title: Capital punishment in the United States

paragraphs: Capital punishment (the death penalty) has existed in the United States since before the United States was a country. As of 2017, capital punishment is legal in 30 of the 50 states. The federal government (including the United States military) also uses capital punishment.

paragraphs: The United States is the only Western country that uses the death penalty.

paragraphs: Before the United States became an independent country, it was a colony of the British Empire. The first known death sentence in colonial America happened in 1608. Captain George Kendall was executed by firing squad at the Jamestown colony after being accused of spying for the Spanish government.

paragraphs: In colonial America, people could be executed for many things. In the Jamestown colony, the first set of rules and punishments the colony's Lieutenant Governor wrote was very strict. There were 48 different capital crimes (crimes that were punishable by death). They included:

paragraphs: When some colonists decided they did not like these strict rules, they ran away from the colony to live with nearby Native Americans. They were brought back to the colony, tortured, and executed.

paragraphs: Each of the Thirteen Colonies came up with its own death penalty laws. For example, in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, which was mostly Puritan, laws were harsh. Under its first capital punishment laws, which were effective from 1636-1647, people were executed for sodomy, adultery, witchcraft, blasphemy, bestiality, assault, rape, statutory rape, perjury in a capital trial, and murder. Later, the colony continued to execute people for witchcraft, including 20 people during the Salem Witch Trials. They also executed people for being Quakers and pirates.

paragraphs: Under the New York colony's Duke's Laws of 1665, a person could be executed for "denial of the one true God" or for hitting their mother or father.

paragraphs: Some colonies were not as strict. For example, the New Jersey colony had no death penalty, and in the Pennsylvania colony only murder and treason were capital crimes.

paragraphs: By 1776, most of the colonies had similar laws about the death penalty. In most colonies, the capital crimes were arson, piracy, treason, murder, sodomy, burglary, robbery, rape, stealing horses, slave rebellion, and counterfeiting (making fake money). Usually, people sentenced to death were hanged.

paragraphs: During the American Revolutionary War, British Major John André was hanged by the Continental Army on October 2, 1780. He was convicted of spying and helping Benedict Arnold.

paragraphs: The first slaves were brought to the Jamestown colony in 1619. Slavery was legal in the United States for the next 246 years, until the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution made it illegal in 1865. Until that time, slaves had no rights.

paragraphs: Slaves could be punished or tortured for any reason, or for no reason at all. Slaves who tried to escape or rebel were often tortured and executed where other slaves could see, to warn them not to do the same thing.

paragraphs: For example, in 1755, in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, a slave named Mark was accused of poisoning his "master." He was executed, then hung in chains at Boston Harbor so his body would rot. This was supposed to remind other slaves not to rebel every time they passed Mark's body. Twenty years later, when Paul Revere made his "Midnight Ride," Mark's skeleton was still hanging in chains at Boston Harbor.

paragraphs: During the 1700s, in the Southern colonies, an unknown number of slaves were executed, sometimes for things like hitting another slave, "fussing," or "sassing" a white person. Laws in the Southern colonies were passed allowing cruel and unusual punishments as well as capital punishment for slaves.

paragraphs: In the late 1700s, activists like Benjamin Rush began to argue that the death penalty should not be used. Between 1794 and 1815, eight states passed laws that made fewer crimes punishable by death. However, many southern states made more crimes punishable by death, especially for slaves.

paragraphs: Major reforms started to happen between 1833 and 1853. At that time, many executions were public events. By 1849, fifteen states had switched to private hangings.

paragraphs: In 1846, Michigan became the first state to abolish the death penalty, just after it entered the United States.

paragraphs: In 1852, Massachusetts's state legislature voted to allow the death penalty only for first-degree murder. The next year, Wisconsin outlawed capital punishment. In 1887, Maine's state legislature banned the death penalty.

paragraphs: The focus on the death penalty slowed while the country was busy with the issue of slavery and the American Civil War. However, in 1897, the United States Congress passed a law that made fewer federal crimes punishable by death. In 1911, Minnesota abolished capital punishment. Several other states also abolished the death penalty, but would start using it again later.

paragraphs: Between 1957 and 1973, six other states permanently abolished the death penalty:

paragraphs: In 1972, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled in "Furman v. Georgia" that the way death penalty laws were written made them unconstitutional. They ruled that sentencing rules were discriminatory, because black people got sentenced to death more often than whites for the same crimes. Because of this, the death penalty was cruel and unusual punishment, which violated the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution. This ruling stopped all executions in the country. Between 1972 and 1976, there were no executions in the United States.

paragraphs: However, by early 1975, thirty states had passed new death penalty laws that they thought would satisfy the Supreme Court. They did. In "Gregg v. Georgia" (1976), the Supreme Court ruled that Georgia's new death penalty law was constitutional. It ruled that capital punishment was not always cruel and unusual punishment, as long as it was done fairly. This meant that states could start executing people again, as long as they had rewritten their death penalty laws like Georgia did, to say that the death penalty would be applied fairly. In 1977, executions began again in the United States.

paragraphs: In two major cases, the Supreme Court has limited who may be executed. In "Atkins v. Virginia" (2002), the Court decided that executing people with intellectual disabilities is cruel and unusual punishment, and is against the Eighth Amendment. Before this decision, between 1984 and 1992, forty-four people with intellectual disabilities were executed in the United States.

paragraphs: Also, in "Roper v. Simmons" (2005), the Supreme Court made it illegal to execute a person who was younger than 18 when they committed their crime.

paragraphs: In 2004, two researchers named M. Watt Espy and John Ortiz Smykia put together a list of executions that became known as "The ESPY File." The Espy File says that between 1608 and 1991, in the American colonies and then the United States, 15,269 people were executed. The Espy File is "the most often cited and used list of America's legal executions." However, in a 2011 study, two researchers criticized The Espy File. They wrote that researchers should not use the File as a complete source of information about executions.

paragraphs: According to the United States Department of Justice, between 1930 and 2002, the United States executed 4,679 people. About two-thirds of these people (about 3,100 people) were executed between 1930 and 1950.

paragraphs: Between 1916 and 1955, the United States military executed 135 soldiers. The military has not executed anyone since 1955.

paragraphs: In 2016, only 5 of 50 or 10% of US states had executions. They were Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Missouri and Texas.

paragraphs: Throughout American history, different methods of execution have been used. During colonial times, cruel and painful methods like burning or crushing people to death were sometimes used. However, since 1776, all but a few executions have been carried out in one of five ways: hanging, firing squad, the electric chair, the gas chamber, or lethal injection.

paragraphs: Since the Bill of Rights was added to the United States Constitution in 1791, "cruel and unusual punishment" has been against the law in the United States. This means that even if a person commits a terrible crime, the Constitution says their punishment cannot be painful or cause suffering on purpose.

paragraphs: Until the beginning of the 20th century, hanging was the most common method of execution in the United States.

paragraphs: However, hanging did not always work the way it was supposed to. If the rope and noose were not put in the correct position, a person could be decapitated. If the rope was not long enough, the person could slowly die of strangulation. People started looking for more 'civilized' ways to execute people.

paragraphs: After Thomas Edison discovered direct current (DC) electricity in 1882, his company showed how powerful it was by using it to kill animals. The idea of using electricity to kill humans grew out of this. New York built the first electric chair, and first used it to execute a prisoner on August 6, 1890. Other states also adopted the electric chair as a method of execution, believing that it was a less painful way to die than hanging.

paragraphs: However, it became clear, even to some members of the Supreme Court, that dying in an electric chair was very painful. Also, even up until the 1990s, electric chairs would work incorrectly, causing prisoners to catch fire or be awake while they were being electrocuted. Around the 1980s, most states began to use lethal injection instead.

paragraphs: Still looking for a more "humane" methods of execution, in 1924, Nevada prison officials tried to secretly pump cyanide gas into death row prisoner Gee Jon's cell to kill him while he slept. This did not work, and they had to build a gas chamber. On February 8, 1924, Jon became the first person to be executed by gas chamber.

paragraphs: From 1924 to 1972, the United States executed about 600 people in gas chambers. Most states used hydrogen cyanide gas. However, by the mid-1970s and 1980s, many people had started to criticize the use of gas chambers. Death from hydrogen cyanide poisoning can be long and painful, and in some executions, prisoners suffered long deaths. After one of these executions, a federal court in California ruled that "execution by lethal gas under the California protocol is unconstitutionally cruel and unusual punishment."

paragraphs: Also, according to sociologist Clifton Bryant, the way it is used in the United States, "the gas chamber is ... the most dangerous, most complicated, and most expensive method of administering the death penalty." By the late 20th century, most states had switched to using lethal injection.

paragraphs: In the 1970s, Oklahoma passed the first law that allowed executions by lethal injection. This was a practical decision: Oklahoma's old electric chair would need expensive repairs, and building a gas chamber would cost over $200,000. However, executing a person by lethal injection would only cost $10 to $15 per person. Lethal injection grew more and more popular in death penalty states. It was viewed as less painful, with less suffering, than the electric chair or gas chamber. Texas was the first state to execute someone by lethal injection, in 1982. Over the next 30 years, all of the death penalty states passed laws making lethal injection their first-choice (or only) method of execution.

paragraphs: However, in the 2010s, American prisons started having trouble getting enough of the medications used to carry out lethal injections. The states had been using three medications for lethal injections:

paragraphs: Then, in 2011, Hospira, the only American company that made sodium thiopental, stopped making the drug. The European Union makes other anesthetics, like propofol. However, since the European Union is against the death penalty, they made it illegal to export any product that could be used in an execution. Another anesthetic, pentobarbital, is also only made in the European Union, and the company that makes it has put limits on selling it to U.S. government customers. A few states have tried mixtures of other drugs, but those executions have not gone well.

paragraphs: As of 2016, many death penalty states have temporarily stopped using lethal injection until they can find a solution to this problem.

paragraphs: As of January 1, 2016, fifteen states have laws that allow them to use a method of execution other than lethal injection. Before the lethal injection drug shortages, these other methods were rarely used. From 1976 to March 23, 2016, there were 1,431 executions:

paragraphs: However, since they stopped being able to get lethal injection drugs, some states have thought about going back to other methods of execution. Here are the states whose laws allow them to use other methods, as of January 1, 2016:

paragraphs: This table shows the death penalty laws in 49 of the 50 states; Washington, D.C.; the federal government; and the United States military, as of January 1, 2016. Under the category "Status," there are four possibilities:

paragraphs: Click on the little triangle at the top of each header box to sort the information in this table by a certain category.

paragraphs: In some areas, prosecutors ask for the death penalty, and judges grant the death penalty, more often than in other areas. Also, once people are convicted and are on "death row," how quickly they are executed depends on the state they are in. On average, in 2004, death penalty states had executed about 10% of the people on their "death rows." However, California had executed only 1% of its prisoners who are sentenced to death. Texas executed 40% of theirs.

paragraphs: One of the controversies about the death penalty is whether it is given unequally to people of different races.

paragraphs: In a report in 1983, David Baldus and others wrote a famous report that looked at whether the death penalty was applied equally to people of different races in Georgia. They found that:

paragraphs: In 1987, the Supreme Court decided a case called "McCleskey v. Kemp". McCleskey's lawyers showed that in Georgia, where McCleskey lived, black people convicted of killing whites were four times more likely to get the death penalty than people convicted of killing non-whites. The Supreme Court accepted this, but ruled against McCleskey. They wrote: "[inequalities] in sentencing are an inevitable part of our criminal justice system." Since then, judges have not allowed lawyers to argue that racial bias plays a part in the death penalty.

paragraphs: Anti-death penalty groups like Amnesty International say:

paragraphs: The United States Department of Justice says that between 1980 and 2008, African Americans committed 52.5% of the murders in the United States; whites committed 45.3%; and Native Americans and Asians committed 2.2%. This means African Americans are less likely to be executed on a per capita basis. The Department of Justice also says that as of 2009, Hispanic or Latino people make up 17.4% of the United States population, but only 13.5% of death row prisoners.

paragraphs: A 2012 study found that non-white soldiers in the United States military are twice as likely as white soldiers to be given the death penalty. Of the 16 soldiers the military has sentenced to death between 1985 and 2012, 10 (62.5%) were non-whites, one of the study's authors said.

paragraphs: The death penalty is definitely given much more often to men than women. As of October 1, 2014:

paragraphs: The University of Michigan Law School keeps a list of people who have been exonerated from death row. The list counts "exonerations" as cases where "a person who has been convicted of a crime is officially cleared based on new evidence of innocence."

paragraphs: According to the list, between 1989 and 2015, 116 people have been exonerated from death row. The most common reasons why these people were exonerated were:

paragraphs: DNA evidence proved that 25 of these people about 22% were innocent of the crimes they were sentenced to death for.

paragraphs: Of the 116 people who were exonerated, 62 (about 53%) were black, 43 (37%) were white, 9 (8%) were Hispanic, and two were members of other races (2%). In the 88 cases where a government official abused their power, 51 of the exonerated people (about 58%) were black; 29 were Caucasian (33%); and 8 (9%) were Hispanic. Seventeen of the 31 people who received an "inadequate legal defense" (about 55%) were black; 12 (about 39%) were white; and two (about 6%) were Hispanic.

paragraphs: The death penalty is a very controversial topic in the United States. People have argued about it since before the Thirteen Colonies became the United States. There are many different arguments for and against the death penalty. This list does not include all of them, just some of the most common ones.

paragraphs: People who do not agree with the death penalty (death penalty "opponents") say our trial system is not perfect. Judges and juries make mistakes. One study done by Columbia Law School found that there were serious mistakes in two-thirds of all capital trials. In these trials, the defendants were sentenced to death anyway. However, when their cases were appealed, over 80% of the defendants were not sentenced to death; 7% were found not guilty.

paragraphs: Opponents argue that because mistakes are so common in capital trials, people can be executed even though they were innocent. As proof, they point the 116 people who were exonerated from death row between 1989 and 2015.

paragraphs: People who support the death penalty (death penalty "supporters") say that mistakes are very rare, especially since new laws were made in the 1970s to add protections for death row inmates. For example, Steve Stewart, Deputy Prosecuting Attorney for the Clark County, Indiana, Fourth Judicial Court, says:

paragraphs: Death penalty supporters say that capital punishment is a "deterrent". This means that people are scared of the death penalty and are less likely to commit a capital crime if they know they could get the death penalty.

paragraphs: Supporters also argue that the next most serious punishment for capital crimes is life in prison. In some states, this means the person could be let out of prison someday. Also, even being in prison for life does not keep killers from killing more people in prison. Executing people is the only way to make sure they will never kill another person.

paragraphs: Opponents argue that nobody has ever proved that capital punishment is more of a deterrent than a long prison sentence. They point out that most states and countries that do not have the death penalty have lower murder rates than death penalty states. They also say that the death penalty is not a deterrent because people often commit murders when they are very upset and are not thinking about what might happen in the future.

paragraphs: Among scholars and researchers, there is no agreement about whether capital punishment is more of a deterrent than any other punishment. Some researchers have done studies that say the death penalty is a deterrent. Other studies have found that the death penalty is not a deterrent in the United States, or in other countries.

paragraphs: Opponents argue that defendants who are poor and/or non-white are more likely to get the death penalty than whites, even if they have committed the same crimes. Supporters say that opponents misuse statistics and exaggerate the situation. For more information, see the section on Sentencing: Among races farther up on this page.

paragraphs: Death penalty debaters argue about whether capital punishment is "cruel and unusual punishment" (which would be unconstitutional). Even the people on the Supreme Court have disagreed on this issue. In 2004, the Court ruled in "Baze v. Rice" that even if an execution causes pain, that does not make it cruel and unusual. However, in his dissenting opinion in "Gregg v. Georgia", Justice William Brennan wrote that the death penalty is "an unusually severe punishment, unusual in its pain... [it] is today a cruel and unusual punishment prohibited by the ... Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments."

paragraphs: The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), an anti-death penalty group, adds that capital punishment is "unusual" because:

paragraphs: Religion plays a complicated role in death penalty arguments. To support the death penalty, some people quote from the Old Testament of the Bible, which says: "An eye for an eye, a life for a life." This means that if you take a life, you should pay with your own life. However, others use parts of the New Testament, where Jesus talks about forgiveness and nonviolence, to oppose the death penalty. They say that no one has the right to take a life but God even if that person has taken a life himself.

paragraphs: In 1999, a group of Jewish rabbis and Catholic Bishops had this to say:


title: Biological half-life

paragraphs: A half life of a substance is the amount of time it takes to decay into half of its activity. Usually, this refers to the body's getting rid of a substance. This happens by the function of kidneys and liver as well as excretion.


title: Der Barbier von Bagdad

paragraphs: Der Barbier von Bagdad ("The Barber of Baghdad"), is an German comic opera with music and libretto by Peter Cornelius. based on The Tale of the Tailor and The Barber’s Stories of his Six Brothers in One Thousand and One Nights. It was first performed in Weimar, on December 15, 1858. By far Cornelius' most successful work and his only opera still regularly performed.


title: Marcelo Martins Moreno

paragraphs: Marcelo Martins Moreno (born 18 June 1987 in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia), known as Marcelo Martins or Marcelo Moreno, is a Bolivian professional footballer who plays as a striker for Chinese Super League club Changchun Yatai and the Bolivia national football team.


title: CRISPR

paragraphs: CRISPR is a term used in microbiology. It stands for Clustered Regularly-Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats. These are a natural segment of the genetic code found in prokaryotes: most bacteria and archaea have it.

paragraphs: CRISPR has a lot of short repeated sequences. These sequences are part of an adaptive immune system for prokaryotes. It allows them to remember and counter other organisms that prey on them, such as bacteriophages.

paragraphs: They have the potential to modify the genes of almost any organism. They are part of a tool that allows precisely targeted cutting and insertion of genes in genetic modification (GM). Work is under way to find how they can be used to attack virus diseases in humans (gene therapy).

paragraphs: Each repetition is followed by short segments of "spacer DNA" from previous exposures to a bacterial virus or plasmid. CRISPR spacers recognize and cut up the foreign genetic elements in a manner like RNA interference in eukaryotic organisms.

paragraphs: In effect, the spacers are fragments of DNA from viruses that have previously tried to attack the cell line. The foreign source of the spacers was a sign to researchers that the CRISPR/cas system could have a role in adaptive immunity in bacteria.

paragraphs: The actual cutting is done by a nuclease called "Cas9". "Cas9" has two active cutting sites, one for each strand of the DNA's double helix. "Cas9" does this by unwinding foreign DNA and checking whether it is complementary to the 20 basepair spacer region of the guide RNA (the spacer region RNA). If it is, the foreign DNA gets chopped up.

paragraphs: The technology has been used to switch off genes in human cell lines and cells, to study "Candida albicans", to modify yeasts used to make biofuel and to genetically modify crop strains.


title: Tayap

paragraphs: Tayap is a small village in Cameroon. It is from Yaoundé, the capital city. It is from Douala, the biggest city of the country.

paragraphs: The climate is equatorial. It is usually hot, . It is often wet. There are four different seasons.

paragraphs: In 2005, 272 people lived in Tayap. The village has a primary school. It has 4 classrooms.

paragraphs: Most people work in agriculture. They produce manioc, bananas, oranges, mangoes, vegetables, peanuts, cocoa and palm oil.

paragraphs: The village is surrounded by a large forest but deforestation is a major problem in this area.

paragraphs: Since 2011 Tayap focuses on biodiversity and ecology. It tries to develop new activities such as tourism.


title: Ordinary least squares

paragraphs: Ordinary least squares or linear least squares is a method for estimating unknown parameters in statistics. It is a method used in linear regression. The goal of the method is to minimize the difference between the observed responses and the responses predicted by the linear approximation of the data. A smaller difference means that model fits the data better. Ordinary least squares is a special case of a method commonly called least squares. The resulting estimator can be expressed by a simple formula.


title: Justice of the peace

paragraphs: A justice of the peace (JP) is a judicial officer, elected or appointed to a local court that has limited jurisdiction. In some locations a JP deals with traffic violations, parking tickets and may have the authority to perform marriages ceremonies. In many places they are the entry-level courts that most criminal cases pass through. JP courts were popular in early history, but are now found mostly in rural areas. Otherwise people would have to travel longer distances to other courts of law.

paragraphs: In 1195, a proclamation of Richard I of England local knights were appointed to keep order. In 1264, "Keepers of the Peace were appointed in every county to serve the king. Such men were called "Justice of the Peace" beginning in about 1362. When colonists came to British North America they brought with them the common law system that included JPs. In France, "Lords of the Court" administered justice. After 1789, justices of the peace were elected.

paragraphs: While the requirements vary from one jurisdiction to another, generally, to become a JP there are few if any educational requirements. An application is filled out and usually there is a fee. Justices may be chosen by their qualifications and references. Many have law degrees while others may have taken a few law classes.


title: Garry Shandling

paragraphs: Garry Emmanuel Shandling (November 29, 1949 – March 24, 2016) was an American comedian, actor, writer, producer and director. He was best known for his work in "It's Garry Shandling's Show" and "The Larry Sanders Show".

paragraphs: Shandling was born Garry Emmanuel Shandling in Chicago, Illinois on November 29, 1949. He was raised in Tucson, Arizona. He studied at the University of Arizona.

paragraphs: Shandling began his career in 1975. He started writing for sitcoms such as "Sanford and Son" and "Welcome Back, Kotter". He began his career in comedy when he was on "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson" and was on the show many times.

paragraphs: Shandling was for a thought to replace Carson (other hopefuls were Joan Rivers, David Letterman and David Brenner). In 1986 he created "It's Garry Shandling's Show", for the pay cable channel Showtime. It was nominated for four Emmy Awards (including one for Shandling) and lasted until 1990. His second show, "The Larry Sanders Show", which began airing on HBO in 1992, was even more successful.

paragraphs: Shandling was nominated for 18 Emmy Awards for the show and won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Comedy Series in 1998, along with Peter Tolan, for writing the series finale. In movies Shandling had a the same role as Senator Stern in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, appearing in "Iron Man 2" and "", as well as a voice in DreamWorks Animation's "Over the Hedge".

paragraphs: His last movies were "" (2015) and "The Jungle Book" (2016).

paragraphs: Shandling was in a relationship with Linda Doucett from 1987 through 1994. He lived in Los Angeles, California.

paragraphs: Shandling died in Los Angeles from a pulmonary embolism caused by thrombosis in his leg on March 24, 2016. He was aged 66.

paragraphs: During his career, Shandling was nominated for 19 Primetime Emmy Awards and two Golden Globe Awards, along with many other awards and nominations. He served as host of the Grammy Awards four times and as host of the Emmy Awards three times.


title: Mount Kenya

paragraphs: Mount Kenya is the highest mountain in Kenya. It is high. It is the second highest mountain in Africa. It is an extinct volcano. It is on the equator. It is northeast of Nairobi.


title: Flame fougasse

paragraphs: A flame fougasse (fougasse or foo gas) is a type of mine or improvised explosive device. It uses an explosive charge to put burning liquid onto a target.

paragraphs: The flame fougasse was developed in Britain as an anti-tank weapon in the World War II invasion crisis of 1940. During that period, about 50,000 flame fougasse barrels were put in some 7,000 batteries. Most were in southern England and some in Scotland. Although never used in combat in Britain, the design saw action later in Greece.


title: Katzenbach v. McClung

paragraphs: Katzenbach v. McClung, 379 U.S. 294 (1964), is a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court. The Court held that Congress acted within its power under the Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution in forbidding racial discrimination in restaurants as this was a burden to interstate commerce. The ruling was a 9–0 decision in favor of the plaintiff—the United States government. It was also a test case of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In particular,

paragraphs: Ollie's Barbecue was a family-owned restaurant that operated in Birmingham, Alabama, that seated 220 customers. It was located on a state highway and was 11 city blocks from an interstate highway. In a typical year, approximately half of the food it purchased from a local supplier came from out-of-state. It catered to local families and white-collar workers. However, they refused to serve African American customers in the restaurant. About 24 of the 36 employees of the restaurant were black.

paragraphs: Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlawing segregation in American schools and public places. One section of the act, Title II, was specifically intended to grant African-Americans full access to public facilities such as hotels, restaurants, and public recreation areas. On the same day, the Supreme Court heard challenges to Title II from a motel owner and from Ollie McClung. Both claimed that the federal government had no right to impose any regulations on small, private businesses. Both ultimately lost. Ollie McClung had won in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama when he received an injunction preventing the Government from enforcing Title II against his restaurant. But then U.S. Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach, appealed this decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.

paragraphs: McClung argued that the Civil Rights Act was unconstitutional, at least as applied to a small, private business such as his. McClung further argued that the amount of food purchased by Ollie's that actually crossed state lines (about half of the food at Ollie's) was so small that Ollie's effectively had no effect on interstate commerce (although McClung admitted that a significant amount of Ollie's business was to interstate travelers). Because of this, McClung argued that Congress had no power to regulate Ollie's Barbecue under the Commerce Clause.

paragraphs: The court ruled unanimously that the Civil Rights Act is constitutional and that it was properly applied against Ollie's Barbecue.

paragraphs: Justice Clark wrote the majority opinion, with concurrences by Justices Black, Douglas, and Goldberg. In section 2 of the opinion, the Court agreed with McClung that Ollie's itself had virtually no effect on interstate commerce. In section 4 of the opinion, the Court held that racial discrimination in restaurants had a significant impact on interstate commerce, and therefore Congress has the power to regulate this conduct under the Commerce Clause. The Court's conclusion was based on extensive Congressional hearings on the issue.

paragraphs: After decades in operation, Ollie's Barbecue moved to the suburb of Pelham in 1999 and closed in 2001.


title: Case citation

paragraphs: Case citation is a system used by legal professionals to identify past court case decisions. These are found either in series of books called reporters or law reports, or in a neutral style that identifies a decision regardless of where it is reported. Case citations are formatted differently in different jurisdictions, but generally contain the same key information.

paragraphs: A legal citation is a "reference to a legal precedent or authority, such as a case, statute, or work, that either agrees with or contradicts a given position". Where cases are published on paper, the citation usually contains the following information:

paragraphs: In some report series, for example in England and Australia, volumes are not numbered independently of the year. So the year and volume number (usually no greater than 4) are required to identify which book of the series has the case reported within its covers. In such citations, it is usual in these jurisdictions to apply square brackets "" to the year (which may not be the year that the case was decided, For example, a case decided in December 2001 may have been reported in 2002).

paragraphs: The Internet brought with it the opportunity for courts to publish their decisions on websites. Decisions of many courts from all over the world can now be found through the website WorldLII and its member institutes.

paragraphs: Most court decisions are not published on paper. The large number of court decisions found online resulted in a flood of information. The result was that a medium-neutral citation system was adopted. This usually contains the following information:

paragraphs: Rather than utilizing page numbers for "pinpoint references", which would depend upon particular printers and browsers, pinpoint quotations refer to paragraph numbers.

paragraphs: The conjunction "versus" is abbreviated to "v" in Commonwealth countries and to "v." in the United States.

paragraphs: In common law countries with an adversarial system of justice, the names of the opposing parties are separated in the case title by the abbreviation "v." The abbreviation represents the Latin word "versus", which means "against". When case titles are read out loud, the "v." can be pronounced, depending on the context, as "and", "against", "versus", or "vee".


title: Barisal Zilla School

paragraphs: Barisal Zilla School is a boys school located in Barisal, Bangladesh. It is one of the oldest and top ranked high schools in the country and the first high school in Barisal Division.

paragraphs: It was founded by an Englishman, N. W. Garret, on 23 December 1829 with only 8 students. Now it has more than two thousand students.

paragraphs: Barisal Zilla School produced many leading local reformers, politicians, statesmen, educationists, philosophers, poets-writers, and sportsmen. Those notable persons include:


title: Boynton v. Virginia

paragraphs: Boynton v. Virginia, , was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States. On December 20, 1958, Bruce Boynton, a senior at Howard Law School, left Washington, D.C. on a bus to go home for Christmas to Montgomery, Alabama. At the bus terminal in Richmond, Virginia he entered the restaurant and sat in the "white only" section. For refusing to leave, he was arrested and convicted for violating a Virginia statute making it illegal for anyone "without authority of law" to remain after being forbidden to do so. He then appealed the conviction to the Supreme Court of Virginia. He maintained “that his conviction violated the Interstate Commerce Act and the Equal Protection, Due Process and Commerce Clauses of the Federal Constitution.” But the state Supreme Court upheld his conviction.He next petitioned the United States Supreme Court for certiorari. The U.S. Supreme Court reversed the conviction of the lower court. The Court held that Boynton “had a federal right to remain in the white portion of the restaurant” as the Interstate Commerce Act “forbids any interstate common carrier by motor vehicle to subject any person to unjust discrimination.” Justice Hugo Black delivered the majority opinion.

paragraphs: The court ruled in a 7-2 decision in favor of Boynton. It held that interstate passengers were protected by the Interstate Commerce Act and the terminal's restaurant was a part of that facility. In part the decision read:

paragraphs: Justices Tom C. Clark and Charles Evans Whittaker dissented in the 7-2 decision. It was the first time since 1946 the court had split over matters of racial segregation.

paragraphs: "Boynton v. Virginia" paved the way and inspired the Freedom Riders to test the new ruling. Black and white riders rode together on Southern racially segregated buses beginning in 1961. After six months of protests and press coverage of the Freedom Riders, The Interstate Commerce Commission outlawed racial discrimination in seating passengers on interstate busses. It ordered the removal of "whites only" signs from all interstate bus terminals.


title: Gregg v. Georgia

paragraphs: Gregg v. Georgia, "Proffitt v. Florida", "Jurek v. Texas", "Woodson v. North Carolina", and "Roberts v. Louisiana", were a group of landmark cases that the United States Supreme Court decided together in 1976. They had to do with capital punishment in the United States.

paragraphs: In these cases, the Court ruled that the states could use capital punishment (the death penalty), but only if they followed certain rules. If the states did not follow these rules when they sentenced people to death, they would be violating the Constitution of the United States by giving out a cruel and unusual punishment.

paragraphs: In 1972, the Court had ruled that the way Georgia was using the death penalty was unconstitutional. After this decision, all of the states stopped using the death penalty while they changed their capital punishment laws. Because of this, there were no executions in the United States between 1972 and 1976.

paragraphs: However, in "Gregg v. Georgia", the Court ruled that Georgia's new death penalty law was constitutional, and they gave the state permission to execute Troy Leon Gregg. This ended the temporary stop on executions in the United States. It made it clear to the states that as long as they followed the rules set out in the "Gregg" decision, they could start using the death penalty again.

paragraphs: The "Gregg" case happened because of another Supreme Court case called "Furman v. Georgia," which the Court decided In 1972. In this case, three different men who had been sentenced to death argued that Georgia was giving them a cruel and unusual punishment. This is against the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution, which makes cruel and unusual punishments illegal.

paragraphs: The Supreme Court agreed that when Georgia gave the death penalty to these three men, the state violated the Eighth Amendment. Different Supreme Court Justices said Georgia's death penalty was 'cruel and unusual' for different reasons.

paragraphs: Some Justices said that Georgia's use of the death penalty was "arbitrary." This meant that Georgia's courts gave the death penalty to some people and not to others, even when they committed the same crime, for no good reason.

paragraphs: Other Justices said Georgia's use of the death penalty was "discriminatory". They wrote that black defendants seemed more likely to get the death penalty than whites. This would violate the Fourteenth Amendment, which says that the states must give every person "the equal protection of the laws." If a certain group, like black people, is more likely to get the death penalty just because of their race, they are not being treated equally under the laws.

paragraphs: After "Furman", all of the states stopped using the death penalty so they could change their capital punishment laws. They wanted these new laws to make sure the death penalty would not be given in an arbitrary or discriminatory way. By early 1975, thirty states had passed new death penalty laws that they thought would satisfy the Supreme Court and let them use the death penalty in a constitutional way.

paragraphs: "Gregg" started out as five separate cases in five different states: "Gregg v. Georgia", "Proffitt v. Florida", "Jurek v. Texas", "Woodson v. North Carolina", and "Roberts v. Louisiana".

paragraphs: After the "Furman" decision, the states of Georgia, Florida, Texas, North Carolina, and Louisiana changed their death penalty laws to obey the Supreme Court's decision in "Furman". After this, the five defendants in these cases Troy Leon Gregg, Charles William Proffitt, Jerry Jurek, James Tyrone Woodson, and Stanislaus Roberts were each convicted of murder. Each was sentenced to death. Each defendant appealed to their state's Supreme Court. Each of the five state Supreme Courts said the death sentences were fair and legal.

paragraphs: Next, the defendants asked the United States Supreme Court to decide whether their death sentences were constitutional. In "Furman", the Court had ruled that the death penalty was "sometimes" cruel and unusual punishment. These five defendants were asking the Supreme Court to rule that the death penalty was "always" cruel and unusual punishment. If the Court ruled this way, it would make the death penalty unconstitutional in the entire United States. The death penalty would be illegal in every state in the country.

paragraphs: The Supreme Court agreed to hear the cases, but they combined them all into one case. This one case is usually called "Gregg v. Georgia", because the entire name of the case is very long.

paragraphs: The United States Supreme Court was trying to answer a few legal questions in "Gregg". The most important were:

paragraphs: The Court ruled 7-2 that the death penalty is not always cruel and unusual punishment. (The two Justices who disagreed, William Brennan and Thurgood Marshall, had already said in "Furman" that they thought capital punishment was "always" cruel and unusual.)

paragraphs: The Court set out two rules that state laws have to include to make sure their death penalty sentencing laws are constitutional:

paragraphs: Specifically, the Court said that Georgia's, Florida's, and Texas's new death penalty laws met these requirements. This meant these laws were constitutional, and these states could go back to executing people.

paragraphs: The Court ruled that North Carolina's and Louisiana's new laws did not meet the requirements, because they made the death penalty mandatory (required in all cases) for some crimes. This meant these laws were still unconstitutional.

paragraphs: The Supreme Court's ruling in "Gregg" was important for several reasons:


title: Proof-of-work system

paragraphs: A proof-of-work (POW) system is a system where finding a solution to a given problem is difficult and/or expensive, but verifying the solution to the given problem is simple and/or cheap.

paragraphs: Find the positive integer whose sha256 hash value is:

paragraphs: To find this integer, you must compute the sha256 value for every integer starting with zero until you find the right value. While each individual computation is trivial and cheap, cumulatively the work adds up and becomes time consuming and expensive. To successfully reproduce the given hash value, you must do some work.

paragraphs: Find some data whose sha256 hash value begins with at least 8 leading zeros:

paragraphs: In the first example, the problem required the original value as proof that work had been done. In this example, it does not matter what the data is, only that it produces a hash value with the given constraints. Finding this data is difficult, but once found, it is trivial to verify by running it through sha256.


title: University of Barisal

paragraphs: University of Barisal ( also known as Barisal University or simply BU), is a public university located in Barisal, a city in southern Bangladesh. It is the only general public university in Barishal division and the country's 33rd public university. It was established in 2011 and started educational activities on 25 January 2012.


title: Ineffective assistance of counsel (United States)

paragraphs: Ineffective assistance of counsel means that a lawyer (counsel) did not help their client defend themselves during a trial. "Ineffective assistance of counsel" is a complaint that a person can make if they have been convicted of a crime, and they want to argue that their trial was not fair.

paragraphs: "Ineffective" means that something, or someone, did not work the way it should have. "Assistance" means "help." "Counsel" is a legal word for "lawyer." So by making a complaint of "ineffective assistance of counsel," a person is saying "my defense attorney did not help me enough."

paragraphs: The Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution says: "the accused shall enjoy the right ... to have the assistance of counsel for his defence." When a person says they had ineffectiveness of counsel, they are saying their lawyer was so bad that they did not receive this right to a lawyer.

paragraphs: Unfortunately, the Sixth Amendment only said that people had the right to have a lawyer. It did not give any more details about this right. Here are some examples of things it did not say:

paragraphs: The Supreme Court tried to answer some of these questions in a case called "Strickland v. Washington", . In this case, the court ruled that there were two things a defendant would have to show in order to prove that they had ineffective assistance of counsel. This became known as the "Strickland test":

paragraphs: This second part was important. After "Stirickland", the states' appeals courts ruled that convictions were legal even in cases where the defense attorney:

paragraphs: There was an important reason why these cases did not qualify as "ineffective assistance of counsel." The prisoners who brought the cases to the Supreme Court could not prove the second piece of the "Strickland test." They could not prove that if they had different lawyers, their trials would have turned out differently. There was so much evidence against them, and they were so obviously guilty, that the appeals courts decided having a different lawyer would not have made any difference. No lawyer could have saved these cases, the state courts basically said.

paragraphs: The issue of ineffective counsel is important in the debate over capital punishment in the United States. The University of Michigan Law School keeps a list of people who have been exonerated from death row. The list counts "exonerations" as cases where "a person who has been convicted of a crime is officially cleared based on new evidence of innocence."

paragraphs: According to the list, between 1989 and 2015, 116 people have been exonerated from death row. Over one out of every four of these people were exonerated because an appeals court ruled they had received ineffective assistance of counsel.


title: Barisal Sadar Upazila

paragraphs: Barisal Sadar () is an Upazila of Barisal District in the Division of Barisal, Bangladesh.

paragraphs: The population of Barisal Sadar Upazila is 527,017. Males are 52.72% of the population, and females 47.28%. The population density is about 1625 people per km².


title: Peristalsis

paragraphs: Peristalsis is a process of contraction and relaxation of the muscle around parts of the alimentary canal.

paragraphs: The most familiar example of this is in the oesophagus. In the oesophagus, peristalsis pushes the ball of food down the oesophagus. The smooth muscle of the oesophagus contracts and relaxes in sequence, and this pushes the ball of food down the oesophagus.

paragraphs: The muscle is worked by a nervous mechanism called the "migrating motor complex". This works in one direction only, and also works in the lower regions of the digestive system.


paragraphs: Institut supérieur de l'aéronautique et de l'espace (ISAE-SUPAERO) is a renowned graduate engineering school in France. It is in a campus of the University of Toulouse (South France).

paragraphs: Its different curricula lead to the following French & European degrees :

paragraphs: Academic activities and industrial applied research are performed mainly in French and English languages. Students from a lot of nationalities participate to the different curricula at SUPAERO.

paragraphs: Most of the 1600 graduate engineer students at ISAE-SUPAERO live in dedicated residential buildings nearby research labs and metro public transports.

paragraphs: The school results from the "École nationale supérieure de l'aéronautique et de l'espace" (created In 1909) and the "École nationale supérieure d'ingénieurs de construction aéronautique" (created in 1946).

paragraphs: Admission to the "Supaero engineering Programme" implemented at ISAE is possible after two/three year scientific undergraduate studies and requires success to either:

paragraphs: The "Supaero Programme" typically lasts three years and results in a Master degree, augmented with international experience. Thus undergraduate studies + the Supaero Programme account for more than a cumulated 300 ECTS credits as applicable in the European education system.

paragraphs: However, graduate students enrolled in the TIME double degree procedure are required to spend two-years at ISAE and spend two years in the TIME-partner institute for a total of four years resulting in a double master degree.

paragraphs: Research activities at ISAE relate to the following topics:


title: Libertarian Party (Spain)

paragraphs: The Libertarian Party (Spanish: Partido Libertario or P-LIB) is a Spanish political party. It was formed in 2009. It is currently led by Juan Pina.

paragraphs: The party believes in classical liberalism and that government should stay out of economics. They also believe in objectivism. They believethat governments should only be able to protect people from violence, theft, fraud, and other actions that go against people's rights. The party is open to some more libertarian and anarcho-capitalism ideas. There are two groups within the party; the Objectivist and Radicals. Most party members aren't involved with these groups.

paragraphs: The party took part in the 2011 Spanish general election in Madrid and Zaragoza. They received about 7,000 votes to the Senate and over 2,000 (0.01 %) to the Congress.


title: European Canadians

paragraphs: European Canadians (sometimes called Euro-Canadians) are Canadians with ancestry from Europe. As of 2011, there were 25,186,890 European Canadians in Canada.

paragraphs: The French were the first Europeans to live in Canada permanently. Hélène Desportes was the first "white" person born in New France. She was born in 1620.

paragraphs: In 2006, most European Canadians had English ancestry (21.03%). Other common ancestries were French (15.82%), Scottish (15.11%), Irish (13.94%), German (10.18%) then Italian (4.63%). However, 32.22% of people said they had Canadian ancestry. Because of this, some people think the numbers for the English and French ancestry are too low.

paragraphs: Most European Canadians are Christian. A small number of them are Jews, Deists, Agnostics, Atheists, Muslims, Bahá'ís, Paganists/Wiccas and Unitarian Universalists. Most also speak English and French.


title: Latin American Canadians

paragraphs: Latin American Canadians are Canadians with ancestry from Latin America. They may also be called "Latino Canadian" and "Latin Canadian". As of 2011, there were 381,280 Latin American Canadians in Canada.

paragraphs: Most Latin American Canadians speak two or more languages. They usually speak Spanish and/or Portuguese along with English and French.

paragraphs: A lot of Latin American Canadians came to Canada in the late 20th century. They came to Canada because it has better economic opportunities than their native country. Some Cubans came to Canada to escape Fidel Castro's regime. Other Latino Americans left their country because Canada offered freedom from war.

paragraphs: In 2011, most Latin American Canadians had Mexican ancestry (18.6%). Other common ancestries were Colombian (16.2%), Salvadoran (11.7%), Peruvian (7.1%), Chilean (6.7%) and Brazilian (6.1%).

paragraphs: Almost all Latino American Canadians are Christian.


title: Roper v. Simmons

paragraphs: Roper v. Simmons, , was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court. The Court ruled that it is unconstitutional to execute a person for crimes they committed before they were 18 years old. This decision affected 25 states in the country, which still allowed executions of children under age 18. Also, the decision reversed the Court's past ruling in "Stanford v. Kentucky", , which had said that executions of children ages 1618 were sometimes legal.

paragraphs: The first known "juvenile" (child under the age of 18) to be executed in America was Thomas Granger. In 1642, he was executed at age 16 or 17 for sodomy. Between 1642 and 2016, 364 juveniles have been executed in the United States.

paragraphs: Until 1988, the Supreme Court had put no limits on how old a person had to be in order to be executed. This meant each state could set their own rules. In some states, the minimum age for execution was as low as 14. For example, in 1944, South Carolina executed a 14-year-old boy named George Stinney in the electric chair. Stinney was the youngest person in the United States to be convicted and executed during the 20th century.

paragraphs: Juvenile executions were much more common earlier on. However, between 1976 and 2005, twenty-two juveniles were executed.

paragraphs: The Supreme Court started to set some limits on juvenile executions in the late 1980s. In 1988, the Supreme Court ruled in "Thompson v. Oklahoma" that children under the age of sixteen could not be executed. However, the next year, in "Stanford v. Kentucky", the Court ruled that juveniles ages 16 and 17 could be given the death penalty.

paragraphs: The "Simmons" case started in Missouri in 1993. Christopher Simmons, who was 17, made a plan to murder a woman named Shirley Crook. He brought two younger friends, Charles Benjamin and John Tessmer, into the plan. They planned to break into Crook's house, steal things, tie Crook up, and throw her off a bridge. Tessmer dropped out of the plan at the last minute. However, Simmons and Benjamin broke into Crook's home, drove her to a state park, and threw her off a bridge.

paragraphs: Simmons and Benjamin were caught and put on trial. There was a lot of evidence of what they had done. Simmons had admitted to the murder. Tessmer testifid against Simmons and said Simmons had planned the crime ahead of time. (In American law, thinking about killing someone ahead of time makes the killing first degree murder.) The jury found Simmons guilty, and recommended a death sentence. The judge agreed.

paragraphs: Simmons appealed his conviction. Each appeals court which heard his case agreed with the original jury's death sentence. Then the United States Supreme Court decided in "Atkins v. Virginia" 536 U.S. 304 (2002) that executing people with intellectual disabilities was unconstitutional. Encouraged, Simmons filed a new petition to the Supreme Court of Missouri. That court decided that "a national consensus has developed against the execution of juvenile offenders," meaning that across the country, most Americans disagreed with executing juveniles. The court ruled that executing juveniles is cruel and unusual punishment, which violates the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution. They changed Simmons' sentence from death to life in prison.

paragraphs: The State of Missouri appealed the decision to the United States Supreme Court. The Court agreed to hear the case.

paragraphs: This case divided the Supreme Court. In a vote of 5-4, they ruled that it is cruel and unusual punishment to execute people who were juveniles when they committed their crimes. This means that executing these people is against the Eighth Amendment, and is unconstitutional. This decision made it illegal for any state in the country to execute someone who was under the age of 18 when they committed their crime.

paragraphs: The Court had a few reasons for making this decision. First, they argued that juveniles are not as mature as adults. They wrote that there is a lot of research showing that:

paragraphs: The Court pointed out that most states realized these things, which is why they kept teenagers from voting, being on juries, or getting married without their parents' approval.

paragraphs: The Court also agreed with the Missouri Supreme Court that there was a "national consensus" against executing people who committed their crimes as juveniles.

paragraphs: Finally, the Court looked at what other countries in the world did. They wrote that:

paragraphs: When the Supreme Court decided "Roper", there were 72 other prisoners in the United States who were on death row because of crimes they committed as juveniles:

paragraphs: These people were not set free. However, their death sentences were automatically cancelled and they were sentenced to spend the rest of their lives in prison instead.


title: Peremptory challenge

paragraphs: A peremptory challenge is a right during voir dire (the process of selecting a jury) to reject a certain number of potential jurors without having to give a reason. The word "peremptory" means without a reason given; allowing no contradiction or refusal. Peremptory challenges may be made by either party to the proceedings. This kind of challenge has been more difficult to use because the Supreme Court of the United States has prohibited peremptory challenges (also called peremptory strikes) based on gender or race. Different jurisdictions allow different numbers of peremptory challenges to each side. Some jurisdictions allow additional peremptory challenges. In United States federal courts each side is allowed three peremptory challenges. Also, if there are more than two parties involved in the proceeding the court may allow additional challenges or restrict the number for all parties.

paragraphs: To insure an impartial jury, during voir dire, prospective jurors are questioned by the lawyers and the court. Either lawyer may challenge a juror for cause. Reasons may include the prospective juror's opinions on issues, personal knowledge of the case, their occupation or any reason to believe the juror may not be able to be fair. Unlike peremptory challenges, challenges for cause may not be limited to a certain number in most jurisdictions. The reason for either type of challenge is that each lawyer is trying to find jurors who are sympathetic to their case.

paragraphs: The peremptory challenge has its roots in Roman law. Both parties would propose up to 100 prospective jurors, then each could strike 50. This left a total of 100 jurors on the jury. In English common law, a prosecutor had an unlimited number of peremptory challenges while the defendant has 35. In 1305, the Parliament of England eliminated all peremptory challenges for the prosecution. In 1988, Parliament eliminated all peremptory challenges for the defense. Peremptory challenges came to the United States with the colonists and Common Law. Peremptory challenges remained much the same until the late 20th century.

paragraphs: The following observation is attributed to Mark Twain:

paragraphs: While the right to use peremptory challenges is not guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States, The Supreme Court has held peremptory challenges are "to assure the parties that the jurors before whom they try the case will decide on the basis of the evidence placed before them, and not otherwise."

paragraphs: Three Supreme Court decisions have shaped the modern peremptory challenge:


title: Batson v. Kentucky

paragraphs: Batson v. Kentucky, , was a landmark decision in which the United States Supreme Court ruled that a prosecutor's use of peremptory challenges in a criminal case may not be used to exclude jurors based solely on their race. The Court ruled that this practice violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The case gave rise to the term "Batson challenge", an objection to a peremptory challenge. This is based on the standard established by the Supreme Court's decision in this case. Later decisions have resulted in the extension of "Batson" to civil cases. For example, in "Edmonson v. Leesville Concrete Company", the Court allowed private litigants to use this challenge. The Supreme Court also allowed it in cases are excluded on the basis of gender as in "J.E.B. v. Alabama ex rel. T.B.".

paragraphs: The principle had been established previously by several state courts, including the California Supreme Court in 1978, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court in 1979 and the Florida Supreme Court in 1984.

paragraphs: James Kirkland Batson was an African American man convicted of burglary and receipt of stolen goods in a Louisville, Kentucky circuit court by a jury composed entirely of white jurors. The key part of his appeal was based on the "voir dire" (jury selection) phase of the trial. During this phase potential jurors are examined by the Court, the prosecution, and the defense, to determine their competence, willingness, and suitability to hear, deliberate and decide a case put to them in order to render a verdict. During "voir dire" the judge can dismiss jurors and both the prosecution and the defense have a limited number of peremptory challenges which they use to excuse any juror for any reason. Each side does this to help their case. Each side also may dismiss jurors for cause (for example, bias).

paragraphs: In "Batson", the judge dismissed several potential jurors for various causes. The defense peremptorily challenged nine potential jurors and the prosecution peremptorily challenged six, including all four black persons. As a result, only white persons were selected. The defense counsel moved to discharge the whole jury on the ground that the prosecutor's removal of the black jurors violated petitioner's rights under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments to a jury drawn from a cross section of the community, and under the Fourteenth Amendment to equal protection of the laws. Without expressly ruling on petitioner's request for a Hearing, the trial judge denied the motion, and the jury ultimately convicted the defendant.

paragraphs: The defendant appealed his conviction to the Kentucky Supreme Court, which upheld the conviction. That court cited "Swain v. Alabama", and held that a defendant claiming lack of a fair cross section must demonstrate systematic exclusion of a group of jurors from the panel of prospective jurors. That is, the defendant had to show that not just in his case, but as a process, juries in his community did not represent a cross section of that community. Batson continued his appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, which granted "certiorari" to decide whether petitioner was tried "in violation of constitutional provisions guaranteeing the defendant an impartial jury and a jury composed of persons representing a fair cross section of the community."

paragraphs: In a 7–2 decision authored by Justice Lewis Powell, the Supreme Court ruled in Batson's favor. The court overruled "Swain v. Alabama" by lowering the burden of proof that a defendant must meet to make a "prima facie" case of purposeful discrimination. In "Swain", the Court had recognized that a "State's purposeful or deliberate denial to Negroes on account of race of participation as jurors in the administration of justice violates the Equal Protection Clause", but that the defendant had the burden of proving a systematic striking of black jurors throughout the county, that is, that the peremptory challenge system as a whole was being perverted. In "Batson" the court ruled that the defendant could make a "prima facie" case for purposeful racial discrimination in jury selection by relying on the record only in his own case. The Court explained:

paragraphs: Justice Marshall, concurring with the majority, called the decision "historic" but added: "The decision today will not end the racial discrimination that peremptories inject into the jury-selection process. That goal can be accomplished only by eliminating peremptory challenges entirely."

paragraphs: In his dissenting opinion, Chief Justice Warren Burger argued that the court's decision in "Batson" "sets aside the peremptory challenge, a procedure which has been part of the common law for many centuries and part of our jury system for nearly 200 years". He believed the majority was replacing peremptory challenges with something very similar to challenge for cause, but was unclear in explaining the standard to be applied. "I am at a loss to discern the governing principles here," he wrote. "I join my colleagues in wishing the nation's judges well as they struggle to grasp how to implement today's holding."

paragraphs: Justice Rehnquist wrote that the majority misapplied equal protection doctrine: "In my view, there is simply nothing 'unequal' about the state using its peremptory challenges to strike blacks from the jury in cases involving black defendants, so long as such challenges are also used to exclude whites in cases involving white defendants, Hispanics in cases involving Hispanic defendants, Asians in cases involving Asian defendants, and so on."

paragraphs: Whether the principles of "Batson" applied retroactively to anyone convicted previously by juries whose racial composition was influenced by peremptory challenges not consistent with this opinion was for a time uncertain. In "Allen v. Hardy" (1986), the Court held that it did not apply retroactively to collateral review of final convictions. In "Griffith v. Kentucky" (1987), it decided it would apply it in cases on direct review.

paragraphs: The term "Batson challenge" describes an objection to opposing counsel's use of a peremptory challenge to exclude a juror from the jury pool based on criteria the courts have found disqualifying, as race was the sole rationale for exclusion in "Batson".

paragraphs: In some cases, parties have appealed a verdict or judgment and asked it be made invalid because one or more peremptory challenges excluded a recognizable group from the jury. Though the "Batson" decision addressed jury selection in criminal trials, in 1991 the Supreme Court later extended the same rule to civil trials in "Edmonson v. Leesville Concrete Company". In 1994, in "J.E.B. v. Alabama ex rel. T.B."., the Court held that peremptory challenges based on sex alone violated the standard established in "Batson" as well.


title: Polearm

paragraphs: Polearms were long sticks that had a blade on the side. They were similar to an axe, but much longer. They were also used by women in ancient Japan.


title: Citizenship in the United States

paragraphs: Citizenship in the United States means being a citizen of the United States. A person who has citizenship is called a citizen. Citizenship does not just mean that a person lives in the United States. United States citizenship gives people many rights, many protections, and also some duties.

paragraphs: There are two ways that people can become citizens of the United States.

paragraphs: The first is called "birthright citizenship." Anybody who is born in the United States automatically becomes a United States citizen.

paragraphs: The second is called "naturalization." This is for people who were born outside the United States. A person becomes a "naturalized citizen" if they apply for citizenship and are approved.

paragraphs: Once a person is a naturalized citizen, they have all of the same rights, protections, and duties as a person who was born in the United States.

paragraphs: Being a United States citizen gives a person many rights. Here is a list of some of these rights.

paragraphs: Citizenship also comes with duties. Here are some of those duties.

paragraphs: Americans are permitted to formally abandon their citizenship, even if they do not possess another citizenship and become stateless as a result. Boris Johnson, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, was an American citizen because he was born there. He renounced his American citizenship in 2016. 5411 other Americans renounced their citizenship in the same year.


title: Gates v. Collier

paragraphs: Gates v. Collier, 501 F.2d 1291 (5th Cir. 1974), was a landmark case decided by a United States federal court called the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. The case had to do with the rights of prisoners at Mississippi State Penitentiary (usually called "Parchman").

paragraphs: "Gates v. Collier" is a very important case for prisoners' rights. It was the first case to rule that many types of physical punishment against prisoners are cruel and unusual punishment, and are against the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution. It was also the first time that the Supreme Court started supervising how the country's prisons were being run.

paragraphs: The Eighth Amendment to the Constitution says that the state cannot give cruel and unusual punishments to anyone.

paragraphs: Parchman opened in 1903. At the prison, there was a program called the "trusty system." This was a system where some prisoners had more rights and freedoms than others. They also had power over the other inmates.

paragraphs: The Governor of Mississippi, James K. Vardaman, said the prison was run “like an efficient slave plantation.” Trusties had guns and were allowed to shoot at prisoners who stepped out of line. Other punishments were painful and severe. The prison also segregated (separated) black and white prisoners.

paragraphs: For years, there were protests over civil rights abuses at Parchman. Eventually, civil rights lawyer Roy Haber began to collect evidence of the abuse. With Haber as their lawyer, four prisoners filed a lawsuit in federal court, saying that conditions at the prison were cruel and unusual. They said that prison trusties and guards punished and tortured prisoners in ways that were painful and humiliating on purpose.

paragraphs: The prisoners' lawsuit, "Gates v. Collier", 349 F. Supp. 881 (1972), went first to a federal court called the United States District Court N.D. Mississippi, Greenville Division. This court ruled strongly in favor of the prisoners. The court found that Parchman's trusties and guards gave many cruel and unusual punishments, including:

paragraphs: The court ruled that the prison had violated the prisoner's rights under the First, Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution. The court ordered the prison to make many different changes to fix these abuses. It also ordered the prison to end the trusty system.

paragraphs: The state of Mississippi appealed this decision to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. However, the Fifth Circuit also agreed with the lower court's earlier decision. Federal Judge William C. Keady wrote that Parchman Farm had violated "modern standards of decency. He ordered an immediate end to all unconstitutional conditions and practices.

paragraphs: The Fifth Circuit Court ruled that Parchman was using cruel and unusual punishments on its prisoners. It was violating their rights to be protected by the laws which apply to prisoners, too.

paragraphs: After the court decision, Parchman had to end its trusty system. It also stopped segregating its prisoners.

paragraphs: After the court decision, other states that used the trusty system had to stop using it too. These states included Arkansas, Alabama, Louisiana, and Texas.

paragraphs: This decision also set some important precedents. One is that even prisoners have the right to be protected from cruel and unusual punishment. Americans' constitutional rights do not all stop when a person goes to prison. It also limited the type of punishments that prisons can use.


title: Sher e Bangla Medical College

paragraphs: Sher-e-Bangla Medical College (SBMC), is a government medical school in Bangladesh, established in 1968. It is located in Barisal.

paragraphs: Construction began on the college on 6 November 1964, at that time it was known as Barisal Medical College.

paragraphs: There are three hostels for male students and two for the female students. Both male and female intern doctors have each one hostel for them.


title: Diaeresis

paragraphs: The diaeresis (plural: diaereses) is also spelled diæresis or dieresis. It is a diacritical mark: two dots ( ¨ ) put over a letter, usually a vowel.


title: 2015–16 La Liga - Results of first round

paragraphs: This is the Results of the first round of 2015–16 La Liga.


title: Château de Saint Cloud

paragraphs: The Château de Saint Cloud was a château in Paris, France. It was sometimes called the Palace of Saint Cloud. It was burned down during the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. It was once a private property of Queen Marie Antoinette. Since December 2006, there has been a movement to rebuild the Château de Saint-Cloud.

paragraphs: The building was originally called the ""he Hôtel d'Aulnay"". In the 16h century, it was expanded into a château by the Gondi banking family. The estate was in the hands of the Gondi family till 1658. At that time it was bought by Philippe of France, Duke of Orléans, the only brother of Louis XIV of France. The estate remained the personal property of the descendants of Philippe of France. It was a country residence, as opposed to the Palais Royal in the center of Paris.

paragraphs: After negotiating for a long time, the Château de Saint-Cloud was bought in 1785 by Louis XVI. He bought it for Marie Antoinette. She thought that the air of Saint-Cloud would be good for her children. Louis Philippe, Duke of Orléans, who had not visited the château since his morganatic marriage to his mistress Madame de Montesson, sold it for 6,000,000 livres. Marie Antoinette started changing Saint-Cloud in 1787-1788. She used her preferred architect Richard Mique. He had also decorated parts of the Palace of Versailles for the queen.

paragraphs: During the Second Empire, Emperor Napoléon III and Empress Eugénie held their imperial court at Saint-Cloud during the spring and the autumn. There was also a reception for Queen Victoria in honour of her 1855 visit to France. In 1859, a model railway was built in the private park. It was built for Napoléon, Prince Imperial, the 3-year-old son of emperor Napoléon III.


title: Essential oil

paragraphs: An essential oil is a liquid from a plant. Essential oils contain chemical compounds that are useful for their scent. They are used in aromatherapy. Perfumes are made with essential oils.

paragraphs: Around the world, essential oils are being studied in modern clinical trials to test ancient claims of healing. They are being studied for their effectiveness as antibacterial agents, fungicides, insecticides, pain relief, stress reduction, and skin problems.

paragraphs: The name "essential oil" comes from theories in the Middle Ages of a fifth element. People than believed that there were four basic elements that everything was made of: fire, water, air and earth. The elusive "soul" of things was called the quintessential element or the fifth element. Over time, "quintessential" was shortened to "essential". Alchemists said that this element could change iron to gold. Some believed it held the planets in their orbits.

paragraphs: Most essential oils today are steam distilled. This process separates out the aromatic essential oils from the solid plant matter. With steam distillation, it can take thousands of pounds of plant matter to create just one liter of essential oil.

paragraphs: Other methods include expelling and solvent extraction. Expelling is using pressure to squeeze the essential oil out of the plant. This method is generally used for citrus oils. Solvent extraction uses substances such as carbon dioxide to extract the essential oil. This method is used for delicate plants such as rose and jasmine, which can be too fragile to go through the distillation process.


title: Birch

paragraphs: A birch tree is a thinleaved deciduous hardwood tree of the genus Betula. They are in the family Betulaceae, which also includes alders, hazels, and hornbeams.

paragraphs: "Betula" contains 30 to 60 species of which 11 are on the IUCN 2011 Green List of Threatened Species. They are usually rather short-lived pioneer species widespread in the Northern Hemisphere.


title: Brown v. Board of Education II

paragraphs: Brown v. Board of Education II (often called Brown II) was a Supreme Court case decided in 1955. The year before, the Supreme Court had decided "Brown v. Board of Education", which made racial segregation in schools illegal. However, many all-white schools in the United States had not followed this ruling and still had not integrated (allowed black children into) their schools. In "Brown II", the Court ordered them to integrate their schools "with all deliberate speed."

paragraphs: In "Brown II", the Supreme Court also set out rules about what schools needed to do to de-segregate. Finally, it explained how the United States government would make sure the schools did de-segregate.

paragraphs: After the Supreme Court decided the original "Brown" case, it planned to hear arguments during its next court session about just how school de-segregation was going to happen. Segregation in United States schools had existed for centuries. The Court understood that it would not be easy to get the states to follow its ruling and de-segregate their schools.

paragraphs: Also, in its ruling in "Brown", the Court had not given the states any instructions for "how" to end school segregation. The Court had also not given the states a deadline for "when" they needed to de-segregate their schools. These were all details that the Supreme Court needed to decide in "Brown II".

paragraphs: When it decided the original "Brown" case in 1954, the Supreme Court had combined "Brown" with four other cases. The Court decided all five cases together as one, which it called "Brown v. Board of Education". This meant that in "Brown II", the Court was again deciding about five different cases. These were:

paragraphs: There were a few legal questions that the Supreme Court had to decide in "Brown II". For example:

paragraphs: The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), whose lawyers had won "Brown", argued that school de-segregation should begin right away. The states argued back that this would be too difficult and too expensive, and that they needed more time to de-segregate.

paragraphs: In a 9-0 decision, the Supreme Court ordered the states to start trying to obey the "Brown" decision and de-segregate their schools. It ordered the states to start making plans about how they were going to integrate their schools.

paragraphs: However, the Court refused to order the schools to integrate right away, like the NAACP had wanted. It also did not set any clear deadline for when schools needed to be de-segregated. In the Court's majority opinion, Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote that the states should integrate "with all deliberate speed."

paragraphs: To many people, it was not clear exactly what this meant. It also meant that the Court was denying relief to the black students in the "Brown" lawsuits. As constitutional law scholar Steven Emanuel explains:

paragraphs: Instead of ordering the states to de-segregate right away, the Court created a slower plan. It gave federal district courts the power to look after whether schools were de-segregating. Justice Warren wrote: "[These] courts will [make sure] that the defendants make a prompt and reasonable start" toward obeying "Brown."

paragraphs: "Brown II" did make it clear that schools in the United States would have to de-segregate. It also set out a process for making sure schools integrated, by giving federal district courts the power to supervise the schools, control how long they could have to de-segregate, and punish them if they refused to integrate.

paragraphs: However, many states, especially in the South, were able to avoid integrating their schools for years because "Brown II" did not set a specific deadline for integration. Justice Warren's ruling that schools needed to de-segregate "with all deliberate speed" was vague and could have many different meanings. States and schools that did not want to integrate chose meanings that gave them excuses not to let black students into their schools.

paragraphs: For example, based on the "Brown II" ruling, a federal district court ruled that Prince Edward County, Virginia, did not have to de-segregate its schools right away. Several years later, in 1959, a federal court of appeals ordered the county to start de-segregating its schools. Prince Edward County responded by refusing to fund (give any money to) the county's schools. With no money, the schools had to close. They stayed closed for five years, from 1959 to 1964.

paragraphs: Prince Edward County helped white students go to white-only private schools. Black students could not go to school at all, unless they moved to a different county.

paragraphs: Finally, in 1964, the United States Supreme Court ruled that what Prince Edward County was doing was unconstitutional, and ordered the schools to re-open without segregation.


title: Joseph Weizenbaum

paragraphs: Joseph Weizenbaum (8 January 1923 - 5 March 2008) was a German-American mathematician and computer scientist. He was born in Berlin. He became famous for writing the program ELIZA, which simulated a doctor, in the 1960s. He also became well-known for having a critical attitude to what computers can and should do. Weizenbaum died of a stroke at age 85, in 2008.


title: Benjamin Franklin Tilley

paragraphs: Benjamin Franklin Tilley (March 29, 1848 in Bristol, Rhode Island – March 18, 1907 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) was an admiral in the US Navy who served in the American Civil War and the Spanish-American War. He was also governor of American Samoa.


title: Black Hills

paragraphs: The Black Hills are a small mountain range from the Great Plains of North America in South Dakota.

paragraphs: Native Americans have a long history in the Black Hills. After conquering the Cheyenne in 1776, the Lakota took over the territory of the Black Hills.

paragraphs: In 1868, the U.S. government signed the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868. This exempted the Black Hills from all white settlement forever.

paragraphs: But, when European Americans discovered gold there in 1874, miners swept into the area in a gold rush. The US government reassigned the Lakota, against their wishes, to other reservations in western South Dakota. Unlike most of South Dakota, the Black Hills were settled by European Americans from population centers to the west and south. Miners flocked there from earlier gold boom places in Colorado and Montana.

paragraphs: As the economy shifted from mining and logging, the tourism industry has grown. The Black Hills have two areas: "The Southern Hills" and "The Northern Hills". The Southern Hills is home to Mount Rushmore National Memorial, Wind Cave National Park, Jewel Cave National Monument, Harney Peak (the highest point in the United States east of the Rockies), Custer State Park (the largest state park in South Dakota, and one of the largest in the US), the Crazy Horse Memorial (the largest sculpture in the world), and the Mammoth Site in Hot Springs, the world’s largest mammoth research facility.


title: Corn Palace

paragraphs: The Corn Palace is an arena in Mitchell, South Dakota. The designs on the buildings are covered in corn and other grains.

paragraphs: The Corn Palace has concerts, sports events, exhibits and other community events. Each year, the Corn Palace is celebrated with a citywide festival, the Corn Palace Festival. Historically it was held at harvest time in September, but now it happens in August. Other popular annual events include the Corn Palace Stampede Rodeo in July and the Corn Palace Polka Festival in September. It is also where the Dakota Wesleyan University Tigers and the Mitchell High School Kernels basketball teams play their games.


title: Chaplain–Medic massacre

paragraphs: The Chaplain-Medic massacre was a crime in the Korean War. It happened on a mountain in South Korea. Thirty unarmed, and critically wounded United States Army soldiers and an unarmed chaplain were killed by people of the North Korean army during the Battle of Taejon.


title: Knossos

paragraphs: Knossos is a Bronze Age archaeological site on the island of Crete. It is at modern Heraklion. It may be Europe's oldest city.

paragraphs: Many Roman coins found on the site had 'Knosion' or 'Knos' on one side, and an image of a Minotaur or Labyrinth on the reverse. These are symbols from the myth of King Minos, supposed to have reigned at Knossos.

paragraphs: The excavations at Knossos began in 1900 by the English archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans (1851–1941) and his team. They worked there for 35 years. The palace was excavated and partly restored. It was large. The team discovered two ancient scripts, called Linear A and Linear B. From the layering of the palace, Evans developed an idea of the civilization that used it, which he called Minoan. The palace was built over a previous Neolithic town. During the Bronze Age, the town surrounded the hill on which the palace was built.

paragraphs: The palace was abandoned at some unknown time at the end of the late Bronze Age, c. 1380–1100 BC, for reasons which are not known.


title: Imre Nagy

paragraphs: Imre Nagy (7 June 1896 - 16 June 1958) was a Hungarian communist politician. He was born in Kaposvár. He was chairman on two occasions. He was executed by hanging in Budapest.


title: Lee Trevino

paragraphs: Lee Buck Trevino (born September 1, 1939) is a retired American professional golfer who was born in Dallas, Texas.


title: China National Space Administration

paragraphs: The China National Space Administration (CNSA) is the national space agency of China, and is based in the Haidian District. It is in charge of the national space program and of managing different space-related activities.


title: Betts v. Brady

paragraphs: Betts v. Brady, , was a landmark case decided by the United States Supreme Court in 1942. The case had to do with "indigent" (poor) people who were on trial for crimes, but did not have enough money to pay for a lawyer. The Court ruled that a person did not need a lawyer to get a fair trial. They also ruled that the states did not have to pay for free lawyers for poor defendants.

paragraphs: In 1963, the Court reversed its decision in "Betts" when it decided "Gideon v. Wainwright", .

paragraphs: The Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution says that "In all criminal [trials], the accused shall ... have the assistance of counsel for his defence." ("Counsel" is another word for "lawyer.")

paragraphs: However, in the 1930s, the Supreme Court made a few decisions that decreased the number of United States citizens who had the right to a lawyer.

paragraphs: In 1932, the Court decided a case called "Powell v. Alabama", . They ruled that the states had to assign free lawyers to poor defendants, but "only" if they were being tried for capital crimes. (Capital crimes are crimes that can be punished with the death penalty.)

paragraphs: Then, in 1938, the Supreme Court ruled in "Johnson v. Herbst" that in "federal" courts, any person who was charged with a crime and could not pay for a lawyer had to be assigned a lawyer for free. However, the Court also ruled that the Sixth Amendment applied "only" to federal courts not to state courts.

paragraphs: This meant that if a person was charged with a crime in a "state" court, and he could not afford a lawyer, he would have to defend himself in court.

paragraphs: In 1941, Betts was indicted (formally charged) with robbery by a court in Maryland. Betts could not pay for a lawyer. He asked the court to assign him a free lawyer. The judge refused. He said the court only appointed free lawyers to people charged with rape or murder.

paragraphs: Betts had to defend himself, without the help of a lawyer. He argued that he had been in a different place at the time of the robbery. He called witnesses who said this was true. However, the judge did not believe Betts. He sentenced Betts to eight years in prison.

paragraphs: Betts filed a writ of habeas corpus with a Maryland appeals court. A writ of habeas corpus asks to be set free from unfair imprisonment. Betts argued that his imprisonment was unfair because he had not been given a lawyer. His petition was denied.

paragraphs: Next Betts filed a writ of habeas corpus to the Court of Appeals of Maryland, the most powerful court in Maryland. It also denied his petition.

paragraphs: Finally, Betts filed a request with the Supreme Court of the United States, asking them to hear his case. The Court agreed.

paragraphs: The "Betts" case brought up some important legal issues for the Court to decide.

paragraphs: Also, the Fourteenth Amendment says that no state can take away any person's "life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person ... the equal protection of the laws."

paragraphs: The Court had already decided that the right to have a lawyer applied to all people in federal criminal trials; people being tried by the states for rape or murder; and anyone who could pay for a lawyer. Now they needed to decide whether poor people had the right to have lawyers too, even if they could not pay for them.

paragraphs: They also needed to decide these questions:

paragraphs: On June 1, 1942, the Supreme Court voted 63 against Betts. They ruled that his conviction was fair.

paragraphs: The Court ruled that having a lawyer was not a basic right. Usually, a defendant did not need a lawyer to get a fair trial, the Court said.

paragraphs: In their decision, the Court did rule that there were special cases where a court should assign a lawyer. In these special cases, not having a lawyer would make it difficult for a defendant to get a fair trial. In each case, the judge was supposed to talk to the defendant to figure out whether any of these "special circumstances" existed. For example, was the defendant mentally able to defend himself? Did he have enough education? Did he understand what happens during a trial?

paragraphs: For 21 years, "Betts" set a precedent that allowed individual courts and judges to decide whether poor people would be given lawyers or not.

paragraphs: Finally, in 1963, the Supreme Court decided a case called "Gideon v. Wainwright", . In the "Gideon" decision, the Court admitted that it made the wrong decision in "Betts". A lawyer "is" needed for a fair trial.


Magasa, Crete


title: Mamba

paragraphs: Mambas are fast-moving venomous snakes of the genus "Dendroaspis" (means "tree asp"). It belongs to the Elapidae family.

paragraphs: They are native to Africa. The black mamba is one of the well-known species and is also the most feared. Other members include the eastern green mamba, western green mamba and Jameson's mamba.

paragraphs: Most mambas are arboreal, meaning they live in trees. The only exception is the black mamba, which lives on land. All mamba species hunt during the day. They prey on birds, lizards and small mammals.

paragraphs: There are many stories of mambas chasing humans, but these snakes usually prefer to avoid contact with humans. Humans are actually their main predators, rather than prey.

paragraphs: Because mambas and cobras are in the same family, they share some similarities. Like the cobra, a mamba might display a hood when threatened. However, a mamba's hood is more narrow and is longer. A mamba usually opens its mouth when threatened, so they lean forward unlike the cobra which usually stands erect.

paragraphs: All mambas are very venomous. Their venom is mostly comprised of neurotoxins, which attack the nervous system. The venom can also contain cardiotoxins (which damage the heart muscle) and fasciculins (which cause muscle twitches).

paragraphs: The toxicity of the venom varies. Changes in the toxicity can even be caused by the weather or altitude.

paragraphs: All mamba species have similar venom, but the black mamba has the most toxic venom and is more aggressive.


title: Chanel

paragraphs: Chanel is a French fashion company created by Coco Chanel (19 August 1883 – 10 January 1971).

paragraphs: It designs clothing, perfumes, luxury goods and jewellery, usually of simple design. It is widely known for the "little black dress" and Chanel No. 5 perfume.


title: Sea Shepherd Conservation Society

paragraphs: The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society (SSCS) is an American organization that aims to protect marine life, and was founded in 1977 by activist Paul Watson, a former member of Greenpeace. One of the things they heavily campaign against is whaling.


title: LGBT rights in Canada

paragraphs: Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights in Canada are some of the most advanced in the world. During the British North America era, same-sex relationships were illegal. They were punishable with capital punishment. Homosexual activity became legal in 1969. Same-sex marriage became legal in 2005.


title: Swinging (sexual practice)

paragraphs: Swinging is a human sexuality based on multi-partner relations. In contrast with an affair, both partners are consenting to sexual exchange of one and the other. It was this exchange that creates a certain eroticism and even sexual arousal.


title: Neufchâtel-en-Bray

paragraphs: Neufchâtel-en-Bray is a commune of Seine-Maritime. It's famous as cheese production: the Neufchâtel.


title: Iris nebula

paragraphs: The Iris nebula is a reflection nebula in the constellation of Cepheus. It is about 1,300 light-years away from Earth.