America has always been a rapidly changing society. As its people change—in numbers, race, ethnicity, income, education, culture—new conflicts arise, some old conflicts burn out, and other conflicts reignite.

The total population of the United States grew by almost 10 percent between 2000 and 2010. But states grew unevenly. The fastest growing states between 2000 and 2010 were the “Sunbelt” states of the West and South. Texas, the nation’s second largest state, gained the most numbers of new residents—4.3 million; California gained—3.4 million, followed by Florida—2.8 million, Georgia—1.5 million, North Carolina—1.5 million, and Arizona—1.3 million. These six states accounted for 54 percent of the overall population growth for the United States during the decade.

Population growth rates—the percentage of population increase over the decade—may be better indicators of the changing requirements of state governments to provide public services, as well as the changing politics in the states. Nevada, the fastest growing state for five decades, grew by 35 percent, followed by Arizona (25 percent), Utah (24 percent), Idaho (21 percent), and Texas (21 percent). The slowest growing were Rhode Island, Louisiana, and Ohio—all of which grew by less than 2 percent. Michigan actually lost 0.6 percent of its population over the decade. The top five fastest growing states between 2000 and 2030 are projected to be Nevada (114 percent), Arizona (109 percent), Florida (80 percent), Texas (60 percent), and Utah (56 percent). (See “Rankings of the States: Population Size and Projected Growth Rate, 2010–2030.”)¹ The Census Bureau predicts that soon Florida will edge past New York into third place in total population.

Rising personal income indicates increased worker productivity and the creation of wealth. Per capita personal income in the United States grew from about $4,000 in 1970 to about $39,791 in 2010. Income is not evenly distributed throughout the states (see “Rankings of the States: Income and Education”). Per capita personal income in Connecticut is more than $56,000, but it is less than $32,000 in Mississippi.

Many economists have asserted that economic growth involves an upgrading in the workforce, the development of professional managerial skills, and an increase in the volume of research. These developments involve a general increase in the educational levels of the adult population. In 1970 about 11 percent of the U.S. adult population had completed four years or more of college; by 2011 that figure had risen to 30 percent. But high levels of educational attainment do not prevail uniformly throughout the states (see “Rankings of the States: Income and Education”).

The extent to which economic development—population growth, income, and education—affects the politics of the states is an important question, which we return to again in the chapters that follow.

Today the nation’s 41 million blacks comprise 13 percent of the total population of the United States. (The distribution of blacks among the 50 states is shown in “Rankings of the States: Hispanic and African American Populations.”) In 1900, most African Americans (89.7 percent) were concentrated in the South. But World Wars I and II provided job opportunities in large cities of the Northeast and Midwest. Blacks could not cast ballots in most southern counties, but they could “vote with their feet.” The migration of blacks from the rural South to the urban North was one of the largest internal migrations in our history. But blacks have steadily been moving back to the South. Today, 55 percent of the nation’s black population lives in the South.²

African American candidates have been increasingly successful in winning city and county offices and state legislative seats. (See Chapter 4 for a discussion of voting rights laws and their impact on the election of minorities.) The largest numbers of black elected officials are found in the southern states. In 1989 the nation’s first elected black governor, Douglas Wilder, moved into Virginia’s statehouse, once the office of Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy. Black candidates have also been increasingly successful in winning elections in large cities throughout the nation and community organizer, Barack Obama, became the first black president of the United States. Later in this book we describe black representation in city councils (Chapter 11) and in state legislatures (Chapter 6), as well as civil rights policy (Chapter 15).

Perhaps the most significant change in the nation’s ethnic composition over the last decade is the growth in the numbers and percentage of Hispanic Americans. In 2000, Hispanics became the nation’s largest minority. More than one in six people in the United States are of Hispanic origin. (The term Hispanic refers to persons of Spanish-speaking ancestry and culture, regardless of race, and includes Mexican Americans, Cuban Americans, Central and South Americans, and Puerto Ricans.) Today Hispanics outnumber African Americans in the U.S. population (see “Rankings of the States: Hispanic and African American Populations”). The largest subgroup is Mexican Americans, some of whom are descendants of citizens living in Mexican territory that was annexed to the United States in 1848 (see Figure 1-1), but most of them have come to the United States in accelerating numbers in recent years. The largest Mexican American populations are in New Mexico, California, Texas, and Arizona. The second largest subgroup is Hispanics from Central and South America, who are concentrated in the Northeast, South, and West. Third largest is Puerto Ricans, many of whom retain ties to the island and move back and forth to the mainland, especially to New York City and now central Florida. Fourth largest are Cubans, most of whom have fled from Castro’s regime and live in the Miami metropolitan area. While these groups share a common language and faith (Catholic), they often differ in their political leanings and participation rates due to varied cultural backgrounds and length of residency in the United States³ (see Chapter 15).

The Asian population, nearly 16 million (5 percent of the nation’s total), is actually growing more rapidly than any other minority. One-half of Asians and Pacific Islanders live in the West. California has the largest Asian population (4.7 million), but Asians are a majority of the population of Hawaii, the only state with a “majority minority” population. Asians, like Hispanics, are not a monolithic group either ethnically or politically.⁴ There are significant language and cultural differences among Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, Cambodians, Malaysians, Pakistanis, Filipinos, Thais, Hmong, Laotians, and Vietnamese Americans. Pacific Islanders, those with origins in Hawaii, Guam, Samoa, or other Pacific Islands, also have unique heritages.

It is estimated that 10 million Native Americans (American Indians and Alaska Natives) once inhabited the North American continent. By 1900 the Native American population had been reduced to barely a half million by war, disease, and forced privations inflicted upon them. Today, Native Americans number nearly 4 million, or 1 percent of the U.S. population. There are more than 562 Indian tribes and Alaska Native groups that speak more than 250 languages. Each tribe has its own culture, history, and identity.⁵ The 10 largest American Indian tribal groups are the Cherokee, Navajo, Latin American Indian, Choctaw, Sioux, Chippewa, Apache, Blackfeet, Iroquois, and Pueblo. The four largest Alaska Native tribal groups are Eskimo, Tlingit-Haida, Alaska Athabascan, and Aleut. The 11 states with the largest Native American populations are, in descending order, California, Oklahoma, Arizona, Texas, New Mexico, New York, Washington, North Carolina, Michigan, Alaska, and Florida (see Chapter 15). Approximately half of all Native Americans live on semiautonomous reservations in various states.

Immigration policy is a responsibility of the national government. Today, roughly a million people per year are admitted to the United States as “lawful permanent residents” (persons who have needed job skills or who have relatives who are U.S. citizens) or as “political refugees” (persons with “a well-founded fear of persecution” in their country of origin). Another 36 million people are awarded temporary visas to enter the United States for study, business, or pleasure.

The easiest way to become a U.S. citizen is to be born here, regardless of whether your parents are here legally or not. If you were born outside of the United States, the golden ticket is the “green card”—the U.S. government–issued document granting you permanent residency status allowing you to live and work in the country. Green cards are issued for family reasons and for special employment. A person may apply for a green card if a spouse, child, or sibling is a U.S. citizen. Persons may also apply if an employer is willing to hire them and to assert that their job skills are crucial. Preferences are given to medical professionals, advanced degree holders, and executives of multinational corporations.

Persons who have resided in the United States for at least five years, who are over age 18, who can read and speak English, who possess “good moral characters” (no felony convictions), and who can pass a modest citizenship test are eligible for naturalization as citizens.

Citizens of the United States are entitled to a passport, issued by the U.S. State Department upon presentation of a photo plus evidence of citizenship (a birth certificate or naturalization papers). A passport entitles holders to reenter the United States after travel abroad. A visa is a document or stamp on a passport, issued by a foreign country, that allows a citizen to enter that country.

In theory, a sovereign nation should be able to maintain secure borders, but in practice the United States has been unwilling and unable to do so. Estimates of illegal immigration vary wildly, between official statistics provided by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and unofficial estimates provided by other organizations like the Pew Hispanic Center and the Center for Immigration Studies. The Department of Homeland Security estimates that over 11 million unauthorized immigrants currently reside in the United States. Other, unofficial estimates range from 12 to 15 million or more. The number varies depending on the economy and actions by state and local governments. Many undocumented immigrants slip across U.S. borders or enter ports with false documentation, while many more overstay tourist or student visas. Nearly 60 percent of these unauthorized immigrants were born in Mexico; the remainder come from other Latin and South American countries, Asia, and elsewhere.⁶ Eighty-five percent of all unauthorized immigrants in the United States come from 10 countries (Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, China, the Philippines, India, Korea, Ecuador, and Vietnam).

Immigration “reform” was the announced goal of Congress in the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, also known as the Simpson–Mazzoli Act. It sought to control immigration by placing principal responsibility on employers; it set fines for knowingly hiring undocumented, or unauthorized, immigrants. However, it allowed employers to accept many different forms of documentation (which, as it turned out, could be easily forged) and at the same time subjected them to penalties for discrimination against legal foreign-born residents. To win political support, the act granted amnesty to undocumented immigrants who had lived in the United States since 1982. But the act failed to reduce the flow of either legal or undocumented immigrants.

Border control is an expensive and difficult task. The federal agency responsible for border security is U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), a branch of the Department of Homeland Security. Localized experiments in border enforcement have indicated that illegal immigration can be reduced by half or more, with significant increases in ICE personnel and technology. However, political opposition to increased border enforcement and reduced immigration comes from a variety of sources. Hispanic groups have been especially concerned about immigration enforcement efforts that may lead to discrimination against all Hispanic Americans. Powerful groups benefit from the availability of undocumented immigrants, such as the agriculture, restaurant, clothing, and hospital industries; they regularly lobby in Washington to weaken enforcement efforts. Some employers prefer hiring undocumented immigrants (“los indocumentados”) because they are willing to work at hard jobs for low pay and few, if any, benefits. Even high-tech firms have found it profitable to bring in English-speaking immigrants as computer programmers.

Congress considered but failed to pass a DREAM (Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors) Act in 2010. The DREAM Act would offer permanent residency to undocumented aliens, who came into the United States as minors, who are under the age of 30, who have lived in the country continuously for five years, and who enrolled in a college or university for two or more years or served honorably in the U.S. military. The bill failed to overcome a filibuster in the U.S. Senate, falling short of the 60 votes necessary. But in 2012, President Barack Obama announced that his administration would not deport young undocumented aliens who matched the DREAM Act’s requirements. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (CIS) now accepts application under this Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

Although the federal government has exclusive power over immigration policy, its decisions have significant effects on states and communities—on their governmental budgets, on the use of their public services, on the security of their residents, and even on their social character. Immigration is by no means uniform across the states. Border states in the southwest and southeast (Florida) have the highest concentrations of unauthorized immigrants. (See Figure 1-3.) Immigration-related politics and policies often differ across the states on issues ranging from allowing undocumented immigrants to secure a driver’s license to giving in-state tuition to children of undocumented immigrants.

Increasingly, states and cities have attempted to enact their own versions of immigration reform. In 1994 California voters approved a referendum, Proposition 187, which would have barred welfare and other benefits to persons living in the state illegally. A federal court later declared major portions of Proposition 187 unconstitutional. And the U.S. Supreme Court has held that a state may not bar the children of undocumented immigrants from attending public schools. Some cities with politically liberal electorates, for example San Francisco, have declared themselves to be “sanctuary” cities, ordering their police officers not to enforce federal immigration laws or even to ask suspects about their immigration status. Some cities with more conservative voters have adopted ordinances making it illegal for landlords to rent to undocumented immigrants or employers to hire them. Federal courts have invalidated most of these laws as an unconstitutional interference in the exercise of federal power.⁷ The U.S. Supreme Court’s propensity to restrict state laws that appear to infringe on federal power was evident in its 2012 ruling (Arizona v. U.S.)that certain portions of Arizona’s tough immigration enforcement law cracking down on undocumented immigrants undermined federal authority. (See “Up Close: Arizona v. the United States on Immigration.”)

Additional state issues involving immigration continue to arise. Can states deny driver’s licenses to persons who cannot prove that they are in the country legally? Should states offer in-state tuition to students who graduated from high school but who are not in the country legally? (State versions of the DREAM Act have been passed in 12 states as of 2013, including Texas, California, and New York. Maryland voters approved a state DREAM Act in 2012 by a 59 percent vote.) And can states act to deny voter registration

to persons who cannot prove their citizenship? In 2004, Arizona voters approved a state constitutional amendment that required proof of citizenship in order to register to vote. In 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Arizona v. Inter-Tribal Council of Arizona, ruled it unconstitutional. The Court, in a 7–2 ruling, said that Arizona’s requirement went beyond registration procedures spelled out in the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (the “motor voter” law) and that federal law trumps state law.

To date, the intense conflict over immigration policy in Washington has prevented any effective action to halt illegal immigration, determine the status of millions of undocumented immigrants, or decide how many aliens should be admitted each year and what the criteria for their admission should be. Beginning during the George W. Bush administration and continuing to Obama’s presidency, Congress has struggled over how to resolve this intensifying problem. Debates have centered on how to compromise diverse interests—employers seeking to keep immigration as open as possible, immigrants seeking a legal path to citizenship, and citizens seeking border security and opposed to any form of amnesty for undocumented aliens. Intense debates have also taken place over strengthening border enforcement, including funding 700 miles of fencing along the 2,000-mile Mexican border; providing a path to citizenship that includes criminal background checks, paying fines and fees, and acquiring English proficiency; establishing a temporary (two-year) guest worker program; and shifting the criteria for legal immigration from family-based preferences to a greater emphasis on skills and education. So far it has been extremely difficult to build consensus on these divisive issues.

Do the states exhibit separate and identifiable political cultures? That is, are there political differences among the states that cannot be accounted for by demographic characteristics, for example, race, ethnicity, income, or education? It does appear that some states have developed historical traditions of Democratic and Republican party affiliation, as well as cultural patterns of liberal and conservative politics, that are independent of any demographic features of their populations. For example, Minnesota has developed a liberal and Democratic tradition, Indiana a conservative and Republican tradition, and neither can be fully explained by the socioeconomic composition of their populations. The liberal politics of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Oregon as well as the conservative politics of Tennessee, North Dakota, and Utah are not fully explained by characteristics of these states’ populations or by specific historical events. So we attribute to “political culture” the differences across states that take into account the values and ways of life of early settler and immigrant groups.

Early attempts at developing different classifications of state political cultures began with examinations of the content and language of each state’s original constitution. These documents were seen as reflecting the cultural values of the early settlers, which were passed down from one generation to the next and became part of the state’s political fabric. More recent attempts have used a combination of race and ethnic origins, religious affiliations, and social structures to classify states and, in turn, to examine how closely cultural differences reflect political and public policy differences across the states.

The newest research¹³ uses U.S. Census and religious survey data to classify all U.S. counties into 11 regional subcultures that represent distinctive differences in race, ethnicity, religion, social class, historical settlement patterns, language, regionalism, sectionalism, and new streams of immigration and migration. (See Figure 1-4.) With the exception of the Rurban subculture, the study’s subcultures represent historical and cultural extensions of earlier settler and immigrant waves. To measure state culture, the study computed the respective proportions of the total statewide population that are under the influence of each subculture.

The state-by-state distribution of regional subcultures shows why each state is unique. Pennsylvania, for example, is dominated by a Germanic subculture, while neighboring West Virginia is dominated by a Heartland subculture. The Rurban subculture is dominant in Oregon, while the Global subculture is dominant in neighboring California. Arkansas has a border-dominated politics, while Mississippi’s remains under the sway of a Blackbelt subculture. Politics in New Mexico continues to be dominated by a Latino subculture, while neighboring Texas now lacks a dominant subculture and is truly multicultural. The regional political subculture measure, a composite of social, economic, ethnic heritage, immigration, and migration factors, is a more powerful predictor of state party affiliation, voting patterns, and public policy outcomes than any single factor.

Some scholars have examined the link between cultural-religious values and citizen attitudes toward immigration reform. For example, “agreement with three values—continuing our heritage as a nation of immigrants, following the Golden Rule, and protecting the dignity of every person—predicts higher support for a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants.”¹⁴

The religious profiles of the states vary significantly and are becoming more important in explaining why states act differently politically, particularly on highly divisive, politically explosive moral issues.¹⁵ A voter’s position on these media-grabbing issues may be grounded in religious beliefs and may be a stronger voting cue than one’s political party affiliation, although the two are often related.¹⁶ Consequently, moral issues (like same-sex marriage, contraceptive coverage, abortion, gambling, marijuana legalization) are increasingly being used by political parties and candidates as wedges, designed to cause voters to cross party lines on those hot-button issues alone. Putting such issues on the ballot in the form of an amendment is seen as a way to boost turnout among religious conservatives, regardless of whether they are Republicans or Democrats. Liberals, in turn, use such amendments as tools to turn out their own voters, many of whom are more concerned about the blurring of church and state than the issue itself.

There are several ways to define a person’s religiosity. The four most common measures are the importance of religion in a person’s life, frequency of attendance at worship services, frequency of prayer, and belief in God.¹⁷ States differ significantly in the degree to which their citizens say religion is important in their lives. Southern states rank highest; New England states rank lowest. (See “Rankings of the State: Religion and Ideology (Liberalism) Actually, it is the frequency of a person’s religious service attendance more than an individual’s specific faith that is often the best determinant of their stance on moral issues and their likelihood of voting.

Political leadership in a state also helps shape its politics and public policy. While we can systematically examine the influence of population size and growth, income, education, race, and ethnicity on state politics, we must also remind ourselves that from time to time individual leaders have brought about political change in their states—change that might not have occurred without their efforts. Electoral politics in states and communities as well as the nation encourage political entrepreneurship—that is, electoral politics provides incentives for candidates to propose policy innovations in order to publicize themselves and win votes.

Education is the biggest expenditure for state and local governments combined. (See Figure 1-5.)However, local governments spend a larger portion of their budgets on education than state governments, but each helps fund this critical activity. States and communities are responsible for decisions about what should be taught in public schools, how much should be spent on the education of each child, how many children should be in each classroom, how often they shall be tested, how much teachers should be paid, how responsibilities in education should be divided between state and local governments, what qualifications teachers must have, what types of rates and taxes shall be levied for education, and many other decisions that affect the life of every child in America. Support for higher education, including funds for state and community colleges and universities, is now a major expenditure of state governments. The federal government has never contributed more than 10 percent of the nation’s total expenditures for education.

States and communities continue to carry a heavy burden in the fields of health and welfare—despite an extensive system of federal grants-in-aid for this purpose. (See Figure 1-5.) States and communities must make decisions about participation in federal programs and allocate responsibilities among themselves for health and welfare programs. While the federal government administers Social Security and Medicare, state governments administer

the largest public assistance programs—Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (cash aid, formerly Aid to Families with Dependent Children), Medicaid (health care for the poor), and food stamps, as well as unemployment compensation. Within the broad outlines of federal policy, states and communities decide the amount of money appropriated for health and welfare purposes, the benefits to be paid to recipients, the rules of eligibility, and the means by which the programs will be administered. States and communities may choose to grant assistance beyond the limits supported by the national government.

The United States has over 4 million miles of surfaced roads and over 240 million registered motor vehicles. States and communities must make decisions about the allocation of money for streets and highways, sources of funds for highway revenue, the extent of gasoline and motor vehicle taxation, the regulation of traffic on the highways, the location of highways, the determination of construction policies, the division of responsibility between state and local governments for highway financing administration, and the division of highway funds between rural and urban areas. While the federal government is deeply involved in highway construction, state and local governments fund well over half of the costs of all highway improvements. For years, mass transit has gotten shortchanged next to highways because a majority of Americans prefer to travel in their own cars over riding buses or taking the subway. Historically, high-speed rail has fared even worse than other forms of mass transit, although there are some signs it is becoming a higher priority. The federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (the Economic Stimulus Package) budgeted $8 billion for building high-speed rail systems connecting major urban areas. Only a handful of states, California being the largest, applied for the funds. For others, the price of such a major infrastructure project was just too high, especially in the middle of a recession. Today, construction of a high-speed rail system is still largely on the drawing boards in many states, although the planning is further along.

States and communities have the principal responsibility for public safety in America. Over 2.4 million state and local government jobs are in the protective services (police, firefighters, and correctional officers), second only to education. Some state police have important highway safety responsibilities and cooperate with local authorities in the apprehension of criminals. However, community police forces continue to be the principal instrument of law enforcement and public safety. Sheriffs and their deputies are still the principal enforcement and arresting officers in rural counties. States and communities also have the principal responsibility for maintaining prisons and correctional institutions. Each year several million Americans are prisoners in jails, police stations, juvenile homes, or penitentiaries. The bulk of these prisoners are in state and local, rather than federal, institutions.

The national government has defined a national system of civil rights, but these rights cannot become realities without the support of state and local authorities. States and communities must deal directly with racial problems, such as racial isolation in the public schools, job discrimination, and segregated housing patterns in the cities. They must also deal directly with the consequences of racial tension, including violence. But in the twenty-first century, civil rights battles are not just racial in nature. Claims of discrimination are on the upswing from older workers, gays and lesbians, women, disabled persons, and immigrants.

Local governments have the principal responsibility for our physical environment. They must plan streets, parks, and commercial, residential, and industrial areas and provide essential public utilities for the community. The waste materials of human beings—rubbish, garbage, and sewage—exceed one ton every day per person. The task of disposal is an immense one; the problem is not only collecting it, but finding ways to dispose of it. If it is incinerated, it contributes to air pollution; and if it is carried off into streams, rivers, or lakes, it contributes to water pollution. A community’s water supply may also be contaminated if pollutants and toxins are buried. Thus, communities are largely responsible for two of the nation’s most pressing problems: air and water pollution.

To pay for public programs, states and communities levy taxes. They must decide what tax burdens their citizens can carry and whether to tax income, sales, or property. At the same time, they must compete with one another to attract industry and commerce. If taxes are too high, businesses and residents may leave along with jobs. But if taxes are too low, the quality of life may deteriorate. Finding the right level of taxation is one of the toughest jobs facing state and local officials—and one of the most perilous politically. And proposing to raise taxes in the middle of a recession can be particularly risky.

The U.S. Constitution, Article I, Section , specified in 1787 that “the seat of the government of the United States” shall be in a “district not exceeding ten square miles” ceded to the federal government by the states (Maryland and Virginia). The District of Columbia was to be governed by Congress. In defense of a separate district, Alexander Hamilton wrote:

Hamilton’s language is stiff and formal, but his meaning is clear: Making Washington a state would generate undue local pressure on Congress.

The Twenty-third Amendment, ratified in 1961, gives Washington full participation in presidential elections. Because Congress has also granted it, by law, full home rule, the city has its own elected mayor and city council. In 1978, Congress passed another constitutional amendment that would grant the District full congressional representation and the right to vote on ratification of future constitutional amendments. However, the necessary three-quarters of the states failed to ratify this amendment. So while DC residents can vote in presidential elections, they are not represented by voting members in the U.S. Senate or House of Representatives. However, DC is represented by an elected nonvoting delegate to the

U.S. House of Representatives who can vote and serve on a committee but cannot vote on any passage of legislation.

Having failed to gain congressional representation by constitutional amendment, District residents and their supporters in Congress turned to a new strategy—calling on Congress to admit the District to the Union as a state. (While the Constitution specifies that Congress shall govern over “such District not exceeding ten miles square . . . as the seat of the government,” presumably Congress could satisfy this constitutional mandate by reducing “the seat of the government” to a few blocks surrounding the Capitol, while admitting the bulk of the District as a state.) This strategy not only reduces the barrier in Congress from a two-thirds vote to a simple majority vote of both houses, but, more important, eliminates the need to secure ratification by three-quarters of the states. Nonetheless, so far Congress has refused to vote for District statehood (presumably the state would be named “Columbia”). Troubles with District self-government have convinced many Congress members that Washington is not ready for statehood. But the District’s residents and its nonvoting representative in Congress never quit trying. Politically, Washington is heavily Democratic, liberal, and black. Its 632,000 residents are likely to support larger social welfare programs, an expanded bureaucracy, and increased federal spending. Opponents of these policies are not likely to be enthusiastic about the District’s representation in Congress.

Nearly 4 million people live on the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico, a population greater than that of 23 states. They are American citizens, who can move anywhere in the United States; and have been subject to the draft in wartime. (Congress granted Puerto Ricans citizenship in 1917.)

The government of Puerto Rico resembles a state government, with a constitution and an elected governor and legislature. However, Puerto Rico has no voting members of Congress and no electoral votes in presidential elections. But Puerto Ricans are represented in the U.S. House of Representatives by a nonvoting representative, just like the District of Columbia.

The United States seized Puerto Rico in 1898 in the Spanish–American War. In 1950, its voters chose to become a “commonwealth ,” and self-governing commonwealth status was officially recognized in 1952. In a 1967 plebiscite, 60 percent of Puerto Ricans voted to remain a commonwealth, 39 percent voted for statehood, and less than 1 percent voted for independence. In nonbinding referenda in 1991, 1993, and 1998, Puerto Ricans continued to support commonwealth status. That changed in 2012. In a two-part referendum, 52 percent first voted against keeping their current U.S. commonwealth status. Then, when asked if they wanted to become a U.S. state, an independent country, or a freely associated state (a type of independence in close alliance with the United States), 61 percent of those who answered the second question opted for statehood. But because over 470,000 voters had intentionally left the second question blank, opponents of statehood were quick to point out that only 45 percent of all those casting ballots—less than a majority—supported statehood. Puerto Ricans remain divided between statehood and commonwealth status and Congress seems to be in no hurry to push for statehood. Many Congress members worry that statehood would cause their own states to lose federal funding and representatives in Congress. Article IV, Section of the U.S. Constitution gives the U.S. Congress the power to grant statehood.

Under commonwealth status Puerto Ricans pay no U.S. income tax, although local taxes are substantial. Yet, they receive all of the benefits to which U.S. citizens are entitled—Social Security, public assistance, food stamps, Medicaid, and Medicare. If Puerto Rico were to become a state, its voters could participate in presidential and congressional elections; but its taxpayers would not enjoy the same favorable cost–benefit ratio they enjoy under commonwealth status. Some Puerto Ricans also fear that statehood would dilute the island’s cultural identity and perhaps force English upon them as the national language.

In addition to the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the United States has 12 “territories,” also known as possessions. The major territories are the U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam, and the Northern Mariana Islands. The residents of all U.S. territories are full U.S. citizens (with the exception of those on American Samoa who are U.S. nationals, but not citizens). These residents possess all the rights and obligations of U.S. citizens, including Social Security payments and benefits and service in the armed forces, except for the right to vote in presidential elections or to vote for representatives in U.S. Congress. Like the District of Columbia, each territory elects a nonvoting delegate at-large to the U.S. House of Representatives who can participate in committees but cannot vote on legislation. However, both the Democratic and Republican parties seat voting delegations from the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the territories at their presidential nominating conventions.¹⁹