by Dom Califano

The United States, as we all know, is a nation made up of fifty states. But it wasn’t always like this– when the nation was first created, there were only 13 states. But as time marched on and the United States spread west, more and more states were added to the union. In America’s over 200 year history, 37 additional states have been admitted to the union to give us the fifty states we all know and love. But sometime in the future, a fifty-first state could be admitted to the union, whether it be from current territories of the United States or territory composed of one or more states, the question of who the fifty-first state is has been thrown around ever since Alaska and Hawaii have been admitted to the union in 1959.

The most well known candidate for the title of ‘fifty-first state’ is Puerto Rico, the unincorporated territory of the United States located in the Caribbean. Puerto Rico has a population of over 3 million which is a higher population than 19 individual states including New Mexico, Nevada, and Kansas. In 2012, the island had a referendum asking the people for what they wanted. According to a CNN article, the 2012 referendum was the “first that was in favor of statehood.” The island had another vote in 2017, but the vote is widely regarded to be an unacceptable representation of what the people want as only 23% of the island’s population that were of age and able to vote actually voted due to political discourse at the time.

Puerto Rico is not the only place wanting statehood within the United States. Another candidate for being the fifty-first state is the District of Columbia, also known as Washington DC. In late 2016, the people of DC voted to see if the people wanted to become a state or not. According to a NPR article from November of 2016, 79% of the people voted in favor of becoming a state. If the District of Columbia does become the fifty-first state, it would be renamed to “New Columbia” and it would also become the smallest state, smaller than Rhode Island and Delaware. 

A third candidate for the title of fifty-first state could have been the State of Sequoyah, though the idea of the state has died with time, the proposal could’ve very much been turned into a proper state with enough support. The proposed state was brought up by Native Americans living within a territory that was then named “Indian Territory” (1834 – 1907). The proposal did not reach too far, besides from support within the territory. The natives proposed the idea to Congress, but Congress did nothing about it. Two years later in 1907 the Indian Territory was incorporated into the newly formed state of Oklahoma. According to an Oklahoma Historical Society article, the people of the Indian Territory had already drafted a state constitution but when the idea of a Sequoyah State was denied, elements from the Sequoyah Constitution were implemented into the Oklahoma State Constitution.