American States (commonly abbreviated to the United States, U.S., United States, America, and America) is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where the company's forty-eight contiguous states and Washington, DC, the capital district, lie between the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, bordered by Canada to the north and Mexico to the south. The state of Alaska is in the northwest of the continent, with Canada to the east and Russia to the west, across the Bering Strait. The state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific. The country also possesses several territories in the Pacific and the Caribbean.
At 3.79 million square miles (9.83 million km2) and with more than 312 million people, the United States is the third or fourth largest country by total area, and the third largest by both area and population. This is one of the world's most ethnically diverse and multicultural, the product of large-scale immigration from many countries. The U.S. economy is the largest national economy in the world, with 2011 GDP estimated $ 15.1 trillion (22% of nominal global GDP and more than 19% of global GDP on a purchasing-power parity). Income per capita is the sixth highest in the world.
Indigenous peoples descended from ancestors who migrated from Asia is now America has been inhabited for thousands of years the American mainland. Native American population is greatly reduced by disease and war after European contact. The United States was established by thirteen British colonies located along the Atlantic seaboard. On July 4, 1776, they issued the Declaration of Independence, which states their right to self-determination and establishing their cooperative unions. Rebellious states defeated the British Empire in the American Revolution, the first successful colonial war of independence United States Constitution was adopted today at 17 September 1787;. Ratification the following year to make the single republic with a strong central government. Bill of Rights, comprising ten constitutional amendments guarantees many civil rights and fundamental freedoms, was ratified in 1791.
Through the 19th century, the United States displaced indigenous tribes, acquired the Louisiana territory from France, Florida from Spain, part of the State of Oregon from Britain, Alta California and New Mexico from Mexico, and Alaska from Russia, and annexed the Republic of Texas and the Republic of Hawaii. Disputes between the agrarian South and industrial North over the expansion of the institution of slavery and states 'rights' provoked the Civil War of the 1860s. Northern victory prevented a permanent split the country and led to the end of legal slavery in the United States. In the 1870s, is the largest national economy in the world. The Spanish-American War and World War I confirmed the country's status as a military power. It emerged from World War II as the first country with nuclear weapons and the UN Security Council permanent members. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union left the United States as sole superpower. These countries accounted for 41% of global military expenditure, and an economic power, politics, and culture in the world.
Etymology
At 1507, German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a world map that he named the land of the Western Hemisphere "America" after Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci. The former British colonies first used the country's modern name of the Declaration of Independence in 1776, "unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America". On 15 November 1777, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation, which states, "The Stile of this Confederacy shall 'United States'." French-American War of 1778 agreement to use "United States of North America", but from the date of July 11, 1778, "United States" is used to bill the state of money, and has become the official name since then.
Short form of "United States" are also standard. Other common forms include the "U.S.", the "USA", and "America". Everyday name including "U.S. A." and, internationally, the "American". "Columbia", once popular name for the United States, comes from Christopher Columbus, appears in the "District of Columbia" name.
The standard way to refer to citizens of the United States is as "American". Although the "United States" is the term officially appositional, "America" and "USA" is more often used to refer to the state adjectivally ("American values", "U.S. forces"). "America" is rarely used in English to refer to people not connected to the United States.
The phrase "United States" was originally treated as plural-eg, "the United States", including the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1865. It became common to treat it as a single-instance, "the United States"-after the end of the Civil War. Single form is now standard; the plural is retained in the idiom "these United States".
Geography and environment
Main article: Geography of the United States, the United States Climate, Environment and the United States
Land area of the United States border is about 1,900 million hectares (7.7 million km2). Alaska, separated from the United States border with Canada, is the largest country in the 365 million hectares (1.48 million km2). Hawaii, occupying an archipelago in the central Pacific, southwest of North America, has more than 4 million hectares (16,000 km2). United States is the third or fourth largest country in the world with a total area (land and water), ranking behind Russia and Canada and just above or below China. The rating varies depending on how two territories disputed by China and India are counted and how the total size of the United States is measured: the various calculations of 3,676,486 square miles (9,522,055 km2) to 3,717,813 square miles (9,629,091 km2) [19] to 3,794,101 square miles (9,826,676 km2). Including the land alone, the United States is third in size behind Russia and China, just ahead of Canada.
The Bald Eagle, the U.S. national bird since 1782
Coastal plain of the Atlantic seaboard gives way further inland to deciduous forest and hills of the Piedmont. Appalachian Mountains divide the eastern seaboard from the Great Lakes and Midwest prairies. Mississippi-Missouri River, the fourth longest river system in the world, runs mainly north-south through the heart of the country. Flat meadows, fertile stretches of the Great Plains to the west, interrupted by mountainous regions in the southeast. Rocky Mountains, on the west bank of the Great Plains, extend north to south across the country, reaching altitudes higher than 14,000 feet (4300 m) in Colorado. Farther west are the rocky Great Basin and deserts such as the Chihuahua and Mojave. Sierra Nevada and Cascade mountain ranges run close to the Pacific coast. At 20 320 feet (6194 m), Alaska's Mount McKinley is the highest peak in the country and in North America. Active volcanoes are common throughout Alaska's Alexander and Aleutian Islands, and Hawaii consists of volcanic islands. Supervolcano underlying Yellowstone National Park in the Rockies is the largest volcanic features on the continent.
United States, with large size and geographic variety, includes most climate types. To the east of the meridian to-100, the climate ranges from humid continental in the north to humid subtropical in the south. The southern tip of Florida is tropical, like Hawaii. Great Plains to the west of the meridian-100 is a semi-arid. Most of the mountainous western mountains. The dry climate in the Great Basin, desert, Mediterranean in coastal California Southwest, and the sea on the coast of Oregon and Washington and southern Alaska. Most of Alaska is subarctic or polar. Unusual extreme weather states bordering the Gulf of Mexico are prone to hurricanes, and most of the world's tornadoes occur in the country, especially in the Midwest Tornado Alley.
The U.S. ecology is considered "Megadiverse": about 17,000 species of vascular plants occur in the contiguous United States and Alaska, and more than 1,800 species of flowering plants found in Hawaii, some of which occur on the mainland. United States is home to over 400 mammals, 750 birds and 500 species of reptiles and amphibians. About 91 000 species of insects have been described. Endangered Species Act of 1973 protects threatened and endangered species and their habitats, which are monitored by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. There are fifty-eight national parks and gardens managed hundreds of other federal, forests, and wilderness areas. Overall, the government has 28.8% of the country's land area. Most of these are protected, although some leased for oil and gas drilling, mining, logging, or farming; 2.4% is used for military purposes.
Political divisions
Main article: U.S. state
Further information: Regional evolution of the United States and the United States territorial acquisitions
The United States is a joint federation of fifty states. Successor to the original thirteen states of the thirteen colonies that revolted against British rule. In the early history of the country, three new countries in the region was held out of the claim that there are states: Kentucky from Virginia, Tennessee from North Carolina, and Maine from Massachusetts. Most of the other countries have been carved from territory obtained through war or purchase by the U.S. government. One set of exceptions comprises Vermont, Texas, and Hawaii: each was an independent republic before joining the union. During the American Civil War, West Virginia broke away from Virginia. State-Hawaii-achieved statehood on the latest August 21, 1959. States do not have the right to secede from the union.
Stating up a large part of the U.S. mainland, two other areas considered integral parts of the country's District of Columbia, federal district where the capital, Washington, lies, and Palmyra Atoll, an uninhabited but incorporated territory in the Pacific Ocean. The United States also has five major overseas territories: Puerto Rico and U.S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean, and American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands and the Pacific. Those born in the main areas (except American Samoa) have U.S. citizenship. American citizens residing in the area has a lot of the same rights and responsibilities as citizens residing in these countries, but they are generally exempt from federal income taxes, may not elect a president, and only has a nonvoting representative in Congress.
History
Main article: History of the United States
Native Americans and European settlement
Indigenous peoples from the U.S. mainland, including Alaska Natives, is believed to have migrated from Asia, began between 40,000 and 12,000 years ago. Some, such as pre-Columbian Mississippian culture, developed advanced agriculture, great architecture, and state-level society. After Europeans began settling the United States, millions of indigenous Americans died from imported diseases like smallpox outbreak.
The Mayflower transported Pilgrims to the New World in 1620, as depicted in William Halsall The Mayflower in Plymouth Harbor, 1882.
In 1492, Genoese explorer Christopher Columbus, under contract with the Spanish crown, reached several Caribbean islands, making first contact with the natives. On 2 April 1513, Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León landed on what is called "La Florida"-the first documented European arrival on what would become the U.S. mainland. Spanish settlement in the region followed by that in the present southwestern United States that attracts thousands through Mexico. French fur traders established outposts of New France around the Great Lakes, France eventually claimed much of the North American interior, down to the Gulf of Mexico. The first successful English settlement was Jamestown Colony in Virginia in 1607 and Haji 'Plymouth Colony in 1620. The 1628 leasing the Massachusetts Bay Colony resulted in a wave of migration; by 1634, New England was settled by some 10,000 Puritans. Between the 1610s-an and the American Revolution, about 50,000 convicts were sent to the American colonies from England. Beginning in 1614, the Dutch settled along the lower Hudson River, including New Amsterdam on Manhattan Island.
In 1674, the Dutch surrender their American territory to England; the province of New Netherlands was renamed New York. Many new immigrants, especially to the South, which obliged servant about two-thirds of all Virginia immigrants between 1630 and 1680. At the turn of the 18th century, African slaves became the primary source of bonded labor. With the 1729 division of Carolina and the 1732 colonization of Georgia, the thirteen British colonies that would become the United States was founded. All had local governments with elections open to most free men, with a growing devotion to the ancient rights of English and a sense of self-government stimulating support for republicanism. All legalized the African slave trade. With a high birth rate, low death rates, and steady immigration, the colonial population grew rapidly. Christian revivalist movement of the 1730s and 1740s known as the Great Awakening sparked interest in both religion and religious freedom. In the French and Indian War, British forces seized Canada from France, but the francophone population remained politically isolated from the southern colonies. Excluding the Native Americans (known as "American Indian"), which is being displaced, those thirteen colonies had a population of 2.6 million in 1770, about one-third that of Britain, nearly one in five Americans were black slaves. Though subject to British taxation, no representation that the American colonists in Parliament of Great Britain.
Independence and expansion
Declaration of Independence, by John Trumbull, 1817-18
Tensions between American colonists and the British during the revolutionary period of the 1760s and early 1770s led to the American Revolutionary War, fought 1775-1781. On June 14, 1775, the Continental Congress, held in Philadelphia, established the Continental Army under the command of George Washington. States that "all men are created equal" and endowed with "rights that can not be separated", Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, mostly composed by Thomas Jefferson, on July 4, 1776. That date is now commemorated every year as Independence Day. In 1777, Articles of Confederation established a weak confederal government that operated until 1789.
After the British defeat by American forces assisted by, French and Spanish England recognized the independence of the United States and sovereignty 'over American territory west to the Mississippi River. Those who want to establish a strong federal government with powers of taxation held a constitutional convention in 1787. The U.S. Constitution was ratified in 1788, and the new republic's first Senate, House of Representatives, and president-George Washington took office in 1789. Bill of Rights, which prohibits federal restrictions on personal freedoms and ensure a variety of legal protection, adopted in 1791.
Attitude toward slavery changed, a clause in the Constitution to protect the Atlantic slave trade only until 1808. Northern states abolished slavery between 1780 and 1804, leaving the slave states of the South as defenders of "peculiar institution". Second Great Awakening, beginning about 1800, made evangelicalism a force behind various social reform movements, including abolitionism.
Territorial acquisitions by date
American desire to expand westward prompted a long series of Indian Wars. Louisiana Purchase of French-claimed territory under President Thomas Jefferson in 1803 almost doubled the size of the nation. War of 1812, declared against Britain over various grievances and fought to a draw, strengthened U.S. nationalism. A series of U.S. military incursions into Florida led Spain to hand and the other Gulf Coast region in 1819. Trail of Tears in the 1830's epitomized Indian removal policy that stripped the native population from their land. The United States annexed the Republic of Texas in 1845, in the middle period when the concept of Manifest Destiny had become popular. The 1846 Oregon Treaty with Britain led to U.S. control of the present American Northwest. U.S. victory in the Mexican-American War resulted in the submission of the 1848 California and much of the present American Southwest. The California Gold Rush of 1848-1849 further spurred western migration. The new railway made it easier for the relocation of settlers and increased conflicts with Native Americans. More than half a century, up to 40 million American bison, or buffalo, were slaughtered for skins and meat, and facilitate the spread of railways. The loss of the buffalo, the primary resource for the plains Indians, was an existential blow to many native cultures.
Civil War and industrialization
Battle of Gettysburg, lithograph by Currier & Ives, ca. 1863
Tensions between slave and free states mounted with arguments about the relationship between state and federal governments, as well as violent conflicts over the spread of slavery into new states. Abraham Lincoln, candidate of the Republican majority antiperbudakan, was elected president in 1860. Before he took office, seven slave states declared their secession-which the federal government maintained was illegal-and formed the United Confederate States of America. With the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter, the Civil War began and four more slave states joined the Confederacy. Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 slaves in the Confederate states to be free. Following the Union victory in 1865, three amendments to the U.S. Constitution guarantees freedom for the nearly four million African Americans who had been slaves, [39] made them citizens, and give them voting rights. War and led to resolution of a substantial increase in federal power. War remains the deadliest conflict in American history, which resulted in the deaths of 620 000 soldiers.
Immigrants at Ellis Island, New York Harbor, 1902
After the war, Abraham Lincoln's assassination radical Republican Reconstruction policies aimed at reintegrating and rebuilding the Southern states while ensuring the rights of newly freed slaves. Resolution of the disputed 1876 presidential election by the Compromise of 1877 ended Reconstruction; Jim Crow laws disenfranchised African Americans immediately. In the North, urbanization and an unprecedented influx of immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe to accelerate the industrialization of the country. Waves of immigration, which lasted until 1929, provided labor and changing American culture. Development of national infrastructure spurring economic growth. 1867 Alaska purchase from Russia completed the country's mainland expansion. Wounded Knee massacre in 1890 was the last major armed conflict of the War of India. In 1893, the Pacific Kingdom of Hawaii indigenous monarchy was overthrown in a coup led by American citizens; the United States annexed the archipelago in 1898. Victory in the Spanish-American War that same year showed that the United States is a world power and led to the annexation of Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines. Philippine independence half a century later, Puerto Rico and Guam remain U.S. territories.
World War I, the Great Depression and World War II
An abandoned farm in South Dakota during the Dust Bowl, 1936
At the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the United States remained neutral. Most Americans sympathized with the intervention, Britain and France, although opposed by many. In 1917, the United States joined the Allies, and the American Expeditionary Force helped to turn the tide against the Central Powers. After the war, the Senate did not ratify the Versailles Treaty, which established the League of Nations. The country is implementing a policy of unilateralism, verging on isolationism. In 1920, women's rights movement won the part of the constitutional amendment granting women's suffrage. Welfare Roaring Twenties ended with the Wall Street Crash of 1929 that triggered the Great Depression. After being elected president in 1932, Franklin D. Roosevelt responded with the New Deal, a variety of policies increasing government intervention in the economy, including the establishment of the Social Security system. Dust Bowl of the mid-1930s impoverished many farming communities and spurred a new wave of western migration.
Landing of a U.S. Army soldier 1st Infantry Division in Normandy on D-Day, June 6, 1944
United States, effectively neutral during the early stages of World War II after the Nazi German invasion of Poland in September 1939, began supplying material to the Allies in March 1941 through the Lend-Lease program. On December 7, 1941, the Empire of Japan launched a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, prompting the United States to join the Allies against the Axis powers and the Japanese American internment by the thousands. Participation in the war spurring capital investment and industrial capacity. Among the major combatants, the United States is the only nation to become richer-indeed, far richer, not poorer because of the war. Allied conferences at Bretton Woods and Yalta outlined a new system of international organizations that put the United States and the Soviet Union in the center of world affairs. As victory was won in Europe, an international conference held in San Francisco produced 1945 of the UN Charter, which became active after the war. United States, having developed the first nuclear weapons, used them on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August. Japan surrendered on September 2, ending the war.
Cold War and protest politics
Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his "I Have a Dream" speech, 1963
United States and the Soviet Union for power after World War II during the Cold War, dominating the military affairs of Europe through NATO and the Warsaw Pact, respectively. While they were engaged in a proxy war and develop a robust nuclear weapons, both countries avoid direct military conflict. Refused and left the land redistribution projects around the world, the United States often supported authoritarian government. American forces against the Chinese Communist forces in the 1950-53 Korean War. House Un-American Activities Committee pursued a series of investigations of suspected leftist subversion, while Senator Joseph McCarthy became a puppet of anticommunist sentiment.
1961 Soviet launch of the first manned space prompted the call of President John F. Kennedy to the United States to be the first to land "man on the moon", achieved in 1969. Kennedy also faces a tense nuclear confrontation with Soviet forces in Cuba. Meanwhile, the United States experienced sustained economic expansion. A growing civil rights movement, symbolized and led by African Americans such as Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr., used non-violence to confront segregation and discrimination. After the assassination of Kennedy in 1963, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 which passed under President Lyndon B. Johnson. He also signed into law the Medicare and Medicaid programs. Johnson and his successor, Richard Nixon, expanded a proxy war in Southeast Asia in the Vietnam War succeeded. A widespread countercultural movement grew, fueled by opposition to the war, black nationalism, and the sexual revolution. Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem, and others led a new wave of feminism that seek political equality, social, and economic development for women.
As a result of the Watergate scandal, in 1974 Nixon became the first U.S. president to resign to avoid impeachment on charges including obstruction of justice and abuse of power. Jimmy Carter administration of the late 1970s was marked by stagflation and the Iran hostage crisis. The election of Ronald Reagan as president in 1980 heralded a shift to the right in American politics, reflected in major changes in taxation and spending priorities. Second term in office brought both the Iran-Contra scandal and significant diplomatic progress with the Soviet Union. Subsequent Soviet collapse ended the Cold.
Contemporary era
World Trade Center on the morning of 11 September 2001
Under President George HW Bush, the United States took a leading role in UN-sanctioned Gulf War. The longest economic expansion in modern U.S. history-from March 1991 until March 2001, covering the Bill Clinton administration and the dot-com bubble. A civil lawsuit and sex scandal led to Clinton's impeachment in 1998, but he remains in office. 2000 presidential election, one of the closest in American history, completed by the U.S. Supreme Court decision-George W. Bush, George HW Bush's son, became president.
On 11 September 2001, al-Qaeda terrorists struck the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon near Washington, DC, killing nearly three thousand people. In response, the Bush administration launched a global war against terror, attack Afghanistan and remove the Taliban government and al-Qaeda training camp. Taliban insurgents continue to fight guerrillas. In 2002, the Bush administration began pushing for regime change in Iraq with controversial reasons. Coalition forces called from the Willing invaded Iraq in 2003, toppled Saddam Hussein. In 2005, Hurricane Katrina caused severe destruction along much of the Gulf Coast, devastating New Orleans. In 2008, amid a global economic recession, the first African American President, Barack Obama, elected. Primary health care and reform of the current financial system two years later. In 2011, an attack by a Navy SEAL killed in Pakistan al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Iraq war ended with the withdrawal of U.S. troops left the country.
Government and politics
The front of the west of the United States Capitol, which houses the U.S. Congress
Main article: United States Federal Government, U.S. state governments, and elections in the United States
United States is a federation of the world's oldest surviving. This is a constitutional republic and representative democracy, "in which majority rule is tempered by minority rights protected by law". The Government is governed by a system of checks and balances defined by the U.S. Constitution, which serves as the nation's highest legal documents [56] In the federal system, citizens are usually subject to three levels of government, federal, state, and. local; task of local government is usually divided between district and city governments. In almost all cases, the executive and legislative officials are selected based on plurality vote by district residents. There is no proportional representation at the federal level, and very rare at lower levels.
South façade of the house, the White House and U.S. President workplace
The federal government comprises three branches:
Legislative: bicameral Congress consists of Senate and House of Representatives, makes federal law, declares war, approves treaties, has the power budget, and has the power of impeachment, which can remove sitting members of government.
Executive: The President is commander-in-chief of the military, can veto legislative bills before they become law, and appoint members of the Cabinet (subject to Senate approval) and other officers, who administer and enforce federal laws and policies.
Judiciary: Supreme Court and lower federal courts, the judges appointed by the president with Senate approval, interpret laws and reverse them they find unconstitutional.
The front of the western United States Supreme Court Building
House of Representatives has 435 members vote, each representing a congressional district for a term of two years. House seats are allocated among states by population every tenth year. In the 2000 census, seven states have at least one representative, while California, most populous state, has fifty-three. The Senate has 100 members with each state has two senators, elected at-large to six years; third of Senate seats to be elected each year. President serve four-year term and can be chosen to the office no more than two times. The president was not elected through direct elections, but by an indirect electoral college system in which the determining votes are allocated to the states and the District of Columbia. The Supreme Court, headed by the Chairman of the United States, has nine members, who serve for life.
The state government is structured in a way more or less the same; Nebraska has a unique unicameral legislature. Governor (CEO) of each state is directly elected. Some state judges and cabinet officials appointed by the governor of each state, while others are elected by popular vote.
The original manuscript of the Constitution establishes the structure and responsibilities of the federal government and its relationship with individual countries. Article One protects the right to "big words" habeas corpus, and Article Three guarantees the right to a trial by jury in all criminal cases. Amendments to the constitution require the approval of three quarters of the state. This constitution has been amended twenty seven times, the first ten changes, which form the Bill of Rights, and Fourteenth Amendment form the primary basis for individual rights of Americans. All laws and government procedures are subject to review and rule of law in violation of the constitution is voided. The principle of judicial review, is not mentioned explicitly in the Constitution, declared by the Supreme Court in Marbury v. Madison (1803).
Party and ideology
Main article: Politics in the United States and political ideology in the United States
Barack Obama took the presidential oath of office from U.S. Chief Justice John Roberts, January 20, 2009
The United States has operated under a two-party system for most of its history. For elective offices at the most, the state-run primary elections choose the major party nomination for the next election. Since the 1856 elections, major parties have become the Democratic Party, founded in 1824, and the Republican Party, founded in 1854. Since the Civil War, only one third-party presidential candidate-former president Theodore Roosevelt, running as a Progressive in 1912-has won as many as 20% of the popular vote.
In American political culture, the Republican Party is considered center-right or conservative and the Democratic Party is considered center-left or liberal. Northeastern states and West Coast and several Great Lakes states, known as the "blue states", are relatively liberal. "Red states" South and parts of the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains are relatively conservative.
Winner of the 2008 presidential election, Democrat Barack Obama, the U.S. president-44. The 2010 midterm elections saw the Republicans take over the House and make gains in the Senate, where Democrats retain a majority. In the 112th United States Congress, the Senate comprises 51 Democrats, two independent who caucuses with Democrats, Republicans and 47; House of Representatives consists of 242 Republicans and 192 Democrats, one seat vacant. There are 29 Republican governors and 20 Democrats and one independent.
