Liberty bell

The Liberty Bell was cast in England in 1752 for Pennsylvania Statehouse (now Independence Hall). The Liberty Bell, like many Americans, is an immigrant, and it was not always known by its present name. It was originally known as the Old Statehouse Bell or the Province Bell.

Damaged after transit, it was recast in Philadelphia in 1753. It is inscribed with the words “Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof”. The bell was rung on July 8, 1776, for the first public reading of the Declaration of Independence. At every event of national importance, the Liberty Bell joined its harmonious tones to the general acclaim: in 1789, the election of George Washington; in 1797, the election of John Adams; in 1799, the death of Washington, in 1801, the election of Thomas Jefferson.

On July 8, 1835, while telling for the funeral procession of John Marshall, Chief of Justice of the Supreme Court and one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, the great bell cracked.

It was after this that the Liberty Bell received its name. Since then, the bell has been on display but has never rung. In fact, no one living knows the voice of the Liberty Bell, for it has never spoken since 1835. Now it is in the Independence Hall of Philadelphia.

THE STATUE OF LIBERTY

To many people, the Statue of Liberty is one of America’s most cherished symbols. It is the symbol of freedom, a freedom that millions of people have come to America to find.

The Statue of Liberty is the large copper statue that stands in New York Harbor on Liberty Island

( formerly Bedloe’s Island). Its proper name is Liberty Enlightening the World. France gave the monument to the USA in 1884 as a symbol of friendship and of the liberty that citizens enjoy under a free form of government.

THE BALD EAGLE

The bald eagle serves as the American national bird, a symbol of the size and strength of the nation. In 1782 it was adopted as the national bird for the USA.

Benjamin Franklin objected to the choice of the bald eagle as the American national bird. He wrote, the eagle is “ a bird of bad moral character; he doesn’t get his living honestly…Too lazy to fish for himself, he watches the labor of the fishing hawk and… takes fish from him.” Franklin suggested choosing the wild turkey instead, but he was outvoted. His colleagues saw the bald eagle as a symbol of freedom and power.

NATIONAL MOTTO: IN GOD WE TRUST

It was adopted on July, 30, 1956 by US Congress. It first appeared on some US coins in 1864, disappeared and reappeared on various coins until 1955, when Congress ordered it placed on all paper money and coins.

“UNCLE SAM”

It is the nickname for the American government. It rose during the War 1812, when Samuel Wilson was an inspector of provisions destined for the American Army, at Troy. The abbreviation of “US” marked on the casks, was then unfamiliar to the people, and one of the workmen spread the facetious saying that it meant “Uncle Sam” Wilson. The old joke about “Uncle Sam” was carried from camp – fire to camp – fire and permeated all the armies in the field.

LECTURE 2

AMERICAN HISTORY

1000. Leif Ericson sails to the east coast of North America

1492 October 12. Christopher Columbus lands in the Bahamas

1607 Colonists establish first permanent English settlement at Jamestown, Virginia.

1776 July 4. The 13 colonies sign the Declaration of Independence

1783 September 3. Britain and US sign Treaty of Paris recognizing American independence. New nation extends from Canada south to Florida, and west from the Atlantic to the Mississippi River.

1787 May 25. Constitutional Convention meets in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to revise Articles of Confederation, the compact among states governing the newly independent nation. New Constitution is adopted by delegates on September 17.

1789 February 4. George Washington is elected first president.

1791 First 10 amendments, the Bill of Rights, are added to the US Constitution.

1796 John Adams is elected second president

1800 Thomas Jefferson is elected third president

1801 December 1. Federal capital moves to Washington, D.C., from temporary quarters in Philadelphia.

1812 War of 1812 against Britain begins. US wins series of naval victories but fails in attempts to invade Canada.

1819 US buys Florida from Spain.

1828 Andrew Jackson is elected seventh president. First US passenger railroad is begun. Noah Webster publishes American Dictionary of the English Language

1836 Texas wins independence from Mexico; it is admitted as a state to the Union in 1845.

1860 Abraham Lincoln is elected 16^th president.

1863 January 1. President Lincoln issues Emancipation Proclamation granting freedom to slaves in southern states.

July 1 – 3. Union forces win major battle at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

November 19. President Lincoln delivers historic Gettysburg Address.

1865 April 9. Civil War ends with surrender of Confederate general, Robert E. Lee, to Union commander, Ulysses S. Grant, at Appo – mattox Court House in Virginia.

April 14. President Lincoln is shot while attending theater in Washington. Lincoln dies the next morning.

1867 Territory of Alaska is purchased from Russia.

1878 First telephone exchange opens.

1879 Thomas A. Edison invents incandescent electric lamp.

1901 September 14.Eight days after being shot, President William McKinley dies; Vice President Theodore Roosevelt becomes president.

1906 President Theodore Roosevelt is first American to receive Nobel Peace Prize.

1908 October 1. Henry Ford introduces efficient, low – cost car, beginning the era of mass production, and “puts America on wheels”.

1914 August 15. Panama Canal, built by the US across Central America, opens, permitting ships to travel from Atlantic to the Pacific without rounding the tip of South America.

1936 Franklin D. Roosevelt is elected to the second term as president and, in 1940, to an unprecedented third term.

1944 November 7. President Roosevelt is elected to the fourth term.

1945 August 6. Atomic bomb is dropped on Hiroshima and, three days later on Nagasaki in Japan.

1949 April 4. United States, Canada, and Western European nations form North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to provide mutual military aid if any member is attacked.

1959 Alaska becomes 49^th state. Hawaii becomes 50^th state.

1960 November. John F. Kennedy is elected 35^th president.

1961 May 5. Astronaut Alan B. Shepard Jr. makes first manned US space flight.

1968 April 4. Martin Luther King Jr., civil rights leader and winner of Nobel Peace Prize, is fatally shot in Memphis, Tennessee.

1974 August 9. President Nixon resigns from office, the first president to do so, and is succeeded by Vice President Gerald R. Ford.

1976 July 4. United States celebrates its Bicentennial.

October 3 -21 . Seven Americans win Nobel Prizes, including Saul Bellow for literature and Milton Friedman for economics.

1984 July – August. The 23^rd Summer Olympic Games are held in Los Angeles, California (as they were 52 years before, in 1932).

1987 September. The nation celebrates the 2000^th anniversary of the Constitution of the USA.

LECTURE 3

System of Government in the USA

The USA is a federal union of 50 states. Its basic law is the Constitution, adopted in 1787, which prescribes the structure of national government & lists its right & fields of authority.

Besides, each state has its government. Thus, all government in America has the dual character of both Federal & State Government. The basic principle of all American government is the separation of the 3 branches: legislative (the US congress), executive (headed by the President) and judicial (headed by the Supreme Court).

Each branch of government holds a certain degree of power over the others, and all take parts in the governmental process.

Although the American system of government is based on Grate Britain’s, it differs in having a written constitution that is the basis of all government and law.

The Constitution of the USA was adopted after the War of Independence on September 17, 1787. It lists the set of rules, laws regulations which provide the practical norms regulating the work of the government. The document embodied the political theories of the Founding Father, who represented the interest of a privileged class, as the great majority of those who formulated the Constitution, were men of property.

The main principle underlying the Constitution was as follows: private property is the backbone of liberty. It was put forward by a rich plantation owner from Virginia, James Medison, who is know to be the «Father of the Constitution» precisely for this reason.

The Constitution is based on 3 main principles.

The first one guarantees basic rights – freedom of speech and religion. The 2^nd principle tells about a government by the people. The 3^rd principle tells about the three branches of the US government, legislative, executive and judicial, that have different powers.

The Constitution consists of the Preamble and 7 articles. 27 amendments have so far been added to its original text.

The first 10 amendments, know as the Bill of Rights, where added in a group in 1791, as a result of growing popular demands. These amendments establish the individual rights and freedoms to all people of the states, including freedom of speech, freedom of press, freedom of worship, the right of the peaceful assembly, the right to bear arms etc.

Some of the amendments are now relatively unimportant, but the 5^th Amendment retains its significance. It provides «no person shell be deprived of life, liberty or property, without due process of law», and no person «shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself».

All the amendments adopted by the Congress become an integral part of the Constitution. Mention should be made of some of them. The 13^th amendment abolished slavery.

The 14^th and 15^th adopted in 1863 and 1870 defined citizenship and gave the vote to all mail citizens, regardless of race, colour or previous condition of servitude.

The 19^th gave the vote to women and was adopted in 1920. The 22 amendment (1951) makes it impossible for any President to hold office for more than 2 terms. The 26^th amendment was adopted in 1971, it lowered the voting age to 18 years.

Preamble

“We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessing of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America. ”

The Articles of the Constitution.

Article I The Congress has many powers. It can decide taxes and make laws about citizenship and about foreign trade. If the U.S. fights with another country, Congress can declare war.

Article II the President Has Other Powers. He or she is the Commander – in – Chief of the military. The President can choose people to be judges on the Supreme Court, he can choose people to be ambassadors. But the Senate must say okay to these people.

Article III The judicial branch has certain powers. The courts can review some laws. If the laws do not agree with the Constitution, the courts can tell Congress to change the laws. The courts listen to the problems about protecting the Constitution rights if the people.

Article IV. States have a republican form of government. States can make some laws. All states must respect the laws of other states.

Article V. The-fourths of the states must say okay to an amendment.

Article VI. The Constitution is the supreme law of the U.S. Everyone must follow the Constitution.

Article VII. Three-fourth of the states must say okay to this Constitution.

Within the Executive branch, there are 14 executive departments. These are: the Department of State, Treasury (міністерство фінансів), Defense, Justice (юстиції), Interior, Agriculture, Commerce (торгівлі), Labor, Health and Human services (охорони здоров’я і соц. забезпечення), Housing and Urban Development (житлового буд-ва і міського розвитку), Transportation, Education, Energy and Veteran Affairs, Each department is established by law and is responsible for a specific area. The heads of the departments are Cabinet members, they are appointed by President (however, must be approved by the Senate).

When the President’s service ends, it is customary for the Cabinet to resign, so the new President can appoint new chiefs of executive departments.

The State Department ranks ahead of other departments in prestige and authority. The political power of the Secretary of State is second only to that of the President. The Secretary of State has the duty of trying to maintain peace and to negotiate economic and political treaties.

In addition to Secretaries, President has an inner Cabinet, the so-called “White House Office”. It is the name given to the President’s immediate assistants and various advisers on the different aspects of home and foreign policy.

The powers given to each branch of the government are carefully balanced by the powers of the other two. Each branch serves as a check on the others. Congress has the power to make laws, but the President may veto any act of Congress. Congress, in turn, can override a veto by a two-thirds vote in each house. Congress can also refuse to provide funds requested by the president. The president can appoint important officials of his administration, but they must be approved by the Senate. The President also has the power to name all federal judges; they, too, must be approved by the senate. The courts have the power to determinate the constitutionality of all acts of congress and of Presidential actions, and to strike down those they find unconstitutional.

The Legislative branch is the Congress, which consist of the Senate and the House of Representative’s. The main function of the legislative branch is to make laws. The congress can make laws about trade, taxes, citizenship and about the District of Columbia. It can maintain army, Navy and Air Force, declare war, establish U. S. Post Office, print and borrow money. The Congress cannot take away the right to a trial, give title of nobility, put a tax on exports, use tax money without authorization. It cannot make laws about marriage, driver’s, licenses, police, etc. (These are done by the states).

There are 435 representatives in the house. A Representative must be at least 25, a U.S. citizen for seven years, and live in the state from which he is elected. There is usually one representative for about 580,000 people in a state. However, all states must have least one representative in the House. States with many representatives have more power in the House then states with only a few representatives. California, which has the larges population, has the greatest number of representatives.

There are 100 members in the Senate, two from each state. Senators must be at least 30 years old, he must live in state and be a U.S. citizen for not less than 9 years. Senators are elected for a term of six years. Their specials duties are: to ratify /approve treaties, to confirm appointments, to try impeached officials. Only the House of President can impeach officials. Only Senate can try the officials. The Senate decides if the official can stay in office.

Although Congressional elections take place every two years, only one-third of the senate in re-elected, thereby ensuring continuity.

The individual seats in the Senate are numbered. Democrats sit in the western part of the chamber – on Vice – President’s right. Republicans sit on the left. Vice-President presides over the Senate and he conducts debates. The Senate is stabler and more conservative than the House, as many Senators are re-elected several times and often they are more experienced politicians.

Congressmen of the house of Representatives. do not have individual seats, by tradition democrats sit on the Speaker’s right, Republicans – on his left. The speaker presides over the House, he conducts debates. The Speaker, like Vice-President, may vote, but usually he does not do it, except in case of tie-vote.

Salary: House of Representatives – 57,500$ a year

Senate – 57,500$ a year

The executive branch includes the President, Vice-President and the Cabinet consisting “of 14 Secretaries of the executive department. “Administration” is a popular term to identify the executive branch of the federal government, responsible for administering and executing laws. The president is elected every 4 years to a 4-years of office, with no more than two full terms allowed (since the 22 Amendment in 1951). He must be a natural-burn citizen of the USA, at least 35 years old, and for at least 14 years a resident of the USA. The term of office of the President begins at noon on January 20.

The president is the head of the state and the government, and the C.-in-C. of the armed forces. He makes foreign police, approved or vetoes laws, appoint judges, advisors and ambassadors; he can pardon a person for a federal crime (give amnesty).