U.S. state
Also known as US state, U.S.A. state, state of America, state of United States, USA state, state of the United States, state of the USA, federated state of the USA
constituent political entity of the United States of America
AI overview
A U.S. state is a political division that makes up part of the United States, with its own government that handles local laws and services within its borders. States matter because they share power with the federal government, allowing Americans to have laws and policies tailored to their regional needs while remaining part of the larger nation.
AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.
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In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sovereignty with the federal government. Due to this shared sovereignty, Americans are citizens both of the federal republic and of the state in which they reside. State citizenship and residency are flexible, and no government approval is required to move between states, except for persons restricted by certain types of court orders, such as paroled convicts and children of divorced spouses who share child custody.
State governments in the U.S. are allocated power by the people of each respective state through their individual state constitutions. All are grounded in republican principles (this being required by the federal constitution), and each provides for a government, consisting of three branches, each with separate and independent powers: executive, legislative, and judicial. States are divided into counties or county-equivalents, which may be assigned some local governmental authority but are not sovereign. County or county-equivalent structure varies widely by state, and states also create other local governments.