1.
Christopher Newport University
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Christopher Newport University, or CNU, is a public liberal arts university located in Newport News, Virginia, United States. CNU is the youngest comprehensive university in the commonwealth of Virginia, the college was founded as an extension of the College of William & Mary and offered extension courses that had already been available in the area for some time. In 1964 the college was relocated to its current location, a 75-acre tract of land purchased and donated by the city, in this same year, the colleges first permanent building was dedicated as Christopher Newport Hall. In 1971, CNC became a college, however, it remained an extension of William & Mary until 1977 when it attained its independence. In 1992, the became a university under the leadership of President Anthony R. Santoro. In 1996, CNU made plans to more competitive. Those plans included the expansion of University property, several new buildings and residence halls, as well as overhauling academic programs,2011 – No.4 nationally for Best colleges for minorities in STEM. 2011 – U. S. News & World Report named CNU one of the schools to watch. 2011 – The Princeton Review chose CNU for the annual best colleges guidebook,2012 – No.3 up-and-coming regional university in the South. 2012 – No.8 among top regional universities in the South. 2013 – No.7 among top regional universities in the South. 2014 – No.7 among top regional universities in the South. 2014 – No.2 up-and-coming regional university in the South,2016 – No.5 among top public regional universities in the South, and No.14 on the overall regional university list for the South. Christopher Newport University offers a variety of bachelor of science. It ensures the highest quality of faculty achievement by preferentially hiring members of Phi Beta Kappa, graduate programs in applied physics and computer science, environmental science and teaching are also available in five-year bachelors to masters, as well as traditional formats. The School of Business is accredited by the AACSB and offers degrees in Accounting, Finance, Management. Worldwide, only one in six business schools has AACSB international accreditation, the Joseph W. Luter, III School of Business scored at the 90th percentile for the 2009–10 academic year in the ETS Major Field Test in Business. The English Department offers the major in English, with concentrations including literature, the History department offers degrees in History
2.
United States Senate
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The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress which, along with the House of Representatives, the lower chamber, composes the legislature of the United States. The composition and powers of the Senate are established by Article One of the United States Constitution. S. From 1789 until 1913, Senators were appointed by the legislatures of the states represented, following the ratification of the Seventeenth Amendment in 1913. The Senate chamber is located in the wing of the Capitol, in Washington. It further has the responsibility of conducting trials of those impeached by the House, in the early 20th century, the practice of majority and minority parties electing their floor leaders began, although they are not constitutional officers. This idea of having one chamber represent people equally, while the other gives equal representation to states regardless of population, was known as the Connecticut Compromise, there was also a desire to have two Houses that could act as an internal check on each other. One was intended to be a Peoples House directly elected by the people, the other was intended to represent the states to such extent as they retained their sovereignty except for the powers expressly delegated to the national government. The Senate was thus not designed to serve the people of the United States equally, the Constitution provides that the approval of both chambers is necessary for the passage of legislation. First convened in 1789, the Senate of the United States was formed on the example of the ancient Roman Senate, the name is derived from the senatus, Latin for council of elders. James Madison made the comment about the Senate, In England, at this day, if elections were open to all classes of people. An agrarian law would take place. If these observations be just, our government ought to secure the permanent interests of the country against innovation, landholders ought to have a share in the government, to support these invaluable interests, and to balance and check the other. They ought to be so constituted as to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority, the senate, therefore, ought to be this body, and to answer these purposes, the people ought to have permanency and stability. The Constitution stipulates that no constitutional amendment may be created to deprive a state of its equal suffrage in the Senate without that states consent, the District of Columbia and all other territories are not entitled to representation in either House of the Congress. The District of Columbia elects two senators, but they are officials of the D. C. city government. The United States has had 50 states since 1959, thus the Senate has had 100 senators since 1959. In 1787, Virginia had roughly ten times the population of Rhode Island, whereas today California has roughly 70 times the population of Wyoming and this means some citizens are effectively two orders of magnitude better represented in the Senate than those in other states. Seats in the House of Representatives are approximately proportionate to the population of each state, before the adoption of the Seventeenth Amendment in 1913, Senators were elected by the individual state legislatures
3.
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
4.
Harry F. Byrd Jr.
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Harry Flood Byrd Jr. was an American orchardist, newspaper publisher and politician. He served in the Senate of Virginia and then represented Virginia in the United States Senate and he was the first independent in the history of the U. S. Senate to be elected by a majority of the popular vote. Byrd was born December 20,1914 in Winchester, Virginia and his siblings included a sister, Westwood and two brothers, Richard Evelyn and Beverley. He was a member of one of the First Families of Virginia, including his uncle Richard E. Byrd, on August 9,1941 Byrd married Gretchen Thompson. They had two sons, Harry and Thomas, and a daughter Beverley and he left the University in 1935 to shore up his fathers newspaper, The Winchester Star. He also gave up an opportunity to join a business in Paris. The Star had been without an editor since his father had left to represent Virginia in the United States Senate in 1933. Upon his joining the paper, his father warned him, If you make too many mistakes, within a year his son became editor and publisher while his father retained financial control and advised him on editorials. Byrd later assumed membership and then leadership roles on the board of directors. Early in his career he also learned the business under the tutelage of John Crown at the Harrisonburg Daily News Record, Byrd was the publisher of that newspaper from 1936 to 1941 and again from 1946 to 1981, and was a member of its board until his death. He later became owner, until 1987, of the Page Shenandoah Newspaper Corporation and he retired as Chairman of the Byrd newspapers in 2001, and his son Thomas succeeded him, indeed, the company has been owned by the family for more than 100 years. While in the Navy he rose to the rank of Lieutenant Commander, after the war, Byrd oversaw the construction of a new facility for the Star. He also became a director of the Associated Press and later served as its Vice-President and he was a member of the Virginia Society of the Sons of the American Revolution. Byrd represented the third generation of his family to enter politics. His grandfather Richard Evelyn Byrd, Sr and he began accompanying his father on trips during the elders governorship, and once remarked that I was in every county and city in the state by the time I was thirteen years old. In time Byrd became a key member in his fathers statewide political network, the fathers hallmark, and that of his organization, became Byrds as well - an insistence upon fiscal restraint on the part of government, referred to as the policy of pay-as-you-go. Byrd reflected this populist political legacy when he stated, I am convinced we have too many laws, too much government regulation, the very wealthy can take care of themselves, the very needy are taken care of by the government. It is Middle America, the cross section, the people who work
5.
Chuck Robb
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Charles Spittal Chuck Robb is an American politician and former officer in the United States Marine Corps. He served as the 64th Governor of Virginia from 1982 to 1986, in 2004, he co-chaired the Iraq Intelligence Commission. Charles Robb was born in Phoenix, Arizona, the son of Frances Howard and he grew up in the Mount Vernon area of Fairfax County, Virginia. He attended Cornell University before earning a B. A. from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1961, a United States Marine Corps veteran and honor graduate of Quantico, Robb became a White House social aide. It was there that he met and eventually married Lynda Johnson, President Lyndon B. Johnson in a service celebrated by the Right Reverend Gerald Nicholas McAllister. Robb went on to serve a tour of duty in Vietnam, where he commanded a company in combat. After the war he earned a J. D. from the University of Virginia Law School in 1973, afterwards he entered private practice with Williams & Connolly. In 1977 Robb won election as a Democrat for the lieutenant governorship of Virginia and he served as lieutenant governor from 1978 to 1982 and as governor from 1982 to 1986. Virginia Democrats again won all three offices in 1985, which was viewed as an endorsement of Robbs leadership while in office. As a campaigner, Robb was capable but reserved, during a time when political communication styles were beginning to favor sound bites, Robb was known for speaking in paragraphs about complex policy issues. He was also noteworthy among his contemporaries for raising substantial sums of campaign funds, politically, Robb was a moderate, and known generally as being fiscally conservative, pro-national security, and progressive on social issues. As governor, he balanced the budget without raising taxes. He appointed a number of women and minorities to state positions. He was the first Virginia governor in 25 years to use the death penalty, Robb was instrumental in creating the Super Tuesday primary that brought political power to the Southern states. He was also a co-founder in creating the Democratic Leadership Council and he was a strong vote-getter in Virginia in the 1980s and helped mold a more progressive Virginia Democratic Party than the one that had ruled the state for decades. He was considered a presidential or vice-presidential prospect for a time, Robb later served as Democratic member of the US Senate from 1989 until 2001. Robb was elected in 1988, defeating Maurice Dawkins with 71% of the vote and his fellow Democrats removed him from the Budget Committee for advocating deeper cuts in federal spending. In 1991, he was one of a handful of Democratic senators to support authorizing the use of force to expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait
6.
United States House of Representatives
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The United States House of Representatives is the lower chamber of the United States Congress which, along with the Senate, composes the legislature of the United States. The composition and powers of the House are established by Article One of the United States Constitution, since its inception in 1789, all representatives are elected popularly. The total number of voting representatives is fixed by law at 435, the House is charged with the passage of federal legislation, known as bills, which, after concurrence by the Senate, are sent to the President for consideration. The presiding officer is the Speaker of the House, who is elected by the members thereof and is traditionally the leader of the controlling party. He or she and other leaders are chosen by the Democratic Caucus or the Republican Conferences. The House meets in the wing of the United States Capitol. Under the Articles of Confederation, the Congress of the Confederation was a body in which each state was equally represented. All states except Rhode Island agreed to send delegates, the issue of how to structure Congress was one of the most divisive among the founders during the Convention. The House is referred to as the house, with the Senate being the upper house. Both houses approval is necessary for the passage of legislation, the Virginia Plan drew the support of delegates from large states such as Virginia, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania, as it called for representation based on population. The smaller states, however, favored the New Jersey Plan, the Constitution was ratified by the requisite number of states in 1788, but its implementation was set for March 4,1789. The House began work on April 1,1789, when it achieved a quorum for the first time, during the first half of the 19th century, the House was frequently in conflict with the Senate over regionally divisive issues, including slavery. The North was much more populous than the South, and therefore dominated the House of Representatives, However, the North held no such advantage in the Senate, where the equal representation of states prevailed. Regional conflict was most pronounced over the issue of slavery, One example of a provision repeatedly supported by the House but blocked by the Senate was the Wilmot Proviso, which sought to ban slavery in the land gained during the Mexican–American War. Conflict over slavery and other issues persisted until the Civil War, the war culminated in the Souths defeat and in the abolition of slavery. Because all southern senators except Andrew Johnson resigned their seats at the beginning of the war, the years of Reconstruction that followed witnessed large majorities for the Republican Party, which many Americans associated with the Unions victory in the Civil War and the ending of slavery. The Reconstruction period ended in about 1877, the ensuing era, the Democratic and the Republican Party held majorities in the House at various times. The late 19th and early 20th centuries also saw an increase in the power of the Speaker of the House
7.
Virginia's 1st congressional district
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Virginias first congressional district is a United States congressional district in the commonwealth of Virginia. The district also includes major military installations and it has been represented by Republican Rob Wittman since 2007. As of 2016, the adjacent 3rd district has been ruled unconstitutional, the Virginia First District started in 1788 covering the counties of Berkeley, Frederick, Hampshire, Hardy, Harrison, Monongalia, Ohio, Randolph and Shenandoah. Of these only Shenandoah and Frederick Counties are in Virginia today, the modern counties of Clarke, Warren and most of Page as well as the independent city of Winchester were included as part of Frederick and Shenandoah counties in 1788. In West Virginia all the current state north and east of a line running from Wood County to Pocahontas County was in the congressional district. The one exception was that Pendleton County, West Virginia was in Virginias 3rd congressional district, in the redistribution which followed the 1850 census, the First District comprised sixteen counties in eastern Virginia. The counties included Accomack, Essex, Gloucester, James City, King and Queen, Mathews, Middlesex, New Kent, Richmond, Warwick, in an 1862 Union special election three out of the sixteen counties in the Union district supplied returns. The First District is noted for its presence of military institutions. Increasing numbers of military and retired voters have swung the district to the right, the Historical Atlas of Political Parties in the United States Congress. The Historical Atlas of United States Congressional Districts, Congressional Biographical Directory of the United States 1774–present http, //www. va1gop. org/ http, //www. 1stcdvademocrats. info/ http, //www. govtrack. us/congress/findyourreps. xpd. state=VA&district=1
8.
Thomas N. Downing
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Thomas Nelms Downing was a lawyer, politician, and Democratic Congressman from Virginias 1st congressional district for nine terms. Downing was born and raised in Newport News, Virginia and he attended Newport News High School, and graduated from Virginia Military Institute in 1940. After serving in the United States Army from 1942 to 1946 and he practiced as a lawyer, as well as a substitute judge of the municipal court of Warwick, Virginia. In 1958 he was elected as a Democrat to Congress and was re-elected eight times, Downing served 18 years in Congress prior to retiring in 1977. 1958, Downing was elected to the U. S,1964, Downing was re-elected with 78. 71% of the vote, defeating Republican Wayne C. 1968, Downing was re-elected with 72. 96% of the vote, defeating Republican James S. Stafford,1972, Downing was re-elected with 78. 09% of the vote, defeating Republican Kenneth D. Wells. Downing was appointed Chairman of the House Select Committee on Assassinations by Carl Albert, the Committee was tasked to look into evidence that was not available to the Warren Commission during its investigation of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Upon his retirement from Congress in 1977, Louis Stokes succeeded Downing as Chairman, Downing stated before and after the HSCAs investigation that he believed there was a conspiracy to assassinate Kennedy. He pushed for a House committee to investigate the nearly two years before its formation. In August 1976, he released affidavits from two men who stated that Richard Nixon approved the plan of a right-wing Cuban exile to eliminate left-wing Cuban exiles after the Bay of Pigs invasion, Downing said that their statements raised the possibility that right-wing Cubans killed Kennedy. Downing stated that they expected pro-Castro Cubans would be blamed for the assassination in retaliation for the assassination of Fidel Castro by United States agents. Downing said, I am firmly convinced, I am sincerely convinced, Downing described JFK, Oliver Stones 1991 film about the assassination of Kennedy, as implausible. He said, Its impossible to tell where fact stops and fiction starts, prior to the investigation, James J. Kilpatrick described Downing as a man of exception integrity and common sense yet not altogether unbiased in the matter of Kennedys assassination. Robert P. Gemberling, head of the FBIs investigation of the assassination for thirteen years after the release of the Warren Commissions report, said in 1976 that Downing and his successor, Henry B. He died from the complications of surgery at the age of 82. Biographical Directory of the United States Congress and this article incorporates public domain material from the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress website http, //bioguide. congress. gov. Thomas N. Downing at Find a Grave
9.
Herbert H. Bateman
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Herbert Herb Harvell Bateman was an American politician in Virginia. He was a member of the United States House of Representatives, serving as a Republican from 1983 until his death from natural causes in Leesburg. Bateman was born in Elizabeth City, North Carolina on August 7,1928, however, he lived most of his life in Newport News, Virginia. A graduate of Newport News High School in 1945, Bateman went on to William, after graduation, he briefly taught at Hampton High School from 1949 to 1951, when he enlisted in the United States Air Force as a 1st lieutenant during the Korean War. Upon his return home, Bateman enrolled in the Law Center at Georgetown University and he served a short time as a clerk for the United States Court of Appeals in Washington, D. C. before practicing law privately in Newport News from 1968 to 1983. During this period he worked to build a base through community activism. Bateman served as president of the Virginia Jaycees and National legal counsel for the United States Junior Chamber of Commerce, Bateman was elected to the Senate of Virginia for 14 years, representing a portion of Newport News. He was originally a Democrat, but became a Republican in 1976, in 1982, he was elected to succeed Paul S. Trible, Jr. as the representative for the 1st District in the United States House of Representatives. While in the House of Representatives, Batemans voting record was moderate by Southern Republican standards and he was a strong supporter of controlling government spending. However, he was active on defense issues. Since Newport News was a center for work, he strongly supported military spending. He also served his constituents as a member of such as the Virginia Jaycees, Peninsula United Way. In 1990, he was diagnosed with lung and prostate cancer, in 1995, he suffered a heart attack, but was able to recover. He had surgery to remove cancer from his lung in 1998. He was diagnosed with a cancerous lymph node in January 2000, Bateman died on September 11,2000 from natural causes. He was in Leesburg, Virginia at the time for a golf tournament and he was serving out the remainder of his ninth term at the time of his death. He was survived by his wife, Laura, and two children, a son and daughter and his son, Herbert H. Bateman Jr. presently serves on the Newport News City Council as Vice Mayor and on the Peninsula Airport Commission. Daughter, Laura Margaret Bateman, is the principle of Bateman Consulting, both his papers from his time as a state senator as well as his papers from his time in Congress can be found at the Special Collections Research Center at the College of William & Mary
