when did louisiana become a part of the united states
20 December 1803
title: Louisiana text: treaty. Despite Federalist objections, the U.S. Senate ratified the Louisiana treaty on October 20, 1803. By statute enacted on October 31, 1803, President Thomas Jefferson was authorized to take possession of the territories ceded by France and provide for initial governance. A transfer ceremony was held in New Orleans on November 29, 1803. Since the Louisiana territory had never officially been turned over to the French, the Spanish took down their flag, and the French raised theirs. The following day, General James Wilkinson accepted possession of New Orleans for the United States. A similar ceremony was held in St. Louis title: History of New Orleans text: There was another relevant treaty in 1801, the Treaty of Aranjuez, and later a royal bill issued by King Charles IV of Spain in 1802; these confirmed and finalized the retrocession of Spanish Louisiana to France. In April 1803, Napoleon sold Louisiana (New France) (which then included portions of more than a dozen present-day states) to the U.S. in the Louisiana Purchase. A French prefect, Pierre Clément de Laussat, who had only arrived in New Orleans on March 23, 1803, formally took control of Louisiana for France on November 30, only to hand it over to the U.S. on December title: Colonial history of the United States text: (including Puerto Rico), and the Spanish East Indies (including Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands). New Spain encompassed the territory of Louisiana after the Treaty of Fontainebleau (1762), though Louisiana reverted to France in the 1800 Third Treaty of San Ildefonso. Many territories that had been part of New Spain became part of the United States after 1776 through various wars and treaties, including the Louisiana Purchase (1803), the Adams–Onís Treaty (1819), the Mexican–American War (1846–1848), and the Spanish–American War (1898). There were also several Spanish expeditions to the Pacific Northwest, but Spain gave the United States all claims to title: Louisiana text: on March 9, 1804, when a French tricolor was raised near the river, replacing the Spanish national flag. The following day, Captain Amos Stoddard of the First U.S. Artillery marched his troops into town and had the American flag run up the fort's flagpole. The Louisiana territory was officially transferred to the United States government, represented by Meriwether Lewis. The Louisiana Territory, purchased for less than 3 cents an acre, doubled the size of the United States overnight, without a war or the loss of a single American life, and set a precedent for the purchase of territory. It opened title: Louisiana text: as President of the United States. Louisiana's secession was announced on January 26, 1861, and it became part of the Confederate States of America. The state was quickly defeated in the Civil War, a result of Union strategy to cut the Confederacy in two by seizing the Mississippi. Federal troops captured New Orleans on April 25, 1862. Because a large part of the population had Union sympathies (or compatible commercial interests), the Federal government took the unusual step of designating the areas of Louisiana under Federal control as a state within the Union, with its own elected representatives to the