New England Southerners and the British. Vermont was admitted to statehood in 1791 after settling a dispute with New York. The territory of Maine had been a part of Massachusetts, but it was granted statehood on March 15, 1820 as part of the Missouri Compromise. Today, New England is defined as the six states of Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. New England's economic growth relied heavily on trade with the British Empire, and the region's merchants and politicians strongly opposed trade restrictions. As the United States and the United Kingdom fought the War of 1812, New England Federalists
Geology of Rhode Island Pleistocene glaciations. The state's geology is part of the broader geology of New England. Rhode Island is divided into two distinct physiographic regions. The Eastern Highlands occupy the northwestern interior of the state, near the state line with Connecticut while the majority of the state's land area is grouped with the larger Atlantic Coastal Plain that extends along the eastern seaboard of the US. Rhode Island is the only state in New England formed entirely atop basement rock from the microcontinent Avalonia. The bedrock of Rhode Island first took shape with the emergence of a volcanic arc near a subduction