Statehood vs. Territories. So Confusing!!!
One of my former students, Chloe, had a great question…
Hey Mr. Irvin, I know I don’t have you anymore as a teacher but I have a question for you … how come the U.S will count Hawaii as a state but not Guam and Cuba and other countries that are owned by the U.S as a state?
There are many requirements to becoming one of the states that make up our country. After the original thirteen states joined to create a union, they set aside rules for territories won by the new country, but not yet official part of the government. These new areas of land were called “territories” and every state outside the original thirteen colonies was at one time a territory or part of a territory. These new areas had to meet certain criteria to join the union and get the benefits of being a state; most importantly representation in our government by getting representatives in the congress. The two most important requirements were to have a required population within certain square miles. Once the population requirement was met the people could vote to join the union. If the majority of the people wanted to join, they sent a request to the national government. Congress would then vote to allow them in, once that bill passed the territory became a state and was awarded two senator seats and representatives in the house based on population (at least 3). The process is much more complicated but this is the bare bones of the process.
Hawaii met these requirements in 1959, becoming our 50th state. Cuba is not a territory of the United States. After winning Cuba in the Spanish/American War we quickly allowed the Cubans to have their own freedom. Later, however, Cuba became communist and now is under a dictator and we are not on good terms. Guam is a military outpost, and I do not believe they have a high enough population. Guam does have three electoral votes in the National Election for President, however. One last territory is Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico has been a territory of the United States since the Spanish/American War. They have voted every election year since then to declare independence, stay a territory, or start the process to become a state in the Union. Every year they have decided to stay a territory. You may wonder why they would want to stay a territory. Territories get a lot of benefits; such as, tax money from the federal government, but less taxes, they have electoral votes, but no congressional seats. As things stand right now Puerto Rico wants to remain a territory, though in recent elections the number of people voting for independence has been on the rise.
I hope this answers your question. Thank you for coming to the blog I hope to hear from more of my former students in the future.
