We're all going to talk about this, so I'm taking notes: 2026 is...
"The United States Semiquincentennial,[a] also called the Bisesquicentennial, the Sestercentennial, or the Quarter Millennium, will be the 250th anniversary of the United States Declaration of Independence. " I'd say Independence Day, July 4 1776, isn't really the date we got the "United States of America":
June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia proposed a resolution that used the name “United Colonies”: "Resolved, That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved,”
June 28 1776, Thomas Jefferson’s draft version of the Declaration started with the following sentence: “A Declaration of the Representatives of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, in General Congress assembled.” but that version wasn't passed...
July 2 1776, the Second Continental Congress made a unanimous resolution and
July 4, 1776 the Declaration of Independence as signed by 23 Congressmen starts with “The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America.” No capital letter in "united" nor anywhere in the document, but "United Colonies" is.
July 8, 1776 the words “United States of America” appeared in the first draft of the Articles of Confederation. The Articles weren’t ratified by the states until March 1781.
August 1776, government
inspectors approved that official gunpowder met standards by stamping “U.S.A.” on the casks.
September 9, 1776, Congress moved that where "the words ‘United Colonies’ have been used, the stile be altered for the future to the “United States.”
September 3, 1783: The Treaty of Paris ended the Revolutionary war with "Prince George the Third" and the "United States of America". Unusual for the era, it was written in English, not French. It recognizes the "free sovereign and independent states".
September 17, 1787, The Constitution that formed the nation itself was signed during the Philadelphia Constitutional Convention.
June 21, 1788, the Constitution is fully ratified by the States, officially forming the United States of America.
I'd say we really don't get the USA's 250th until 2038. Lets have a party now anyway: September 9, 1776 works, too.
references:
https://constitutioncenter.org/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Semiquincentennial
https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/declara/ruffdrft.html
https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/paris.asp
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