6. President election in the us

• there are 2 main parties in the USA, they are Democratic party and Republican party

• to become a US President you must be 35 y.o., be a US citizen born in the USA, have lived in the USA at least 14 years

• steps of election campaign:

  1. voters have to choose from the list of the candidates

  2. parties choose their presidential candidates

  3. candidates travel around the countries, give speeches

  4. during the national debates candidates discuss problems of education, taxes, foreign politics etc.

  5. members of the Electoral college vote their choice

  6. Inauguration Day [January, 20]

• Electoral College – the institution that officially elects the President and Vice President of US every four years

• Twenty-seven amendments have been ratified since the original signing of the Constitution, the first ten of which are known collectively as the Bill of Rights [These limitations serve to protect the natural rights of liberty and property.].

• Before an amendment can take effect, it must be proposed to the states by a two-thirds vote of both houses of Congress or by a convention (known as an Article V convention) called by two-thirds of the states, and ratified by three-fourths of the states or by three-fourths of conventions thereof, the method of ratification being determined by Congress at the time of proposal. To date, no convention for proposing amendments has been called by the states, and only once—in 1933 for the ratification of the twenty-first amendment—has the convention method of ratification been employed.

• 12th Revises presidential election procedures

• 20th Fixes the dates of term commencements for Congress (January 3) and the President (January 20); known as the "lame duck amendment"

• 22nd Limits the number of times that a person can be elected president. A person cannot be elected president more than twice. Additionally, a person who has served more than two years of a term to which someone else was elected cannot be elected more than once.

• 26th Establishes the right to vote for those age 18 years or older.

7. Pilgrims in the New World

• 1620 – Mayflower transported 102 English Pilgrims, including a core group of Separatists, to New England

• Colonists – puritans – English Protestants who disagreed with many practices of the Church of England

• Mayflower Compact - the first written laws for the new land

• Plymouth Colony - the first permanent European settlement in New England

• Forefathers, Founders, Piligrims - political leaders and statesmen who participated in the American Revolution by signing the United States Declaration of Independence, taking part in the American Revolutionary War, and establishing the United States Constitution.

• 1773 – Boston Tea Party - was a political protest by the Sons of Liberty [a group consisting of American patriots that originated in the pre-independence North American British colonies] in Boston, a city in the British colony of Massachusetts, against the tax policy of the British government and the East India Company that controlled all the tea imported into the colonies

• 1775 – American War of Independence

• July 4, 1774 – American Declaration of Independence

• 1783 – Britain recognizes the US

• The Founding Fathers – the Signers of the Declaration of Independence 1776

• There was one man who fell overboard during a storm. John Howland. There is not much known about the incident except that one of the crewmen supposedly threw an oar overboard and then a rope. Howland was saved.