What were the United States called when there was only one state.?

The colonies had already decalred themselves states in the Declaration of Independence.

They were still the "United States," as per the Articles of Confederation, which had been approved in 1781 and were America's first constitution.

It was known as the New World.

The colonies were part of the British Commonwealth; you would be a citizen/subject of the British Empire. For example if you were from the Commomwealth State of Virginia, you would be British.

When these colonies of commonwealth states 'seceded' from the British empire/commonwealth, they declared themselves in effect a new commonwealth/union of states with a federal government based in the district of Columbia - a kind of neutral Federal land that took on the task of managing the then extremely weak and limited roles of a central federal govt. For example, in that day it was even debated that if President George Washington left the federal govt. to visit a neighboring state, the governor of the neighboring state would in fact be considered then the more powerful official and would have even more executive power than the president of the U.S.A.

State Powers and State Rights were for many years in the U.S.A. considered powerful and separate sovereign bodies who really had more power than the central federal govt. In fact, grammatically,

the people referred to the country as these United States rather than the United States. Secession was frequently debated and at various times both northern and southern states threatened and seriously considered secession as a constitutional mechanism to resolve conflict between states and the federal govt. In fact, despite the great Civil War the issue of secession was never resolved.

One of the major reasons Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis...and other high ranking Confederate officials were never put on trial for treason...was because it was feared that they would appear before the U.S. Supreme court and successfully win their case by showing that secession was in fact constitutional and they were by no means guilty of treason. This would of course open up a giant can of worms as it would basically then have the consequence of saying that the Union forces won the war by violating the US Constitution and that despite losing the war, the southern states were nevertheless well within their constitutional rights to secede. So the issue was 'tabled' and the resolution of secession was in fact ignored and never resolved.

After the Civil War 'these' United States became called 'the' United States. In Europe on up through the early 20th century one even hears the U.S.A. referred to as the American Union. The conflict between strong central govt. and strong decentralized govt. is a conflict common to many nations all over the world going back well over a 1000 yrs. of history. For example, there is now the Russian Federation which is a kind of Confederate Govt. which is more decentralized than the old U.S.S.R which was a highly centralized union. In the early days of the Russian Revolution one of the biggest sources of conflict was the constant bickering and distress regarding the formation of a highly decentralized govt. ruled by local committess/soviets or a highly centralized govt. led by a great central committee. The debate continues. One see's it in various separatist movements ie. Quebec's desire to secede from Canada, Scotland's desire to be Independent from the current United Kingdom and to have its own govt. and constitutional monarchy. It was a problem as old as Greece, Rome and China....

The United States were called these united states, the American Union and as the American Colonies of Great Britain... There was never only one state. The reason there was never 'one' state is that the colonies were established at various times as separate states - never all at once as one big state. To win independence from Britain, these various separate states united so as to combine forces and form a central govt. that could facilitate the war effort. In fact, France <and this was very sensible of France> informed the American patriots that they needed to form a federal/central govt. so as to achieve formal diplomatic recognition and receive French aide. Once could not aide the colonists if they were disorganized as different states without a central federal govt. to negotiate on their behalf.

It was called "Hank."