Mark Brader:
> * We will start with a US history question for Round 1. When did
> the Congress pass the "Articles of Confederation and Perpetual
> Union between the States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay,
> Rhode Island, and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York,
> New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North
> Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia", which also introduced
> the term "United States of America" into official usage?
Rob Parker 1776-07-04 -499 days
Erland Sommarskog 1776-07-04 -499
Marc Dashevsky 1776-11-11 -369
Bruce Bowler 1777-06-30 -138
Joshua Kreitzer 1777-09-04 -72
** CORRECT ** 1777-11-15
Stephen Perry 1777-11-15
Dan Tilque 1779-06-24 +586
Gareth Owen 1779-10-23 +707
Jeff Turner 1783-10-20 +2,165
Dan Blum 1787-06-30 +3,514
Peter Smyth 1787-07-04 +3,518
Peter Smyth is eliminated. Well done to Stephen for the exact answer.
The earliest answer given was 1776-07-04. What happened then was that
the Congress, having voted 2 days earlier to declare independence,
voted to accept the wording of the Declaration of Independence.
This declaration did not form any entity called the USA, but declared
that *each* of 13 colonies was now an independent state. Because they
acted in unison, the phrase "united States of America" was used (in
two places), but in the original handwritten version it was spelled
without a capital U, and "United Colonies" was used as well with the
same meaning.
The Articles of Confederation was the first agreement by these nascent
countries to enter into a perpetual union, and specified that "The
Stile of this Confederacy shall be 'The United States of America'."
After being passed by the Congress it had to be ratified by the 13
states, which was completed on 1781-03-01.
The Articles of Confederation were then replaced by the Constitution,
which converted the USA from a confederation of 13 countries into a
federal union. This was adopted by a constitutional convention on
1787-09-17, close to the date that Dan and Peter gave. Again, it had
to be ratified by the 13 states, which was completed on 1790-05-29;
but it asserted that it only had to be ratified by 9 states to be in
effect among the ratifying states, and was proclaimed to be in effect
on 1789-03-04 when 11 states had ratified.
--
Mark Brader, Toronto "I seem to have become a signature quote."
m...@vex.net -- David Keldsen