1.
Honolulu
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Honolulu is the capital and largest city of the U. S. state of Hawaii. It is an part of and the county seat of the City and County of Honolulu on the island of Oahu. The city is the gateway to Hawaii and a major portal into the United States. The city is also a hub for international business, military defense, as well as famously being host to a diverse variety of east-west and Pacific culture, cuisine. Honolulu is the most remote city of its size in the world and is both the westernmost and the southernmost major U. S. city. For statistical purposes, the U. S. Census Bureau recognizes the area commonly referred to as City of Honolulu as a census county division. Honolulu is a financial center of the islands and of the Pacific Ocean. The population of the city of Honolulu was 337,256 as of the 2010 census, while the Honolulu CCD was 390,738, Honolulu means sheltered harbor or calm port. The old name is said to be Kou, a district encompassing the area from Nuuanu Avenue to Alakea Street. The city has been the capital of the Hawaiian Islands since 1845, as of 2015, Honolulu was ranked high on world livability rankings, and was also ranked as the 2nd safest city in the U. S. It is also the most populated Oceanian city outside Australasia and ranks second to Auckland as the most populous city in Polynesia, evidence of the first settlement of Honolulu by the original Polynesian migrants to the archipelago comes from oral histories and artifacts. These indicate that there was a settlement where Honolulu now stands in the 11th century, however, after Kamehameha I conquered Oʻahu in the Battle of Nuʻuanu at Nuʻuanu Pali, he moved his royal court from the Island of Hawaiʻi to Waikīkī in 1804. His court relocated in 1809 to what is now downtown Honolulu, the capital was moved back to Kailua-Kona in 1812. In 1794, Captain William Brown of Great Britain was the first foreigner to sail into what is now Honolulu Harbor, more foreign ships followed, making the port of Honolulu a focal point for merchant ships traveling between North America and Asia. In 1845, Kamehameha III moved the permanent capital of the Hawaiian Kingdom from Lahaina on Maui to Honolulu and he and the kings that followed him transformed Honolulu into a modern capital, erecting buildings such as St. Andrews Cathedral, ʻIolani Palace, and Aliʻiōlani Hale. At the same time, Honolulu became the center of commerce in the islands, an economic and tourism boom following statehood brought rapid economic growth to Honolulu and Hawaiʻi. Modern air travel brings, as of 2007,7.6 million visitors annually to the islands, today, Honolulu is a modern city with numerous high-rise buildings, and Waikīkī is the center of the tourism industry in Hawaiʻi, with thousands of hotel rooms. According to the United States Census Bureau, the CDP has an area of 68.4 square miles
2.
Oahu
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Oʻahu or Oahu /oʊˈɑːhu/, known as The Gathering Place, is the third largest of the Hawaiian Islands. It is home to about two-thirds of the population of the U. S. state of Hawaii, the state capital, Honolulu, is on Oʻahus southeast coast. Along with the rest of the Hawaiian Islands, Oahu is one of the largest and northernmost islands of Polynesia, in the greatest dimension, this volcanic island is 44 miles long and 30 miles across. The length of the shoreline is 227 miles, the island is the result of two separate shield volcanoes, the Waiʻanae and Koʻolau Ranges, with a broad valley or saddle between them. The highest point is Kaʻala in the Waiʻanae Range, rising to 4,003 feet above sea level, the island was home to the Kunia Regional SIGINT Operations Center from 1941 to 2012, it is now home to the National Security Agencys Hawaii Cryptologic Center. The island is home to 953,207 people in 2010, Oʻahu has for a long time been known as the Gathering Place. The term Oʻahu has no confirmed meaning in Hawaiian, other than that of the place itself, ancient Hawaiian tradition attributes the names origin in the legend of Hawaiʻiloa, the Polynesian navigator credited with discovery of the Hawaiian Islands. The story relates that he named the island after a son, residents of Oʻahu refer to themselves as locals, no matter their ancestry. The city of Honolulu—largest city, state capital, and main deepwater marine port for the State of Hawaiʻi—is located here. As a jurisdictional unit, the island of Oʻahu is in the Honolulu County, although as a place name. Well-known features found on Oʻahu include Waikīkī, Pearl Harbor, Diamond Head, Hanauma Bay, Kāneʻohe Bay, Kailua Bay, being roughly diamond-shaped, surrounded by ocean and divided by mountain ranges, directions on Oʻahu are not generally described with the compass directions found throughout the world. Locals instead use directions originally using Honolulu as the central point, to go ewa means traveling toward the western tip of the island, Diamond Head is toward the eastern tip, mauka is inland and makai toward the sea. Oʻahu is also known for having the longest rain shower in history, kaneohe Ranch, Oʻahu, Hawaiʻi reported 247 straight days with rain from August 27,1993 to April 30,1994. The island has many one of them being rainbow state. This is because rainbows are a sight in Hawaiʻi due to the frequent rain showers. The average temperature in Oʻahu is around 70 to 85 degrees, the weather during the winter is cooler, but still warm with the average temperature of 68-78 degrees. The windward side is known for some of the most beautiful beaches in the world, lanikai Beach on the windward coast of Oʻahu has been consistently ranked among the best beaches in the world. The 300-year-old Kingdom of Oʻahu was once ruled by the most ancient aliʻi in all of the Hawaiian Islands, the first great king of Oʻahu was Mailikukahi, the lawmaker, who was followed by many generation of monarchs
3.
Territory of Hawaii
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The Hawaii Admission Act specified that the State of Hawaii would not include Palmyra Atoll, The Midway Islands, Johnston Atoll, Sand Island, or Kingman Reef. The U. S. Congress passed the Newlands Resolution which annexed the Republic of Hawaii to the United States, Hawaiis territorial history includes a period from 1941 to 1944—during World War II—when the islands were placed under martial law. Civilian government was dissolved and a governor was appointed. Thurston actively lobbied Congress while the former monarchy lobbied Democrats to protest, First annexation proceedings began when Democrat Grover Cleveland took office. Cleveland was an anti-imperialist and was strongly against annexation and he withdrew the annexation treaty from consideration, mounted an inquiry, and recommended the restoration of Liliʻuokalani as queen. The provisional government convened a convention to establish the Republic of Hawaii. Thurston was urged to become the nations first president but he was worried his brazen personality would damage the cause of annexation, Dole, former Supreme Court Justice and friend of Queen Liliʻuokalani, was elected as the first and only president of the new regime. Hawaiis strategic location to support the Spanish–American War in the Philippines made it important to American interests. On July 4,1898, the United States Congress passed the Newlands Resolution and it was signed into law by President McKinley on July 7,1898, and came into effect on August 12,1898. Former President Sanford B. Dole was appointed Hawaiis first territorial governor, the Newlands Resolution established a five-member commission to study which laws were needed in the newly organized Territory of Hawaii. The commission included, Territorial Governor Sanford B, Dole, Senators Shelby M. Cullom and John T. Morgan, Representative Robert R. Hitt and former Hawaii Chief Justice and later succeeding Territorial Governor Walter F. Frear. The commissions final report was submitted to Congress for a debate which lasted over a year, the Organic Act established the Office of the Territorial Governor, an office appointed by the sitting American president and was usually from his own political party. The territorial governor served at the pleasure of the President of the United States and nominated by him and confirmed by the Senate, Representative in the U. S. House of Representatives Representation in the U. S. His transports encouraged him to purchase passenger steamships that would carry tourists hoping to vacation in Hawaii from the mainland United States, matsons fleet included the SS Wilhelmina, rivaling the best passenger ships serving traditional Atlantic routes. With the boom in interest of Hawaiian vacations by Americas wealthiest families in the late 1920s, Matson added the SS Mariposa, SS Monterey, Matson Navigation Company operated two resort hotels in Honolulu near royal grounds. The first hotel on Waikīkī was the Moana Hotel which opened in 1901, as the first hotel in Waikīkī, the Moana Hotel was nicknamed the First Lady of Waikīkī. The hotel gained international attention in 1920 when Edward, Prince of Wales and future King Edward VIII of the United Kingdom, in 1927, the luxurious Royal Hawaiian Hotel, informally called the Pink Palace of the Pacific, opened for business. It was the preferred Hawaii residence of President Franklin D. Roosevelt when he visited Hawaii during World War II, with annexation, the United States saw Hawaii as its most strategic military asset
4.
Long Beach, California
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Long Beach is the 36th most populous city in the United States and the 7th most populous in California. It is located on the Pacific Coast of the United States, as of 2010, its population was 462,257. Long Beach is the second largest city in the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the Port of Long Beach is the second busiest container port in the United States and is among the worlds largest shipping ports. The city also maintains a progressively declining oil industry with minor wells located both directly beneath the city as well as offshore, manufacturing sectors include those in aircraft, automotive parts, electronic equipment, audiovisual equipment, petrochemicals, precision metals and home furnishings. Long Beach lies in the corner of Los Angeles County. Downtown Long Beach is approximately 22 miles south of Downtown Los Angeles, indigenous people have lived in coastal Southern California for over 10,000 years, and several successive cultures have inhabited the present-day area of Long Beach. By the 16th-century arrival of Spanish explorers, the dominant group were the Tongva people and they had at least three major settlements within the present-day city. Tevaaxaanga was a settlement near the Los Angeles River, while Ahwaanga and Povuunga were coastal villages. Along with other Tongva villages, they were forced to relocate in the century due to missionization, political change. In 1784 the Spanish Empires King Carlos III granted Rancho Los Nietos to Spanish soldier Manuel Nieto, the Rancho Los Cerritos and Rancho Los Alamitos were divided from this territory. The boundary between the two ran through the center of Signal Hill on a southwest to northeast diagonal. A portion of western Long Beach was originally part of the Rancho San Pedro and its boundaries were in dispute for years, due to flooding changing the Los Angeles River boundary, between the ranchos of Juan Jose Dominguez and Manuel Nieto. In 1843 Jonathan Temple bought Rancho Los Cerritos, having arrived in California in 1827 from New England and he built what is now known as the Los Cerritos Ranch House, a still-standing adobe which is a National Historic Landmark. Temple created a cattle ranch and prospered, becoming the wealthiest man in Los Angeles County. Both Temple and his house played important local roles in the Mexican–American War. On an island in the San Pedro Bay, Mormon pioneers made an attempt to establish a colony. Two years previous Flint, Bixby & Co had also purchased along with Northern California associate James Irvine, to manage Rancho Los Cerritos, the company selected Lewellyns brother Jotham Bixby, the Father of Long Beach. Three years later Bixby bought into the property and would form the Bixby Land Company
5.
Ukulele
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The ukulele, sometimes abbreviated to uke, is a member of the lute family of instruments, it generally employs four nylon or gut strings or four courses of strings. Some strings may be paired in courses, giving the instrument a total of six or eight strings and it gained great popularity elsewhere in the United States during the early 20th century and from there spread internationally. The tone and volume of the instrument vary with size and construction, ukuleles commonly come in four sizes, soprano, concert, tenor, and baritone. The ukulele is commonly associated with music from Hawaii where the name translates as jumping flea. Legend attributes it to the nickname of the Englishman Edward William Purvis, one of King Kalākauas officers, because of his size, fidgety manner. According to Queen Liliʻuokalani, the last Hawaiian monarch, the means the gift that came here, from the Hawaiian words uku. Three immigrants in particular, Madeiran cabinet makers Manuel Nunes, José do Espírito Santo, one of the most important factors in establishing the ukulele in Hawaiian music and culture was the ardent support and promotion of the instrument by King Kalākaua. A patron of the arts, he incorporated it into performances at royal gatherings,50,000 schoolchildren and adults learned ukulele through the Doane program at its peak. Today, a program created by James Hill and J. Chalmers Doane continues to be a staple of music education in Canada. The ukulele came to Japan in 1929 after Hawaiian-born Yukihiko Haida returned to the country upon his fathers death, Haida and his brother Katsuhiko formed the Moana Glee Club, enjoying rapid success in an environment of growing enthusiasm for Western popular music, particularly Hawaiian and jazz. During World War II, authorities banned most Western music, but fans and players kept it alive in secret, in 1959, Haida founded the Nihon Ukulele Association. Today, Japan is considered a home for Hawaiian musicians. Demand surged in the new century because of its simplicity and portability. The ukulele was popularized for an audience during the Panama Pacific International Exposition. The Hawaiian Pavilion featured a guitar and ukulele ensemble, George E. K. Awai and his Royal Hawaiian Quartet, the popularity of the ensemble with visitors launched a fad for Hawaiian-themed songs among Tin Pan Alley songwriters. The ensemble also introduced both the lap steel guitar and the ukulele into U. S. mainland popular music, where it was taken up by vaudeville performers such as Roy Smeck and Cliff Ukulele Ike Edwards. On April 15,1923 at the Rivoli Theater in New York City, Smeck appeared, playing the ukulele, in Stringed Harmony, a short film made in the DeForest Phonofilm sound-on-film process. On August 6,1926, Smeck appeared playing the ukulele in a short film His Pastimes, made in the Vitaphone sound-on-disc process, the ukulele soon became an icon of the Jazz Age
6.
Guitar
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The guitar is a musical instrument classified as a fretted string instrument with anywhere from four to 18 strings, usually having six. The sound is projected either acoustically, using a wooden or plastic and wood box, or through electrical amplifier. It is typically played by strumming or plucking the strings with the fingers, the guitar is a type of chordophone, traditionally constructed from wood and strung with either gut, nylon or steel strings and distinguished from other chordophones by its construction and tuning. There are three types of modern acoustic guitar, the classical guitar, the steel-string acoustic guitar, and the archtop guitar. The tone of a guitar is produced by the strings vibration, amplified by the hollow body of the guitar. The term finger-picking can also refer to a tradition of folk, blues, bluegrass. The acoustic bass guitar is an instrument that is one octave below a regular guitar. Early amplified guitars employed a body, but a solid wood body was eventually found more suitable during the 1960s and 1970s. As with acoustic guitars, there are a number of types of guitars, including hollowbody guitars, archtop guitars and solid-body guitars. The electric guitar has had a influence on popular culture. The guitar is used in a variety of musical genres worldwide. It is recognized as an instrument in genres such as blues, bluegrass, country, flamenco, folk, jazz, jota, mariachi, metal, punk, reggae, rock, soul. The term is used to refer to a number of chordophones that were developed and used across Europe, beginning in the 12th century and, later, in the Americas. The modern word guitar, and its antecedents, has applied to a wide variety of chordophones since classical times. Many influences are cited as antecedents to the modern guitar, at least two instruments called guitars were in use in Spain by 1200, the guitarra latina and the so-called guitarra morisca. The guitarra morisca had a back, wide fingerboard. The guitarra Latina had a sound hole and a narrower neck. By the 14th century the qualifiers moresca or morisca and latina had been dropped, and it had six courses, lute-like tuning in fourths and a guitar-like body, although early representations reveal an instrument with a sharply cut waist
7.
Mandolin
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A mandolin is a musical instrument in the lute family and is usually plucked with a plectrum or pick. It commonly has four courses of doubled metal strings tuned in unison, although five, the courses are normally tuned in a succession of perfect fifths. It is the member of a family that includes the mandola, octave mandolin, mandocello. There are many styles of mandolin, but three are common, the Neapolitan or round-backed mandolin, the mandolin and the flat-backed mandolin. The round-back has a bottom, constructed of strips of wood. The carved-top or arch-top mandolin has a shallower, arched back. The flat-backed mandolin uses thin sheets of wood for the body, each style of instrument has its own sound quality and is associated with particular forms of music. Neapolitan mandolins feature prominently in European classical music and traditional music, carved-top instruments are common in American folk music and bluegrass music. Flat-backed instruments are used in Irish, British and Brazilian folk music. Some modern Brazilian instruments feature a fifth course tuned a fifth lower than the standard fourth course. There has also been a type and an instrument with sixteen-strings. Much of mandolin development revolved around the soundboard, pre-mandolin instruments were quiet instruments, strung with as many as six courses of gut strings, and were plucked with the fingers or with a quill. However, modern instruments are louder—using four courses of metal strings, the modern soundboard is designed to withstand the pressure of metal strings that would break earlier instruments. The soundboard comes in many shapes—but generally round or teardrop-shaped, sometimes with scrolls or other projections, there is usually one or more sound holes in the soundboard, either round, oval, or shaped like a calligraphic f. A round or oval sound hole may be covered or bordered with decorative rosettes or purfling, Mandolins evolved from the lute family in Italy during the 17th and 18th centuries, and the deep bowled mandolin, produced particularly in Naples, became common in the 19th century. Dating to around c.13,000 BC, a painting in the Trois Frères cave in France depicts what some believe is a musical bow. From the musical bow, families of stringed instruments developed, since each string played a note, adding strings added new notes, creating bow harps, harps. In turn, this led to being able to play dyads and chords, another innovation occurred when the bow harp was straightened out and a bridge used to lift the strings off the stick-neck, creating the lute
8.
Columbia Records
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Columbia Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, Inc. the United States division of Sony Corporation. It was founded in 1887, evolving from an enterprise named the American Graphophone Company. Columbia is the oldest surviving brand name in the sound business. Columbia Records went on to release records by an array of singers, instrumentalists. It is one of Sony Musics three flagship record labels alongside RCA Records and Epic Records, rather, as above, it was connected to CBS, a broadcasting media company which had purchased the company in 1938, and had been co-founded in 1927 by Columbia Records itself. Though Arista Records was sold to Bertelsmann Music Group, it would become a sister label of Columbia Records through its mutual connection to Sony Music. The Columbia Phonograph Company was founded in 1887 by stenographer, lawyer and New Jersey native Edward Easton and it derived its name from the District of Columbia, where it was headquartered. At first it had a monopoly on sales and service of Edison phonographs and phonograph cylinders in Washington. As was the custom of some of the regional companies, Columbia produced many commercial cylinder recordings of its own. Columbias ties to Edison and the North American Phonograph Company were severed in 1894 with the North American Phonograph Companys breakup, thereafter it sold only records and phonographs of its own manufacture. In 1902, Columbia introduced the XP record, a brown wax record. According to Gracyk, the molded brown waxes may have sold to Sears for distribution. Columbia began selling records and phonographs in addition to the cylinder system in 1901, preceded only by their Toy Graphophone of 1899. For a decade, Columbia competed with both the Edison Phonograph Company cylinders and the Victor Talking Machine Company disc records as one of the top three names in American recorded sound. In order to add prestige to its catalog of artists. The firm also introduced the internal-horn Grafonola to compete with the extremely popular Victrola sold by the rival Victor Talking Machine Company, during this era, Columbia used the famous Magic Notes logo—a pair of sixteenth notes in a circle—both in the United States and overseas. Columbia was split into two companies, one to make records and one to make players, Columbia Phonograph was moved to Connecticut, and Ed Easton went with it. Eventually it was renamed the Dictaphone Corporation, in late 1923, Columbia went into receivership
9.
RCA Records
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RCA Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, Inc. It is one of SMEs three flagship labels, alongside Columbia Records and Epic Records. The label has released multiple genres of music, including pop, rock, hip hop, R&B, blues, jazz, the companys name is derived from the initials of the labels former parent company, the Radio Corporation of America. It is the second oldest recording company in US history, after sister label Columbia Records, RCAs Canadian unit is Sonys oldest label in Canada. It was one of only two Canadian record companies to survive the Great Depression, kelly, Enrique Iglesias, Foo Fighters, Kings of Leon, Kesha, Miley Cyrus, Giorgio Moroder, Jennifer Hudson, DAngelo, Pink, Tinashe, G-Eazy, Pitbull, Zayn and Wizkid. In 1929, the Radio Corporation of America purchased the Victor Talking Machine Company, then the worlds largest manufacturer of phonographs and phonograph records. The company then became RCA Victor but retained use of the Victor Records name on their labels until the beginning of 1946 when the labels were finally switched over to RCA Victor. With Victor, RCA acquired New World rights to the famous Nipper His Masters Voice trademark, in Shanghai, China, in 1931, RCA Victors British affiliate the Gramophone Company merged with the Columbia Graphophone Company to form EMI. This gave RCA head David Sarnoff a seat on the EMI board, in September 1931, RCA Victor introduced the first 33⅓ rpm records sold to the public, calling them Program Transcriptions. In the depths of the Great Depression, the format was a commercial failure, during the early part of the depression, RCA made a number of attempts to produce a successful cheap label to compete with the dime store labels. The first was the short-lived Timely Tunes label in 1931 sold at Montgomery Ward, in 1932, Bluebird Records was created as a sub-label of RCA Victor. It was originally an 8-inch record with a blue label. In 1933, RCA reintroduced Bluebird and Electradisk as a standard 10-inch label, another cheap label, Sunrise, was produced. The same musical couplings were issued on all three labels and Bluebird Records still survives eight decades after Electradisk and Sunrise were discontinued, RCA also produced records for Montgomery Ward label during the 1930s. Besides manufacturing records for themselves, RCA Victor operated RCA Custom which was the leading record manufacturer for independent record labels, RCA Custom also pressed record compilations for The Readers Digest Association. RCA sold its interest in EMI in 1935, but EMI continued to distribute RCA recordings in the UK, RCA also manufactured and distributed HMV classical recordings on the RCA and HMV labels in North America. During World War II, ties between RCA and its Japanese affiliate JVC were severed, the Japanese record company is today called Victor Entertainment and is still a JVC subsidiary. From 1942 to 1944, RCA Victor was seriously impacted by the American Federation of Musicians recording ban, virtually all union musicians could not make recordings during that period
10.
San Francisco
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San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the cultural, commercial, and financial center of Northern California. It is the birthplace of the United Nations, the California Gold Rush of 1849 brought rapid growth, making it the largest city on the West Coast at the time. San Francisco became a consolidated city-county in 1856, after three-quarters of the city was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake and fire, San Francisco was quickly rebuilt, hosting the Panama-Pacific International Exposition nine years later. In World War II, San Francisco was a port of embarkation for service members shipping out to the Pacific Theater. Politically, the city votes strongly along liberal Democratic Party lines, San Francisco is also the headquarters of five major banking institutions and various other companies such as Levi Strauss & Co. Dolby, Airbnb, Weebly, Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Yelp, Pinterest, Twitter, Uber, Lyft, Mozilla, Wikimedia Foundation, as of 2016, San Francisco is ranked high on world liveability rankings. The earliest archaeological evidence of habitation of the territory of the city of San Francisco dates to 3000 BC. Upon independence from Spain in 1821, the became part of Mexico. Under Mexican rule, the system gradually ended, and its lands became privatized. In 1835, Englishman William Richardson erected the first independent homestead, together with Alcalde Francisco de Haro, he laid out a street plan for the expanded settlement, and the town, named Yerba Buena, began to attract American settlers. Commodore John D. Sloat claimed California for the United States on July 7,1846, during the Mexican–American War, montgomery arrived to claim Yerba Buena two days later. Yerba Buena was renamed San Francisco on January 30 of the next year, despite its attractive location as a port and naval base, San Francisco was still a small settlement with inhospitable geography. The California Gold Rush brought a flood of treasure seekers, with their sourdough bread in tow, prospectors accumulated in San Francisco over rival Benicia, raising the population from 1,000 in 1848 to 25,000 by December 1849. The promise of fabulous riches was so strong that crews on arriving vessels deserted and rushed off to the gold fields, leaving behind a forest of masts in San Francisco harbor. Some of these approximately 500 abandoned ships were used at times as storeships, saloons and hotels, many were left to rot, by 1851 the harbor was extended out into the bay by wharves while buildings were erected on piles among the ships. By 1870 Yerba Buena Cove had been filled to create new land, buried ships are occasionally exposed when foundations are dug for new buildings. California was quickly granted statehood in 1850 and the U. S. military built Fort Point at the Golden Gate, silver discoveries, including the Comstock Lode in Nevada in 1859, further drove rapid population growth. With hordes of fortune seekers streaming through the city, lawlessness was common, and the Barbary Coast section of town gained notoriety as a haven for criminals, prostitution, entrepreneurs sought to capitalize on the wealth generated by the Gold Rush
11.
United States Congress
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The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States consisting of two chambers, the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the Capitol in Washington, D. C, both senators and representatives are chosen through direct election, though vacancies in the Senate may be filled by a gubernatorial appointment. Members are usually affiliated to the Republican Party or to the Democratic Party, Congress has 535 voting members,435 Representatives and 100 Senators. The House of Representatives has six non-voting members in addition to its 435 voting members and these members can, however, sit on congressional committees and introduce legislation. Puerto Rico, American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, the members of the House of Representatives serve two-year terms representing the people of a single constituency, known as a district. Congressional districts are apportioned to states by using the United States Census results. Each state, regardless of population or size, has two senators, currently, there are 100 senators representing the 50 states. Each senator is elected at-large in their state for a term, with terms staggered. The House and Senate are equal partners in the legislative process—legislation cannot be enacted without the consent of both chambers, however, the Constitution grants each chamber some unique powers. The Senate ratifies treaties and approves presidential appointments while the House initiates revenue-raising bills, the House initiates impeachment cases, while the Senate decides impeachment cases. A two-thirds vote of the Senate is required before a person can be forcibly removed from office. The term Congress can also refer to a meeting of the legislature. A Congress covers two years, the current one, the 115th Congress, began on January 3,2017, the Congress starts and ends on the third day of January of every odd-numbered year. Members of the Senate are referred to as senators, members of the House of Representatives are referred to as representatives, congressmen, or congresswomen. One analyst argues that it is not a solely reactive institution but has played a role in shaping government policy and is extraordinarily sensitive to public pressure. Several academics described Congress, Congress reflects us in all our strengths, Congress is the governments most representative body. Congress is essentially charged with reconciling our many points of view on the public policy issues of the day. —Smith, Roberts, and Wielen Congress is constantly changing and is constantly in flux, most incumbents seek re-election, and their historical likelihood of winning subsequent elections exceeds 90 percent
