The Political system of the USA
The United States of America is a federal republic consisting of 50 states. Each state has its own government («state government*). In some ways the United States is like 50 small countries.
The government of the USA act according to the Constitution which was signed by the first thirteen representatives of thirteen original American states in 1787. The document was written in 1787 and since that time twenty six Amendments have been added. The first ten Amendments were simply rights or the Bill of rights. According to the Constitution the USA is a republic. So, the officials of any rank are elected by US citizens. Every citizen has rights which can not be violated.
The Constitution proclaims a federal system of government which keeps both the states and the federal power from getting too much power. It means that the federal government is given certain powers, for example, to make peace or war, to issue money and to regulate the trade and so on.
The federal power is located in Washington, D.C. It is based on legislative, executive and juridical branches of power.
The legislative power is vested in Congress, which consists of two houses: the Senate and the House of Representatives, There are 435 members in the House of Representatives and 100 senators in Congress. Each state elects two members for the Senate.
The executive branch is headed by the President who is assisted by the Vice President. The President enforces federal laws, serves as commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces. The President can veto a bill unless Congress by a two-thirds vote shall overrule him. The Vice President, elected from the same political party as the President, acts as chairman of the Senate, and in the event of the death of the President, assumes the Presidency. The President of the USA is chosen in nationwide elections every 4 years together with the Vice.-President. The President can not be elected for more than two terms. The Cabinet is made up of Department Secretaries. The most important of them is the Secretary of State, who deals with foreign affairs.
The judicial branch is made up of Federal District Courts, 11 Federal Courts and the Supreme Court. Federal judges are appointed by the President for life.
Federal courts decide cases involving federal law, conflicts between citizens of different states.
Constitution has been amended twenty six times. The Bill of Rights guarantees individual liberties: freedom of word,» religion and so on. Later amendments abolished slavery, granted the vote to women and colour people and allowed citizens to vote at the age of 18.
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Classicism and Romanticism in English Architecture.
Over the course of the 16th century Classical features derived from the Renaissance architecture of Italy exerted an increasing influence, initially on surface decoration but in time shaping the entire design of buildings, while the use of medieval features declined.
During the 17th century the continuing advance of Classical forms overrode the eclecticism of English Renaissance architecture, which gave way to a more uniform style derived from continental models, chiefly from Italy. The style was typified by square or round-headed windows and doors, flat ceilings, colonnades, pilasters, pediments and domes. Classical architecture in England tended to be relatively plain and simple in comparison with the contemporaneous Baroque architecture of the continent, being influenced above all by the Palladian style of Italy. This was first introduced to England by Inigo Jones and typified by his Queen's House at Greenwich.
The later 17th century saw Baroque architecture, a version of Classicism characterised by heavy massing and ostentatiously elaborate decoration, become widespread in England. Grand Baroque country houses began to appear in England in the 1690s, exemplified by Chatsworth House and Castle Howard. The most significant English Baroque architects after Wren were Sir John Vanbrugh and Nicholas Hawksmoor, who adapted the Baroque style to fit English tastes in houses such as Blenheim Palace, Seaton Delaval Hall and Easton Neston.
The 18th century saw a turn away from Baroque elaboration and a reversion to a more austere approach to Classicism. This shift initially brought a return to the Italian Palladianism that had characterised the earliest manifestations of Classical architecture in England. Later Neoclassical architecture increasingly idealised ancient Greek forms, which were viewed as representing Classicism in its original 'purity', as against Roman forms, now regarded as degenerate. Country houses representing this style include Woburn Abbey and Kedleston Hall. This period also saw the emergence of an increasingly planned approach to urban expansion, and the systematic, simultaneous construction of whole streets or squares, or even of entire districts, gave rise to new forms of domestic construction, the terrace and the crescent, as exemplified in Bath and in Bloomsbury and Mayfair in London. Among the notable architects practising in this era were Robert Adam, Sir William Chambers, John Wood and James Wyatt.
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The Gothic revival was a development which emerged in England and whose influence, except in church building, was largely restricted to the English-speaking world. It had begun on a small scale in the 18th century under the stimulus of Romanticism, a trend initiated by Horace Walpole's house Strawberry Hill. However, widespread Gothic construction began only in the 19th century, led by the renewal of church building but spreading to secular construction. Early Gothic revival architecture was whimsical and unsystematic, but in the Victorian era the revival developed an abstract rigour and became a movement driven by cultural, religious and social concerns which extended far beyond architecture, seeing the Gothic style and the medieval way of life as a route to the spiritual regeneration of society. The first great ideologue of this movement was Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin, who together with Charles Barry designed the new Houses of Parliament, the grandest work of Victorian Gothic architecture.
The Geography of the USA.
The United States of America stretches from Atlantic Ocean across North America and far into the Pacific.
Because of such a huge size of the country the climate differs from one part of the country to another. The coldest climate is in the northern part, where there is heavy snow in winter and the temperature may go down to 40 degrees below zero. The south has a subtropical climate, with .temperature as high as 49 degrees in summer.
The continental part of the USA consists of the highland regions and two lowland regions. The highland regions are the Appalachian mountains in the east and the Cordillera in the west. Between the Cordillera and the Appalachian mountains are the centre! lowlands which are called- the prairie, and eastern lowlands called the Mississippi valley. There are many mountains especially in the west and southwest. The Rocky mountains extend all the way from New Mexico to Alaska.
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The major characteristic of the United States is probably its great variety. Its physical environment ranges from the Arctic to the subtropical, from the moist rain forest to the arid desert, from the rugged mountain peak to the flat prairie.
Many rivers cross the country. The most important are the Mississippi, Missouri, Colorado, Sacramento.The continental part of the USA consists of the highland regions and two lowland regions. The highland regions are the Appalachia mountains in the east and the Cordillera in the west.
Between the Cordillera and the Appalachian Mountains are the central lowlands which are called the prairie, and eastern lowlands called the Mississippi valley.
The principal rivers of the USA are the Mississippi, the longest river in the world (7,330 km) and the Hudson river. The climate of the USA differs greatly from one part of the country to another. The coldest climate is in the northern part, where there is heavy snow in winter and the temperature may go down to 40 degrees below zero. The south has a subtropical climate, with temperature as high as 49 degrees in summer.
The main lakes in the USA are the Great Lakes in the north. The nation's natural advantages and resources are probably greater than those of any other area of equal size. The land is as varied as it huge. There are plains and mountains, grasslands and forests, sandy soil, clay and rich, dark loams.
The mineral resources vary from precious gold and rare uranium to common lead and zinc. Coal, oil, iron, copper and other minerals are abundant. They form basis of modern industry.
English Sculpture.
15th Century - English sculpture, realist by inclination and also because of Flemish influence, nearly always favoured juxtaposed statues in niches, sometimes placed in rows at several levels . Friezes composed of the head and shoulders of angels, surmounting a parapet, are typical of the Perpendicular style. The tomb with mourners of Richard Beauchamp (1439, Warwick), by John Massingham, illustrates the vigour of funerary art. The tomb used as a chantry chapel is frequently found, for example: tomb of Henry IV (1443, Canterbury); bishops' chantries at Lincoln, Hereford and Ely. At the begirming of the 16th century Henry VII's chapel in Westminster abbey was given a lively statuary, perhaps by R. Bellamy, while in the rich heraldic decoration of King's College chapel, Cambridge, the human figure had a modest place. The carved wooden stalls of the early 16th century at Windsor, Ripon, Manchester, and in the Henry VII chapel were inspired by Dutch or Flemish models. Sculpture in alabaster was developed on the scale of an industry. Ready-made panels were used to compose sarcophagi, tombs and altars. These stereotyped works, gilded and polychrome, whose style seldom varied, were destined for an English clientиle as well as for the foreign market.
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16th Century - Italian sculptors, summoned by Henry VIII and Cardinal Wolsey, introduced about 1512-1520 the art of the Renaissance (tombs of Dr Young [1512], of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York [1512-1519] in Westminster abbey, works by Pietro Torrigiano, in the Florentine manner; medallions of polychrome terracotta by Giovanni da Majano, and the ceiling of Cardinal Wolsey's Closet after 1521, in Hampton Court). English sculptors adapted themselves with varying degrees of success to the Italian style in funerary art (tombs of the Fitzwilliams, about 1525, at Tickhill; of Sir Anthony and Lady Browne, about 1540-1548, at Battle). In purely decorative work they used foliage, arabesques and other motifs in the style of the Renaissance (ceilings in Hampton Court, rood screen and carved wooden stalls in King's College chapel, Cambridge, 1532-1536) but the real spirit of this art remained foreign to them. First the abolition of the monasteries, then, under Edward VI, the ban on images in the sanctuaries restrained the activities of sculptors, who confined themselves to decoration and to funerary art. In the time of Elizabeth, the work of German and Netherlands decorators spread Italianism in the northern manner. This more overloaded style appeared in monumental chimneypieces (Knole, Longford, Hatfield). The form of the tombs became classical; the statuary adorning them was generally stiff, sometimes awkward: tombs of the Fetiplaces in Swenecombe (1562), of Sir Richard Pecksall (1571), Westminster.
17th Century - English sculpture of the early 17th century was very provincial, with Nicholas Stone and Edward Marshall the only English-born sculptors to rise above the general level of mediocrity. Their styles were based on contemporary Netherlandish sculpture with small admixtures of Italian influence; and after 1660 the uncomprehending borrowings of John Bushnell from Bernini serve only to make his figures look ludicrous. The most distinguished English-born sculptor of the second half of the 17th century was Edward Pearce, in whose rare busts is to be found something of Bernini's vigour and intensity. But the general run of English sculpture as represented by Francis Bird, Edward Stanton, and even the internationally renowned woodcarver Grinling Gibbons remained unexceptional. It was not until John Michael Rysbrack from Antwerp settled in England in c. 1720, followed by the Frenchman Louis-Franзois Roubiliac in c. 1732, that two sculptors of European stature were active in England.
18th Century - Pieter Scheemaker (1691-1770) of Antwerp and Laurent Delvaux of Ghent carved a number of tombs in Westminster abbey, but it was not until John Michael Rysbrack from Antwerp settled in England in c. 1720, followed by the Frenchman Louis-Franзois Roubiliac in c. 1732, that two sculptors of European stature were active in England. The busts and tombs of Rysbrack and Roubiliac have a power and vitality previously unknown in English sculpture; they were responsible for the revival that took place in the 18th century. The finest sculpture in England during the 18th century was done by Roubiliac. In 1737 he made his reputation with his statue of Handel for Vauxhall Gardens; towards 1750 he worked as a modeller at the Chelsea china factory (fine terra-cotta busts of Alexander Pope, Colly Cibber and Hogarth, and Martin Folkes (1749). His tombs in Westminster abbey include those of the 2nd Duke of Argyll (1748) and Lady Elizabeth Nightingale (1761). At the end of the century there was a return to the antique and a number of English sculptors went to Rome; among these Joseph Wilton (1722-1803), a pupil of Roubillac (monuments for General Wolfe, Stephen Hales and Admiral Holmes), showed originality. Thomas Banks (1735-1805) was more uneven (Thetis and her Nymphs, tomb of Sir Eyre Coote, 1783). Joseph Nollekens (1737-1823) produced competent portrait busts (bust of Dr Johnson in Westminster abbey) and executed a number of tombs of classical inspiration. The elder John Bacon (1740-1799) executed the Chatham monument in Westminster abbey and that of Dr Johnson in St Paul's. John Flaxman (1755-1826) enjoyed a European reputation in his own day as the finest sculptor after Canova. In 1775-1787 he worked for Wedgwood, who was popularising Neoclassical designs in his new `Etruscan' ware. Funerary sculpture formed the majority of his later work (Lord Mansfield, 1795, Westminster abbey).
Britain in Middle Ages.
THE MIDDLE AGES (1066-1485) Perhaps the most famous date in British history is 1066, when William the First (William the Conqueror) invaded England with an army of soldiers from Normandy (in north-west France). The Normans were originally Vikings, who had moved to north France in about AD 900. William defeated the Saxon king (Harold) at the Battle of Hastings: Hastings is a town on the south coast of England. The story of the invasion is told in pictures in the Bayeux Tapestry. This was the last time that England was successfully invaded by a foreign army.
The kings in the Middle Ages built many castles across England and Wales to make the area secure. The Tower of London was built at this time to protect London from enemies sailing up the river Thames, and the kings lived here during the Middle Ages. Edward the First built many castles in Wales to control the country (for example: Caerphilly Castle, Harlech Castle or Caernarfon Castle).
The system of government at that time was known as the feudal system. The king owned all the land, but divided this between barons and the Church. The barons had their own private armies, and agreed to pay taxes and fight for the king. They lived in houses known as manors. The private armies which they controlled were led by trained soldiers known as knights, who would ride horses and wear metal suits of armour to protect themselves in battle. Yeomen were farmers, who were free but had to do some work for the baron. Serfs (peasants) were owned by the baron and had to provide food in exchange for their security - they were not allowed to leave the manor without permission. This created a class system: people still talk of an upper class, middle class and working class, although the definition of these terms is no longer clear.
The Christian church became rich and powerful in England and Wales under the Normans. Many churches and cathedrals were built, including those at Chichester and Durham. The Pope (based in Rome) was the leader of the Christian church in Europe. The lands around Jerusalem were regarded as holy by Christians. This area was controlled by Arabs during the time of the Dark Ages, but Christians were still allowed to go there to visit their holy places. However, in the early Middle Ages this area was invaded by Turks, and Christians in Jerusalem were attacked. The Pope ordered Christians to go there to attack the Turks, and there were a number of wars known as the Crusades.
Scotland was invaded in about 1300 by Edward the First, but there was a rebellion led by William Wallace. Although this was successful, Edward later defeated and killed Wallace. Robert Bruce became the leader of the Scottish, and he later defeated a much larger English army at the battle of Bannockburn in central Scotland. This allowed Scotland to remain independent and keep its own kings and laws.
England and France spent many years fighting each other, especially in the period known as the Hundred Years War. At one time England ruled almost all of France, helped by victories at the battles of Crécy in the time of Edward the Third and Agincourt in the time of Henry the Fifth.However, a rebellion against the English was led by Joan of Arc, and by the end of the Middle Ages the English had lost nearly all of the land in France.
The Black Death was a disease carried by rats which spread through much of Europe. About a third of the population of Britain were killed by this, with England being affected particularly badly. This meant there were fewer serfs (peasants) to farm the land, and those who survived had to work harder for no extra benefit. When the king tried to increase taxes to pay for the war against France, peasants attacked their lords and marched to London, asking for higher wages and their freedom. This was known as the Peasant's Revolt. Although the king promised to help them, the leaders of the revolt were killed after they returned home.
William Caxton set up the first printing presses in England at the end of this period. Books started to be produced in English, not just in Latin or French. The printing process helped to establish a standard form of English. It also helped to spread of education and the ideas of the Renaissance, which started in Italy in the 1400s.
There were a series of battles between the House of York (whose family symbol was a white rose) and the House of Lancaster (whose family symbol was a red rose), the leaders of which both wanted to rule England. These fights were known as the Wars of the Roses. The final result was a victory for Lancaster's Henry Tudor (Henry the Seventh) at Bosworth Field. He ended the fighting between the families by marrying a member of the House of York. This was the start of the Tudor period.
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