New York State's borders touch (clockwise from the northwest) two Great Lakes (Erie and Ontario, which are connected by the Niagara River); one former Great Lake (Lake Champlain); the provinces of Ontario and Quebec in Canada; three New England states (Vermont, Massachusetts, and Connecticut); the Atlantic Ocean, and two Mid-Atlantic states (New Jersey and Pennsylvania). In addition, Rhode Island shares a water border with New York.
New York is also the site of the only extra-territorial enclave within the boundaries of the U.S., the United Nations compound on Manhattan's East River.
The southern tip of New York State—New York City, its suburbs, and the southern portion of the Hudson Valley—can be considered to form the central core of a "megalopolis," a super-city stretching from the northern suburbs of Boston to the southern suburbs of Washington and therefore occasionally called "BosWash". First described by Jean Gottmann in 1961 as a new phenomenon in the history of world urbanization, the megalopolis is characterized by a coalescence of previous already-large cities of the Eastern Seaboard: a heavy specialization on tertiary activity related to government, trade, law, education, finance, publishing and control of economic activity; plus a growth pattern not so much of more population and more area as more intensive use of already existing urbanized area and ever more sophisticated links from one specialty to another. Several other groups of megalopolis-type super-cities exist in the world, but that centered around New York City was the first described and still is the best example.
The five New York City boroughs (and their counties) are:
The eastern end of Long Island includes the suburban counties of Nassau and Suffolk, which, however, are not part of New York City.
The megalopolis, however, is not the only aspect of New York State. While best known for New York City's urban atmosphere, especially Manhattan's skyscrapers, by contrast the rest of the state is dominated by farms, forests, rivers, mountains, and lakes. Few people know that New York's Adirondack State Park is larger than any National Park in the U.S. outside of Alaska. Niagara Falls, on the Niagara River as it flows from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario, is a popular attraction. The Hudson River begins with Lake Tear of the Clouds and flows south through the eastern part of the state without draining Lakes George or Champlain. Lake George empties at its north end into Lake Champlain, whose northern end extends into Canada, where it drains into the Richelieu and then the St Lawrence Rivers. Four of New York City's five boroughs are on the three islands at the mouth of the Hudson River: Manhattan Island, Staten Island, and Long Island.
"Upstate" is a common term for New York State north of the New York City metropolitan area. Which of the suburban counties north of The Bronx along the Hudson River (Rockland, Westchester, Putnam, Orange, and Dutchess) are included in the Upstate region depends on who is using this term. Upstate New York typically includes the Catskill and Adirondack Mountains, the Shawangunk Ridge, the Finger Lakes and the Great Lakes in the west; and Lake Champlain, Lake George, and Oneida Lake in the northeast; and rivers such as the Delaware, Genesee, Hudson, Mohawk, and Susquehanna. The highest elevation in New York is Mount Marcy in the Adirondacks.
East of Manhattan extends the appropriately named Long Island, stretching approximately 120 miles (190 km) from Kings (Brooklyn) and Queens Counties (part of New York City) on the western end to Orient and Montauk Points in the semi-rural "East End" of the Island. The two counties that are encountered as one travels east from New York City are Nassau and Suffolk. Three of Suffolk County's ten towns—Brookhaven, Riverhead, and Southampton— despite being subject to the overdevelopment of New York City's expanding suburbs, are host to the 102,500 acre (415 km²) state designated and protected Central Pine Barrens region. This remarkably undeveloped region overlies part of Long Island's federally designated Sole Source Aquifer which provides drinking water to nearly three million residents, and it contains terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems of statewide and national significance, interconnected surface and ground waters, recreational areas, historic locales, farmlands, and residential communities. This region is the largest remnant of a forest thought to have once encompassed over a quarter million acres (1,000 km²) on Long Island following the last glacial advance some 15,000 to 20,000 years ago. Much of the region's ecosystem is similar to the larger New Jersey Pinelands (also called "Pine barrens") to the south and southwest of New York City, along with Cape Cod's pine barrens. All three areas share geologic and ecological characteristics common along the Atlantic Coastal Plain of the U.S.
Trees have played a major role in the surrounding areas of New York. Very large trees can even grow in the New York metropolitan area (for example, the Queens Giant is the tallest tree and the oldest living thing in the New York metro area).
See also List of National Parks in New York
The first European settlers in the area now known as the State of New York were Dutch settlers in the colony known as New Amsterdam, beginning in 1613. These settlers were claiming this land as theirs, marginalizing the aboriginal inhabitants who had been living there since the Pleistocene epoch. The English traded the modern-day country of Suriname for New Amsterdam in 1664; they renamed it New York, after the Duke of York, the future King James II. On November 1, 1683, the government was reorganized. The colony, then called the Province of New York, was divided into twelve counties, each of which was subdivided into towns. The territory of New York extended much farther than present-day New York State, having no official western boundary other than the Pacific Ocean. Two of New York's eastern coastal counties, Cornwall and Dukes, later became parts of Massachusetts and Maine. Counties were also ceded to Vermont before Vermont entered the Union in 1791.
New York was one of the original thirteen colonies that became the United States. It was the 11th state to ratify the United States Constitution, on July 26, 1788.
The Dutch, who began to establish trading-posts on the Hudson River in 1613, claimed jurisdiction over the territory between the Connecticut and the Delaware Rivers, which they called New Netherlands. The government was vested in "The United New Netherland Company," chartered in 1614, and then in "The Dutch West India Company," chartered in 1621.
In 1649, a convention of the settlers petitioned the "Lords States-General of the United Netherlands" to grant them "suitable burgher government, such as their High Mightinesses shall consider adapted to this province, and resembling somewhat the government of our Fatherland," with certain permanent privileges and exemptions, that they might pursue "the trade of our country, as well along the coast from Terra Nova to Cape Florida as to the West Indies and Europe, whenever our Lord God shall be pleased to permit."
The directors of the West India Company resented this attempt to shake their rule and wrote their director and council at New Amsterdam: "We have already connived as much as possible at the many impertinences of some restless spirits, in the hope that they might be shamed by our discreetness and benevolence, but, perceiving that all kindnesses do not avail, we must, therefore, have recourse to God to Nature and the Law. We accordingly hereby charge and command your Honors whenever you shall certainly discover any Clandestine Meetings, Conventicles or machinations against our States government or that of our country that you proceed against such malignants in proportion to their crimes."
These grants embraced all the lands between the west bank of the Connecticut River and the east bank of the Delaware.
The Duke of York previously purchased in 1663 the grant of Long Island and other islands on the New England coast made in 1635 to the Earl of Stirling, and in 1664 he equipped an armed expedition which took possession of New Amsterdam, which was thenceforth called New York. This conquest was confirmed by the treaty of Breda, in July 1667. In July 1673, a Dutch fleet recaptured New York and held it until it was restored to the English by the treaty of Westminster in February, 1674. The second grant was obtained by in the New York state Library.
The New York constitution was based on its colonial charter. This constitution was framed by a convention which assembled at White Plains, New York on July 10, 1776, and after repeated adjournments and changes of location, terminated its labors at Kingston, New York on Sunday evening, April 20, 1777, when the constitution was adopted with but one dissenting vote. It was not submitted to the people for ratification. It was drafted by John Jay. (Verified from "Journals of the Provincial Congress, Provincial Convention Committee of Safety and Council of Safety of the State of New York, 1775, 1776 1777, vol. I. Albany: Printed by Thurlow Weed, printer to the State 1964." pp. 892-898.)
This constitution was a combination document, containing its Declaration of Independence from Great Britain, and its Constitutional Law. It called for a weak bicameral legislature and a strong executive branch. It retained provisions from the colonial charter such as the substantial property qualification for voting and the ability of the governor to disband the elected legislature. This imbalance of power between the branches of state government kept the elite firmly in control, and disenfranchised most New Yorkers who would fight the Revolutionary War. Slavery was legal in New York until 1827.
Under this constitution, the Assembly had a provision for a maximum of 70 Members, with the following apportionment:
This apportionment was to stand unchanged until a period of seven years from the end of the Revolution had expired, whereupon a census was held to correct the apportionment.
On the subject of Disenfranchisement, Article VII of the new constitution had the following to say:
VII. That every male inhabitant of full age, who shall have personally resided within one of the counties of this State for six months immediately preceding the day of election, shall, at such election, be entitled to vote for representatives of the said county in assembly; if, during the time aforesaid, he shall have been a freeholder, possessing a freehold of the value of twenty pounds, within the said county, or have rented a tenement therein of the yearly value of forty shillings, and been rated and actually paid taxes to this State: Provided always, That every person who now is a freeman of the city of Albany, or who was made a freeman of the city of New York on or before the fourteenth day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and seventy-five, and shall be actually and usually resident in the said cities, respectively, shall be entitled to vote for representatives in assembly within his said place of residence.
The western part of New York had been settled by the six nations of the Iroquois Confederacy for at least 500 years before Europeans came. The Iroquois had maintained the area between Seneca and Cayuga Lakes as a grassland prairie, which abounded in wild game including grazing American Bison herds. In colonial times, the Iroquois were prosperously growing corn, vegetables and orchards, and keeping cows and hogs; fish were also abundant.
The colonial charter of New York granted unlimited westward expansion. Massachusetts' charter had the same provision, causing territorial disputes between the colonies and with the Iroquois. During the revolution, four of the Iroquois nations fought on the side of the British. In 1779, Major General John Sullivan was sent to defeat the Iroquois. The Sullivan Expedition moved northward through the Finger Lakes and Genesee Country, burning all the Iroquois communities and destroying their crops and orchards. Refugees fled to Fort Niagara where they spent the following winter in hunger and misery. Hundreds died of exposure, hunger and disease. After the war, many moved to Canada.
Transportation in western New York was difficult before canals were built in the early part of the nineteenth century. The Hudson and Mohawk Rivers could be navigated only as far as Central New York. While the St. Lawrence River could be navigated to Lake Ontario, the way westward to the other Great Lakes was blocked by Niagara Falls, and so the only route to western New York was over land. Governor DeWitt Clinton strongly advocated building a canal to connect the Hudson River with Lake Erie, and thus all the Great Lakes. Work commenced in 1817, and the Erie Canal was finished in 1825. The canal opened up vast areas of New York to commerce and settlement, and enabled port cities such as Buffalo to grow and prosper. The Welland Canal was completed in 1833, bypassing Niagara Falls to connect Lakes Ontario and Erie.
Sullivan's men returned from the campaign to Pennsylvania and New England to tell of the enormous wealth of this new territory. Many of them were given land grants in gratitude for their service in the Revolution. From 1786 through 1797 several groups of wealthy land speculators entered into agreements with one another, with neighboring states, and with the Indians to obtain title to vast tracts of land in western New York. Some purchases of Iroquois lands are the subject of numerous modern-day land claims by the individual nations of the six nations.