I’ve been curious about why Delaware was permitted to break off as an independent state from Pennsylvania.
As I understand it, Wm. Penn had the property, not as part of the original land grant, but as a purchase/business transaction he made after the fact. It would seem that he would want the ocean front property for commerce. Even though Philadelphia was a thriving inland port, Delaware provided direct access to the Atlantic. Even then, Penn had to see the potential advantages.
So, I checked the ol’ wiki history, and it seems that on June 15, 1776, Delaware declared its independence from Britian and Pennsylvania at the same time. There didn’t seem to be much of a protest made, so I assume there was some sort of agreement between the Delaware leaders and the Pennsylvania leaders. But I’m missing some major details. Can anyone help me understand:
Why Pennsylvania seemed to easily give up some prime oceanfront real estate and potential Atlantic ports with no real fight or argument?
When the declaring of independence was going on, did other counties attempt to cede from their current states? (I would assume Delaware was the only successful one). But if the Western part of Virginia wanted to do this instead of waiting for the Civil War, would this have been taken seriously or permitted?
Was there any compensation paid to Pennsylvania for this land loss?
Present day question - I’ve read that there is a proposed state of Jefferson, which would be a few counties of southern Oregon and Northern California. Is there a process within the constitution to cover something like this, or if Oregon and California were willing to allow this to occur, would it be permitted by congress?
Thanks!
SFP
Article IV, section 3 of the US Constitution provides: "New states may be admitted by the Congress into this union; but no new states shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other state; nor any state be formed by the junction of two or more states, or parts of states, without the consent of the legislatures of the states concerned as well as of the Congress. "
So, it could happen if Oregon, California and the US Congress agreed to do so. It is pretty doubtful that two states would cede territory like that to form a new state.
Sort of. Delaware and Pennsylvania shared a governor in the years leading up to the revolution, but each area had it’s own assembly (from 1704), and the Delaware part of the colony (the “Lower Counties”) were self governing. They just shared a governor. And since in 1776, the governor was Royalist, and Pennsylvania was also writing a new constitution at the time…
While Penn’s heirs continued to appoint a single governor for Pennsylvania and Delaware, both colonies had long realized that they did not have common interests, and the Pennsylvania assembly chose to meet without representatives from “the lower counties.” by the time of the revolution, Delaware was much more ambivalent about independence than Pennsylvania.
According to Wikipedia, “Historically the area now occupying West Virginia had a separate identity from the early days of pioneering settlement. The early British American settlers called the area Vandalia. After the American Revolution the settlers of the area sought the status of an individual state of the union under the name Westsylvania, but their attempts were blocked by Virginia which claimed most of the area, and Pennsylvania which claimed a small part of the area.” So, no.
The best example of this was Vermont, which was territory claimed by both New York and New Hampshire. The locals declared themselves independent of both colonies in 1777, and functioned as an sovereign entity until joining the United States as the fourteenth state in 1791.