Government Glossary of Terms

Act: Legislation that has passed both Houses of Congress and has been either approved by the President, or passed over his veto, thus becoming law.

Alien: A person residing without being a citizen of his non-native country.

Amendment: A proposal by a congressional member to alter the language or provisions of a bill or act.

The Constitution of the United States, as provided in Article V, may be amended when two thirds of each house of Congress approves a proposed amendment and three fourths of the states thereafter ratify it.


Bill: Formally introduced legislation.


Bill of Rights: The first ten amendments to the United States Constitution.



Centralized Government: A form of government in which the national government maintains the power (as in Washington DC).

Checks and Balances: A system of limits imposed by the Constitution of the United States on all branches of a government.

Citizen: A native or naturalized member of a state or nation.




Delegate: A person designated to act for or represent another or others. Delegates are seen at a political convention.

Democratic: Characterized by the principle of political or social equality for all.



Federalists: A group of people who supported the adoption of the Constitution. Leading Federalists included Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay.



Hearing: A meeting or session of a committee of Congress. These are usually open to the public. Their purpose is to obtain information and opinions on proposed legislation, conduct an investigation, or oversee something.

Hopper: A box into which a proposed legislative bill is dropped and thereby officially introduced.

Immigrant: A person who migrates to another country. They usually migrate for for permanent residence.

Impeachment: A formal accusation issued by a legislature against a public official charged with crime or other serious misconduct.



Initiative: A procedure by which a specified number of voters may propose a statute, constitutional amendment, or ordinance.

Judicial Review: The power of a court to judge the constitutionality of the laws of a government or the acts of a government official.

Law: A rule of conduct. They are established and enforced by an authority.



Line-Item Veto: The power of the executive to disapprove of particular items of a bill without having to disapprove of the entire bill.

National: A person under the protection of a specific country. Also known as a citizen or subject.

Naturalization: The official act by which a person is made a national of a country other than his native one.



Primary Election: An election held to decide which candidates will be on the November general election ballot.



Ratification: The act of approval of a proposed constitutional amendment by the legislatures of the States. Can also mean the Senate process of advice and consent to treaties negotiated by the President.



Redistricting: The process within the States of redrawing legislative district boundaries to reflect population changes following a census.

Referendum: The submission of a law, proposed or already in effect, to a direct vote of the people.


Republic: A state or nation in which the supreme power rests in all the citizens entitled to vote. There are representatives elected, directly or indirectly, by them and responsible to them.

Separation of Powers: The distribution of power and authority among the branches of government- legislative, executive, and judicial.



Tabling Motion: A motion to stop action on a pending proposal and to lay it aside indefinitely. The measure which has been tabled is effectively defeated.

Veto: The constitutional procedure by which the President refuses to approve a bill or joint resolution and thus prevents its enactment into law. It can be overridden only by a two-thirds vote in each House. A pocket veto occurs after Congress has adjourned and is unable to override the President’s action.

How American Laws Are Made

Laws may be initiated in either chamber of Congress, the House of Representatives or the Senate.

1. When a Representative has an idea for a new law , he becomes the sponsor of it and it is known as a bill. He will introduce it to his chamber by giving it to the clerk of the House or by placing it in a box, called the hopper. The clerk assigns a legislative number to the bill, with H.R. for bills introduced in the House and S. for bills introduced in the Senate. The Government Printing Office (GPO) then prints the bill and distributes copies to each representative.


2. The bill will be assigned to a committee for study. The committee then may release or revise the bill with a recommendation to pass it. They can also table it.


3. Once a bill is released, it goes on a calendar (a list of bills awaiting action). A Rules Committee may call for the bill to be voted on quickly, limit the debate, or limit or prohibit amendments. Undisputed bills may be passed by unanimous consent, or by a two-thirds vote if members agree to suspend the rules.


4. The bill will go to the floor of the for consideration and begins with a complete reading of the bill. If the bill passes by simple majority it will move to the other chamber.


5. In order to be introduced in the other chamber, a member must be recognized as the presiding officer and announce the introduction of the bill. An actusually means a bill that has been passed by both houses and becomes law.




7. Once released, the bill goes to the chamber floor for consideration. A simple majority passes the bill.

Once approved, a bill is printed by the Government Printing Office (GPO) in a process called enrolling. The clerk from the introducing house certifies the final version.

The enrolled bill is now signed by the Speaker of the House and then the vice president.

8. It is sent for presidential consideration. The president has ten days to sign or veto the enrolled bill. If the president vetoes the bill, it can still become a law if two-thirds of the Senate and two-thirds of the House then vote in favor of the bill.

Order of Succession

If the President of the United States is incapacitated, dies, resigns, is for any reason unable to hold his office, or is removed from office (impeached and convicted), people in the following offices, in this order, will assume the office of the President.

They must be qualified as stated by the Constitution to assume the office of the President, which means they have to be must be at least 35 years old, must be a natural-born U.S. citizen, and have lived in the U.S. for at least 14 years.

* Vice President
* Speaker of the House
* President Pro Tempore of the Senate
* Secretary of State
* Secretary of the Treasury
* Secretary of Defense
* Attorney General
* Secretary of the Interior
* Secretary of Agriculture
* Secretary of Commerce
* Secretary of Labor
* Secretary of Health and Human Services
* Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
* Secretary of Transportation
* Secretary of Energy
* Secretary of Education
* Secretary of Veterans Affairs
* Secretary of Homeland Security

The 25th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, passed in 1967, provides for procedures to fill vacancies in the Vice Presidency; further clarifies presidential succession rules.

Branches of Government

White House Executive Branch
The power of the executive branch is vested in the President, who also serves as Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces.

U.S. Supreme Court Judicial Branch
The judicial branch hears cases that challenge or require interpretation of the legislation passed by Congress and signed by the President.

U.S. Capitol Legislative Branch
The legislative branch of the federal government consists of the Congress, which is divided into two chambers -- the Senate and the House of Representatives.

Stars and Stripes

When two new States were admitted to the Union (Kentucky and Vermont), a resolution was adopted in January of 1794, expanding the flag to 15 stars and 15 stripes.

Capt. Samuel C. Reid, USN, suggested to Congress that the stripes remain 13 in number to represent the Thirteen Colonies, and that a star be added to the blue field for each new State coming into the Union. Accordingly, on April 4, 1818, President Monroe accepted a bill requiring that the flag of the United States have a union of 20 stars, white on a blue field, and that upon admission of each new State into the Union one star be added to the union of the flag on the fourth of July following its date of admission. The 13 alternating red and white stripes would remain unchanged. This act succeeded in prescribing the basic design of the flag, while assuring that the growth of the Nation would be properly symbolized.

Hawaii made the 50th star in 1960. With the 50-star flag came a new design and arrangement of the stars in the union, a requirement met by President Eisenhower in August , 1959. To conform with this, a national banner with 50 stars became the official flag of the United States.

Betsy Ross

Although Betsy Ross made flags for 50 years, there is no proof that she made the first Stars and Stripes. It is known that she made flags for the Pennsylvania State Navy in 1777. The flag popularly known as the "Betsy Ross flag," which arranged the stars in a circle, did not appear until the early 1790's.

The Stars and Stripes

The Stars and Stripes was a result of a resolution adopted by the Second Continental Congress at Philadelphia on June 14, 1777.

The resolution read:

"Resolved, that the flag of the United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field representing a new constellation. "

The resolution gave no instruction as to how many points the stars should have, nor how the stars should be arranged on the blue union.


Strong evidence indicates that Francis Hopkinson of New Jersey, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, was responsible for the stars in the U.S. flag.

Francis Scott Key

Francis Scott Key, a 34-year old lawyer-poet, watched the attack from the deck of a British prisoner-exchange ship on the night of September 13, 1814. The British fleet bombarded Fort McHenry in the harbor at Baltimore, Maryland. Key had gone to seek the release of a friend but they were refused permission to go ashore until after the attack.

On the following morning, Key turned his telescope to the fort and saw that the American flag was still waving. The sight so inspired him that he pulled a letter from his pocket and began to write the poem. This poem was adopted as the national anthem of the United States--"The Star Spangled Banner." Key was returned to Baltimore and later that day took a room at a Baltimore tavern where he completed the poem. Years later, Key told a hometown audience in Frederick, Maryland:

"I saw the flag of my country waving over a city-the strength and pride of my native State-a city devoted to plunder and desolation by its assailants. I witnessed the preparation for its assaults. I saw the array of its enemies as they advanced to the attack. I heard the sound of battle; the noise of the conflict fell upon my listening ear, and told me that 'the brave and the free' had met the invaders."

List of Founding Fathers

Connecticut
William. Samuel Johnson
Roger Sherman
Oliver Ellsworth (Elsworth)* Delaware
George Read
Gunning Bedford, Jr.
John Dickinson
Richard Bassett
Jacob Broom
Georgia
William Few
Abraham Baldwin
William Houston*
William L. Pierce*
Maryland
James McHenry
Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer
Daniel Carroll
Luther Martin*
John F. Mercer*
Massachusetts
Nathaniel Gorham
Rufus King
Elbridge Gerry*
Caleb Strong*
New Hampshire
John Langdon
Nicholas Gilman
New Jersey
William Livingston
David Brearly (Brearley)
William Paterson (Patterson)
Jonathan Dayton
William C. Houston*
New York
Alexander Hamilton
John Lansing, Jr.*
Robert Yates*
North Carolina
William. Blount
Richard. Dobbs Spaight
Hugh Williamson
William R. Davie*
Alexander Martin*
Pennsylvania
Benjamin Franklin
Thomas Mifflin
Robert Morris
George Clymer
Thomas Fitzsimons (FitzSimons; Fitzsimmons)
Jared Ingersoll
James Wilson
Gouverneur Morris
South Carolina
John Rutledge
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney
Charles Pinckney
Pierce Butler
Rhode Island
Rhode Island did not send any delegates to the Constitutional Convention.
Virginia
John Blair
James Madison Jr.
George Washington
George Mason*
James McClurg*
Edmund J. Randolph*
George Wythe*
(* indicates delegates who did not sign the Constitution)
Connecticut
William. Samuel Johnson
Roger Sherman
Oliver Ellsworth (Elsworth)*
Delaware
George Read
Gunning Bedford, Jr.
John Dickinson
Richard Bassett
Jacob Broom
Georgia
William Few
Abraham Baldwin
William Houston*
William L. Pierce*
Maryland
James McHenry
Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer
Daniel Carroll
Luther Martin*
John F. Mercer*
Massachusetts
Nathaniel Gorham
Rufus King
Elbridge Gerry*
Caleb Strong*
New Hampshire
John Langdon
Nicholas Gilman
New Jersey
William Livingston
David Brearly (Brearley)
William Paterson (Patterson)
Jonathan Dayton
William C. Houston* New York
Alexander Hamilton
John Lansing, Jr.*
Robert Yates*
North Carolina
William. Blount
Richard. Dobbs Spaight
Hugh Williamson
William R. Davie*
Alexander Martin*
Pennsylvania
Benjamin Franklin
Thomas Mifflin
Robert Morris
George Clymer
Thomas Fitzsimons (FitzSimons; Fitzsimmons)
Jared Ingersoll
James Wilson
Gouverneur Morris
South Carolina
John Rutledge
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney
Charles Pinckney
Pierce Butler
Rhode Island
Rhode Island did not send any delegates to the Constitutional Convention.
Virginia
John Blair
James Madison Jr.
George Washington
George Mason*
James McClurg*
Edmund J. Randolph*
George Wythe*

About the Founding Fathers

The Founding Fathers
Delegates to the Constitutional Convention

On February 21, 1787, the Continental Congress resolved that:

...it is expedient that on the second Monday in May next a Convention of delegates who shall have been appointed by the several States be held at Philladelphia for the sole and express purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation...

The original states, except Rhode Island, collectively appointed 70 individuals to the Constitutional Convention, but a number did not accept or could not attend. Those who did not attend included Richard Henry Lee, Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Samuel Adams and, John Hancock.

In all, 55 delegates attended the Constitutional Convention sessions, but only 39 actually signed the Constitution. The delegates ranged in age from Jonathan Dayton, aged 26, to Benjamin Franklin, aged 81, who was so infirm that he had to be carried to sessions in a sedan chair.

Decleration of Independence

Drafted by Thomas Jefferson between June 11 and June 28, 1776, the Declaration of Independence is at once the nation's most cherished symbol of liberty and Jefferson's most enduring monument. Here, in exalted and unforgettable phrases, Jefferson expressed the convictions in the minds and hearts of the American people. The political philosophy of the Declaration was not new; its ideals of individual liberty had already been expressed by John Locke and the Continental philosophers. What Jefferson did was to summarize this philosophy in "self-evident truths" and set forth a list of grievances against the King in order to justify before the world the breaking of ties between the colonies and the mother country.

Amendments

The First Federal Congress took up the question of a bill of rights almost immediately. Congress proposed twelve amendments to the states. Ten of these were added to the Constitution on December 15, 1791.

The Bill of Rights that is on permanent display here is the Joint Resolution passed by Congress on September 25, 1789, proposing twelve–not ten–amendments. The first article, concerning the ratio of constituents to each congressional representative, was never ratified by the states; the second article listed, concerning congressional pay, was ratified in 1992 as the Twenty-seventh Amendment.

Charters of Freedom...Part VI

Eleven years after the Declaration of Independence announced the birth of the United States, the survival of the young country seemed in doubt. The War for Independence had been won, but economic depression, social unrest, interstate rivalries, and foreign intrigue appeared to be unraveling the fragile confederation. In early 1787, Congress called for a special convention of all the states to revise the Articles of Confederation. On September 17, 1787, after four months of secret meetings, the delegates to the Constitutional Convention emerged from their Philadelphia meetingroom with an entirely new plan of government–the U.S. Constitution–that they hoped would ensure the survival of the experiment they had launched in 1776.

They proposed a strong central government made up of three branches: legislative, executive, and judicial; each would be perpetually restrained by a sophisticated set of checks and balances. They reached compromises on the issue of slavery that left its final resolution to future generations. As for ratification, they devised a procedure that maximized the odds: the Constitution would be enacted when it was ratified by nine, not thirteen, states. The Framers knew they had not created a perfect plan, but it could be revised. The Constitution has been amended twenty-seven times and stands today as the longest-lasting written constitution in the world.

Charters of Freedom...Part V

The Revolution's ideals of liberty and equality existed side by side with the brutal realities of human slavery. By the time of the Revolution, slavery existed in all the colonies, slaves made up 20 percent of the population, and their labor had become a vital contribution to the physical and economic development of the colonies. The existence of slavery created tensions that would strain the integrity of the United States for many decades to come.

The Society of Friends, a religious group also known as the Quakers, formed the first formal antislavery society in 1775. Throughout the Revolution, as the states struggled to find common ground, the issue of slavery was so divisive that it threatened to shatter their fragile union. Some prominent leaders of the Revolution raised their voices to oppose slavery on moral grounds. Slaves and free Africans embraced the principles of liberty and equality embedded in the Declaration as their own best hope for freedom and better treatment. Many, fighting as soldiers in the American armies, helped to defeat the British, while earning their freedom and gaining the respect and gratitude of some whites. And clinging to their own understanding of "all men are created equal," they pushed the country closer to living out the full promise of its words.

Charters of Freedom...Part IV

Throwing off the British monarchy on July 4, 1776, left the United States with no central government. It had to design and install a new government–and quickly. As early as May 1776, Congress advised each of the colonies to draw up plans for state governments; by 1780, all thirteen states had adopted written constitutions. In June 1776, the Continental Congress began to work on a plan for a central government. It took five years for it to be approved, first by members of Congress and then by the states. The first attempt at a constitution for the United States was called the Articles of Confederation.

This first constitution was composed by a body that directed most of its attention to fighting and winning the War for Independence. It came into being at a time when Americans had a deep-seated fear of a central authority and long-standing loyalty to the state in which they lived and often called their "country." Ultimately, the Articles of Confederation proved unwieldy and inadequate to resolve the issues that faced the United States in its earliest years; but in granting any Federal powers to a central authority–the Confederation Congress–this document marked a crucial step toward nationhood. The Articles of Confederation were in force from March 1, 1781, until March 4, 1789, when the present Constitution went into effect.

Charters of Freedom...Part III

In June 1776, as Thomas Jefferson composed a draft of the Declaration of Independence from a second floor parlor of a bricklayer's house in Philadelphia, the largest invasion force in British military history was headed for New York Harbor. By the time the last of the fifty-six signers had affixed their names to the final, edited document months later, an invading force of British soldiers had landed at Staten Island, the British had taken New York City, and the American patriots had committed themselves to a long and bloody struggle for liberty and independence.

The Declaration announced to the world the separation of the thirteen colonies from Great Britain and the establishment of the United States of America. It explained the causes of this radical move with a long list of charges against the King. In justifying the Revolution, it asserted a universal truth about human rights in words that have inspired downtrodden people through the ages and throughout the world to rise up against their oppressors.

Jefferson was not aiming at originality. The Declaration articulates the highest ideals of the Revolution, beliefs in liberty, equality, and the right to self-determination. Americans embraced a view of the world in which a person's position was determined, not by birth, rank, or title, but by talent, ability, and enterprise. It was a widely held view, circulated in newspapers, pamphlets, sermons, and schoolbooks; but it was Thomas Jefferson, the 33-year-old planter from Virginia, who put the immortal words to it.

On July 4, 1776, Congress completed its editing of the document that reduced the text by 25 percent ("mutilations" is what Jefferson called it) and formally adopted the Declaration; on July 19, Congress ordered that a formal copy of the Declaration be prepared for members to sign; and on August 2, the final parchment–the one presently displayed in the nearby case–was presented to Congress and the signing began.

Charters of Freedom...Part II

The sole governing authority presiding over the tumultuous events of the American Revolution between 1774 and 1789 was a body known as Congress. With no power to regulate commerce or lay taxes, and with little ability to enforce any of its decisions, this group, representing the thirteen colonies, declared independence, conducted a war that defeated one of the greatest military powers of its day, and invented a new political entity that became a sovereign independent nation. Its members pondered everything from the rightness of independence to the number of flints needed by the armies–sometimes with the enemy not far from their doorstep. Asserting their rights, they found themselves labeled as traitors.

The fifty-four men who composed the First Continental Congress represented different interests, religions, and regions; they held conflicting opinions as to how best restore their rights. Most did not know each other; some did not like each other. With no history of successful cooperation, they struggled to overcome their differences and, without any way of knowing if the future held success or nooses for them all, they started down a long and perilous road toward independence.

The Charters of Freedom

From the National Archives.......

In 1761, fifteen years before the United States of America burst onto the world stage with the Declaration of Independence, the American colonists were loyal British subjects who celebrated the coronation of their new King, George III. The colonies that stretched from present-day Maine to Georgia were distinctly English in character although they had been settled by Scots, Welsh, Irish, Dutch, Swedes, Finns, Africans, French, Germans, and Swiss, as well as English.

As English men and women, the American colonists were heirs to the thirteenth-century English document, the Magna Carta, which established the principles that no one is above the law (not even the King), and that no one can take away certain rights. So in 1763, when the King began to assert his authority over the colonies to make them share the cost of the Seven Years' War England had just fought and won, the English colonists protested by invoking their rights as free men and loyal subjects. It was only after a decade of repeated efforts on the part of the colonists to defend their rights that they resorted to armed conflict and, eventually, to the unthinkable–separation from the motherland.

Amendments XXI-XXVII

AMENDMENT XXI

Passed by Congress February 20, 1933. Ratified December 5, 1933.

Section 1.
The eighteenth article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.

Section 2.
The transportation or importation into any State, Territory, or Possession of the United States for delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited.

Section 3.
This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by conventions in the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States by the Congress.

---

AMENDMENT XXII

Passed by Congress March 21, 1947. Ratified February 27, 1951.

Section 1.
No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of President more than once. But this Article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this Article was proposed by Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this Article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term.

Section 2.
This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission to the States by the Congress.

---

AMENDMENT XXIII

Passed by Congress June 16, 1960. Ratified March 29, 1961.

Section 1.
The District constituting the seat of Government of the United States shall appoint in such manner as Congress may direct:

A number of electors of President and Vice President equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives in Congress to which the District would be entitled if it were a State, but in no event more than the least populous State; they shall be in addition to those appointed by the States, but they shall be considered, for the purposes of the election of President and Vice President, to be electors appointed by a State; and they shall meet in the District and perform such duties as provided by the twelfth article of amendment.

Section 2.
The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

---

AMENDMENT XXIV

Passed by Congress August 27, 1962. Ratified January 23, 1964.

Section 1.
The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay poll tax or other tax.

Section 2.
The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

---

AMENDMENT XXV

Passed by Congress July 6, 1965. Ratified February 10, 1967.

Note: Article II, section 1, of the Constitution was affected by the 25th amendment.

Section 1.
In case of the removal of the President from office or of his death or resignation, the Vice President shall become President.

Section 2.
Whenever there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress.

Section 3.
Whenever the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, and until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary, such powers and duties shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President.

Section 4.
Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that no inability exists, he shall resume the powers and duties of his office unless the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive department or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit within four days to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Thereupon Congress shall decide the issue, assembling within forty-eight hours for that purpose if not in session. If the Congress, within twenty-one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office.

---

AMENDMENT XXVI

Passed by Congress March 23, 1971. Ratified July 1, 1971.

Note: Amendment 14, section 2, of the Constitution was modified by section 1 of the 26th amendment.

Section 1.
The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.

Section 2.
The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

---

AMENDMENT XXVII

Originally proposed Sept. 25, 1789. Ratified May 7, 1992.

No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of representatives shall have intervened.

Amendment X

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.