HaCKeRz KrOnIcKLeZ 3/HaCKeRz_KrOnIcKLeZ.iso/anarchy/essays/schoolsucks/usgov.txt

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U.S. Government (History)
The United States Government

A collection of short reports all dealing with the United States Government.

William Jefferson Clinton


        William Jefferson Clinton was born on August 19, 1946, in Hope,
Arkansas.  His father,
William J. Blythe III was killed in an automobile collision just two months
before WilliamÆs birth.
At age four, William Jefferson Blythe IV was legally adopted by his mothers
second husband,
Roger Clinton, making him William Jefferson Clinton.
        At age 22 William received a BachelorÆs degree from Georgetown
University.  Just five
years later, he received his law degree from Yale.
          Soon after graduating from Yale, he became a law professor at the
University of
Arkansas.  He did not stay in one place for long though, and in 1978 he
became the Attorney
General of Arkansas.  From this political position, he moved higher up in the
ranks and in 1978
won the election for the gubernatorial seat of Arkansas.  In the 1980
elections, however, William
(Bill) was defeated by Republican Frank White.  As the youngest governor of
Arkansas in 40
years, Bill then became the youngest ex-governor in United States history.
During the interim,
Clinton was hired by the law firm Wright, Lindsey and Jennings.  In the 1982
elections, Mr.
Clinton went after the position of governor with renewed vigor and defeated
incumbent
Republican Frank White.  During the campaigning for the election a Time
magazine article
stated: ôIf Clinton does win, it could seem like less a comeback than a canny
mid-course
correction in the path of a young, bright political star.ö
        Clinton went on to win the next two gubernatorial elections in the
state of Arkansas.  In
1988 he had the possibility of a Democratic Party presidential nomination,
but he refused to run.
Finally, in 1991, Clinton announced that he was going to run for President of
the United States.
        In the 1992 election, Bill Clinton ran against Republican incumbent
George Herbert
Walker Bush and independent Ross H. Perot.  During the campaign, Bill met
with some difficulty
when the media discovered that he had dodged the Vietnam draft, been
unfaithful to his spouse,
and smoked marijuana while attending Oxford.  Bill placated the
liberal-biased media by saying
that he didnÆt believe in the war, and he ôdidnÆt inhale.ö  Opposition
mounted when reporters
discovered that Clinton and his wife, Hillary Rodham, whom he married in
1975, had made some
questionable dealings over a piece of real estate referred to commonly as
Whitewater.
        Despite the seemingly insurmountable odds, Clinton won the election,
with 46% of voting
Americans supporting him.


 Antonin Scalia, Supreme Court Justice

        Antonin Scalia was born March 11, 1936 in an Italian majority section
of Trenton, New
Jersey.  His father, Eugene Scalia was a literary scholar and a professor of
Romance Languages
at Brooklyn College.  His mother was an elementary school teacher.
        Scalia attended Xavier High School, a Catholic Military academy.  He
graduated, first in
his class, in 1953.  One of his good friends once said: ôHe was brilliant,
way above everybody
else.ö  He later majored in History at Georgetown University in Washington,
D.C., where he
again graduated first in his class.  Soon after leaving Georgetown, he
enrolled in Harvard Law
School, where he was known around the campus as an effective debater.
        From Harvard he earned an LL. B. Degree and in 1960 joined the
Cleveland based law
firm Jones, Day, Cockly and Reavis.  He was one of the most straightforward
conservatives on
the staff and there too earned a reputation as a debater.
        Later, President Richard Nixon appointed Scalia to the position of
Part-time General
Counsel in Executive Office of Telecom Policy.  He was confirmed by Congress
under the
Gerald Ford administration for the position of Assistant Attorney General in
charge of the Justice
DepartmentÆs office of legal counsel.  At that time his job was mostly to
give advice to the
President and the Attorney General.
        In 1977 he became a Professor at the University of Chicago Law
School. Antonin Scalia
is now an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court.  He took his
oath in 1986 and is
the first Italian-American Supreme Court Justice.  He was part of President
Ronald ReaganÆs
effort to make the judiciary system more conservative.
        Mr. Scalia is very outspoken against racially based affirmative
action programs and the
ôConstitutional Rightö to abortion.  His views are closely related to those
of the Reagan
administration.  Scalia is a very intelligent individual, has an elegant
writing style, and has
personal charm that makes him an influential member on the Supreme Court.


Legislative Department

        The Legislative Department consists mostly of the House and the
Senate, the two parts
of Congress.  The Senate has 100 members or two per state.  The House of
Representatives has
one representative per 30,000 people in the state, currently 435, not
including the one from
Washington, D.C., who is not allowed to vote.  This is called the ôgreat
compromiseö because
when the laws were first being written the larger states wanted to have a
system like the House
of Representatives, and the smaller states wanted an equal voice and liked
the Senate system
better.  Finally, in a compromise they decided to have both.

 Facts on the House of Representatives:
╖ House of Representative members are elected to a 2 year  term.
╖ The minimum age to become a member is 25 years.
╖ In order to become a member, you must have been a citizen of the United
States for 7 years.
╖ Members must be a resident of the state they are elected by.
╖ The House of Representatives has the æpower of impeachment.Æ  This means
that the House
can vote to put the president of the United States on trial before the
Senate.  The only president
to have ever been impeached was Andrew Johnson in 1867.  When the Senate
finally voted,
however, he missed being removed from office by one vote.

        Facts on the Senate:
╖ Senators are elected to six year terms.
╖ The minimum age for a senator is 30 years.
╖ You must have been a citizen of the United States for 9 years.
╖ The Senate tries cases of impeachment.

        Powers Granted to Congress
The congress shall have the power
1. To lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts
and provide for the
common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties,
imposts, and excises
shall be uniform throughout the United States;
2. To borrow money on the credit of the United States;
3. To regulate commerce with foreign nations and among several states;
4. To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the
subject of bankruptcies
throughout the United States;
5. To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix
the standard of weights
and measures;
6. To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current
coin of the United
States;
7. To establish post offices and post roads;
8. To promote the progress of science and useful arts by securing for limited
times to authors
and inventors the exclusive rights to their respective writings and
discoveries;
9. To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court;
10.  To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas
and offenses against
the law of nations;
11. To declare war and make rules concerning captures on land and water.
12. To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money for that use
shall be for a longer
term than two years;
13.  To provide and maintain a navy;
14. To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval
forces;
15.  To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the
Union, suppress the
insurrections, and repel invasions;
16. To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia, and for
governing such part of
them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the
states,
respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training
the militia according to
the discipline prescribed by Congress.


Ronald Wilson Reagan

Ronald W. Reagan was born February 6, 1911, in Tampico, Illinois.  He
attended Eureka College
and graduated in 1932 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics.  He was
also popular on his
high school football team and played in college.
        Soon after graduating from college, Reagan began working as a radio
sports announcer.
His big break, however, was in 1937 when he became a contract actor for
Warner Brothers
starring in such movies as Knute Rockne-All American, KingÆs Row, and
probably his most
famous, Bedtime for Bonzo.
        During WWII Reagan patriotically served his country (unlike some
other presidents) as a
captain in the army.  It was soon after this that he became active in
Democratic politics,
supporting Harry S. Truman for president in 1948 and Douglas over Nixon in
the California
senatorial race in 1950.  In 1952, Ronald Reagan married actress Nancy Davis,
a contract
actress for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.  They had two children.
        Between the years of 1954 and 1962 Reagan was the host of a
television program called
General Electric Theater.  In the early 1950Æs, Reagan wised up and became
more conservative,
this time supporting Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952 and Richard Nixon in 1960.
 In 1962, Mr.
Reagan switched his voter registration to Republican, and was elected
governor of California in
1966 and 1970.
        He was not able to do everything that he had hoped as governor,
because for six of the
eight years there was a democratic majority in the state legislature.
However, he did find time to
cut welfare and start the Medi-Cal program to pay medical bills for the poor.
 Reagan increased
income taxes to avoid a projected deficit but later gave rebates when the
state government had
a surplus. Reagan also lowered the high property taxes of California.
        In 1976, Ronald Reagan challenged Gerald R. Ford for the Republican
nomination but
lost by a small margin.  He was not a quitter, however, and in 1980 he chased
after the
nomination again and easily beat George Bush whom he later chose for his vice
president.
        During the Reagan Administration, Reagan brought conservatives to
power both in the
Republican Party and in the nation.  ReaganÆs economic program, sometimes
called
Reaganomics, was a tax and spending cuts budget which stimulated economic
growth between
1982 and 1987.



The Constitution of the United States of America

        The constitution of the United States is the framework of the
government.  On it all laws
are based, and if there is a conflict, the law will be determined
unconstitutional by the Supreme
Court.  An amendment to the constitution is when a change is made to the
constitution.  In this
section of my Government Booklet, some of the most important amendments will
be discussed.

        Amendment 1
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or
prohibiting the free
exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the
right of the people to
peaceably assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of
grievances.

        The first amendment is probably the most famous amendment, because it
gives citizens
of the United States their basic rights and privileges.  However, these
rights do have limits, and
once you go past the limit, you are breaking the law.

        Amendment 2
A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state,
the right of the people to
keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

                Ask any member of the NRA what the second amendment is, and 9
times out of
ten, he will be able to quote it for you.  With the laws going more and more
to the left, it is my
guess that this right will be infringed within the next ten years.

        Amendment 4
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and
effects, against
unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated; and no warrants
shall issue but upon
probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing
the  place to be
searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

        This amendment is basically saying that the government, police, etc.,
cannot come into
your house without a warrant and æjust causeÆ for wanting to search the area.

        Amendment 8
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel
and unusual
punishments inflicted.

        This amendment is one of the ones for people accused of a crime.  In
essence, they are
not to have bail unreasonably high, fines unreasonably high, or tortured.
Many people say that
the death penalty is cruel and unusual punishment, but they are wrong.

        Amendment 13
Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for a crime
whereof the party
shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any
place subject to their
jurisdiction.  Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by
appropriate legislation.

        This amendment totally abolishes any slavery within the legal
jurisdiction of the United
States.

        Amendment 19
The right of the citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or
abridged by the
United States or by any state on account of sex.  The Congress shall have
power to enforce this
article by appropriate legislation.

        This amendment, made in 1920, gives women the right to vote.
Previously, women had
almost no rights, and voting was a privilege that they were not allowed to
have.

        Amendment 21
The Eighteenth Article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States
is hereby repealed.
The transportation or importation into any state, territory, or possession of
the United States for
delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws
thereof, is hereby
prohibited.

        This amendment repealed, or took back the eighteenth amendment which
made alcohol
illegal.

        Amendment 22
No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice,
and no person who has
held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years
of a term to which
some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of
President more than
once.

        This amendment makes it so that a president can only serve for two
terms in his lifetime.
This keeps the United States from ever having a dictatorship.



        Amendment 26
The right of citizens of the United States, who are 18 years of age or older,
to vote shall not be
denied or abridged by the United States or any state on account of age.  The
Congress shall
have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

        This amendment, made in 1971, lowers the voting age from 21 to 18.


                        The Presidents of the United States

      President         Election   Years in      Political Party    Home
State
                                Year        Office

George Washington       1788    1789-1793       None            Virginia
George Washington       1792    1793-1797       None            Virginia
John Adams              1796    1797-1801       Federalist      Massachusetts
Thomas Jefferson        1800    1801-1805       Republican      Virginia
Thomas Jefferson        1804    1805-1809       Republican      Virginia
James Madison           1808    1809-1813       Republican      Virginia
James Madison           1812    1813-1817       Republican      Virginia
James Monroe            1816    1817-1821       Republican      Virginia
James Monroe            1820    1821-1825       Republican      Virginia
John Quincy Adams       1824    1825-1829       Republican      Massachusetts
Andrew Jackson  1828    1829-1833       Democrat        Tennessee
Andrew Jackson  1832    1833-1837       Democrat        Tennessee
Martin Van Buren        1836    1837-1841       Democrat        New York
William H. Harrison     1840    1841            Whig            Ohio
John Tyler                      1841-1845       Whig            Virginia
James K. Polk           1844    1845-1849       Democrat        Tennessee
Zachary Taylor          1848    1849-1850       Whig            Louisiana
Millard Fillmore                        1850-1853       Whig            New
York
Franklin Pierce         1852    1853-1857       Democrat        New Hampshire
James Buchanan  1856    1857-1861       Democrat        Pennsylvania
Abraham Lincoln 1860    1861-1865       Republican      Illinois
Abraham Lincoln 1864    1865            Republican      Illinois
Andrew Johnson          1865-1869       Republican      Tennessee
Ulysses S. Grant        1868    1869-1873       Republican      Illinois
Ulysses S. Grant        1872    1873-1877       Republican      Illinois
Rutherford B. Hayes     1876    1877-1881       Republican      Ohio
James A. Garfield       1880    1881            Republican      Ohio
Chester A. Arthur               1881-1885       Republican      New York
Grover Cleveland        1884    1885-1889       Democrat        New York
Benjamin Harrison       1888    1889-1893       Republican      Indiana
Grover Cleveland        1892    1893-1897       Democrat        New York
William McKinley        1896    1897-1901       Republican      Ohio
William McKinley        1900    1901            Republican      Ohio
Theodore Roosevelt              1901-1905       Republican      New York
Theodore Roosevelt      1904    1905-1909       Republican      New York
William H. Taft         1908    1909-1913       Republican      Ohio
Woodrow Wilson  1912    1913-1917       Democrat        New Jersey
Woodrow Wilson  1916    1917-1921       Democrat        New Jersey
Warren G. Harding       1920    1921-1923       Republican      Ohio
Calvin Coolidge                 1923-1924       Republican      Massachusetts
Calvin Coolidge         1924    1925-1929       Republican      Massachusetts
Herbert Hoover          1928    1929-1933       Republican      California
Franklin D. Roosevelt   1932    1933-1937       Democrat        New York
Franklin D. Roosevelt   1936    1937-1941       Democrat        New York
Franklin D. Roosevelt   1940    1941-1945       Democrat        New York
Franklin D. Roosevelt   1944    1945            Democrat        New York
Harry S. Truman         1945-1949       Democrat        Missouri
Harry S. Truman 1948    1949-1953       Democrat        Missouri
Dwight D. Eisenhower    1952    1953-1957       Republican      Pennsylvania
Dwight D. Eisenhower    1956    1957-1961       Republican      Pennsylvania
John F. Kennedy 1960    1961-1963       Democrat        Massachusetts
Lyndon B. Johnson               1963-1965       Democrat        Texas
Lyndon B. Johnson       1964    1965-1969       Democrat        Texas
Richard M. Nixon        1968    1969-1973       Republican      California
Richard M. Nixon        1972    1973-1974       Republican      California
Gerald R. Ford                  1974-1977       Republican      Michigan
Jimmy Carter            1976    1977-1981       Democrat        Georgia
Ronald Reagan           1980    1981-1985       Republican      California
Ronald Reagan           1984    1985-1989       Republican      California
George Bush             1988    1989-1993       Republican      Texas
Bill Clinton            1992    1993-           Democrat        Arkansas


The Executive Branch

        The executive branch of the government is led by the president,
currently Bill Clinton.
His main duties are to:

A) Enforce laws.  It is the in the oath of office of the president to æuphold
the laws and constitution
of the United States.Æ

B) Act as Commander in chief of the armed forces.  The president has this
title because he is the
æhead honchoÆ in the military.  The buck stops there.  The president can ask
congress for the right
to go to war as did Franklin Delano Roosevelt after the bombing of Pearl
Harbor on December 7,
1941.  Congress voted yes and the United States entered WWII.

C) Appoint key officials in the government.  Among the many that the
president appoints are
Supreme Court Justices, the surgeon general, and the attorney general.

D) Recommend laws to congress.  The president can introduce a bill to
congress.  The Senate
and the House will vote on the bill.  If both approve it, it goes back to the
president for him to
sign.  Once he has signed it, it is a law.  Either part of Congress may
introduce a bill as well.  If it
passes through both the House and the Senate, it goes to the president for
him to sign.  If he
disagrees with the bill, he may choose to veto it.  Veto is a combination of
the words vote no.
When the president vetoes a bill, it goes back to Congress for them to review
it.  In order to
check the presidentÆs power and pass the bill into law, there must be a
two-thirds majority when
the ballots are cast.

        The president also has the power to grant a reprieve or pardon to any
convicted criminal
or even someone who has not been charged yet.  This is illustrated by Gerald
FordÆs pardon of
Richard Nixon before he was to be charged for any involvement of his in the
Watergate scandal.
The pardon was granted to keep the United States from being embarrassed at
having one of
their presidents on trial.  On the upside, Nixon was respected globally for
his efforts to open and
establish relations with China.
        The president of the United states has a four year term.  He may
serve up to two terms
in his lifetime.  The salary for the president is $200,000 per year.  The
president must also be a
natural born citizen and must have lived in the United States for 14 years
before running.


Jack Metcalf


        Jack Metcalf, a Washington State senator, attended the University of
Washington
between 1944 and 1948.  He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Pacific
Lutheran University
in 1951 and then later in 1965-66 went back to the University of Washington.
 He also
patriotically served his country in the armed forces between 1946 and 1947.
        Metcalf, a teacher and bed & breakfast owner, has a wife, Norma, and
four children.
        Metcalf has a colorful background as a good Republican public
servant.  His political
career began in 1958 when he received the Republican  nomination for  one of
the Washington
House of Representatives positions.  Between the years of 1961 and 1965, Jack
Metcalf served
his state in the Washington House of Representatives.  In 1964, however, he
was defeated for
re-election.  Never a quitter, though, Metcalf ran for a Washington State
senator position, and
won.  He served as a senator between 1967 and 1975.  In 1968 and 74, Metcalf,
now a seasoned
politician, received the Republican nomination for the Senate.  He served in
the Washington
Senate from 1981 to 1993.  He was the Republican nominee for the United
States House of
Representatives in 1992.
        At the age of 67, he took his House of Representatives oath, and was
the oldest member
of the ôClass of æ94.ö  In his 1992 campaign for the Congressional seat
against Democratic
challenger Al Swift, he promised to limit his terms to six years in Congress.
 He has described
himself as a ôguy willing to take some kamikaze runs.ö  Metcalf has stated a
call for the
restoration of the gold standard, and criticizes the Federal Reserve System.
        In 1994, it did not look like Metcalf was indeed going to again win
the Republican
nomination.  He had to survive direct attacks from Republican rival Senator
Tom Erwin in the
primaries.  He won the nomination, however, but it looked bleak for Metcalf
against State
Senator Harriet Spanel.  However, most of her financial backing came from
unions,
environmentalists, and womenÆs groups.  1994 was the wrong year to be a
liberal.  Although
Spanel had the better funding, she was hurt by her support of the assault
weapons ban and the
Brady Bill.  Metcalf opposed both.  Another thing that helped Metcalf was his
total opposition to
abortion, which made him popular among conservatives.  Spanel won support
from San Juan
County, but Metcalf won the rest of the counties in the district.

Review
        There are three branches of the United States Government.  The
legislative, judicial, and
the executive.  Ideally, no one is more powerful than the other two.  They
are all equal.  They all
have certain powers as well as certain checks on powers.  Congress is the
main body of the
legislative branch, and is composed of two parts: the Senate and the House of
Representatives.
The judicial branch consists of all of the courts in the United States, but
is headed by the
Supreme Court.  The president is the leader of the Executive branch.  In
order to become a
president, one must be at least 35 years of age and a natural born citizen
living in the United
States for 14 years.  The term of office for a president is 4 years.
        The term of office for the Unites States House of Representative
members is  2 years,
while Senators enjoy 6 years in a term.  In order to be in the House, you
must be at least 25
years of age, for Senators the minimum age is 30.  There are 100 members of
the Senate, two
for every state.  The House of Representatives, however, has 435 members,
plus one from
Washington D.C., but he/she is not allowed to vote.
        In order for a bill to become law, it must pass the Senate, House of
Representatives, and
the President must sign it.  If the president vetoes a bill, it is kicked
back into Congress, where it
may undergo revision, or simply be voted upon again.  If Congress votes and
both halves get a
2/3 majority, the bill is passed into law without the president being able to
do anything about it.
        Some of the presidentÆs jobs are to be the Commander in Chief of the
Armed Forces, to
enforces laws, and to grant pardons to criminals.  Congress sets and collects
taxes, has the
power to borrow money, declares war, provides for an army and a navy, creates
lesser courts,
and coins money.


Bibliography

Blough, Glen O. The Young PeopleÆs Book of Science.  United States of
America,
McGraw-Hill, ⌐1968, pp. 1-436.

Claiborne, Robert. Word Mysteries & Histories.   Boston, Houghton Mifflin
Company,
        ⌐1986.  pp. 2-308.

ôCongress.ö  The New American Desk Encyclopedia.  Volume 1, page 302.
        United States of America, Penguin Books Incorporated, 1989.

Markoff, John.  Cyberpunk.  New York, Simon & Schuster, ⌐ 1991, pp. 1-366

ôWebsterÆs New World Dictionary Second College Edition,ö United States of
America,
        The World Publishing Company, ⌐1970.  pp. 156, 224, 332, 627, 633.

Wood, Leonard C.  America, its People and its Values.  United States of
America,
        Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, ⌐1979