The Northwest Ordinance served as a bridge between the Declaration of Independence and the Articles of Confederation as well as between the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. It was the most significant legacy of the Confederation Congress. By providing a generous philosophical and practical structural framework for colonial territories to be governed and to evolve into full-fledged states, the Northwest Ordinance ensured that the United States would not encounter the same colonial problems as other empires. The cornerstone of the new imperial policy of the British Empire after 1763 was embodied in the Declaratory Act (1766), which proclaimed that Parliament could bind Americans “in all cases whatsoever.” The Northwest Ordinance did exactly the opposite, saying that once each of the American colonies reached a certain level of population, they could enter the Union as an equal member state. This policy, which was used for the five states that were carved out of the territory northwest of the Ohio River, served as the blueprint for most of the other territorial possessions of the United States that elected statehood.