there was not a single congress without delegates. During the period from 1870 to 1891, there were as many as ten serving at one time. With the admission of Hawaii, and with Puerto Rico sending a Resident Commissioner, the office temporarily went out of existence. Resident commissioner Similar to delegates are resident commissioners, who represented the large areas acquired during the Spanish–American War, and for much of the 20th century were considered colonies, not territories and unlike the previously acquired areas which would become the contiguous U.S. or Alaska and Hawaii, did not have residents with the rights of or to U.S. citizenship. Territories can secede from the United States with the consent of Congress, and in the case of the Philippines, they have. Puerto Rico Puerto Rico, a U.S. commonwealth, has been represented by a non-voting resident commissioner since 1901. The resident commissioner holds a status similar to that of a delegate within the House, but serves a four-year term. The resident commissioner is the only individual elected to the House who serves for this duration. The Philippines From 1907 until 1937, while it was a U.S. territory, the Philippines elected two non-voting resident commissioners to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives. From 1937 until 1946, while it was a U.S. commonwealth, the Philippines sent one non-voting resident commissioner to the House. Upon independence in 1946, the Philippines ceased to be represented in Congress. List of past delegates Listed here by their congressional districts. Current delegates In the mid-1960s, a number of small territories that had no prospects of becoming states began to petition for representation in Congress. Starting in 1970, the House of Representatives started to grant representation to these territories, but with limited voting rights. American Samoa As the U.S. Virgin Islands and Guam had delegates in Washington, D.C., the American Samoa-based Political Status Study Commission had meetings with the delegates from these two territories. They came home to Pago Pago convinced of the importance of having this representation in the nation's capital. Members of the American Samoa Fono had already been attending budget hearings in Washington for over a decade by 1970. During a special session held in July 1969, Salanoa Aumoeualogo, the President of the American Samoa Senate, introduced Senate Bill 54 to create a delegate at-large to Washington with four-year terms (without congressional rights), which was approved by Governor Owen Aspinall on August