Northern Mariana Islands

The Northern Mariana Islands, officially the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), is an insular area and commonwealth of the United States consisting of 14 islands in the north western Pacific Ocean. The CNMI includes the 14 northernmost islands in the Mariana Archipelago except the southernmost island of the chain, Guam, which is a separate U.S. territory. The CNMI and Guam are the westernmost point (in terms of jurisdiction) and territory of the United States.

The Islands have a landmass of 475,26 km² and a population of 53.883 people (census 2010) The vast majority of the population resides on Saipan, Tinian, and Rota. The other islands of the Northern Marianas are sparsely inhabited. The administrative center is Capitol Hill, a village in north western Saipan. However, most publications consider Saipan to be the capital because the island is governed as a single municipality.

The first people of the Mariana Islands immigrated at some point between 4000 BC and 2000 BC from Southeast Asia. The ancient people of the Marianas raised colonnades of megalithic capped pillars called latte stones upon which they built their homes. The first European explorer of the area, the Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan, arrived in 1521. He landed on Guam, the southernmost island of the Marianas, and claimed the archipelago for Spain. Three days after he had been welcomed on his arrival, Magellan fled the archipelago. Spain regarded the islands as annexed and later made them part of the Spanish East Indies (1565). In 1734, the Spanish built a royal palace in Guam for the governor of the islands. Guam operated as an important stopover between Manila and Mexico for galleons carrying gold between the Philippines and Spain. Some galleons sunk in Guam remain.

In 1668, Father Diego Luis de San Vitores renamed the islands Las Marianas in honour of his patroness the Spanish regent Mariana of Austria (1634–1696), widow of Felipe IV (reigned 1621-1655). Following its loss during the Spanish-American War of 1898, Spain ceded Guam to the United States and sold the remainder of the Marianas (the Northern Marianas), along with the Caroline Islands, to Germany under the German-Spanish Treaty of 1899. Germany administered the islands as part of its colony of German New Guinea and did little in terms of development.

Early in World War I, Japan declared war on Germany and invaded the Northern Marianas. In 1919, the League of Nations awarded all of Germany's islands in the Pacific Ocean located north of the Equator, including the Northern Marianas, under mandate to Japan. Under this arrangement, the Japanese thus administered the Northern Marianas as part of the South Pacific Mandate. During the Japanese period, sugar cane became the main industry of the islands. Garapan on Saipan was developed as a regional capital.

On 8 December 1941, hours after the attack on Pearl Harbour, Japanese forces from the Marianas launched an invasion of Guam. On 15 June 1944, the United States military invaded the Mariana Islands, starting the Battle of Saipan, which ended on 9 July.

After Japan's defeat in World War II, the Northern Marianas were administered by the United States as part of the United Nations Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, which gave responsibility for defence and foreign affairs to the United States. Negotiations for commonwealth status began in 1972 and a covenant to establish a commonwealth in political union with the United States was approved in a 1975 referendum. A new government and constitution partially came into effect in on 9 January 1978. The United Nations approved this arrangement pursuant to Security Council Resolution 683. The Northern Mariana Islands came under U.S. sovereignty on 4 November 1986.

The Northern Mariana Islands does not have voting representation in the United States Congress, but, since 2009, has been represented in the U.S. House of Representatives by a delegate who may participate in debate but may not vote on the floor. The commonwealth has no representation in the U.S. Senate.

The Northern Mariana Islands do not issue their own stamps, but use the stamps of the United States. There are only two stamps dedicated to the Islands, one to commemorate the relation between the USA and the Islands issued on 4 November 1993 and one in the Flags of our Nation series from 11 August 2011. I bought some of these on internet and sent my envelope to the post office on Saipan. It arrived with a nice, but light, postmark.

Date sent: 2 May 2017

Date postmark: 23 May 2017

Date received: 7 June 2017

Number of days: 36

Envelope in collection: 148