http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/nh09.asp

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16y ago

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