1.
United States
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Forty-eight of the fifty states and the federal district are contiguous and located in North America between Canada and Mexico. The state of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east, the state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean, the geography, climate and wildlife of the country are extremely diverse. At 3.8 million square miles and with over 324 million people, the United States is the worlds third- or fourth-largest country by area, third-largest by land area. It is one of the worlds most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, paleo-Indians migrated from Asia to the North American mainland at least 15,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century, the United States emerged from 13 British colonies along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the following the Seven Years War led to the American Revolution. On July 4,1776, during the course of the American Revolutionary War, the war ended in 1783 with recognition of the independence of the United States by Great Britain, representing the first successful war of independence against a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, after the Articles of Confederation, the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, were ratified in 1791 and designed to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties. During the second half of the 19th century, the American Civil War led to the end of slavery in the country. By the end of century, the United States extended into the Pacific Ocean. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the status as a global military power. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the sole superpower. The U. S. is a member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States. The United States is a developed country, with the worlds largest economy by nominal GDP. It ranks highly in several measures of performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP. While the U. S. economy is considered post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge economy, the United States is a prominent political and cultural force internationally, and a leader in scientific research and technological innovations. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America after the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci
2.
Flag of the United States
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The flag of the United States, often referred to as the American flag, is the national flag of the United States. S. Nicknames for the flag include The Stars and Stripes, Old Glory, the current design of the U. S. flag is its 27th, the design of the flag has been modified officially 26 times since 1777. The 48-star flag was in effect for 47 years until the 49-star version became official on July 4,1959, the 50-star flag was ordered by the then president Eisenhower on August 21,1959, and was adopted in July 1960. It is the version of the U. S. flag and has been in use for over 56 years. At the time of the Declaration of Independence in July 1776, the flag contemporaneously known as the Continental Colors has historically been referred to as the first national flag. The name Grand Union was first applied to the Continental Colors by George Preble in his 1872 history of the American flag, the flag closely resembles the British East India Company flag of the era, and Sir Charles Fawcett argued in 1937 that the company flag inspired the design. Both flags could have been constructed by adding white stripes to a British Red Ensign. However, an East India Company flag could have nine to 13 stripes. In any case, both the stripes and the stars have precedents in classical heraldry, Flag Day is now observed on June 14 of each year. While scholars still argue about this, tradition holds that the new flag was first hoisted in June 1777 by the Continental Army at the Middlebrook encampment. The first official U. S. flag flown during battle was on August 3,1777, Massachusetts reinforcements brought news of the adoption by Congress of the official flag to Fort Schuyler. A voucher is extant that Capt. Swartwout of Dutchess County was paid by Congress for his coat for the flag, the 1777 resolution was most probably meant to define a naval ensign. In the late 18th century, the notion of a flag did not yet exist. The flag resolution appears between other resolutions from the Marine Committee, on May 10,1779, Secretary of the Board of War Richard Peters expressed concern it is not yet settled what is the Standard of the United States. However, the term, Standard, referred to a standard for the Army of the United States. Each regiment was to carry the standard in addition to its regimental standard. The national standard was not a reference to the national or naval flag, the appearance was up to the maker of the flag. Some flag makers arranged the stars into one big star, in a circle or in rows, one arrangement features 13 five-pointed stars arranged in a circle, with the stars arranged pointing outwards from the circle, the so-called Betsy Ross flag
3.
Timeline of United States history
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This is a timeline of United States history, comprising important legal and territorial changes and political and economic events in the United States and its predecessor states. To read about the background to these events, see History of the United States, some dates before September 14,1752, when the British government adopted the Gregorian calendar, may be given in the Old Style
4.
President of the United States
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The President of the United States is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president directs the executive branch of the government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces. The president is considered to be one of the worlds most powerful political figures, the role includes being the commander-in-chief of the worlds most expensive military with the second largest nuclear arsenal and leading the nation with the largest economy by nominal GDP. The office of President holds significant hard and soft power both in the United States and abroad, Constitution vests the executive power of the United States in the president. The president is empowered to grant federal pardons and reprieves. The president is responsible for dictating the legislative agenda of the party to which the president is a member. The president also directs the foreign and domestic policy of the United States, since the office of President was established in 1789, its power has grown substantially, as has the power of the federal government as a whole. However, nine vice presidents have assumed the presidency without having elected to the office. The Twenty-second Amendment prohibits anyone from being elected president for a third term, in all,44 individuals have served 45 presidencies spanning 57 full four-year terms. On January 20,2017, Donald Trump was sworn in as the 45th, in 1776, the Thirteen Colonies, acting through the Second Continental Congress, declared political independence from Great Britain during the American Revolution. The new states, though independent of each other as nation states, desiring to avoid anything that remotely resembled a monarchy, Congress negotiated the Articles of Confederation to establish a weak alliance between the states. Out from under any monarchy, the states assigned some formerly royal prerogatives to Congress, only after all the states agreed to a resolution settling competing western land claims did the Articles take effect on March 1,1781, when Maryland became the final state to ratify them. In 1783, the Treaty of Paris secured independence for each of the former colonies, with peace at hand, the states each turned toward their own internal affairs. Prospects for the convention appeared bleak until James Madison and Edmund Randolph succeeded in securing George Washingtons attendance to Philadelphia as a delegate for Virginia. It was through the negotiations at Philadelphia that the presidency framed in the U. S. The first power the Constitution confers upon the president is the veto, the Presentment Clause requires any bill passed by Congress to be presented to the president before it can become law. Once the legislation has been presented, the president has three options, Sign the legislation, the bill becomes law. Veto the legislation and return it to Congress, expressing any objections, in this instance, the president neither signs nor vetoes the legislation
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John Tyler
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John Tyler was the tenth President of the United States. He was also, briefly, the tenth Vice President, elected to office on the 1840 Whig ticket with William Henry Harrison. Tyler became president after Harrisons death in April 1841, only a month after the start of the new administration. Still, the circumstances of his rise to the presidency. A firm believer in manifest destiny, President Tyler sought to strengthen and preserve the Union through territorial expansion, Tyler, born to an eminent Virginia family, came to national prominence at a time of political upheaval. In the 1820s the nations only political party, the Democratic-Republicans, though initially a Democrat, his opposition to Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren led him to ally with the Whig Party. Tyler served as a Virginia state legislator, governor, U. S. representative and he was put on the ticket to attract states rights Southerners to what was then a Whig coalition to defeat Van Burens re-election bid. Harrisons death made Tyler the first vice president to succeed to the presidency without being elected to the office, because of the short duration of Harrisons one-month term, Tyler served longer than any president in U. S. history who was never elected to the office. A strict constructionist, Tyler found much of the Whig platform unconstitutional, believing that the president should set policy instead of deferring to Congress, he attempted to bypass the Whig establishment, most notably Kentucky Senator Henry Clay. Most of Tylers Cabinet resigned soon into his term, and the Whigs, dubbing him His Accidency, though Tyler was not the first president to veto bills, he was the first to see his veto overridden by Congress. Although he faced a stalemate on domestic policy, he had several achievements, including the Webster–Ashburton Treaty with Britain. He initially sought election to a term as president, but after failing to gain the support of either Whigs or Democrats. When the American Civil War began in 1861, Tyler sided with the Confederate government, although some have praised Tylers political resolve, his presidency is generally held in low esteem by historians. He is considered an obscure president, with presence in American cultural memory. John Tyler was born on March 29,1790, like his future running mate William Henry Harrison, he hailed from Charles City County, Virginia, both descended from aristocratic and politically entrenched families. The Tyler family traced its lineage to colonial Williamsburg in the 17th century, the elder Tyler served four years as Speaker of the House of Delegates before becoming a state court judge. He subsequently served as governor and as a judge on the U. S. District Court at Richmond and his wife, Mary Marot, was the daughter of a prominent plantation owner, Robert Booth Armistead. She died of a stroke when her son John was seven years old, with his two brothers and five sisters, Tyler was raised on Greenway Plantation, a 1, 200-acre estate with a six-room manor house his father had built
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Virginia
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Virginia is a state located in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, as well as in the historic Southeast. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth are shaped by the Blue Ridge Mountains and the Chesapeake Bay, the capital of the Commonwealth is Richmond, Virginia Beach is the most populous city, and Fairfax County is the most populous political subdivision. The Commonwealths estimated population as of 2014 is over 8.3 million, the areas history begins with several indigenous groups, including the Powhatan. In 1607 the London Company established the Colony of Virginia as the first permanent New World English colony, slave labor and the land acquired from displaced Native American tribes each played a significant role in the colonys early politics and plantation economy. Although the Commonwealth was under one-party rule for nearly a century following Reconstruction, the Virginia General Assembly is the oldest continuous law-making body in the New World. The state government was ranked most effective by the Pew Center on the States in both 2005 and 2008 and it is unique in how it treats cities and counties equally, manages local roads, and prohibits its governors from serving consecutive terms. Virginias economy changed from agricultural to industrial during the 1960s and 1970s. Virginia has an area of 42,774.2 square miles, including 3,180.13 square miles of water. Virginias boundary with Maryland and Washington, D. C. extends to the mark of the south shore of the Potomac River. The southern border is defined as the 36° 30′ parallel north, the border with Tennessee was not settled until 1893, when their dispute was brought to the U. S. Supreme Court. The Chesapeake Bay separates the portion of the Commonwealth from the two-county peninsula of Virginias Eastern Shore. The bay was formed from the river valleys of the Susquehanna River. Many of Virginias rivers flow into the Chesapeake Bay, including the Potomac, Rappahannock, York, and James, the Tidewater is a coastal plain between the Atlantic coast and the fall line. It includes the Eastern Shore and major estuaries of Chesapeake Bay, the Piedmont is a series of sedimentary and igneous rock-based foothills east of the mountains which were formed in the Mesozoic era. The region, known for its clay soil, includes the Southwest Mountains around Charlottesville. The Blue Ridge Mountains are a province of the Appalachian Mountains with the highest points in the state. The Ridge and Valley region is west of the mountains and includes the Great Appalachian Valley, the region is carbonate rock based and includes Massanutten Mountain. The Cumberland Plateau and the Cumberland Mountains are in the southwest corner of Virginia, in this region, rivers flow northwest, with a dendritic drainage system, into the Ohio River basin
7.
Vice President of the United States
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The executive power of both the vice president and the president is granted under Article Two, Section One of the Constitution. The vice president is elected, together with the president. The Office of the Vice President of the United States assists, as the president of the United States Senate, the vice president votes only when it is necessary to break a tie. Additionally, pursuant to the Twelfth Amendment, the president presides over the joint session of Congress when it convenes to count the vote of the Electoral College. Currently, the president is usually seen as an integral part of a presidents administration. The Constitution does not expressly assign the office to any one branch, causing a dispute among scholars whether it belongs to the executive branch, the legislative branch, or both. The modern view of the president as a member of the executive branch is due in part to the assignment of executive duties to the vice president by either the president or Congress. Mike Pence of Indiana is the 48th and current vice president and he assumed office on January 20,2017. The formation of the office of vice president resulted directly from the compromise reached at the Philadelphia Convention which created the Electoral College, the delegates at Philadelphia agreed that each state would receive a number of presidential electors equal to the sum of that states allocation of Representatives and Senators. The delegates assumed that electors would typically choose to favor any candidate from their state over candidates from other states, under a plurality election process, this would tend to result in electing candidates solely from the largest states. Consequently, the delegates agreed that presidents must be elected by a majority of the number of electors. To guard against such stratagems, the Philadelphia delegates specified that the first runner-up presidential candidate would become vice president, the process for selecting the vice president was later modified in the Twelfth Amendment. Each elector still receives two votes, but now one of those votes is for president, while the other is for vice president. The requirement that one of those votes be cast for a candidate not from the electors own state remains in effect. S, other statutorily granted roles include membership of both the National Security Council and the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution. As President of the Senate, the president has two primary duties, to cast a vote in the event of a Senate deadlock and to preside over. For example, in the first half of 2001, the Senators were divided 50-50 between Republicans and Democrats and Dick Cheneys tie-breaking vote gave the Republicans the Senate majority, as President of the Senate, the vice president oversees procedural matters and may cast a tie-breaking vote. As President of the Senate, John Adams cast 29 tie-breaking votes that was surpassed by John C. Calhoun with 31. Adamss votes protected the presidents sole authority over the removal of appointees, influenced the location of the national capital, on at least one occasion Adams persuaded senators to vote against legislation he opposed, and he frequently addressed the Senate on procedural and policy matters
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Chief Justice of the United States
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The Chief Justice of the United States is the head of the United States federal court system and the chief judge of the Supreme Court of the United States. The Chief Justice is one of nine Supreme Court justices, the eight are the Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States. From 1789 until 1866, the office was known as the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, the Chief Justice also serves as a spokesperson for the judicial branch. The Chief Justice leads the business of the Supreme Court and presides over oral arguments, when the court renders an opinion, the Chief Justice—when in the majority—decides who writes the courts opinion. The Chief Justice also has significant agenda-setting power over the courts meetings, in the case of an impeachment of a President of the United States, which has occurred twice, the Chief Justice presides over the trial in the Senate. In modern tradition, the Chief Justice also has the duty of administering the oath of office of the President of the United States. The first Chief Justice was John Jay, the 17th and current Chief Justice is John G. Roberts, Jr. The office was known as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and is still informally referred to using that title. However,28 U. S. C. §1 specifies that the title is Chief Justice of the United States, the title was changed from Chief Justice of the Supreme Court by Congress in 1866 at the suggestion of the sixth Chief Justice, Salmon P. Chase. Chase wished to emphasize the Supreme Courts role as a branch of government. The first Chief Justice commissioned using the new title was Melville Fuller in 1888, use of the previous title when referring to Chief Justices John Jay through Roger B. Taney is technically correct, as that was the title during their time on the court. The other eight members of the court are officially Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States, the Chief Justice is the only member of the court to whom the Constitution refers as a Justice, and only in Article I. Article III of the Constitution refers to all members of the Supreme Court simply as Judges, the Chief Justice is nominated by the President of the United States and confirmed to sit on the Court by the United States Senate. The salary of the Chief Justice is set by Congress, the Constitution prohibits Congress from lowering the salary of any judge, including the Chief Justice, while that judge holds office. As of 2015, the salary is $258,100 per year, which is higher than that of the Associate Justices. Three serving Associate Justices have received promotions to Chief Justice, Edward Douglass White in 1910, Harlan Fiske Stone in 1941, Associate Justice Abe Fortas was nominated to the position of Chief Justice of the United States, but his nomination was filibustered by Senate Republicans in 1968. Despite the failed nomination, Fortas remained an Associate Justice until his resignation the following year, there have been 21 individuals nominated for Chief Justice, of whom 17 have been confirmed by the Senate, although a different 17 have served
9.
Roger B. Taney
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Roger Brooke Taney was the fifth Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, holding that office from 1836 until his death in 1864. He delivered the majority opinion in Dred Scott v. S and he was the first Roman Catholic appointed both to a presidential cabinet, as Attorney General under President Andrew Jackson, as well as to the Court. Taney, a Jacksonian Democrat, was made Chief Justice by Jackson, Taney was a believer in states rights. He inherited slaves from his father but manumitted them and gave pensions to the older ones and he believed that power and liberty were extremely important and if power became too concentrated, then it posed a grave threat to individual liberty. He opposed attempts by the government to regulate or control matters that would restrict the rights of individuals. From Prince Frederick, Maryland, he had practiced law and politics simultaneously, after abandoning the Federalist Party as a losing cause, he rose to the top of the states Jacksonian machine. He was bought and sold and treated as an article of merchandise and traffic. The court also declared the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional, thus permitting slavery in all of the countrys territories, Taney died during the final months of the American Civil War on the same day that his home state of Maryland abolished slavery. Roger Brooke Taney was born on March 17,1777 in Calvert County, Maryland and he was the second son, and the third of seven children born to a slaveholding family of tobacco planters in Calvert County, Maryland. He received an education from a series of private tutors. After instructing him for a year, his last tutor, David English, at the age of 15 he entered Dickinson College in Pennsylvania, graduating with honors in 1795. As a younger son with no prospect of inheriting the family plantation and he read law and in 1799 was admitted to the bar. He quickly distinguished himself as one of Marylands most promising young lawyers, Taney married Anne Phoebe Charlton Key, sister of Francis Scott Key, on January 7,1806. In 1799, the year he began practicing as an attorney, Taney was elected to the Maryland House of Delegates. He ran for re-election in 1800, but lost, returning to private practice, he served as a director of the State Bank Branch in Frederick, Maryland, from 1810 to 1815. He was elected the Maryland State Senate in 1816, serving until 1821—this time as a Democratic Republican and he was also a director of the Frederick County Bank from 1818 to 1823, when he returned to private practice. When the 1824 presidential election divided the party supporters and opponents of Andrew Jackson, Taney became a staunch Jacksonian Democrat. In 1833, as secretary of the Treasury, Taney ordered an end to the deposit of Federal money in the Second Bank of the United States, an act that killed the institution
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Maryland
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The states largest city is Baltimore, and its capital is Annapolis. Among its occasional nicknames are Old Line State, the Free State, the state is named after Henrietta Maria of France, the wife of Charles I of England. George Calvert was the first Lord of Baltimore and the first English proprietor of the colonial grant. Maryland was the state to ratify the United States Constitution. Maryland is one of the smallest U. S. states in terms of area, as well as one of the most densely populated, Maryland has an area of 12,406.68 square miles and is comparable in overall area with Belgium. It is the 42nd largest and 9th smallest state and is closest in size to the state of Hawaii, the next largest state, its neighbor West Virginia, is almost twice the size of Maryland. Maryland possesses a variety of topography within its borders, contributing to its nickname America in Miniature. The mid-portion of this border is interrupted by Washington, D. C. which sits on land that was part of Montgomery and Prince Georges counties and including the town of Georgetown. This land was ceded to the United States Federal Government in 1790 to form the District of Columbia, the Chesapeake Bay nearly bisects the state and the counties east of the bay are known collectively as the Eastern Shore. Close to the town of Hancock, in western Maryland, about two-thirds of the way across the state. This geographical curiosity makes Maryland the narrowest state, bordered by the Mason–Dixon line to the north, portions of Maryland are included in various official and unofficial geographic regions. Much of the Baltimore–Washington corridor lies just south of the Piedmont in the Coastal Plain, earthquakes in Maryland are infrequent and small due to the states distance from seismic/earthquake zones. The M5.8 Virginia earthquake in 2011 was felt moderately throughout Maryland, buildings in the state are not well-designed for earthquakes and can suffer damage easily. The lack of any glacial history accounts for the scarcity of Marylands natural lakes, laurel Oxbow Lake is an over one-hundred-year-old 55-acre natural lake two miles north of Maryland City and adjacent to Russett. Chews Lake is a natural lake two miles south-southeast of Upper Marlboro. There are numerous lakes, the largest of them being the Deep Creek Lake. Maryland has shale formations containing natural gas, where fracking is theoretically possible, as is typical of states on the East Coast, Marylands plant life is abundant and healthy. Middle Atlantic coastal forests, typical of the southeastern Atlantic coastal plain, grow around Chesapeake Bay, moving west, a mixture of Northeastern coastal forests and Southeastern mixed forests cover the central part of the state
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Media related to 1844 in the United States at Wikimedia Commons
