 Following the Peace of Paris, the U.S. grew internally, first by territories that would become states in the Ordinance of 1787.Virginia ceded its colonial charter claims to the lands north of the Ohio River.The Northwest Territory as defined by the Ordinance of 1787—that is, the U.S. lands recognized in the Treaty of Paris (1783) north of the Ohio River and east of the Mississippi—was commemorated on its 150th anniversary with a stamp issued on July 13, 1937.