On March 10, 1821, President James Monroe Appointed General Andrew Jac

On March 10, 1821, President James Monroe appointed General Andrew Jackson to take possession of Florida and gave him the full powers of governor. Jackson accepted the office only on the condition that he could resign as soon as the territorial government was organized.(1) On July 17, 1821, Spain transferred Florida to the United States, and Jackson sent his resignation to the president in November. In all, Andrew Jackson visited Florida only three times: in 1814 during the War of 1812, in 1818 during the First Seminole War, and in 1821 to organize the first territorial government.(2) The change from Spanish to American rule was not a smooth transition. The Spanish population quickly realized the unruly settlers who visited their homes and establishments had neither the money nor inclination to purchase their property at fair market value. The volatile Mayor of St. Augustine Juan Entralgo refused to cooperate with Jackson, and when the Spanish Governor Don Jose Callava protested Jackson's policies, Jackson threw him in jail.(1) Few Spaniards elected to remain under American rule. Many elected to strip their homes of anything useful and burnt the foundations so the Americans were left with ruins. The new Territory of Florida was second only to Georgia in land area east of the Mississippi River. This huge size, coupled with the state's under populated peninsular, posed serious problems to the state's future development. Northern Congressmen feared that Florida would be divided into two slave states, thus disrupting the delicate balance of having equal slave and free states in the United States Senate.(3) Jackson felt there were more obvious problems: a lack of population, the absence of decent roads and physical resources, and the presence of hostile Seminole Indians.(1) Territorial Florida had a simple governmental structure. The Governor, a three-year appointee of the President, had to operate with a minimum of Federal funding. The Territorial Council, elected by the people, could only borrow money, issue licenses, and organize a state militia. As the population grew, the legislature began to charter counties with appointed commissioners to handle local civil and criminal cases. It was essential to resolve the territory's financial indebtedness so that Florida could construct the transportation and economic ties to the rest of the South. The only forms of state revenue were taxes on land sales, license fees, and poll taxes. Two political groups soon developed out of this struggle to finance Florida's development. The Jacksonian Democrats, benefiting from their location in Middle Florida at the center of the plantation and political, often joined the Whig Party. Florida's Whigs supported increased spending on railroads and state banks, which they de emed essential to the maturation of the Florida economy. East Florida, dominated by small farmers, disliked the willingness of the Whigs to spend public funds on such economic projects. The anti-Call forces were led by two men from St. Augustine, lawyer Robert Raymond Reid and sugar planter David Yulee Levy. They organized a ferocious attack on Call when the Pensacola Bank, which Call endorsed, collapsed, harming many small West Florida farmers. These Democrats gained the support of frontiersmen with their opposition to the planter aristocracy and appeal to less taxes. The election of David Yule Levy, a European Jew, in a traditionalist Protestant was an indication of the acceptance of the anti-Call platform. Despite their belief in less spending, both Levy and Reid were firm supporters of Florida statehood.(1) By 1840, Florida had taken its place as a member of the Old South. Its leading citizens, many of neighboring Georgia and Alabama, had formed economic and political ties to all the institutions of Southern society. Florida was an agrarian society and this predominance of agriculture, with its definable class and caste, would leave an notable mark on Florida history. The plantation leaders led Florida in wealth and political power. There remained in most counties only the urban professionals to challenge this plantation elite and many of them were firmly entrenched in the cotton culture. The townsfolk represented a middle strata of shopkeepers, merchants, artisans, and builders. The small farmer and the stock tender represented the lower economic groups, while the black freedmen and the slave held the least status and power. Two of the best-operated plantations in Florida were

Qu es el advance parole o permiso de viaje

Qu es el advance parole o permiso de viaje El advance parole es un permiso de viaje es un requerimiento indispensable para que algunos extranjeros que se encuentran en los Estados Unidos puedan viajar fuera del paà ­s y regresar. Este artà ­culo informa sobre quià ©n,  deben solicitarlo, cundo, cà ³mo, costos, consecuencias de viajar sin solicitar este permiso y quà © formas puede tener una vez que es aprobado. Quià ©nes deben solicitar el permiso conocido como advance parole Son varias las categorà ­as de extranjeros que deben solicitar el advance parole para viajar al extranjero y regresar. Pero el punto comà ºn que tienen todos ellos es que son personas que estn en la actualidad en los Estados Unidos y que si viajan al extranjero sin el permiso de viaje  no podrà ­an regresar porque carecen del debido documento migratorio, como serà ­a una visa vlida o la tarjeta de residencia permanente.   A continuacià ³n, las situaciones en las que es necesario solicitar un advance parole o permiso de viaje: 1. Ajuste de estatus   La ms comà ºn es la de las personas que han solicitado un  ajuste de estatus  en el  proceso para adquirir la tarjeta de residencia (green card). Por ejemplo, algunos esposos de ciudadanos americanos y que cumplen con una serie de requisitos. Mientras se demora el proceso de ajuste de estaus, estas personas pueden viajar al extranjero siempre si tienen un advance parole. Sin embargo, no todas las personas en proceso de ajuste deben solicitarlo. Y es que existen las siguientes excepciones: las personas que ingresaron al paà ­s con visas K-3 (esposos de ciudadanos)K-4 (hijos de ciudadanos)H-1B (profesionales)   L-1 (transfer entre empresas) y que cuentan con una visa vlida. Es muy importante el requisito de la validez del visado, ya que si no lo es, se deber pedir el advance parole mientras se est en el proceso del ajuste de estatus. Asimismo, los que solicitan el ajuste porque ya tienen un estatus de refugiado o de asilado aprobado  y està ©n en proceso de ajuste de estatus para obtener la green card deben solicitar el documento para viajar al extranjero y poder regresar (ver ms abajo cul aplica a este caso) y no el advance parole. 2. Solicitante de asilo Las personas que tienen una peticià ³n de asilo pendiente tambià ©n deben solicitar el advance parole antes de viajar fuera de los Estados Unidos. Pero no las que ya lo tienen aprobado, a quienes corresponde un documento para viajar (ver ms abajo). 3. Visa T o visa U aprobada La visa T se concede a personas que han sido và ­ctimas de trata de personas Por su parte, las visas U se otorgan a và ­ctimas de determinados delitos que han colaborado con las autoridades para resolver un crimen o lograr la condena del delincuente.   Sin embargo, cabe destacar que mientras se procesa la visa U o la T y est pendiente su aprobacià ³n, es aconsejable no viajar fuera de los Estados Unidos.   4. Accià ³n diferida aprobada Los muchachos y muchachas entre 15 y 30 aà ±os que hayan solicitado la accià ³n diferida, tambià ©n conocida como DACA, por sus siglas en inglà ©s,  y que ya la tengan aprobada pueden solicitar un advance parole para viajar al extranjero. 5. TPS Es una situacià ³n excepcional de proteccià ³n temporal que permite a los ciudadanos de determinados paà ­ses y que reà ºnen todos los requisitos seà ±alados por la ley permanecer en Estados Unidos y trabajar legalmente. En la actualidad aplica a ciudadanos de: El Salvador, Guinea, Haità ­, Honduras, Liberia, Nepal, Nicaragua, Sierra Leona, Somalia, Sudn, Sudn del Sur, Siria y Yemen. Quià ©nes no pueden pedir un advance parole Aunque una persona se encuentre dentro de las categorà ­as nombradas, es decir, ajuste de estatus, TPS, asilo pendiente, visa T o Visa U aprobados, no se puede solicitar el advance parole si se est en un proceso pendiente de deportacià ³n o expulsià ³n. Destacar que la excepcià ³n son los muchachos con DACA aprobado. Adems, consultar con un abogado en todos los casos si es que se tienen una cita para comparecer en una corte migratoria o se tienen cualquier asunto criminal pendiente o una condena por un tema de delitos o faltas. Por otro lado, no pueden solicitar este permiso para viajar los migrantes indocumentados excepto, como ya se ha dicho, los muchachos con DACA aprobado, quienes en la actualidad se encuentran en una situacià ³n que podrà ­a calificarse de semi-legalidad.  ¿Cà ³mo se solicita el advance parole? Llenando el formulario I-131. Marcar la casilla correcta, ya que este documento tambià ©n se solicita para los casos en los que se pide un permiso de reentrada o un documento de viaje (ver ms abajo). Por lo tanto hay que checar dos veces para verificar que se marca lo correcto.   Si se est en un proceso de ajuste de estatus lo ms frecuente es que se envà ­e al mismo tiempo junto con el documento en que se solicita el ajuste y un permiso de trabajo.  ¿Cundo debe solicitarse el advance parole? Antes de salir de Estados Unidos. Adems, tener en cuenta que en la mayorà ­a de los casos es necesario que le tomen al solicitante las huellas digitales (dactilares), para lo cual recibir una cita. Si se viaja fuera antes de este trmite se considera que se ha abandonado la peticià ³n de advance parole, que queda sin efecto. Costos El costo de aplicar depende de la situacià ³n de cada uno y la razà ³n por la que aplica y hasta puede ser gratis.   Si se solicita el permiso de viaje junto con el ajuste de estatus y el permiso de trabajo ya no es necesario pagar una cuota adicional.   En los otros casos, la cuota es de $360, pero verificar siempre en el documento del USCIS en el que explica cà ³mo llenar el formulario, ya que esa cantidad puede cambiar.  Tambià ©n se puede verificar el costo llamando gratuitamente al USCIS a su servicio de atencià ³n al cliente marcando al 1-800-575-5283. Adems, en algunos casos es posible solicitar una exencià ³n del pago y asà ­ saldrà ­a gratis.  ¿Cunto se demora el advance parole? Suele tardar unos dos o tres meses en procesarse. Es posible solicitar una tramitacià ³n acelerada marcando al Centro Nacional de Atencià ³n al Cliente al 1-800-375-5283 o incluyendo una carta en la aplicacià ³n en la que se adjunta documentacià ³n que sirve para apoyar la peticià ³n. En casos realmente urgentes es posible que el solicitante se presente en una oficina del USCIS. Se puede buscar la ms cercana en esta aplicacià ³n. Bajar el cursor a mitad de pgina y ahà ­ clicar en el mapa de Estados Unidos encima del estado en el que se reside.   En este caso, se debe llevar la aplicacià ³n del I-131, un cheque para el pago de la tarifa, dos fotos tipo pasaporte y documentacià ³n de apoyo para demostrar la urgencia. Por ejemplo, un certificado de defuncià ³n o un informe mà ©dico.  ¿Cà ³mo luce e documento en el que se aprueba el advance parole? Una vez que el USCIS aprueba este permiso, puede lucir de dos formas: El documento que se conoce como I-512Una tarjeta de permiso de trabajo que sirve a su vez como advance parole y asà ­ lo dice el propio documento en la frase serve as I-512 Advance parole.  ¿El permiso de viaje o advance parole garantiza el ingreso a Estados Unidos? La respuesta a esa pregunta es negativa. Y es que siempre hay que tener presente que la à ºltima palabra la tiene el oficial migratorio de la CBP.   Adems, tener en cuenta que las personas que ingresan, que son la mayorà ­a, son consideradas desde el punto de vista migratorio como parolee y, por el contrario, no es un admitted. Esta es una distincià ³n tà ©cnica y jurà ­dica que conviene tener en cuenta.  ¿Cules son las consecuencias de no solicitar el advance parole? Se puede salir de Estados Unidos, pero el problema aparece en el momento en que se quiere regresar. El oficial migratorio puede impedirlo y en ese caso se tendr que esperar fuera de Estados Unidos a que finalice el proceso. Adems, en algunos casos en los que la persona ha estado en Estados Unidos ilegalmente por ms de 180 dà ­as puede saltar el problema aà ±adido del castigo de los tres y de los cinco aà ±os.   Finalmente, otra consecuencia es que se considere que se ha abandonado el trmite migratorio pendiente, con lo cual habrà ­a que iniciarlo de nuevo. Casos distintos al del advance parole, pero similares y que a veces se confunden Hay otros permisos para regresar a los Estados Unidos que no pueden confundirse con el advance parole. Se piden utilizando el mismo formulario pero se marca una casilla diferente. Las personas que tienen el estatus de refugiado o de asilado deben solicitar un documento que se conoce como documento para viajar para refugiados (refugee travel document, en inglà ©s), para estar capacitados para viajar fuera de los Estados Unidos. Los asilados no deben confundir dos situaciones: cuando la peticià ³n de asilo est pendiente, que es un advance parole lo que deben solicitar, y cuando el asilo ha sido aprobado, que se debe solicitar un refugee travel document.   A veces existen confusiones porque se pide utilizando el mismo formulario, el I-131, pero son distintos los documentos que se obtienen. Fijarse bien en el cuadradito que se marca cuando se pide el beneficio. Tambià ©n deben solicitar este documento para viajar los familiares de los refugiados y de los asilados que obtienen este estatus de forma derivada. Por otro lado, con el mismo formulario I-131 puede solicitarse un permiso de reentrada, que es diferente al permiso de viaje o advance parole. El de reentrada es un permiso por el que deben aplicar los residentes permanentes legales o los residentes condicionales que van a pasar ms de un aà ±o. Y es que los residentes tienen la obligacià ³n de residir en los Estados Unidos y tienen que respetar ciertas reglas de tiempos en sus estadà ­as en otros paà ­ses. Por el contrario,un caso completamente distinto es el de los residentes permanentes que sà ³lo tienen la green card estampada en el pasaporte porque todavà ­a no han recibido la de plstico. Estas personas pueden viajar sin necesidad de pedir permiso previo. Parole que pueden pedir las personas que se encuentran en el extranjero para ingresar a USA Un caso completamente distinto es el del parole que piden extranjeros fuera de Estados Unidos para ingresar al paà ­s. Aquà ­ se hace una mencià ³n porque a veces se confunden con el permiso para viajar. Pero son cosas diferentes que aplican a casos distintos. Los casos de parole que se solicitan desde el extranjero son: Por razones humanitarias extraordinarias como razones mà ©dicas o legales, como por ejemplo, testificar en un juicio.Programa de menores centroamericanosPrograma de reunificacià ³n familiar para cubanos y haitianos Conclusià ³n Los extranjeros presentes en Estados Unidos con un proceso migratorio pendiente deben asegurarse antes de viajar a otro paà ­s si para ellos existe el requerimiento de solicitar un advance parole antes de salir. Y eso aplica asà ­ sea para cruzar a Canad o a Mà ©xico a una localidad justo pegada a la frontera con Estados Unidos y por sà ³lo unas horas. Este artà ­culo es meramente informativo. No es asesorà ­a legal.

Civil Rights Activist Fannie Lou Hamer Quotes

Civil Rights Activist Fannie Lou Hamer Quotes Fannie Lou Hamer, called the spirit of the Civil Rights Movement, led the way with organizing ability, music, and stories, helping to win the right to vote for African Americans in the South. See: Fannie Lou Hamer Biography Selected Fannie Lou Hamer Quotations Im sick and tired of being sick and tired. To support whatever is right, and to bring in justice where weve had so much injustice. Nobodys free until everybodys free. We serve God by serving our fellow man; kids are suffering from malnutrition. People are going to the fields hungry. If you are a Christian, we are tired of being mistreated. Whether you have a Ph.D., or no D, were in this bag together. And whether youre from Morehouse or Nohouse, were still in this bag together. Not to fight to try to liberate ourselves from the men this is another trick to get us fighting among ourselves but to work together with the black man, then we will have a better chance to just act as human beings, and to be treated as human beings in our sick society. There is one thing you have got to learn about our movement. Three people are better than no people. One night I went to the church. They had a mass meeting. And I went to the church, and they talked about how it was our right, that we could register and vote. They were talking about we could vote out people that we didnt want in office, we thought that wasnt right, that we could vote them out. That sounded interesting enough to me that I wanted to try it. I had never heard, until 1962, that black people could register and vote. When they asked for those to raise their hands whod go down to the courthouse the next day, I raised mine. Had it high up as I could get it. I guess if Id had any sense Idve been a little scared, but what was the point of being scared? The only thing they could do to me was kill me and it seemed like theyd been trying to do that a little bit at a time ever since I could remember. The landowner said I would have to go back to withdraw or I would have to leave and so I told him I didnt go down there to register for him, I was down there to register for myself. I am determined to get every Negro in the state of Mississippi registered. They just kept beating me and telling me, You nigger bitch, were gonna make you wish you were dead. ... Every day of my life I pay with the misery of that beating. on northern racism, speaking in New York: The manll shoot you in the face in Mississippi, and you turn around hell shoot you in the back here. in nationally-televised testimony to the Credentials Committee of the Democratic National Convention, 1964: If the Freedom Democratic Party is not seated now, I question America. Is this America? The land of the free and the home of the brave? Where we have to sleep with our telephones off the hook, because our lives be threatened daily. When the Democratic National Committee offered a compromise in 1964 to seat 2 delegates of the 60 sent by the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party: We didnt come for no two seats when all of us is tired. to Senator Hubert H. Humphrey, who brought a compromise offer to the MFDP delegates: Do you mean to tell me that your position is more important than four hundred thousand black peoples lives? ... Now if you lose this job of Vice-President because you do what is right, because you help the MFDP, everything will be all right. God will take care of you. But if you take it this way, why, you will never be able to do any good for civil rights, for poor people, for peace, or any of those things you talk about. Senator Humphrey, Im going to pray to Jesus for you. Question to her mother when she was a child: Why werent we white? We are sick and tired of our people having to go to Vietnam and other places to fight for something we dont have here. Quotes About Fannie Lou Hamer: Hamer biographer Kay Mills: If Fannie Lou Hamer had had the same opportunities that Martin Luther King had, then we would have had a female Martin Luther King. June Johnson: Im amazed at how she put fear in the hearts of powerful people like Lyndon B. Johnson. Constance Slaughter-Harvey: Fannie Lou Hamer made me realize that we’re nothing unless we can hold this system accountable and the way we hold this system accountable is to vote and to take an active note to determine who our leaders are. More About Fannie Lou Hamer Fannie Lou Hamer BiographyWomen and the Civil Rights Movement About These Quotes Quote collection assembled by Jone Johnson Lewis. Each quotation page in this collection and the entire collection  © Jone Johnson Lewis. This is an informal collection assembled over many years. I regret that I am not be able to provide the original source if it is not listed with the quote.

Meaning of Life Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Meaning of Life - Essay Example Besides these tortures, he encountered constant threats of being thrown into the gas ovens probably because of his physical appearance. However, in spite of the experiences he faced in the three camps that he served, he emerged as a visionary person. His reason for being optimistic was that human beings hold the freedom of choosing the manner in which they view the circumstances they undergo on a daily basis. Therefore, they create meaning from such circumstances. Frankl outlined three experiences that the prisoners went through after their arrival at the concentration camps, during their stay there and after they were freed from the camps. After realizing where they had been taken to and the reason for their transfer, the first experience that the prisoners felt was the shock. Later, the shock would be replaced by a second experience. The experience would be the phase of psychological reaction as well as apathy. These were the necessary methods that the prisoners would use to cope with the abuse that they received from their supervisors. During this stage, the fear of death was no longer the prisoners’ concern. On the contrary, the part that was most painful was the insults that they received. The prisoners would be given uniforms that were more of rags (Frankl, 7-26). Also, they would be issued with shoes most of which did not fit them. Those who had reported with better shoes had no choice but to give them to the SS guards or risk s evere punishments. At a time, the prisoners were forced to walk bare footed on the snow since their shoes had been worn out. The author describes a twelve-year-old boy who he saw being taken to the sickbay. The boy had been forced to stand attention on the snow bear footed for hours because there were no shoes for him at the camp. The results were that the boy’s toes got some frostbites. Frankl writes that there was a frequent

How Can an Engineering Airline Maintenance Organisation Identify Assignment

How Can an Engineering Airline Maintenance Organisation Identify Existing or New Staff to Take on Managerial Responsibilities - Assignment Example However, for airlines to operate effectively, they must have to maintain their planes, which are the key to their returns. Therefore, there is a need for an airline maintenance organization contracted by an airline. The airline entrusts the maintenance organization with the responsibility of ensuring the aircraft are worthy of operating. According to Hines (2003), the maintenance organizations are required to assess the competence and qualification of aircraft maintenance employees and the results can either confirm the need for training or not. Nevertheless, when the organization is seeking for an employee, who will match the managerial responsibilities, it can choose to either recruit internally or externally from a pool of candidates. When an organization decides to recruit externally, there are a number of steps involved. According to Roberts (1997 p3), the main purpose of selecting candidates is to match them with the organization’s responsibilities, hence consideration o f competence of the candidates is important. The first step in attracting candidates for a particular position is through advertising, whereby, an organization can choose from a variety, newspapers, internet, or posters among others. The interested candidates respond via curriculum vitae or application letters. The organization then proceeds to sort the quality qualified CVs from the low-quality ones and shortlist the qualified candidates. The qualified candidates are then invited for the interview, at a certain date, time, and venue. During the interviews, the employees are expected to answer the question confidently and correctly; the interviews determine the capability of a candidate to take up the required roles. According to Holbeche (2009 pp 175), after the interview is conducted, feedback should be given to the unsuccessful and successful candidates. It is important to recruit new talent into the organization, as they contribute towards new ideas; however, the skills and expe rience have to fit the assigned role. In this case, of the managerial responsibility, the experience is necessary for this position.  

The Critical Legal Studies Movement

The Critical Legal Studies Movement The Critical Legal Studies (CLS) movement came to the fore in the United States (US) in the 1970s. This movement is a body of like-minded thinkers who claim to attack the virtues that they say are proclaimed by the liberal legal system. It is a radical theoretical movement which rejects the distinction between law and politics and the notion that law can be neutral and value free. The movement proposes the integration of law and social theory. Since the Critical Legal Studies movement is relatively new, its value as a theory of law is still being assessed, but despite its continual development it has given much of interest to thinking about the law. Indeed, like other sceptical theories it may undermine the coherent world of law which legal academics and practitioners tend to portray. In Britain, the Critical Legal Conference was formed in 1984.  [1]   Although CLS has been largely a US movement, it was influenced to a great extent by European philosophers, such as nineteenth-century German social theorists Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels and Max Weber; Max Horkheimer and Harberd Marcuse of the Frankfrut School German social philosophy; the Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci; and poststructuralist French thinkers Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida, representing respectively fields of history and literary theory. CLS has borrowed heavily from legal realism, the school of legal thought that flourished in the 1920s and 1930s. Like CLS scholars, legal realists rebelled against accepted legal theories of the day and urged more attention to the social context of the law. Among noted CLS scholars Roberto Mangabeira Unger, Robert W. Gordon, Mark Kelman, Peter Gabel, Morton J. Horwitz, Dunkan Kennedy and Katherine A. Mackinnon.  [2]   The founders of CLS found a yawning absence at the level of theory, fundamentally convinced that law and politics could not be separated. How could law be so tilted to favour the powerful, given the prevailing explanations of law as either democratically chosen or the result of impartial judicial reasoning from neutral principles? Yet how could law be a tool for social change, in the face of Marxist explanations of law as mere epiphenomenal outgrowths of the interests of the powerful? CLS scholars have influenced try to explain both why legal principles and doctrines do not yield determinate answers to specific disputes and how legal decisions reflect cultural and political values that shift over time. They focused from the start on the ways that law contributed to illegitimate social hierarchies, producing domination of women by men, nonwhites by whites, and the poor by the wealthy. They claim that apparently neutral language and institutions, operated through law, mask relationship s of power and control. The emphasis on individualism within the law similarly hides patterns of power relationships while making it more difficult to summon up a sense of community and human interconnection. Joining in their assault on these dimensions of law, CLS scholars have differed considerably in their particular methods and views.  [3]   One of the characteristic of CSL is that it has been rejected formalism. Formalism has tended to be the fall back position of liberal legal thinking when forced to confront the question: how can a legal system give the kinds of neutral decisions expected of it. Formalists, as CLS characterise them,  [4]  circumvent this problem by insisting that the judge is not imposing his or anyone elses values but merely interpreting the words of the law. By separating core and penumbra Hart could be taken to admit the problem by his indulgence that the judge had to have recourse to discretion in interpreting the penumbra of legal rules. CLS theorists also share the related view that the law is indeterminate. They have shown that using standard legal arguments, it is possible to reach sharply contrasting conclusions in individual cases. The conclusions reached in any case will have more to do with the social context in which they are argued and decided than with any overarching scheme of legal reasoning. Moreover, CLS scholars argue that the esoteric and convoluted nature of legal reasoning actually screens the laws indeterminacy. They have used the ideas of deconstruction to explore the ways in which legal texts are open to multiple interpretations. The CLS thesis refutes the claim that traditional legal scholarship produces rules and principles of law which guide human behaviour. Both legal formalism and positivism, which look upon law as a system of rules which are rationally made, are repudiated. Traditional legal scholarship treats the law as objective and neutral. The CLS claims that law can not be objective because human and social realities always manifest themselves in the legal discourses. Roberto Mangabeira Unger, who teaches at Harvard Law School and is widely regarded as the intellectual leader of the movement, now offers the public a short manifesto he describes as more a proposal than a description. It is an ambitious and impressive undertaking. It also defies summation. It is a carefully crafted statement with ideas interlocked like a chain-link fence that stretches as far as the eye can see. And the full purport of his message can only be appreciated by an attentive reading. Even so, five themes seem central to his argument. There were two distinct stages in the role of law in western societies before the modern era. First it served to establish and defend social hierarchies and social class divisions. Toward the end of the 18th century, however, it was put to the revolutionary task of protecting rights of individuals irrespective of their social rank or class. In this country the founding fathers relied on democracy (created by our public law, the Constitution) and the market (fostered by private law, notably contract) to give form and limits to those rights.  [5]   By the 20th century the context in which American law operated had drastically changed. Social arrangements sanctioned by law had come to include an array of hierarchies of economic power and pernicious social distinctions protected as rights by the very legal system created to establish individual freedom and equality. The politics of democracy and the blind forces of the market proved woefully inadequate to govern a society increasingly dominated by modern science and technology. Hence there is a compelling need to restructure our social order to make it compatible with freedom and equality. The way to accomplish this reconstruction, according to Roberto M. Unger, is not through classical revolution of the kind Marx advocated, brought about by an alliance between disaffected elites and the downtrodden. Rather law must be reinvented to give it a revolutionary new purpose: to lead the dismantling of the various hierarchies of power and privilege that through perversions of the legal process have come to threaten the higher values of our society.  [6]  Of property law, he says that it has its own inbuilt legal market which is a constitutional interest with its own legal structure in a democracy. According to him, the situation is fraught with ambiguity and indeterminacy, because of the abstract nature of the concept of rights. With respect to contract law, Unger explains that contract law allows freedom to contract, but that this is promptly contradicted by other principles which say that people can only bind themselves in contract for what the law allows. Unger present s an argument on formalism which states that every doctrine relies on some view of human associations which are right and realistic in social life. The lawyer needs a theory as his guiding vision, which prevents him from seeing legal reasoning as a game of analogies. To Unger, reliance on analogies leads to analogy-mongering, and this must stop. He claims that this received wisdom is challengeable as wrong, and to do this one should rely on a normative theory of a branch of law supplied by the CLS. This is Ungers deviation doctrine, which embellishes the CLSs nihilistic view of law. Mark G. Kelman examines the importance to criminal law of the stage that precedes legal analysis. His argument is that legal argument has two phases: interpretive construction and rational rhetoricism, and that the former, a vital step which undercuts the authority of the latter, goes virtually unexamined.  [7]  For example, the result of a case may depend on weather the defendants act is set in a board or narrow time frame. This issue has come to a head with a series of cases where battered women have murdered their husbands and the scope of the provocation defence has been tested.  [8]  If a broad time frame as been used she may have defences of provocation, even self-defence; in a narrow time frame she has committed murder. There is no meta-theory to determine the appropriate time frame; the decision accordingly is unreasonable. There are some techniques which the CLS have deployed in analyzing legal texts, namely Trashing, Deconstruction, Genealogy, etc. Leading CLS scholar Mark G. Kelman defends trashing against mainstream academic critics, claiming that the discrediting of accepted legal argument is good According to him the most frequently recurring theme in the attacks on our technique, the more-or-less hysterical counter-Revolution against Trashing. It is abundantly apparent that the vast preponderance of mainstream American legal academics were told (repeatedly) by their moms and dads, If you dont have anything nice or constructive to say, say nothing at all.  [9]   Again he stated that law-and-economics studies of private law rules have not actually analyzed the concrete implications of rule choices on particular occasions, pretensions of policy relevance to the contrary. Instead, they have again and again simply derived apologies for existing arrangements from a highly general and theoretical economic vision. There are two politically central insights of mainstream private law and economics scholarship: (1) In situations involving strangres (where markets cannot work because of transaction costs), proper legal rules that establish implicit fees for harming others can be applied to concrete cases so that parties who interact to create a joint cost will take all cost-justified, damage-averting precautions; and (2) in situations involving those in contractual relationships, competitive markets function in such a way that buyers inevitably get whatever they desire at the lowest possible price a [*308] price that is the sum of the production cost of the desired good and a normal profit sufficient to prevent industry exit. One goal, if not an inevitable effect, of trashing is to destabilize a variety of theoretical world views (and thus, one would hope, related [*328] commonsense world views) that imply the beneficence or inexorability of social life as we see it. Of course, asserting that there must be a causal connection between the high-level apologetics of the intelligentsia and the everyday mediating political ideals that help us organize and make sense of daily interactions would be patently ridiculous. But one can discern at least a close family resemblance between elaborate, mandarin apologetics and the more ordinary, complacency-inducing, commonsensical bits of wisdom without straining credulity.  [10]   According to Robert Gordon Decontruction is one of the CLS techniques best work is a familiar work kind of left-wing scholarship, unmasking the often unconscious ideological bias behind legal structures and procedures, which regularly makes it easy for business groups to organise collectively to pursue their economic and political interests but which makes it much more difficult for labour, poor people, civil rights groups to pursue theirs.  [11]   CLS claims that mainstream legal thought acts to reify; it does this by translating social practices into things. For example, the relation between employer and employee brings about a range of consequences and expectations for both parties. The terms confirm or foster an implicit hierarchy; both employer and employee will expect the latter to follow instructions and generally defer to the former. Another way to heighten awareness of the transitory, problematic, and manipulable ways legal discourses divide the world is to write their history under the Genealogy technique. Some critics charge that CLS work hampers progressive political movements by challenging the idea of the subject and human agency. Others view CLS work as unimportant or failing because of inadequate development of specific policies, strategies, or constructive direction. CLS is faulted for implying that simply changing how people think about law will change power relationships or constraints on social change, although a fair reading indicates that Crits simply treat changes in thought as a necessary but insufficient step for social change. Feminists and Critical Race Theorists object that conventional critical legal studies employ a critique of rights that neglects the concrete role of rights talk in the mobilization of oppressed and disadvantaged people. Robert Gordon has responded with a warning that even such mobilization efforts must be done with an experimental air and full knowledge that there are no deeper logics of historical necessity that can guarantee that what we do now will be justified later. Total Word Count: 2110.

Reconstruction after the Civil War Essay

Black political activity during the Reconstruction after the Civil War came from the experience of after war slavery or what was called servitude. A strong sense of community grew out of shared racial oppression and contributed to the formation of a political stand for the black freedman. Even though this formation was important it really did not become very strong after the Civil War. Emancipation was confusing to most blacks and the wartime disorder didn’t help the uncertain situation. Freedmen moved very cautiously to explore what changes were happening in their lives. They were more interested in individual measures to enhance their freedom and avoided becoming politically active. One of the freedmen’s first desires was to leave anything having to do with slavery behind. They wanted to define their new status different than the slavery they had known. What many blacks did first after becoming free was to leave the plantation that had enslaved them. Some looked for family and other headed for towns and cities, but most wanted to leave. Autonomy was a key issue that arose out of emancipation. At first the freedmen hoped their needs would be met by the federal government. Inspired by wartime confiscation of planters land, and the promise of the Freedmen’s Bureau, the former slaves waited for their â€Å"forty acres and a mule†. The Freedmen’s Bureau was a temporary agency set up to aid the former slaves by providing relief, education, legal help, and assistance in gaining land or employment and came from the Reconstruction period. The problem of how to reconstruct the Union after the South’s military defeat was won of the most difficult challenges faced by American policymakers. The Constitution didn’t provide any guidelines. The farmers had not anticipated a division of the country into warring sections. Emancipation was a major force for the Northern war aims, but the problem became larger when questions arose on how far the federal government should go to secure freedom and civil rights for former slaves. The debate that followed led to a major political crisis. Advocates of a minimal Reconstruction policy favored quick restoration of the Union with no protection for the freed slaves beyond the prohibition of slavery. Proponents of a more radical policy wanted readmission of the southern states to be dependent on guarantees that loyal men would displace the Confederate higher ups in position of power and that blacks would gain some of the basic rights of American citizenship. The White House wanted the lesser approach and congress endorsed the more radical approach of Reconstruction (Divine, Breen, Fredrickson & Williams, 1987, p. 457). The tension between the President and Congress on how to reconstruct the Union began during the war. Lincoln never had a plan for bringing the states back together, but he did take some initiatives that indicated a more lenient and forgiving policy towards Southerners who gave up the struggle and denounced slavery. Lincoln issued a Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction in 1863 that offered a full pardon to all Southerners, except certain classes of Confederate leaders, who would take an oath of allegiance to the union and acknowledge the legality of emancipation (Fitzgerald, 1989, p. 11). This policy was meant to shorten the war. The President hoped that granting pardon and political recognition to oath-taking minorities would weaken the southern cause by making it easy for disillusioned confederates to switch sides. But Congress was unhappy with the President’s reconstruction experiments and in 1864 refused to seat the Unionists elected to the House and Senate from Louisiana and Arkansas. A minority of congressional Republicans, who were strong anti-slavery radicals, wanted protection for black rights as a precondition for the readmission of the southern states. These Republican militants were upset because Lincoln had not insisted that the constitution creators provide for black suffrage. The dominate view in Congress was that the southern states had definitely forfeited their place in the Union and that it was up to Congress to decide when and how they would be readmitted. Congress passed a Reconstruction bill of its own in 1864. The Wade-Davis bill which required that fifty percent of the voters must take an oath of future loyalty before the restoration process could begin (Divine Breen, Fredrickson & Williams, 1987 p. 452). Those who would swear that they had never willingly supported the Confederacy could vote in an election for delegates to a constitutional convention. The bill did not require black suffrage, but it did give federal courts the power to enforce emancipation, but Lincoln used a pocket veto and refused to sign. Congress and the President remained stalled on the Reconstruction issue for the rest of the war. But during the last months in office Lincoln showed some desire to compromise. He showed much interest in getting the governments in Louisiana and Arkansas that he started, with the Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction in 1863, to gaining full recognition but Lincoln was warming up to the ideal of including black suffrage in all of this. Sadly Mr. Lincoln died before anyone knew the outcome of the struggle between congress and this man. Andrew Johnson’s attempt at reconstruction also put him on the defensive with Congress creating the most serious crisis in the history of relations between the executive and legislative branches of the federal government. During the war Johnson endorsed Lincoln’s emancipation policy and carried it into effect. He viewed it primarily as a means of destroying the power of the planter class rather than as recognition of black humanity (Divine Breen, Fredrickson & Williams, 1987). Johnson’s presidency was a huge surprise and really wasn’t suppose to happen considering that he was a southern Democrat and a fervent white supremacist. But the root of the problem was that he disagreed with the majority of Congress on what Reconstruction was supposed to accomplish. A believer of the Democratic states’ rights he wanted to restore the prewar feral system as quickly as possible, with the only changes being that states would no longer have the right to legalize slavery or to secede. Many Republican’s believed that if the old southern ruling class were to gain power they would devise a plan to subjugate blacks. Emancipation had removed the three-fifths clause of the constitution that counted slaves as only three-fifth of a person now they were to be counted in determining representation. Congress favored a Reconstruction policy that would give the federal government authority to limit the role of ex-confederates and provide protection for black citizenship (Fitzgerald, 1989, p. 48). The disagreement between the President and Congress became irreconcilable in early 1866 when Johnson vetoed two bills that had passed with overwhelming Republican support (Fitzgerald, 1989, 81). The first was to extend the life of the Freedmen’s Bureau and the second was a civil rights bill meant to nullify the black codes and guarantee to the freedmen full and equal benefit of all laws and security of self and property as the white had. Johnson was successful at blocking the Freedmen’s bureau bill but later a modified version did pass. The Civil Rights Act won the two-thirds majority needed to override the president’s veto. The main fact was that recovery would not happen or even begin until a new labor system replaced slavery. It was widely assumed in both the North and South that southern prosperity would continue to depend on cotton and that the plantation was the most efficient way for producing the crop. But rebuilding the plantation economy was hindered by lack of capital, the belief of southern whites that blacks would work only if forced, and by the freedmen’s resistance to labor conditions that were still basically slavery (Divine, Breen, Fitzgerald & Williams, 1987). Blacks wanted to be small independent farmers rather than plantation laborers and they believed that the federal government would help them to attain their dreams. General Sherman, who had huge numbers of black fugitives follow his army on a famous march, issued an order in 1865 that set aside the islands and coastal areas of Georgia and South Carolina for only black occupancy on forty acre plots. The Freedmen’s Bureau was given control of hundreds of thousands of acres of abandoned or confiscated land and authorized to make forty acre grants to black settlers for a three year period. After that they would have the option to buy at low prices. Over forty thousand black farmers worked on three hundred thousand acres of land they thought were going to be theirs (Berlin, 1976, p. 141). But the dream of forty acres and a mule the government promised was not going to happen. President Johnson pardoned the owners of most of the land assigned to the ex-slaves by Sherman and the Freedmen’s Bureau and along with the failure of congress to propose an effective program of land confiscation and redistribution the land blacks could not gain title to the land they had been working. The ex-slaves even without land and in poverty still were reluctant to settle down and commit their selves to wage labor for their former masters. They were hoping for something better and some still expecting grants of land while others were just trying to increase their bargaining power. The most common form of agricultural employment in 1866 was contract labor. Under this system workers would commit themselves for a year in return for fixed wages that the bulk of would be paid after harvest. Many planters were inclined to make hard bargains, abuse their workers or cheat them at the end of the year. The Freedmen’s Bureau took the role of reviewing the contracts and enforcing them. Buy the bureau officials had differing notions of what it meant to protect blacks from exploitation. Some stood up strongly for the rights of the freedmen; others served as allies of the planters, rounding up available workers, coercing them to sign contracts for low wages, and keeping them in line (Fitzgerald, 1989, p. 138). After 1867 the bureau’s influence was fading and a new arrangement come from direct negotiations between planters and freedmen. Unhappy with gang labor and constant white supervision, blacks demanded sharecropper’s status. This meant that they wanted the right to work a small piece of land independently in return for a fixed share of the crop produced on it and that was usually half. With the shortage of labor this gave the freedmen enough leverage to force this arrangement on those planters who were unwilling. But many landowners found it to their advantage because it did not require much capital and forced the tenants to share the risks of crop failure or a fall in cotton prices. Blacks at first viewed sharecropping as a step up from wage labor and a direction towards land ownership, but in reality it was just a new kind of slavery (Fitzgerald, 1989, p. 140). Croppers had to live on credit until their cotton was sold, and planters or merchants seized the chance to give them at high prices and huge rates of interest. Creditors were entitled to deduct what was owned to them out of the tenant’s share of the crop and this left most sharecroppers with no net profit at the end of the year, some with debt that had to be worked off the next year (Fitzgerald, 1989, p. 141). Blacks moving to cities and towns found themselves living in an increasingly segregated society. The Black Codes of 1865 attempted to require separation of the races in public places but most of the codes were set aside by federal authorities as violations of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, but that was defeated by private initiatives and community pressures. In some cities blacks successfully resisted forced separation on streetcars by appealing to the military during the brief period when it exercised authority or by organizing boycotts. But they found it almost impossible to gain admittance to most hotels, restaurants, and other privately owned establishments that catered to whites. When black supported Republican governments came to power in 1868, some of them passed civil rights acts requiring equal access to public facilities, but little efforts were made to enforce the legislation (Berlin, 1976, p. 249). Some forms of racial separation were not openly discriminatory and blacks accepted or even endorsed them. Freedmen who had belonged to white churches as slaves welcomed the chance to join all black denominations which gave freedom from white dominance and a more congenial style of worship. The first schools for ex-slaves were all black institutions established by the Freedmen’s Bureau and various northern missionary societies (Berlin, 1976, p. 285). Blacks had been denied any education at all after the war and blacks viewed separate schooling as an opportunity rather than as a form of discrimination. The Freedmen’s Bureau was a government agency that was to give assistance and protection to the Southern ex-slave after the Civil war. It gave assistance to the relief of the needy of both white and black. Its main job was to improve labor relations, administering justice and developing a black educational system. The Bureau influence though suffered in the North and was mortally damaged in the South by corruption, especially those that were connected with promising Republican control of the black vote. These excesses strengthened resistance to black suffrage and encouraged secret organizations like the Ku Klux Klan (Sehat, 2007). The bureau was established under the War Department and was suppose to exist for one year after the war. It was strengthened and its life extended in 1866 when Johnson attempted to veto. Its Director was a Christian general by the name of Oliver O. Howard and functioned through ten districts. Each had an assistant commissioner with the power to control all individuals that were refugees and freedmen. The Freedmen’s Bureau became the strongest single instrument of Reconstruction. Even though it was ended in 1869 its educational activities were extended to 1872 and its soldiers’ bounty payments till 1872 and had an expenditure of about $20,000,000 (Divine Breen Fredrickson & Williams, 1987). Reconstruction failed because it was inadequately motivated, conceived and enforced. But the causes of this failure remain in shadow. Some explain it in terms of an underlying racism that prevented white Republicans from identifying fully with the cause of the black equality. Others use the clash between the class interests of those in charge of implementing and managing Reconstruction and the poor people of the South who were supposed to benefit. But the basic issue raised by Reconstruction was how to achieve racial equality in America and that was not resolved during that era and is still in conflict even today. Reference: Berlin, I. (1976). Slaves without masters. New York: Vintage Books Divine, R. A. , Breen, T. H. , Fredrickson, G. M. and Williams, R. H. (1987). America past and present, 2nd. Ed. Illinois: Scott , Foresman and Company. Fitzgerald, M. W. (1989). The union league movement in the deep south. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press. Gibson, G. J. (1957). Lincoln’s League: The league movement during the Civil War. Ph. D. dissertation, University of Illinois. Sehat, D. ( 2007, May). The civilizing mission of Booker T. Washington. Journal of Southern History, 73(2), 323-362.