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Democracy Awakening
Democracy Spring was a progressive social movement organization based in the United States that used campaigns of escalating nonviolent civil disobedience to build active public support to "end the corruption of big money in politics and protect the right to vote for all Americans." The organization began as a coalition of "more than 100 progressive groups" with a common interest in US federal legislation intended to reduce "the influence of money in politics" and "expand and protect voting rights." A ten-day non-violent protest march was held in April 2016 from Philadelphia to Washington, DC. Its demands included the passage of several bills such as those to improve voter rights and empowerment and require fair elections. During the course of the protest, 900 to 1,200 individuals were arrested. The group disbanded in 2019. Actions 140-mile march to U.S. Capitol and sit-ins A group of Democracy Spring participants began a ten-day march from Philadelphia to Washington, D ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Electoral Reform
Electoral reform is a change in electoral systems which alters how public desires are expressed in election results. That can include reforms of: * Voting systems, such as proportional representation, a two-round system (runoff voting), instant-runoff voting (alternative voting, ranked-choice voting, or preferential voting), Instant Round Robin Voting called Condorcet Voting, range voting, approval voting, citizen initiatives and referendums and recall elections. * Vote-counting procedures * Rules about political parties, typically changes to election laws * Eligibility to vote * How candidates and political parties are able to stand (nomination rules) and how they are able to get their names onto ballots (ballot access) * Electoral constituencies and election district borders * Ballot design and voting equipment * Scrutineering (election monitoring by candidates, political parties, etc.) * Safety of voters and election workers * Measures against bribery, coercion, and conflicts of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ben Cohen (businessman)
Bennett Cohen (born March 18, 1951) is an American businessman, activist and philanthropist. He is a co-founder of the ice cream company Ben & Jerry's. Early life Cohen was born in Brooklyn, New York, and raised in the town of Merrick, New York, on Long Island by Jewish parents Frances and Irving. He spent at least one summer at Buck's Rock Performing and Creative Arts Camp in New Milford, Connecticut. Cohen first met and befriended his future business partner Jerry Greenfield in a seventh grade gym class in 1963. They continued on to Sanford H. Calhoun High School. In his senior year, Cohen found work as an ice cream man before leaving to attend Colgate University in Hamilton, New York. Over the next decade, Cohen pursued his interest in pottery and dropped out of college after his sophomore year. He also worked as a McDonald's cashier, Pinkerton guard, deliverer of pottery wheels, mop-boy at Jamesway and Friendly's, assistant superintendent, ER clerk, and taxi driver, bef ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Publicly Funded Elections
A publicly funded election is an election funded with money collected through income tax donations or taxes as opposed to private or corporate funded campaigns. It is a policy initially instituted after Nixon for candidates to opt into publicly funded presidential campaigns via optional donations from tax returns. It is an attempt to move toward a one voice, one vote democracy, and remove undue corporate and private entity dominance. Jurisdictions such as United Kingdom, Norway, India, Russia, Brazil, Nigeria, and Sweden have considered legislation that would create publicly funded elections. United States Methods of publicly funded election legislation have been adopted in Colorado, Maine, Connecticut, Florida, Hawaii, Maryland, Michigan, Arizona, North Carolina, New Mexico, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, West Virginia, and Massachusetts. Court rulings and legality Portions of Vermont system for publicly funding elections were found unconstitution ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Citizens United V
Citizenship is a "relationship between an individual and a state to which the individual owes allegiance and in turn is entitled to its protection". Each state determines the conditions under which it will recognize persons as its citizens, and the conditions under which that status will be withdrawn. Recognition by a state as a citizen generally carries with it recognition of civil, political, and social rights which are not afforded to non-citizens. In general, the basic rights normally regarded as arising from citizenship are the right to a passport, the right to leave and return to the country/ies of citizenship, the right to live in that country, and to work there. Some countries permit their citizens to have multiple citizenships, while others insist on exclusive allegiance. Determining factors A person can be recognized or granted citizenship on a number of bases. Usually, citizenship based on circumstances of birth is automatic, but an application may be required. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Democratic National Committee
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) is the governing body of the United States Democratic Party. The committee coordinates strategy to support Democratic Party candidates throughout the country for local, state, and national office, as well as works to establish a "party brand". It organizes the Democratic National Convention held every four years to nominate a candidate for President of the United States and to formulate the party platform. While it provides support for party candidates, it does not have direct authority over elected officials. When a Democrat is president, the White House controls the Committee. According to Boris Heersink, "political scientists have traditionally described the parties’ national committees as inconsequential but impartial service providers." Its chair is elected by the committee. It conducts fundraising to support its activities. The DNC was established at the 1848 Democratic National Convention. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
2016 Democratic National Convention
The 2016 Democratic National Convention was a presidential nominating convention, held at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from July 25 to 28, 2016. The convention gathered delegates of the Democratic Party, the majority of them elected through a preceding series of primaries and caucuses, to nominate a candidate for president and vice president in the 2016 United States presidential election. Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was chosen as the party's nominee for president by a 54% majority of delegates present at the convention roll call securing it over primary rival Senator Bernie Sanders, who received 46% of votes from delegates, and becoming the first female candidate to be formally nominated for president by a major political party in the United States. Her running mate, Senator Tim Kaine from Virginia, was confirmed by delegates as the party's nominee for vice president by acclamation. Delegates at the convention also adopted a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Independent Voter Project
The Independent Voter Project (IVP) is a 501(c)(4) United States nonprofit organization. It launched in 2006 with a $1 million grant from John Moores. IVP seeks to re-engage nonpartisan voters and promote nonpartisan election reform through initiatives, litigation, and voter education. The Independent Voter Project has a 501(c)(3) sister organization called the Foundation for Independent Voter Education (FIVE). All IVP Board Members serve as volunteers. IVP and FIVE are co-publishers of IVN.us, an open news site that caters to independent voters and focuses on election reform issues. IVP was founded by former California State Senator and Assemblymember Steve Peace, a registered Democrat, former California Assemblymember Jeff Marston, a Republican, and Dan Howle. Howle and Marston are the current co-chairs. Peace is no longer a board member but is still a financial contributor. Activities IVP is best known for authoring California's nonpartisan blanket primary (top-two primar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Merrick Garland Supreme Court Nomination
On March 16, 2016, President Barack Obama nominated Merrick Garland for Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States to succeed Antonin Scalia, who had died one month earlier. At the time of his nomination, Garland was the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. This vacancy arose during Obama's final year as president. Hours after Scalia's death was announced, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he would consider any appointment by the sitting president to be null and void. He said the next Supreme Court justice should be chosen by the next president—to be elected later that year. Senate Democrats criticized the move as being unprecedented, and responded saying that there was sufficient time to vote on a nominee before the election. Scalia's death brought about an unusual, but not unprecedented, situation in which a Democratic president had the opportunity to nominate a Supreme Court justice while the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
President Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the United States. He previously served as a U.S. senator from Illinois from 2005 to 2008 and as an Illinois state senator from 1997 to 2004, and previously worked as a civil rights lawyer before entering politics. Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii. After graduating from Columbia University in 1983, he worked as a Community organizing, community organizer in Chicago. In 1988, he enrolled in Harvard Law School, where he was the first black president of the ''Harvard Law Review''. After graduating, he became a civil rights attorney and an academic, teaching constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School from 1992 to 2004. Turning to elective politics, he Illinois Senate career of Barack Obama, repre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Voting Rights Act
The suffrage, Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a landmark piece of Federal government of the United States, federal legislation in the United States that prohibits racial discrimination in voting. It was signed into law by President of the United States, President Lyndon B. Johnson during the height of the civil rights movement on August 6, 1965, and United States Congress, Congress later amended the Act five times to expand its protections. Designed to enforce the Voting rights in the United States, voting rights guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, Fifteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, the Act sought to secure the right to vote for Race and ethnicity in the United States, racial minorities throughout the country, especially in the Southern United States, South. According to the United States Department of Justice, U.S. Department of Justice, the Act is consi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gerrymandering
In representative democracies, gerrymandering (, originally ) is the political manipulation of electoral district boundaries with the intent to create undue advantage for a party, group, or socioeconomic class within the constituency. The manipulation may involve "cracking" (diluting the voting power of the opposing party's supporters across many districts) or "packing" (concentrating the opposing party's voting power in one district to reduce their voting power in other districts). Gerrymandering can also be used to protect incumbents. Wayne Dawkins describes it as politicians picking their voters instead of voters picking their politicians. The term ''gerrymandering'' is named after American politician Elbridge Gerry, Vice President of the United States at the time of his death, who, as governor of Massachusetts in 1812, signed a bill that created a partisan district in the Boston area that was compared to the shape of a mythological salamander. The term has negative con ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States Capitol
The United States Capitol, often called The Capitol or the Capitol Building, is the seat of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, which is formally known as the United States Congress. It is located on Capitol Hill at the eastern end of the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Though no longer at the geographic center of the federal district, the Capitol forms the origin point for the street-numbering system of the district as well as its four quadrants. Central sections of the present building were completed in 1800. These were partly destroyed in the 1814 Burning of Washington, then were fully restored within five years. The building was later enlarged by extending the wings for the chambers for the bicameral legislature, the House of Representatives in the south wing and the Senate in the north wing. The massive dome was completed around 1866 just after the American Civil War. Like the principal buildings of the executive and judicial branches ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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