From the Pew Research Center: What we know about the increase in U.S. murders in 2020

- Click here for the study. 

The U.S. murder rate rose 30% between 2019 and 2020 – the largest single-year increase in more than a century, according to data published this month by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The findings align with a separate tabulation of the nation’s murder rate published in September by the FBI.

The CDC tracks murders by analyzing information contained in death certificates. The FBI tallies murders by collecting information from thousands of law enforcement agencies across the country. Despite their different methodologies, both sources point to a sharp rise in the U.S. murder rate during the pandemic year of 2020, even as the rate itself remained well below the level of earlier decades.

. . . 5. It is not yet clear why murders rose dramatically in 2020. Experts have pointed to a variety of potential causes, including the economic and societal changes brought on by the coronavirus pandemic and changes in police-community relations after the murder of George Floyd in Minnesota last year. But the exact reasons remain unclear.

The FBI data, at least, shows that murder wasn’t the only form of violent crime to go up last year. The rate of aggravated assault rose nearly 12% between 2019 and 2020. And since aggravated assault is by far the most common type of violent crime tracked by the FBI, the overall violent crime rate in the U.S. also increased in 2020, by about 5%. Two other kinds of violent crime tracked by the FBI – rape and robbery – declined in 2020.

Public Opinion on Crime

- PPI: Actual violent crime has nothing to do with our fear of violent crime.

- Gallup: More Americans Say Crime Is Rising in U.S.

- Brennan Center: Just Facts: Crime in Context — The Lessons of History.

From Roll Call: Former Utah Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, who helped shape health and tax policy, dead at 88

- Click here for the article. 

Once in the Senate, Hatch championed a variety of issues including a balanced-budget amendment to the Constitution, which he sponsored 17 times; immigration and border security; religious freedom; and the Americans with Disabilities Act.

As the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee and the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, he also played leading roles in passing landmark laws related to national security and health care, including teaming with the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts to create the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) for children living in or near poverty as part of a larger 1997 budget law.

. . . Then-Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa was his ally in preparing a 1994 law that limited the Food and Drug Administration’s ability to withdraw dietary supplements from stores (supplements are a huge industry in Utah). A 1984 law credited with making generic medicines more widely available is named for its champions, Hatch and Democratic California Rep. Henry A. Waxman.

He was reelected in 2012 after a difficult challenge from the tea party, which charged Hatch with being out of touch. After seeing three-term Utah Sen. Robert F. Bennett denied the GOP Senate nomination in 2010 when conservatives at the party’s nominating convention lined up behind two challengers, Hatch had two years to prepare for a similar battle. He tacked to the right on most issues, established ties to the tea party movement and engaged in aggressive fundraising.

Legislation he was involved in

- Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.

- Children's Health Insurance Plan.

- Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017.

From the Pew Research Center - Criminal Justice

- What the data says (and doesn’t say) about crime in the United States.

How much crime is there in the U.S.?

It’s difficult to say for certain. The two primary sources of government crime statistics – the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) – both paint an incomplete picture, though efforts at improvement are underway.

The FBI publishes annual data on crimes that have been reported to the police, but not those that haven’t been reported. The FBI also looks mainly at a handful of specific violent and property crimes, but not many other types of crime, such as drug crime. And while the FBI’s data is based on information it receives from thousands of federal, state, county, city and other police departments, not all agencies participate every year. In 2019, the most recent full year available, the FBI received data from around eight-in-ten agencies.

BJS, for its part, tracks crime by fielding a large annual survey of Americans ages 12 and older and asking them whether they were the victim of a crime in the past six months. One advantage of this approach is that it captures both reported and unreported crimes. But the BJS survey has limitations of its own. Like the FBI, it focuses mainly on a handful of violent and property crimes while excluding other kinds of crime. And since the BJS data is based on after-the-fact interviews with victims, it cannot provide information about one especially high-profile type of crime: murder.

All those caveats aside, looking at the FBI and BJS statistics side-by-side does give researchers a good picture of U.S. violent and property crime rates and how they have changed over time.

- From police to parole, black and white Americans differ widely in their views of criminal justice system.

Black Americans are far more likely than whites to say the nation’s criminal justice system is racially biased and that its treatment of minorities is a serious national problem.

In a recent Pew Research Center survey, around nine-in-ten black adults (87%) said blacks are generally treated less fairly by the criminal justice system than whites, a view shared by a much smaller majority of white adults (61%). And in a survey shortly before last year’s midterm elections, 79% of blacks – compared with 32% of whites – said the way racial and ethnic minorities are treated by the criminal justice system is a very big problem in the United States today.

Racial differences in views of the criminal justice system are not limited to the perceived fairness of the system as a whole. Black and white adults also differ across a range of other criminal justice-related questions asked by the Center in recent years, on subjects ranging from crime and policing to the use of computer algorithms in parole decisions.

Crime Data

- Texas Crime Rates 1960 - 2019.

- FBI: Uniform Crime Reporting Program.

- Bureau of Justice Statistics: Criminal Victimization, 2019.

- FBI: Crime in the U.S.

- DPS: Crime in Texas, 2020.

- United Health Foundation: Violent Crime.

From the Texas Tribune - 4/25

In Texas, thousands in fines paid by oil and gas polluters benefit the fossil fuel industry.

After a Taiwanese plastics and petrochemical company leaked harmful gasses from its chemical plant in the Gulf Coast town of Point Comfort in 2021, Texas’ environmental agency fined it nearly $267,000. Instead of paying the entire fine to the state, Formosa — which uses fossil fuels to create plastics — sent half the money to the Texas Natural Gas Foundation, a nonprofit entity that promotes natural gas to the public.

Texas state law allows polluters to divert some of their fines that normally go to the state’s general revenue fund to “supplemental environmental projects,” or SEPs. The Texas Natural Gas Foundation has qualified as an SEP since 2016.

In theory, SEPs are meant to remediate industrial pollution and environmental harm by funding programs like cleanups at illegal dump sites, habitat restoration or household hazardous waste pickups in communities.

Public documents obtained by Floodlight show that SEPs like the one with the Texas Natural Gas Foundation can directly benefit the companies that are being penalized — by paying to staff and run industry programs.

According to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality’s description of the Texas Natural Gas Foundation’s SEP, the nonprofit aims to raise $8 million to replace state government-owned diesel trucks and buses with new gas vehicles that the foundation argues are cleaner. Several school districts receive SEP funding for similar bus replacement projects. But by allowing entities like the Texas Natural Gas Foundation to receive state funds, Texas is allowing the fossil fuel industry to reshuffle money back to itself, public documents show.

Biden administration drops fight over Texas’ Medicaid waiver, now in place until 2030.

A federal health care program that Texas uses to help pay for health care for uninsured Texans — worth billions of dollars annually — is safe for another decade after the federal government said Friday that it would stop fighting the Trump-era agreement to extend the program beyond its expiration date later this year.

“It is not the best use of the federal government’s limited resources to continue to litigate this matter,” reads a letter sent Friday to state health officials from the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. “This should resolve the issue without the need for further litigation and will create no disruption to the people who rely on Texas’ Medicaid program.”

The announcement concludes a yearlong legal battle over the so-called 1115 waiver, specifically how long it should stay in effect and how parts of it should be funded.

Federalism and Public Policy

Federalism and Public Policy: 

A reminder about where to look for the basic functions of each level of government.


National Powers:

Enumerated, Delegated, Implied, and Inherent Powers
- development of commerce
- internal and external security
- coordinating state activities
U.S. Constitution: Article 1, Section 8.
U.S. Constitution: Article 2, Section 2.
U.S. Constitution: Article 3, Section 2.
U.S. Code.
U.S. Executive Agencies
House Committees
Senate Committees


State Powers:

Reserved and Concurrent Powers
- police powers -  health, safety, welfare, morals
- create local governments
U.S. Constitution: Article 1, Section 4.
U.S. Constitution: Article 1, Section 10. (prohibited powers)
Texas Constitution
Texas Statutory Code
Texas Fiscal Size-Up
Texas Sunset Review Commission
Texas House Committees
Texas Senate Committees


Local Powers: 

Wards of the state - Dillon's rule
- administrate state laws
- resolve local disputes
Texas Constitution Articles 9 and 11
Texas Local Government Code
Texas Constitution Article 3, Section 56 (limits on states)
Codes of Ordinances

- Categories of Public Policy.
- Federalism and Public Policy.
- The Public Policy Process. 
- The Issue Attention Cycle.

From Texas State Records: Understanding the Lone Star State’s Criminal Justice System

A useful overview.

- Click here for it. 

Local Law Enforcement

County Level
- Brazoria County Sheriffs Office.  
- Brazoria County Constables Office.
- Harris County Sheriffs Office. 
- Harris County Constables Office.

Municipal Level.
- Alvin Police Department
- Houston Police Department
- Pearland Police Department

Independent School Districts

Community College Districts

Texas House Committees
- Criminal Jurisprudence Committee.
- Judiciary & Civil Jurisprudence Committee.
- Criminal Justice Reform, Interim Study Committee.

Texas Senate Committees
- Senate Committee on Criminal Justice.
- Senate Committee on Jurisprudence.

State Code
- Texas Penal Code.
- Texas Code of Criminal Procedure.

- Texas District Courts - Brazoria County.

- Alvin Code of Ordinances.
- Alvin Police Department.
- Alvin Municipal Court.
- Alvin City Jail. 

From the Texas Association of Counties: What's the Difference Between Sheriff, Police and Constable?

Great question.

- Click here for an answer. 

 

From the Texas Fiscal Size-Up: PUBLIC SAFETY AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE

- Click here for the source, and go to page 325. 

Public safety and criminal justice agencies are funded in Article V of the General Appropriations Act and provide various services to ensure the safety and security of Texans. Those services include the adult and juvenile corrections systems (community supervision, incarceration, and parole services), law enforcement and highway patrol, the Texas military forces, and driver license processing. Additional services provided include county jail regulation, law enforcement officer training and licensing, alcoholic beverage industry oversight, and firefighter certification. Border security is coordinated among several Article V agencies and agencies in other articles of government. Public safety and criminal justice agencies are funded primarily with General Revenue Funds.

- Click here for the source.

Scroll down for the breakdown into the different sources of funding.

From the Fiscal Size-Up: Four methods of finance

- Click here for the source, go to page 1. 

The Legislature uses four methods of finance to appropriate funds to state agencies and public institutions of higher education: General Revenue Funds, General Revenue– Dedicated Funds, Federal Funds, and Other Funds.

• General Revenue Funds include the nondedicated portion of the General Revenue Fund, which is the state’s primary operating fund. General Revenue Funds also include the Available School Fund, the State Instructional Materials Fund, and the Foundation School Fund;

• General Revenue–Dedicated Funds include approximately 200 accounts within the General Revenue Fund that are dedicated for specific purposes by statute or by the funds-consolidation process. For example, Account No. 151, Clean Air, is funded primarily through a portion of motor vehicle inspection fees and a portion of air pollution control fees. These Account No. 151 revenues are statutorily dedicated to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to provide funding for various air quality, monitoring, and permitting programs;

• Federal Funds include grants, allocations, payments, or reimbursements received from the federal government by state agencies and institutions. Th e largest portion of federal funding appropriations is for the Medicaid program in Article II. Other examples of Federal Funds appropriations include the Title I Grants to Local Educational Agencies, National School Lunch Program, Transportation Grants and National Highway System Funding, Special Education Basic State Grants, and the Children’s Health Insurance Program; and

• Other Funds consist of any funds that are not included in the General Revenue Fund (dedicated or not) or Federal Funds. Examples of Other Funds include the State Highway Fund, the Texas Mobility Fund, the Property Tax Relief Fund, the Economic Stabilization Fund, trust

Austin’s ban on some digital billboards can stand, U.S. Supreme Court says.

If Roe v. Wade is overturned, Texas district attorney offices would become a new battleground.

As Texas home values skyrocket, state officials wrestle with how to slow property tax increases.

From the Brookings Institution: US immigration policy: A classic, unappreciated example of structural racism

For our look at public policy.

- Click here for the article. 

In sharp contrast to today’s undocumented population, “illegal” European immigrants faced few repercussions. There was virtually no immigration enforcement infrastructure. If caught, few faced deportation. All of those who entered unlawfully before the 1940s were protected from deportation by statutes of limitations, and in the 1930s and 1940s, tens of thousands of unauthorized immigrants like Nora O’Donnell’s grandfather were given amnesty.[viii] The few not covered by a statute of limitations or amnesty had another protection: until 1976 the government rarely deported parents of US citizens.[ix] There were no immigrant restrictions on public benefits until the 1970s, and it wasn’t until 1986 that it became unlawful to hire an undocumented immigrant.

In sum, from the early 1900s through the 1960s, millions of predominantly white immigrants entered the country unlawfully, but faced virtually no threat of apprehension or deportation. Businesses lawfully employed these immigrants, who were eligible for public benefits when they fell on hard times.

By contrast, the undocumented population today—mostly Latino and overwhelmingly people of color— none of the privileges accorded to previous generations of white immigrants. The toughening of immigration laws coincided with a shift of immigration from Europe to newcomers from Latin America, Asia, and Africa,[x] often in the context of racialized debates targeted mainly at Latinos. Researchers have documented how through the 1960s, racialized views of Mexicans shaped law and bureaucratic practice.[xi] Over the next decade, Congress: ended the Bracero program, which had allowed as many as 800,000 temporary migrants from Mexico annually to work mainly in agriculture; cut legal immigration from Mexico by 50%; and ended the long-standing practice that parents of US citizens wouldn’t be deported. Reducing lawful means of immigrating predictably led to a rise in unauthorized entries, which was met with calls for tougher enforcement.[xii]

From the Sunset Review Commission: Impact of Sunset Reviews

We discussed this in a class the other day - what has the Sunset Review Commission actually done?

- Click here for the page. 

Specific examples of the most impactful changes are highlighted below.

Less Burdensome Regulation

The Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation’s resources and capabilities had been stretched thin by decades of taking on new or troubled programs, jeopardizing the quality of service to licensees and the general public. Sunset eliminated 29 types of licenses that provided little or no benefit to the public and were held by 160,000 businesses and individuals, such as polygraph examiners and combative sports event coordinators. Sunset also streamlined the regulation of about 345,000 barbers, cosmetologists, and their businesses to reduce both the department’s workload and regulatory burdens on the licensees.

The Sunset process removed unnecessary regulatory obstacles to doing business in Texas at 10 state agencies, such as notarization of application forms, subjective qualifications to get a license or permit, onerous educational requirements, inconsistencies in licensing and examination processes, and arbitrary rules on how criminal convictions affect eligibility for certification. 

More Accountable, Efficient State Government

The Texas Animal Health Commission’s animal health testing laboratory had become outdated, inefficient, and unjustifiably expensive to operate. Sunset directed the agency to close the lab and outsource regulatory animal health tests to Texas A&M University’s nationally accredited veterinary lab, to the extent testing is available, efficient, and cost-effective. The change will lower the state’s cost of testing for contagious animal diseases and eliminate duplication of state-funded operations. 

Historically, the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement has not effectively collected or used data to assess and prioritize regulatory processes such as audits, which state law requires to be risk-based. The Sunset Commission directed the agency to improve its approach to audits, contracting, and overall decision-making. Although the agency’s Sunset bill did not pass, these management directives should lead to operational improvements.
To improve consistency and efficiency of operations at the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, the Legislature required the agency to adopt policies to guide its enforcement processes, and to standardize its regulatory programs to the extent feasible. The department must also refine existing strategic planning efforts and establish a more complete and formal internal audit process. 

Broader Public Engagement

Sunset’s review of the Teacher Retirement System found a major disconnect between the agency and the retired teachers it serves, resulting in poor service and confusing requirements, particularly about the process to appeal agency decisions. Sunset required the agency’s board of trustees to appoint an independent ombudsman to monitor these interactions and recommend improvements, and required the agency to develop a strategic plan to communicate with and engage its customers.

Despite the Texas Department of Agriculture’s broad reach across Texas, it lacked an effective strategy to engage stakeholders statewide. The Legislature increased opportunities for public input into the department’s activities by authorizing the creation of advisory committees and requiring a strategic planning process with public input for inspections. Sunset also directed the department to improve information for the public on its website about its regulations and operations. 

More Effective Public Safety

Having clear standards for jails is critical to the mission of the Texas Commission on Jail Standards to protect both inmates and the public. For years, however, the agency set vague, ineffective requirements for how jails are managed and operated. Sunset directed the agency to develop more specific and effective jail standards that account for risk. Further, Sunset legislation requires the agency to implement risk-based inspections and more consistent enforcement protocols, with escalating penalties for noncompliance.

Complaints are an important tool in identifying and addressing regulatory violations that could harm the public. Sunset directed 11 agencies to more clearly explain their complaint filing procedures and final decisions to complainants, and to strengthen and formalize their processes for reviewing and investigating complaints, taking enforcement actions, and tracking, analyzing, and reporting complaint data. For example, Sunset directed the Credit Union Department to overhaul its complaints process and more clearly communicate its authority and process for investigating complaints.

For ACC GOVT 2306 Ch 14

- Fracking.
- Land
- Good Roads Amendment
- Road User Fees
- environmentalism
- alternative energy
- Dream Act
- Spicewood Beach
- Federal Aid Road Act
- Ogallala Aquifer
- TCEQ
- rule of capture
- Plyler v Doe
- Light Rail
- mass transit
- Clean Energy Tax
- subsidies 
- radioactive waste
- Trans Texas Corridor
- eminent domain
- diversified economy 

Texas Towns Run Out of Water as Drought Takes its Toll

From Wikipedia: Piggly-Wiggly

long story 

- Click here for the entry.

At the time of its founding, grocery stores did not allow customers to gather their own goods. Instead, a customer would give a list of items to a clerk, who would then go through the store, gathering them. This created a greater cost and higher prices. Piggly Wiggly introduced the innovation of allowing customers to go through the store, gathering their goods, thus cutting costs and lowering prices.[2] Losses due to easier shoplifting were more than offset by profits from increased impulse purchasing. Others were initially experimenting with this format, which came to be known as a "groceteria", reminding people of cafeterias, another relatively new, self-service idea.[7]

Piggly Wiggly Corporation secured the self-service format and issued franchises to hundreds of grocery retailers for the operation of its stores. The concept of the "self-serving store" was patented[8] by Saunders in 1917.

Customers at Piggly Wiggly entered the store through a turnstile and walked through four aisles to view the store's 605 items sold in packages and organized into departments. The customers selected merchandise as they continued through the maze to the cashier. Instantly, packaging and brand recognition became important to companies and consumers alike.[6]

The original Piggly Wiggly Store, Memphis, Tennessee, 1918

Piggly Wiggly was the first to:
provide checkout stands.[9]
price mark every item in the store.[9]
provide shopping carts for customers, starting in 1937 in Oklahoma.[10]

The success of Piggly Wiggly was phenomenal, and other independent and chain grocery stores changed to self-service in the 1920s and 1930s. At its peak in 1932 (see Clarence Saunders), the company operated 2,660 stores and posted annual sales in excess of $180 million. In November 1922, Saunders attempted a squeeze on the substantial short interest in the stock, running the share price up from 40 to 120 and profiting by millions on paper. The Stock Exchange Governors responded by deciding that a corner had been established in Piggly Wiggly and removed the stock from the Board, eventually forcing Saunders to turn over his assets to the banks that had financed his leveraged position. Saunders reputedly lost $9 million in the attempted corner.

Animated Map Shows History Of Immigration To The US

Texas Governor Greg Abbott battles with Biden administration over immigr...

The law that broke US immigration

From Wikipedia: Title 42 expulsion

- Click here for the entry. 

Title 42 expulsions are removals by the U.S. government of persons who have recently been in a country where a communicable disease was present. The extent of authority for contagion-related expulsions is set out by law in 42 U.S.C. § 265. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the Trump administration used this provision (section 265) to generally block land entry for many migrants. The program has been continued by the Biden administration.[1]

The program allows the US Border Patrol and US Customs and Border Protection to prohibit the entry of persons who potentially pose a health risk by being subject to previously-announced travel restrictions or because by unlawfully entering the country to bypass health-screening measures.[2][3] Its use was implemented under the Trump administration and has continued under the Biden administration to prohibit asylum seekers from lawfully petitioning for asylum in the United States.[4] Persons subject to the order are not held in congregate areas for processing and are instead immediately expelled to their country of last transit.[3] If they are unable to be returned to the country of last transit, the Border Patrol will work with its interagency partners to expel the person to their country of origin.[3] Expulsions under Title 42 are not based on immigration status and are tracked separately from immigration.

From the Texas Tribune: Gov. Greg Abbott brags about his border initiative. The evidence doesn’t back him up.

Let's pay special attention to how this is financed.

- Click here for the link. 

2021: Operation Lone Star

Description: Under the operation that launched in March 2021, Abbott deployed more than 10,000 Texas National Guard members and DPS troopers to the border to combat drug smuggling and unauthorized immigration. For the first time, some migrants are being arrested on state criminal trespassing charges after crossing into the U.S. on private property. The National Guard is also helping build border barriers and creating what Abbott and DPS call a “steel curtain,” a combination of vehicles, concertina wire and shipping containers, to deter anyone seeking to cross.

Stated reason: About two months after Biden’s inauguration, Abbott blamed the new administration for what he called an escalating crisis at the border. When the governor launched the operation, the number of people crossing into the state via the southern border had reached a two-decade high. Under Title 42, more than three-quarters of migrants apprehended from January through March were immediately turned away.

End date: Ongoing

Cost: DPS estimates spending about $2.5 million per week for up to 1,600 troopers involved in the mission. The Texas Military Department estimates that the current deployment of 10,000 National Guard members will cost an additional $2 billion a year, nearly five times what the Legislature had budgeted for the deployment. The cost doesn’t include additional funding for related expenses such as jails, public defenders and grants awarded to local governments through the governor’s office.

Claimed success: State officials have touted more than 13,000 criminal arrests, tens of thousands of pounds of drugs seized and more than 230,000 unauthorized migrants referred to the Border Patrol.
Reported concerns: An investigation by ProPublica, The Texas Tribune and The Marshall Project found that the state’s claims of success have been based on shifting metrics that included taking credit for uncovering crimes that had no links to the border, work conducted by troopers who were in the region before the operation began, and arrests, drug seizures and migrant apprehensions made in conjunction with other agencies. More than nine months into the operation, DPS told the news organizations that it had removed about 2,000 charges it deemed not related to border crime from a dataset of arrests credited to Operation Lone Star. The state faces several lawsuits and calls for investigation from Democrats, lawyers and advocacy groups following media reports detailing alleged civil rights violations and court rulings raising questions about the constitutionality of the trespassing arrests. Despite DPS and Abbott’s office highlighting human trafficking and smuggling arrests, the largest share of arrests are of people accused of trespassing on private property. The Army Times and the Tribune have also reported about poor working conditions and suicides among National Guard members deployed under the operation.

Instructions for Form 1040

- Click here for it. 

Affordable Care Act

Who Files

Dependents

Standard Deduction

Presidential Campaign Fund

Virtual Currency

Income

- PPP
- Chapter 11 Bankruptcy
- Community property States

Form 1040: The U.S. Individual Income Tax Return

- Click here for it.

From H&R Block: What is Form 1040?

From Wikipedia: Form 1040.

From Wikipedia: Tax Day.

Regarding the Income Tax

- History of taxation in the United States.

- Tariff in United States history.

- Income tax in the United States.

- Internal Revenue Service.

- Commissioner of Internal Revenue.

- Revenue Act of 1861.

- Revenue Act of 1862.

- Wilson-Gorman Tariff of 1894.

- Pollock v. Farmers' Loan & Trust Co. (1895)

- Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

- - Case law.

- Revenue Act of 1913.

- Brushaber v. Union Pacific Railroad Co.

- Marginal tax rates.

- Effective income tax rates.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget#/media/File:2020_US_Federal_Budget_Infographic.png

https://www.cbo.gov/topics/budget

https://www.reuters.com/business/us-cracks-down-russian-debt-payments-latest-sovereign-payments-halted-2022-04-05/

Selling K Building

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-16/u-s-treasury-confirms-russia-not-barred-from-servicing-bonds

chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://www.alvincollege.edu/about/financial-information/pdf/Legislative-Appropriations-2022-and-2023.pdf

https://markets.businessinsider.com/commodities/oil-price?type=wti

https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/060215/what-difference-between-upstream-and-downstream-oil-and-gas-operations.asp

https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/excise-tax

https://comptroller.texas.gov/taxes/sales/#:~:text=Texas%20imposes%20a%206.25%20percent,as%20well%20as%20taxable%20services.

https://comptroller.texas.gov/taxes/insurance/ret-tax.php

https://www.hctax.net/SpecialPermitTaxes/Hotel

https://comptroller.texas.gov/taxes/property-tax/exemptions/

https://codes.findlaw.com/tx/government-code/gov-t-sect-403-109.html#:~:text=(a)%20The%20property%20tax%20relief,allocated%20monthly%20to%20the%20fund.

https://wbctx.com/williams-brothers-wins-work-at-txdot-december-2015-letting/

https://www.alvincollege.edu/news/press-releases/ACC-Receives-Stimulus-Funds.html

https://www.alvincollege.edu/cewd/financial-aid.html

The Fiscal Size-Up - Some notes from Chapter 2

- Click here for it.

Major State Funds
- General Revenue Fund
- Available School Fund
- Foundation School Fund
- State Highway Fund  
- Texas Mobility Fund
- Property Tax Relief Fund
- Tax Reduction and Excellence in Education Fund
- Economic Stabilization Fund

Federal Funds Appropriations
- Health and Human Services
- Business and Economic Development
- Education

Local Revenue
- Property Taxes
- - Taxable Values
- - Property Tax Levies
- Local Sales Tax

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Land_Survey_System

https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/Docs/CN/pdf/CN.7.pdf

https://www.lanereport.com/134805/2020/11/delving-into-the-history-of-bourbon/#:~:text=There%20isn't%20much%20documentation,first%20African%20American%20master%20distiller.

https://dp.la/primary-source-sets/cotton-gin-and-the-expansion-of-slavery

https://propaccess.trueautomation.com/mapSearch/?cid=51

https://www.oyez.org/cases/1966/395

https://www.crf-usa.org/black-history-month/slavery-in-the-american-south#:~:text=Slaves%20had%20no%20constitutional%20rights,card%20games%20and%20horse%20races.

https://trid.trb.org/view/1258708#:~:text=The%20right%20to%20travel%20is,without%20government%20interference%20and%20intrusion.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Casor

https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/the-true-law-of-free-monarchies-by-king-james-vi-and-i

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Two-Treatises-of-Government

https://www.txdot.gov/inside-txdot/projects/studies/houston/i45-galveston-causeway.html

https://abc13.com/new-construction-2022-real-estate-public-transportation-houston-traffic/11407560/#:~:text=This%20project%20will%20be%20seen,and%20start%20service%20in%202027.

https://communityimpact.com/houston/bay-area/transportation/2021/10/19/i-45-widening-project-deadline-from-nasa-parkway-to-fm-518-extended-by-several-months/

https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/transportation/2021/08/31/407437/controversial-i-45-expansion-project-set-to-move-forward-for-now/

https://houstonhistorymagazine.org/2010/12/uh-tsu-perpetuating-separate-but-equal/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-drop_rule

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Clayton_Powell_Jr.

https://www.beaconbroadside.com/broadside/2019/01/before-passing-away-carol-channing-passed-for-white.html

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1996/06/17/white-like-me

https://www.thefamouspeople.com/profiles/homer-plessy-31242.php

https://www.vox.com/2014/5/20/5732208/the-green-lantern-theory-of-the-presidency-explained

From Pro-Publica: America's Highest Earners and their Taxes Revealed

Just in time for tax day.

- Click here for it.

Which people and professions rake in the most income year after year? Which are most adept at shielding that money from the taxman? And what does this tell you about America?

The top earners, of course, are often fodder for lists — but those are usually based on estimates or even speculation.

A trove of IRS data obtained by ProPublica has the definitive answers, revealing the incomes and tax rates of the 400 Americans with the highest incomes from 2013 to 2018. It took an average of $110 million per year in income to crack that list — with plenty of names you would expect and some that may surprise you.

We’ll also show how much the 400 paid in federal income taxes. (ProPublica is naming the 15 highest income earners, along with an assortment that represent income patterns that we’ve identified.

In theory, our tax system is designed to tax the rich at higher rates than everyone else. That’s not the way it works at the loftiest incomes. The data reveals a system where the very highest earners, on average, pay far lower tax rates than the merely affluent do. And even among the top 400, some groups have it better than others: Tech billionaires pay rates well below even other business owners.

- Click here for the high earners and their tax rates.

INTERIM COMMITTEE CHARGES

Texas Legislature

- Texas House.

- Texas Senate.

- - Texas House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee.

- - Texas Senate Committee on Criminal Justice.

From Wikipedia: Equality before the law

I think I prefer using "equality before the law" rather than "civil rights" since its a bit more precise. I more clearly states the goal of the various movements that seek to establish it.

- Click here for the entry.

Equality before the law, also known as equality under the law, equality in the eyes of the law, legal equality, or legal egalitarianism, is the principle that all people must be equally protected by the law.[1] The principle requires a systematic rule of law that observes due process to provide equal justice, and requires equal protection ensuring that no individual nor group of individuals be privileged over others by the law. Sometimes called the principle of isonomy, it arises from various philosophical questions concerning equality, fairness and justice. Equality before the law is one of the basic principles of some definitions of liberalism.[2][3] It is incompatible with legal slavery.

. . . Liberalism calls for equality before the law for all persons.[2] Classical liberalism as embraced by libertarians and modern American conservatives opposes pursuing group rights at the expense of individual rights.[3]

In his Second Treatise of Government (1689), John Locke wrote: "A state also of equality, wherein all the power and jurisdiction is reciprocal, no one having more than another; there being nothing more evident, than that creatures of the same species and rank, promiscuously born to all the same advantages of nature, and the use of the same faculties, should also be equal one amongst another without subordination or subjection, unless the lord and master of them all should, by any manifest declaration of his will, set one above another, and confer on him, by an evident and clear appointment, an undoubted right to dominion and sovereignty."[14]

In 1774, Alexander Hamilton wrote: "All men have one common original, they participate in one common nature, and consequently have one common right. No reason can be assigned why one man should exercise any power over his fellow creatures more than another, unless they voluntarily vest him with it".[15]

In Social Statics, Herbert Spencer defined it as a natural law "that every man may claim the fullest liberty to exercise his faculties compatible with the possession of like liberty to every other man". Stated another way by Spencer, "each has freedom to do all that he wills provided that he infringes not the equal freedom of any other".

  

Other Civil Rights Movements

- Civil Rights Movements.

- Feminist movement.

- Native American civil rights.

- Chicano Movement.

- Black Power movement.

- Asian American movement.

more to come

Abolitionism and Civil Rights

- Click here for Abolitionism on the United States.

- Civil rights movement (1865–1896).

- Civil rights movement (1896–1954).

- Click here for Slave States and Free States.

Slavery Clauses in the U.S. Constitution

Article One, Section 2. 3: Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding the whole number of free persons, including those bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three-fifths of all other persons.

- 3/5ths Compromise.

Article One, Section 9.1: The migration or importation of such persons as any of the states now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the year 1808, but a tax or duty may be imposed on such importations, not exceeding 10 dollars for each person.

- Slave Trade Clause.
- Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves.
- African Slave Trade.

Article 4, Section 2.3: No person held to service or labour in one state, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labour, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labour may be due.

- Fugitive Slave Clause.

Article 5: no amendment which may be made prior to the year 1808, shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article.

 

From Wikipedia: Slave Codes

- Click here for it. 

The most common elements are:

Movement restrictions: Most regions required any slaves away from their plantations or outside of the cities they resided in to have a pass signed by their master. Many cities in the slave-states required slave-tags, small copper badges that enslaved people wore, to show that they were allowed to move about.

Marriage restrictions: Most places restricted the marriage rights of enslaved people, ostensibly to prevent them from trying to change masters by marrying into a family on another plantation. Marriage between people of different races was also usually restricted.

Prohibitions on gathering: Slave codes generally prevented large groups of enslaved people from gathering away from their plantations.

Slave patrols: In the slave-dependent portions of North America, varying degrees of legal authority backed slave patrols by plantation owners and other free whites to ensure that enslaved people were not free to move about at night, and to generally enforce the restrictions on slaves.

Trade and commerce by slaves: Initially, most places gave enslaved people some land to work personally and allowed them to operate their markets. As slavery became more profitable, slave codes restricting the rights of enslaved people to buy, sell, and produce goods were introduced. In some places, slave tags were required to be worn by enslaved people to prove that they were allowed to participate in certain types of work.

Punishment and killing of slaves: Slave codes regulated how slaves could be punished, usually going so far as to apply no penalty for accidentally killing a slave while punishing them. Later laws began to apply restrictions on this, but slave-owners were still rarely punished for killing their slaves. Historian Lawrence M. Friedman wrote: "Ten Southern codes made it a crime to mistreat a slave.... Under the Louisiana Civil Code of 1825 (art. 192), if a master was ′convicted of cruel treatment,′ the judge could order the sale of the mistreated slave, presumably to a better master."

Education restrictions: Some codes made it illegal to teach slaves to read.

- Click here for anti-literacy laws in the United States.

From Wikipedia: Freedom suit

- Click here for the article.  

Freedom suits were lawsuits in the Thirteen Colonies and the United States filed by slaves against slaveholders to assert claims to freedom, often based on descent from a free maternal ancestor, or time held as a resident in a free state or territory.

The right to petition for freedom descended from English common law and allowed people to challenge their enslavement or indenture. Petitioners challenged slavery both directly and indirectly, even if slaveholders generally viewed such petitions as a means to uphold rather than undermine slavery. Beginning with the colonies in North America, legislatures enacted slave laws that created a legal basis for "just subjection;" these were adopted or updated by the state and territorial legislatures that superseded them after the United States gained independence. These codes also enabled enslaved persons to sue for freedom based on wrongful enslavement.

While some cases were tried during the colonial period, the majority of petitions for freedom were heard during the antebellum period in the border or the Southern United States. After the American Revolution, most northern states abolished slavery and were considered "free". The United States Congress prohibited slavery in some newly established territories, and some new states were admitted to the union as free states. The rise in travel and migration of masters with slaves between free and slave states resulted in conditions that gave rise to slaves suing for freedom. Many free states had residency limits for masters who brought slaves into their territory; after that time, the slave would be considered free. Some slaves sued for wrongful enslavement after being held in a free state.

Other grounds for suit were that the person was freeborn and illegally held in slavery, or that the person was illegally held because of being descended from a freeborn woman in the maternal line. The principle of partus sequitur ventrem, first incorporated into Virginian law by a 1662 statute in the House of Burgesses, established that children's status was that of the mother. It was also adopted into law by all of the Southern colonies, and later the slave states of the United States.

The Jefferson Grid

http://www.core77.com/reactor/undesigningamerica.asp

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Land_Survey_System

Covid 19's impact on Social Security funding

https://budgetmodel.wharton.upenn.edu/issues/2020/5/28/social-security-finances-coronavirus

https://www.npr.org/2021/09/01/1033151631/a-new-report-says-the-covid-recession-has-pushed-social-security-insolvency-up-a

https://www.investopedia.com/the-pandemic-impact-of-social-security-and-medicare-5186940#:~:text=Impact%20of%20COVID%2D19%20Legislation%20on%20Social%20Security&text=Reduced%20Federal%20Insurance%20Contributions%20Act,the%20delay%20(CARES%20Act)11

Indentured Servitude

From Wikipedia: An act concerning Servants and Slaves

- Click here for the entry. 

The Virginia Slave Codes of 1705 (formally entitled An act concerning Servants and Slaves), was a series of laws enacted by the Colony of Virginia's House of Burgesses in 1705 regulating the interactions between slaves and citizens of the crown colony of Virginia. The enactment of the Slave Codes is considered to be the consolidation of slavery in Virginia, and served as the foundation of Virginia's slave legislation.

- These codes effectively embedded the idea of slavery into law by the following devices:
- Established new property rights for slave owners
- Allowed for the legal, free trade of slaves with protections granted by the courts
- Established separate courts of trial
- Prohibited slaves from going armed, without written permission
- Whites could not be employed by any blacks
- Allowed for the apprehension of suspected runaways

History of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service

Links 4/7

https://www.texastribune.org/2022/04/07/texas-rural-water-projects-swift/

https://www.sunset.texas.gov/reviews-and-reports/agencies/texas-water-development-board

chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/viewer.html?pdfurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.twdb.texas.gov%2Fpublications%2Freports%2Fspecial_legislative_reports%2Fdoc%2F2020_SWIFT.pdf&clen=4299492&chunk=true

chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/viewer.html?pdfurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.sunset.texas.gov%2Fpublic%2Fuploads%2F2022-04%2FTexas%2520Water%2520Development%2520Board%2520Staff%2520Report_3-30-22.pdf&clen=3209627&chunk=true

https://tarlton.law.utexas.edu/c.php?g=815580&p=5820525

https://www.crf-usa.org/brown-v-board-50th-anniversary/southern-black-codes.html

https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/1866-texas-black-codes/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Festivus

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_crime_in_the_United_States

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_law_of_the_United_States

Links - 4/12

https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/Docs/CN/htm/CN.1.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inchoate_offense

https://networks.h-net.org/node/5301/pages/1030420/timeline-federal-history

https://www.specialagents.org/which-is-truly-the-oldest-federal-agency

https://www.usmarshals.gov/history/oldest.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netscape_Navigator#History_and_development

https://www.gocoastguard.com/about-the-coast-guard/learn-the-history

https://www.tdi.texas.gov/fire/

https://www.tcfp.texas.gov/about/texas-fire-service

https://www.texastribune.org/2022/04/05/texas-border-mission-budget/

From the Texas Tribune: After pursuing an indictment, Starr County district attorney drops murder charge over self-induced abortion

A possible reaction to negative public opinion. 

- Click here for the article.

After charging a woman with murder over a self-induced abortion, forcing her to spend three days in jail and drawing national attention, Starr County officials announced Sunday they would change course and move to dismiss the case.

Lizelle Herrera was arrested Thursday and held in jail on a $500,000 bond, court records show. She was released on bail Saturday, according to jail records and a local abortion fund. The district attorney had presented the possible murder charge to a grand jury last month, leading to her indictment and arrest, before his Sunday announcement.

“In reviewing applicable Texas law, it is clear that Ms. Herrera cannot and should not be prosecuted for the allegation against her,” Gocha Allen Ramirez, the district attorney in Starr County, said in a news release.



Few details on the case have been made public, including how the abortion was performed and how far along the pregnancy had been. Ramirez’s news release said a hospital reported the January abortion to the Starr County Sheriff’s Department, prompting the criminal investigation and murder indictment.

Demonstrators protested outside Starr County Jail on Saturday against the arrest of Lizelle Herrera. Credit: Michael Gonzalez For The Texas Tribune

It’s also unclear under which statute Herrera was charged. Texas law exempts a pregnant person from being charged with murder or any lesser homicide charge for an abortion. The pregnant person is also typically excluded from lesser criminal charges if abortion laws are broken, as state laws instead target the provider.

“For pregnant people, the rule in the state of Texas has essentially always been, since the beginning of criminalization of abortion, that the pregnant person can not be prosecuted,” said Elizabeth Sepper, a law professor at the University of Texas at Austin.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starr_County,_Texas

Links - 4/11

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/04/07/federal-agents-impersonators-secret-service/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Postal_Inspection_Service

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_enforcement_agency

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_executive_departments#Former_departments

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Post_Office_Department

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_fraud_prevention

Mid-term loss

https://rollcall.com/2022/04/11/texas-election-is-gops-chance-to-prove-how-midterm-winds-are-blowing/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_midterm_election

https://www.vox.com/22899204/midterm-elections-president-biden-thermostatic-opinion

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas%27s_34th_congressional_district

https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/vitalstats_ch2_tbl4.pdf

From Wikipedia: First Families of Virginia

The birth of hierarchy and aristocracy in what would become the United States. 

- Click here for the entry.

First Families of Virginia (FFV) were those families in Colonial Virginia who were socially prominent and wealthy, but not necessarily the earliest settlers.[1] They descended from English colonists who primarily settled at Jamestown, Williamsburg, The Northern Neck and along the James River and other navigable waters in Virginia during the 17th century. These elite families generally married within their social class for many generations and, as a result, most surnames of First Families date to the colonial period.

The American Revolution cut ties with Britain but not with its social traditions. While some First Family members were loyal to Britain, others were Whigs who not only supported, but led the Revolution.[2] Most First Families remained in Virginia, where they flourished as tobacco planters, and from the sale of slaves to the cotton states to the south. Indeed, many younger sons were relocated into the cotton belt to start their own plantations. With the emancipation of slavery during the Civil War and the consequential loss of slave labor, Virginia plantations struggled to turn a profit. The First Families, albeit poorer than before, maintained social and political leadership. Marshall Fishwick says that by the 1950s, "the old-time aristocracy [had] not given up, or sunk into decadence as Southern novelists suggest." They adopted modern agricultural technology and co-opted rich "Yankees" into their upper-class, rural horse-estate society.

From the Library of Congress: Virginia Records Timeline: 1553 to 1743

To help set up our look at civil rights policy.

- Click here here for it. 

From Wikipedia: Authoritarianism

Generally tied in with oligarchy.

- Click here for the entry. 

Authoritarianism is a form of government characterized by the rejection of political plurality, the use of strong central power to preserve the political status quo, and reductions in the rule of law, separation of powers, and democratic voting.[1] Political scientists have created many typologies describing variations of authoritarian forms of government.[1] Authoritarian regimes may be either autocratic or oligarchic and may be based upon the rule of a party or the military.

In an influential 1964 work,[4] the political scientist Juan Linz defined authoritarianism as possessing four qualities:

1 - Limited political pluralism, is realized with constraints on the legislature, political parties and interest groups.

2 - Political legitimacy is based upon appeals to emotion and identification of the regime as a necessary evil to combat "easily recognizable societal problems, such as underdevelopment or insurgency."

3 - Minimal political mobilization, and suppression of anti-regime activities.

4 - Ill-defined executive powers, often vague and shifting extends the power of the executive.

Minimally defined, an authoritarian government lacks free and competitive direct elections to legislatures, free and competitive direct or indirect elections for executives, or both.[7] Broadly defined, authoritarian states include countries that lack civil liberties such as freedom of religion, or countries in which the government and the opposition do not alternate in power at least once following free elections.[8] Authoritarian states might contain nominally democratic institutions such as political parties, legislatures and elections which are managed to entrench authoritarian rule and can feature fraudulent, non-competitive elections.[9] Since 1946, the share of authoritarian states in the international political system increased until the mid-1970s but declined from then until the year 2000.

Authoritarianism is characterized by highly concentrated and centralized government power maintained by political repression and the exclusion of potential challengers. It uses political parties and mass organizations to mobilize people around the goals of the regime.[11] Adam Przeworski has theorized that "authoritarian equilibrium rests mainly on lies, fear and economic prosperity."

From Wikipedia: Hierarchy

What some argue is a natural state in government. Only certain people are meant to rule.

- Click here for the entry. 

A hierarchy (from Greek: ἱεραρχία, hierarkhia, 'rule of a high priest', from hierarkhes, 'president of sacred rites') is an arrangement of items (objects, names, values, categories, etc.) that are represented as being "above", "below", or "at the same level as" one another. Hierarchy is an important concept in a wide variety of fields, such as philosophy, architecture, design, mathematics, computer science, organizational theory, systems theory, systematic biology, and the social sciences (especially political philosophy).

A hierarchy can link entities either directly or indirectly, and either vertically or diagonally. The only direct links in a hierarchy, insofar as they are hierarchical, are to one's immediate superior or to one of one's subordinates, although a system that is largely hierarchical can also incorporate alternative hierarchies. Hierarchical links can extend "vertically" upwards or downwards via multiple links in the same direction, following a path. All parts of the hierarchy that are not linked vertically to one another nevertheless can be "horizontally" linked through a path by traveling up the hierarchy to find a common direct or indirect superior, and then down again. This is akin to two co-workers or colleagues; each reports to a common superior, but they have the same relative amount of authority. Organizational forms exist that are both alternative and complementary to hierarchy.

- Click here for Oligarchy.

Oligarchy (from Greek ὀλιγαρχία (oligarkhía); from ὀλίγος (olígos) 'few', and ἄρχω (arkho) 'to rule or to command')[1][2][3] is a form of power structure in which power rests with a small number of people. These people may or may not be distinguished by one or several characteristics, such as nobility, fame, wealth, education, or corporate, religious, political, or military control.

Throughout history, oligarchies have often been tyrannical, relying on public obedience or oppression to exist. Aristotle pioneered the use of the term as meaning rule by the rich,[4] for which another term commonly used today is plutocracy. In the early 20th century Robert Michels developed the theory that democracies, like all large organizations, tend to turn into oligarchies. In his "Iron law of oligarchy" he suggests that the necessary division of labor in large organizations leads to the establishment of a ruling class mostly concerned with protecting their own power..

From Wikipedia: Case Law

An alternative source of public policy.

- Click here for the entry on case law. 

Case law, also used interchangeably with common law, is law that is based on precedents, that is the judicial decisions from previous cases, rather than law based on constitutions, statutes, or regulations. Case law uses the detailed facts of a case that have been resolved by courts or similar tribunals. These past decisions are called "case law", or precedent. Stare decisis—a Latin phrase meaning "let the decision stand"—is the principle by which judges are bound to such past decisions, drawing on established judicial authority to formulate their positions.

These judicial interpretations are distinguished from statutory law, which are codes enacted by legislative bodies, and regulatory law, which are established by executive agencies based on statutes. In some jurisdictions, case law can be applied to ongoing adjudication; for example, criminal proceedings or family law.

In common law countries (including the United Kingdom, United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand), it is used for judicial decisions of selected appellate courts, courts of first instance, agency tribunals, and other bodies discharging adjudicatory functions.

- Click here for the entry on common law.

In law, common law (also known as judicial precedent or judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions.[2][3][4] The defining characteristic of “common law” is that it arises as precedent. In cases where the parties disagree on what the law is, a common law court looks to past precedential decisions of relevant courts, and synthesizes the principles of those past cases as applicable to the current facts. If a similar dispute has been resolved in the past, the court is usually bound to follow the reasoning used in the prior decision (a principle known as stare decisis). If, however, the court finds that the current dispute is fundamentally distinct from all previous cases (called a "matter of first impression"), and legislative statutes are either silent or ambiguous on the question, judges have the authority and duty to resolve the issue (one party or the other has to win, and on disagreements of law, judges make that decision).[5] The court states an opinion that gives reasons for the decision, and those reasons agglomerate with past decisions as precedent to bind future judges and litigants. Common law, as the body of law made by judges,[4][6] stands in contrast to and on equal footing with statutes which are adopted through the legislative process, and regulations which are promulgated by the executive branch (the interactions among these different sources of law are explained later in this article). Stare decisis, the principle that cases should be decided according to consistent principled rules so that similar facts will yield similar results, lies at the heart of all common law systems.[7]

The common law—so named because it was "common" to all the king's courts across England—originated in the practices of the courts of the English kings in the centuries following the Norman Conquest in 1066.[8] The British Empire later spread the English legal system to its far flung colonies, many of which retain the common law system today. These "common law systems" are legal systems that give great weight to judicial precedent, and to the style of reasoning inherited from the English legal system.

Federalism and Public Policy

For our look at public policy, a reminder about where to look for the basic functions of each level of government.

National Powers: 

U.S. Constitution: Article 1, Section 8.
U.S. Constitution: Article 2, Section 2.
U.S. Constitution: Article 3, Section 2.
U.S. Code.
U.S. Executive Agencies
House Committees
Senate Committees

State Powers: 

U.S. Constitution: Article 1, Section 4.
U.S. Constitution: Article 1, Section 10. (prohibited powers)
Texas Constitution
Texas Statutory Code
Texas Fiscal Size-Up
Texas Sunset Review Commission
Texas House Committees
Texas Senate Committees

Local Powers

Texas Constitution Articles 9 and 11
Texas Local Government Code
Texas Constitution Article 3, Section 56 (limits on states)
Codes of Ordinances

Stupid Questions - GOVT 2305 SCH2

I think the most confusing thing for me is just all the laws that were set back then were kind of different . I gotta remember that some of them are different from what they are today.

Should the collective or majority of population be able to do whatever it wants to the individual? How can we make our government more diverse, more structured, and less corrupt and singled minded?

Okay here is my stupid. Who started the government and said that it should be run the way it is? Like it seems so odd that this whole government just started and someone became in change for whatever reason. So how did the government form and who was the person that lead the building of the government?

Stupid Question:

· Who invents words and how do they get them validated?

· What makes a person “free” in this world?

Most confused on:

· The most confusing part of this course for me has probably been understanding how and why our government is set up and how it functions. By this I mean, like the different divisions, leaders, governments, and terminology function together. It’s a lot of details but I know there is a system.

- The supreme Court cases and how it works. I am totally confused especially about our last written assignment #8

For a stupid question: How many times do you think you've sneezed in your lifetime?

And the most confusing thing about the subject matter is the different documents I need to keep up with. These historical documents provide context for the entire class, so there would inevitably be many documents that validate our circumstances or the past conditions of the United States government. Since all of them have to do with Government, I can sometimes confuse them with other historical documents.
I honestly dont have a question I, for the most part, understand what's happening I do wanna the taxes assignment where we file our taxes together that would be cool and useful.

Do you like my class? Did you know the earth is round? Are you sure you are actually a teacher ? honestly I don’t really find anything very confusing in your class at this moment.

From Open Secrets: Dark Money Process

- Click here for it.