"The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America."
An immediate and vital question is raised by the official title of the Declaration: notice that the document is identified as the work of "thirteen united States," and that the word "States" is capitalized but the word "united" is not. This seems to suggest that our independence gave birth not to one big nation but to a lot of small ones. With the end of British authority in North America, Massachusetts and Virginia and yes, even Rhode Island became independent not only of Parliament and King but of each other.
On the other hand, as soon as the Declaration gets started it speaks of independence as the act of "one People," not thirteen distinct peoples. And in fact, from independence up to 1860 the "united States" always behaved as one nation in their dealings with other nations. While the first Congress under the Articles of Confederation was notoriously ineffective, no state government tried to go it alone.
This question is so important that we Americans ultimately had to fight a Civil War with one another to settle it. When the deep South seceded in two waves in 1860-61,