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Louisiana
The Pelican State, where the Mississippi meets the Gulf
Louisiana is built almost entirely of river. For thousands of years the Mississippi has dumped its sediment here on its way to the Gulf of Mexico, raising a vast, flat delta of bayous, swamps, and marsh that makes up the southern third of the state. It is the lowest and wettest of the Gulf states, with much of New Orleans sitting below sea level behind levees. The north rises into low rolling hills and pine forest, but water — fresh, brackish, and salt — defines the place.
The delta is one of the most productive and most fragile landscapes in the country. Its wetlands shelter fisheries, refineries, and the busy ports of the lower Mississippi, yet they are vanishing fast, losing land to subsidence, sea-level rise, and the very levees that protect the cities. Driskill Mountain, the high point, reaches a mere 535 feet (163 m). The combination of river, swamp, and Gulf has shaped a culture — Cajun and Creole, French and Spanish, African and American — as distinctive as the geography that produced it.
Economy
Louisiana's economy runs on the Mississippi River and the Gulf: oil and gas production and refining, petrochemical plants lining the river, and some of the busiest ports in the nation, including the Port of South Louisiana. Seafood, sugarcane and rice farming, and the tourism magnet of New Orleans complete a distinctive Gulf Coast economy.
Politics
Louisiana carries 8 electoral votes and votes reliably Republican in presidential elections, while New Orleans remains a strong Democratic stronghold. The state has a distinctive local political culture organized around parishes rather than counties and a nonpartisan jungle-primary system.