Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon University is a private research university based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools, the university became the Carnegie Institute of Technology in 1912 and began granting four-year degrees. In 1967, the Carnegie Institute of Technology merged with the Mellon Institute of Industrial Research to form Carnegie Mellon University. With its main campus located 3 miles from Downtown Pittsburgh, Carnegie Mellon has grown into an international university with over a dozen degree-granting locations in six continents, including campuses in Qatar and Silicon Valley, more than 20 research partnerships; the university has seven colleges and independent schools which all offer interdisciplinary programs: the College of Engineering, College of Fine Arts, Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences, Mellon College of Science, Tepper School of Business, H. John Heinz III College of Information Systems and Public Policy, the School of Computer Science.
Carnegie Mellon counts 13,961 students from 109 countries, over 105,000 living alumni, over 5,000 faculty and staff. Past and present faculty and alumni include 20 Nobel Prize laureates, 13 Turing Award winners, 23 Members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 22 Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, 79 Members of the National Academies, 124 Emmy Award winners, 47 Tony Award laureates, 10 Academy Award winners; the Carnegie Technical Schools were founded in 1900 in Pittsburgh by the Scottish American industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, who wrote the time-honored words "My heart is in the work", when he donated the funds to create the institution. Carnegie's vision was to open a vocational training school for the sons and daughters of working-class Pittsburghers. Carnegie was inspired for the design of his school by the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York founded by industrialist Charles Pratt in 1887. In 1912, the institution changed its name to Carnegie Institute of Technology and began offering four-year degrees.
During this time, CIT consisted of four constituent schools: the School of Fine and Applied Arts, the School of Apprentices and Journeymen, the School of Science and Technology, the Margaret Morrison Carnegie School for Women. The Mellon Institute of Industrial Research was founded in 1913 by a banker and industrialist brothers Andrew and Richard B. Mellon in honor of their father, Thomas Mellon, the patriarch of the Mellon family; the Institute began as a research organization which performed work for government and industry on a contract and was established as a department within the University of Pittsburgh. In 1927, the Mellon Institute incorporated as an independent nonprofit. In 1938, the Mellon Institute's iconic building was completed and it moved to its new, current, location on Fifth Avenue. In 1967, with support from Paul Mellon, Carnegie Tech merged with the Mellon Institute of Industrial Research to become Carnegie Mellon University. Carnegie Mellon's coordinate women's college, the Margaret Morrison Carnegie College closed in 1973 and merged its academic programs with the rest of the university.
The industrial research mission of the Mellon Institute survived the merger as the Carnegie Mellon Research Institute and continued doing work on contract to industry and government. CMRI closed in 2001 and its programs were subsumed by other parts of the university or spun off into autonomous entities. Carnegie Mellon's 140-acre main campus is three miles from downtown Pittsburgh, between Schenley Park and the Squirrel Hill and Oakland neighborhoods. Carnegie Mellon is bordered to the west by the campus of the University of Pittsburgh. Carnegie Mellon owns 81 buildings in the Squirrel Hill neighborhoods of Pittsburgh. For decades the center of student life on campus was the University's student union. Built in the 1950s, Skibo Hall's design was typical of Mid-Century Modern architecture, but was poorly equipped to deal with advances in computer and internet connectivity; the original Skibo was razed in the summer of 1994 and replaced by a new student union, wi-fi enabled. Known as University Center, the building was dedicated in 1996.
In 2014, Carnegie Mellon re-dedicated the University Center as the Cohon University Center in recognition of the eighth president of the university, Jared Cohon. A large grassy area known as "the Cut" forms the backbone of the campus, with a separate grassy area known as "the Mall" running perpendicular; the Cut was formed by filling in a ravine with soil from a nearby hill, leveled to build the College of Fine Arts building. The northwestern part of the campus was acquired from the United States Bureau of Mines in the 1980s. In 2006, Carnegie Mellon Trustee Jill Gansman Kraus donated the 80-foot -tall sculpture Walking to the Sky, placed on the lawn facing Forbes Ave between the Cohon University Center and Warner Hall; the sculpture was controversial for its placement, the general lack of input that the campus community had, its aesthetic appeal. In April 2015, Carnegie Mellon University, in collaboration with Jones Lang LaSalle, announced the planning of a second office space structure, alongside the Robert Mehrabian Collaborative Innovation Center, an upscale and full-service hotel, retail and dining development along Forbes Avenue.
This complex will connect to the Tepper Quadrangle, the Heinz College, the Tata Consultancy Services Building, the Gates-Hillman Center to create an innovation corridor on the university campus. The eff
Moon
The Moon is an astronomical body that orbits planet Earth and is Earth's only permanent natural satellite. It is the fifth-largest natural satellite in the Solar System, the largest among planetary satellites relative to the size of the planet that it orbits; the Moon is after Jupiter's satellite Io the second-densest satellite in the Solar System among those whose densities are known. The Moon is thought to have formed not long after Earth; the most accepted explanation is that the Moon formed from the debris left over after a giant impact between Earth and a Mars-sized body called Theia. The Moon is in synchronous rotation with Earth, thus always shows the same side to Earth, the near side; the near side is marked by dark volcanic maria that fill the spaces between the bright ancient crustal highlands and the prominent impact craters. After the Sun, the Moon is the second-brightest visible celestial object in Earth's sky, its surface is dark, although compared to the night sky it appears bright, with a reflectance just higher than that of worn asphalt.
Its gravitational influence produces the ocean tides, body tides, the slight lengthening of the day. The Moon's average orbital distance is 1.28 light-seconds. This is about thirty times the diameter of Earth; the Moon's apparent size in the sky is the same as that of the Sun, since the star is about 400 times the lunar distance and diameter. Therefore, the Moon covers the Sun nearly during a total solar eclipse; this matching of apparent visual size will not continue in the far future because the Moon's distance from Earth is increasing. The Moon was first reached in September 1959 by an unmanned spacecraft; the United States' NASA Apollo program achieved the only manned lunar missions to date, beginning with the first manned orbital mission by Apollo 8 in 1968, six manned landings between 1969 and 1972, with the first being Apollo 11. These missions returned lunar rocks which have been used to develop a geological understanding of the Moon's origin, internal structure, the Moon's history. Since the Apollo 17 mission in 1972, the Moon has been visited only by unmanned spacecraft.
Both the Moon's natural prominence in the earthly sky and its regular cycle of phases as seen from Earth have provided cultural references and influences for human societies and cultures since time immemorial. Such cultural influences can be found in language, lunar calendar systems and mythology; the usual English proper name for Earth's natural satellite is "the Moon", which in nonscientific texts is not capitalized. The noun moon is derived from Old English mōna, which stems from Proto-Germanic *mēnô, which comes from Proto-Indo-European *mḗh₁n̥s "moon", "month", which comes from the Proto-Indo-European root *meh₁- "to measure", the month being the ancient unit of time measured by the Moon; the name "Luna" is used. In literature science fiction, "Luna" is used to distinguish it from other moons, while in poetry, the name has been used to denote personification of Earth's moon; the modern English adjective pertaining to the Moon is lunar, derived from the Latin word for the Moon, luna. The adjective selenic is so used to refer to the Moon that this meaning is not recorded in most major dictionaries.
It is derived from the Ancient Greek word for the Moon, σελήνη, from, however derived the prefix "seleno-", as in selenography, the study of the physical features of the Moon, as well as the element name selenium. Both the Greek goddess Selene and the Roman goddess Diana were alternatively called Cynthia; the names Luna and Selene are reflected in terminology for lunar orbits in words such as apolune and selenocentric. The name Diana comes from the Proto-Indo-European *diw-yo, "heavenly", which comes from the PIE root *dyeu- "to shine," which in many derivatives means "sky and god" and is the origin of Latin dies, "day"; the Moon formed 4.51 billion years ago, some 60 million years after the origin of the Solar System. Several forming mechanisms have been proposed, including the fission of the Moon from Earth's crust through centrifugal force, the gravitational capture of a pre-formed Moon, the co-formation of Earth and the Moon together in the primordial accretion disk; these hypotheses cannot account for the high angular momentum of the Earth–Moon system.
The prevailing hypothesis is that the Earth–Moon system formed after an impact of a Mars-sized body with the proto-Earth. The impact blasted material into Earth's orbit and the material accreted and formed the Moon; the Moon's far side has a crust, 30 mi thicker than that of the near side. This is thought to be; this hypothesis, although not perfect best explains the evidence. Eighteen months prior to an October 1984 conference on lunar origins, Bill Hartmann, Roger Phillips, Jeff Taylor challenged fellow lunar scientists: "You have eighteen months. Go back to your Apollo data, go back to your computer, do whatever you have to, but make up your mind. Don't come to our conference unless you have something to say about the Moon's birth." At the 1984 conference at Kona, the giant impact hypothesis emerged as the most consensual theory. Before the conference, there were parti
Time capsule
A time capsule is a historic cache of goods or information intended as a method of communication with future people and to help future archaeologists, anthropologists, or historians. Time capsules are sometimes created and buried during celebrations such as a world's fair, a cornerstone laying for a building, or at other events. Time capsules are placed with the intention that they will be accessed at a future date. One of the earliest time capsules known was discovered in November 2017 in Burgos, Spain. A wooden statue of Jesus Christ had hidden inside it a document with economic and cultural information, written by Joaquín Mínguez, chaplain of the Cathedral of Burgo de Osma in 1777. An early example of the use of a time capsule was the Detroit Century Box; the brainchild of Detroit mayor William C. Maybury, it was created on December 31, 1900, scheduled to be opened 100 years later, it was filled with photographs and letters from 56 prominent residents describing life in 1900 and making predictions for the future, included a letter by Maybury addressed to the mayor of Detroit in 2000.
The capsule was opened by city officials on December 31, 2000, in a ceremony presided over by mayor Dennis Archer. The 1939 New York World's Fair time capsule was created by Westinghouse as part of their exhibit, it was 90 inches long, with an interior diameter of 6.5 inches, weighed 800 pounds. Westinghouse named the copper and silver alloy "Cupaloy", claiming it had the same strength as mild steel, it contained everyday items such as a spool of thread and doll, a Book of Record, a vial of staple food crop seeds, a microscope and a 15-minute RKO Pathé Pictures newsreel. Microfilm spools condensed the contents of a Sears Roebuck catalog, dictionary and other texts; this first modern time capsule was followed in 1965 by a second capsule at the same site, but 10 feet to the north of the original. Both capsules are buried 50 feet below site of the Fair. Both the 1939 and 1965 Westinghouse Time Capsules are meant to be opened in 6939. More in 1985, Westinghouse created a smaller, Plexiglas shell to be buried beneath the New York Marriott Marquis hotel, in the heart of New York's theater district.
However, this time capsule was never put in place. The Crypt of Civilization at Oglethorpe University, intended to be opened in 8113, is regarded as the first modern time capsule, although it was not called one at the time. George Edward Pendray is responsible for coining the term "time capsule." During the socialist period in the USSR, many time capsules were buried with messages to a future communist society. Four time capsules are "buried" in space; the two Pioneer Plaques and the two Voyager Golden Records have been attached to spacecraft for the possible benefit of spacefarers in the distant future. A fifth time capsule, the KEO satellite, was scheduled to be launched in 2015-16. However, it has been delayed several times and an actual launch date has not been given. After launch, it will carry individual messages from Earth's inhabitants addressed to earthlings around the year 52,000, when it is due to return to Earth, it is debated when time capsules were first used but current evidence shows it was used as early as 1876, the principle is simple and the idea and first use of time capsules could be much older than we know.
In 2014, a Revolutionary-era time capsule was found at the Massachusetts State House dating to 1795 and credited to Samuel Adams and Paul Revere. It was opened in 1855 with some contents added. A time capsule dating 1777 was discovered within a religious statute in Sotillo de la Ribera; the International Time Capsule Society was created to maintain a global database of all existing time capsules. According to time capsule historian William Jarvis, most intentional time capsules do not provide much useful historical information: they are filled with "useless junk", new and pristine in condition, that tells little about the people of the time. Many time capsules today contain only artifacts of limited value to future historians. Historians suggest that items which describe the daily lives of the people who created them, such as personal notes and documents, would increase the value of the time capsule to future historians. If time capsules have a museum-like goal of preserving the culture of a particular time and place for study, they fulfill this goal poorly in that they, by definition, are kept sealed for a particular length of time.
Subsequent generations between the launch date and the target date will have no direct access to the artifacts and therefore these generations are prevented from learning from the contents directly. Therefore, time capsules can be seen, in respect to their usefulness to historians, as dormant museums, their releases timed for some date so far in the future that the building in question is no longer intact. Historians concede that there are many preservation issues surrounding the selection of the media to transmit this information to the future; some of these issues include the obsolescence of technology and the deterioration of electronic and magnetic storage media, possible language problems if the capsule is dug up in the distant future. Many buried time capsules are lost, as interest in them fades and the exact location is forgotten, or they are destroyed within a few years by groundwater. Archives and archival materials, including videos, might be the best types of time capsules, as long as the medium can still be used, or the data can be read by the latest technologies and software.
The 1947 docudrama The Beginning or the End is a semi-his
Brownsville, Pennsylvania
Brownsville is a borough in Fayette County, United States, first settled in 1785 as the site of a trading post a few years after the pacification of the Iroquois enabled a post-Revolutionary war resumption of westward migration. The Trading Post soon became a tavern and Inn, was soon receiving emigrants heading west as it was located above the cut bank overlooking first ford that could be reached to those descending from the Mountains Brownsville is located 40 miles south of Pittsburgh along the east bank of the Monongahela River. According to the United States Census Bureau, the borough of Brownsville, located as a county border town has a total area of 1.1 square miles, of which 0.97 square miles is land and 0.1 square miles, or 10.47%, is water—most of, the Fayette County half of the Monongahela River between the community and the flatter lands of opposite shore West Brownsville in Washington County. As a community, the town is the central population center for a number of outlying hamlets geographically tied to the town for the same reasons they were founded nearby—Western Pennsylvania has far more hills and steep slopes than flats or gentle sloping terrains suitable for settlement.
This keeps Brownsville at the nexus of the transportation infrastructure which grew up during its history. While no longer a passenger depot, the town and cross-River West Brownsville share an important Railway bridge creating a balloon loop allowing the turning of complete coal trains. Newest is the limited access toll road PA Route 43, which connects the town to strategic points and southern Pittsburgh at Clairton. River hugging PA Route 88, connects to towns up and down the Mon Valley and the historic National Road reached East Saint Louis and connected the town to the immigrants arriving in the port of Baltimore traveling west on the Cumberland Turnpike and the National Road. From its founding, well into the 19th century, as the first reachable population center west of the Alleghenies barrier range on the Mississippi watershed, the borough grew into an industrial center, market town, transportation hub, outfitting center, river boat-building powerhouse, it was a gateway destination for emigrants heading west to the Ohio Country when a trading post, the new United States' Northwest Territory and their "legal successors" for travelers heading westwards on the various Emigrant Trails both to the Near West and Far West from its founding until well into the 1850s.
As outfitting center, the borough provided the markets for the small-scale industries in the surrounding counties—and quite a few in Maryland shipping goods over the pass by mule-train via the Cumberland Narrows toll-route. Brownsville became a major center for building steamboats through the 19th century, producing 3,000 boats by 1888; the borough developed in the late 19th century as a railroad yard and coking center, with other industries related to the rise of steel in the Pittsburgh area. It reached a peak of population of more than 8,000 in 1940. Postwar development occurred in suburbs; the restructuring of the railroad and steel industries caused a severe loss of jobs and population in Brownsville, beginning in the 1970s. The borough had a population of 2,331 as of the 2010 census. Brownsville is located on the banks of the Monongahela River, a major tributary of the Ohio River, one of North America's most important waterways; the Monongahela is navigable at Brownsville, offers inexpensive barge transportation to Chicago, New Orleans, St.
Marks in Florida, Tulsa, Kansas City and Brownsville, Texas, on the border with Mexico. The shipyards of Brownsville, provided Captain Richard King of Brownsville, with powerful new-built riverboats to navigate the fast currents of the Rio Grande in 1849. Brownsville is connected to the satellite community of West Brownsville by the Brownsville Bridge completed in 1914, which spans the Monongahela River. In 1960, the Lane Bane Bridge was constructed just downstream, path of U. S. Route 40 was moved to the new high-level structure and new four lane highway by-passing old Route 40 until the two merged in the small bedroom neighborhood known locally as Malden In pre-Columbian times, the right bank Monongahela held several mounds where iron rich red stone predominated, now believed to have been constructed by a branch of the Mound Builders cultures, but were believed by colonials to have been forts—leading to the area near the river crossing being called Redstone Old Fort in various colonial government records, Fort Burd, when an arms cache was built there.
By the time the region first became known to Dutch colonists and traders and the French in the 1640s, the lands were unoccupied, but under the management of one tribe or shared by several groups of Iroquoian peoples the Erie people, or Wenro people and shared with Seneca, the Shawnee people and the Susquehannocks. With all the rivers and streams tributary to the Monongahela, Allegheny Rivers, there is little known about the region's precise role in the Beaver Wars of the 17th century, but when French and Dutch and Swedish fur traders penetrated to the Greater Ohio Basin in the 1640s-1650s, the one thing that seemed clear to those observers was the lands termed the Ohio Country seemed empty and unpopulated; when in the 17th century, the occasional Englishman, as provincial Virginian or Marylanders generated their observations the emptiness of the region was confirmed. Before the 1750s, the area was'colonized' by weakened remnant tribes such as the Delaware, the few Erie and the Susquehannock survivors the Iroquo
Oakland, California
Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, United States. A major West Coast port city, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third largest city overall in the San Francisco Bay Area, the eighth most populated city in California, the 45th largest city in the United States. With a population of 425,195 as of 2017, it serves as a trade center for the San Francisco Bay Area. An act to incorporate the city was passed on May 4, 1852, incorporation was approved on March 25, 1854, which made Oakland a city. Oakland is a charter city. Oakland's territory covers what was once a mosaic of California coastal terrace prairie, oak woodland, north coastal scrub, its land served as a rich resource when its hillside oak and redwood timber were logged to build San Francisco. Oakland's fertile flatland soils helped. In the late 1860s, Oakland was selected as the western terminal of the Transcontinental Railroad. Following the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, many San Francisco citizens moved to Oakland, enlarging the city's population, increasing its housing stock and improving its infrastructure.
It continued to grow in the 20th century with its busy port, a thriving automobile manufacturing industry. The earliest known inhabitants were the Huchiun Indians; the Huchiun belonged to a linguistic grouping called the Ohlone. In Oakland, they were concentrated around Lake Merritt and Temescal Creek, a stream that enters the San Francisco Bay at Emeryville. In 1772, the area that became Oakland was colonized, with the rest of California, by Spanish settlers for the King of Spain. In the early 19th century, the Spanish crown granted the East Bay area to Luis María Peralta for his Rancho San Antonio; the grant was confirmed by the successor Mexican republic upon its independence from Spain. Upon his death in 1842, Peralta divided his land among his four sons. Most of Oakland fell within the shares given to Antonio Vicente; the portion of the parcel, now Oakland was called Encinal—Spanish for "oak grove"—due to the large oak forest that covered the area, which led to the city's name. During the 1850s—just as gold was discovered in California—Oakland started growing and developing because land was becoming too expensive in San Francisco.
The Chinese were struggling financially, as a result of the First Opium War, the Second Opium War, the Taiping Rebellion, so they began migrating to Oakland in an effort to provide for their families in China. However, the Chinese struggled to settle because they were discriminated against by the white community and their living quarters were burned down on several occasions; the majority of the Chinese migrants lived in unhealthy conditions in China and they had diseases, so plague spread into San Francisco though the Chinese were inspected for diseases upon their arrival to San Francisco. In 1851, three men—Horace Carpentier, Edson Adams, Andrew Moon—began developing what is now downtown Oakland. In 1852, the Town of Oakland became incorporated by the state legislature. During this time, Oakland had 75-100 inhabitants, two hotels, a wharf, two warehouses, only cattle trails. Two years on March 25, 1854, Oakland re-incorporated as the City of Oakland, with Horace Carpentier elected the first mayor, though a scandal ended his mayorship in less than a year.
The city and its environs grew with the railroads, becoming a major rail terminal in the late 1860s and 1870s. In 1868, the Central Pacific constructed the Oakland Long Wharf at Oakland Point, the site of today's Port of Oakland. A number of horsecar and cable car lines were constructed in Oakland during the latter half of the 19th century; the first electric streetcar set out from Oakland to Berkeley in 1891, other lines were converted and added over the course of the 1890s. The various streetcar companies operating in Oakland were acquired by Francis "Borax" Smith and consolidated into what became known as the Key System, the predecessor of today's publicly owned AC Transit. Oakland was one of the worst affected cities in California, impacted by the plague epidemic. Quarantine measures were set in place at the Oakland ports requiring the authorities at the port to inspect the arriving vessels for the presence of infected rats. Quarantine authorities at these ports inspected over a thousand vessels per year for plague and yellow fever.
By 1908, over 5,000 people were detained in quarantine. Hunters were sent to poison the affected areas in Oakland and shoot the squirrels, but the eradication work was limited in its range because the State Board of Health and the United States Public Health Service were only allotted about $60,000 a year to eradicate the disease. During this period Oakland did not have sufficient health facilities, so some of the infected patients were treated at home; the State Board of Health along with Oakland advised physicians to promptly report any cases of infected patients. Yet, in 1919 it still resulted in a small epidemic of Pneumonic plague which killed a dozen people in Oakland; this started when a man killed a squirrel. After eating the squirrel, he fell ill four days and another household member contracted the plague; this in turn was passed on either indirectly to about a dozen others. The officials in Oakland acted by issuing death certificates to monitor the spread of plague. At the time of incorporation in 1852, Oaklan
Elliott Cresson Medal
The Elliott Cresson Medal known as the Elliott Cresson Gold Medal, was the highest award given by the Franklin Institute. The award was established by Elliott Cresson, life member of the Franklin Institute, with $1,000 granted in 1848; the endowed award was to be "for some discovery in the Arts and Sciences, or for the invention or improvement of some useful machine, or for some new process or combination of materials in manufactures, or for ingenuity skill or perfection in workmanship." The medal was first awarded 21 years after Cresson's death. The Franklin Institute continued awarding the medal on an occasional basis until 1998 when they reorganized their endowed awards under one umbrella, The Benjamin Franklin Awards. A total of 268 Elliott Cresson Medals were given out during the award's lifetime
Chancellor
Chancellor is a title of various official positions in the governments of many nations. The original chancellors were the cancellarii of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the cancelli or lattice work screens of a basilica or law court, which separated the judge and counsel from the audience. A chancellor's office is called a chancery; the word is now used in the titles of many various officers in all kinds of settings. Nowadays the term is most used to describe: The head of the government A person in charge of foreign affairs A person with duties related to justice A person in charge of financial and economic issues The head of a university The Chancellor of Austria, denominated Bundeskanzler for males and Bundeskanzlerin for females, is the title of the head of the Government of Austria. Sebastian Kurz is the incumbent Bundeskanzler of Austria. Chancellor or Grand Chancellor is the common translation of the Chinese title chengxiang or zaixiang, which in imperial China was the head of the government serving under the emperor.
The Chancellor of Germany or Bundeskanzler, is the title for the head of government in Germany. Bundeskanzlerin is the feminine form. In German politics, the Bundeskanzler position is equivalent to that of a prime minister and is elected by the Bundestag, every four years on the beginning of the electoral period after general elections. Between general elections, the Federal Chancellor can only be removed from office by a konstruktives Misstrauensvotum which consists in the candidacy of an opposition candidate for the office of Chancellor in the Bundestag. If this candidate gets a majority of the entire membership of the Bundestag, he or she will be sworn in as new Federal Chancellor; the current German Bundeskanzlerin is Angela Merkel of the CDU. The former German Empire, the Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany had the equivalent position of Reichskanzler, as the head of the executive. Between 1871 and 1918 the Chancellor was appointed by the German Emperor. During the Weimar Republic, the Chancellor was chosen by the Reichspräsident and stood under his authority.
This continued during the first two years of the Nazi regime until the death of President Paul von Hindenburg in 1934. Between 1934 and 1945 Adolf Hitler, the dictatorial head of state and government of Nazi Germany was called "Führer und Reichskanzler". In Switzerland, the Federal Chancellor is not the political head of government, but rather its administrative head as the Chief of Staff of the Swiss Federal Government, he or she is elected by the Swiss Federal Assembly to head the Federal Chancellery — the general staff of the seven-member executive Federal Council, the Swiss federal government. The Chancellor participates in the meetings of the seven Federal Councilors with a consultative vote and prepares the reports on policy and activities of the council to parliament; the chancellery is responsible for the publication of all federal laws. In most Swiss Cantons there is a State Chancellor who heads the central administrative unit of the cantonal government. In the Canton of Geneva, the first documents attesting to the existence of a Chancellor go back to the 12th century.
In the 16th century the Chancery is described as the permanent secretariat of the executive and legislature. The first of these functions still constitutes an important part of its activities in Geneva and other cantons. In the Canton of Berne, the Chancellor is elected by the Grand Council and has the task of supporting the Grand Council and the Executive Council in carrying out their tasks; the Chancellor directs the staff of the Executive Council, supports the President of the Government and the Executive Council in the performance of their duties, participates as an advisor to the President of the Grand Council in Grand Council sessions. In Latin America, the equivalents to "chancellor" are used to refer to the post of foreign minister, it is used as a synonym to the full titles of the ministers of foreign affairs, notably in Mexico it relates to the position of head of the ministry of foreign affairs. The ministry of foreign affairs in Spanish-speaking countries in the Americas is referred to as the Cancillería or in Portuguese-speaking Brazil as Chancelaria.
However, in Spain the term canciller refers to a civil servant in the Spanish diplomatic service responsible for technical issues relating to foreign affairs. As to the German foreign service the term Kanzler refers to the administrative head of a diplomatic mission. In Finland the Chancellor of Justice supervises the legality of actions taken by the government and monitors the implementation of basic civil liberties. In this special function the chancellor sits in the Finnish Cabinet, the Finnish Council of State. In Sweden the Chancellor of Justice or Justitiekanslern acts as the Solicitor General for the Swedish Government; the office was introduced by Charles XII of Sweden in 1713. There was a Lord High Chancellor or Rikskansler as the most senior member of the Privy Council of Sweden. Ther
