U.S. possessions

Political divisions (also referred to as administrative divisions) of the United States are the various recognized governing entities that together form the United States. The first-level political (administrative) division of the United States is the state. There are 50 states, which are bound together in a union with each other. Each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a defined geographic territory, and shares its sovereignty with the United States federal government. According to numerous decisions of the United States Supreme Court, the 50 individual states and the United States as a whole are each sovereign jurisdictions.

All state governments are modeled after the federal government and consist of three branches (although the three-branch structure is not Constitutionally required): executive, legislative, and judicial. They retain plenary power to make laws covering anything not preempted by the U.S. Constitution, federal statutes, or treaties ratified by the U.S. Senate, and are organized as presidential systems where the governor is both head of government and head of state (even though this too is not required). The various states are then typically subdivided into counties. Louisiana uses the term parish and Alaska uses the term borough for what the Census terms county equivalents in those states.

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