The Declaration of Independence represented thirteen British colonies in North America.
Those colonies were New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. Together, they became the original United States after declaring independence.
The number thirteen appears repeatedly in early American symbols. The first U.S. flag had thirteen stars and thirteen stripes, and the Great Seal's design also uses thirteen in several places. A common error is to count only the colonies that voted immediately or to confuse the thirteen colonies with the states that later ratified the Constitution.
The declaration's formal title referred to the “thirteen United States of America.” Although New York's delegates initially abstained from the July 4 vote because they lacked instructions, New York was still one of the thirteen colonies represented in the political union described by the document.