American state underpinned by hush money (4)
I believe the answer is:
cash
'money' is the definition.
(cash is a type of money)
'american state underpinned by hush' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite see how this works, but
'american' could be 'a' (common abbreviation - e.g. in organisation names) and 'a' is found in the answer.
'hush' could be 'sh' (both are used to tell someone to be quiet) and 'sh' is found in the answer.
A single letter 'c' remains which might be clued in a way I don't understand.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for cash that I've seen before include "Brass" , "Wimbledon champion" , "bread" , ""Readies"" , "Till" .)