American Government Essay Example for Free

American Government Essay Introduction There are different ways to which issues in the society can be expressed in relation to emotions, thoughts and artistry. In various eras, movies have been used to tackle issues on religions, philosophies, and even the thoughts and emotions of the writers and directors during the time it is being filmed. For example, the movies entitled Blue Collar, Norma Rae and Roger and Me are movies wherein the problems on employment in any societies have been tackled accordingly. During the time of the creation of the movies, there have been apparent issues with employment that needs to be addressed by the government. Apparently, the theme of conservatism and the plight to destroy it is was the main theme of the three movies mentioned. The motivational principle that has been applied in the course of generating an understanding of the concept of conservatism as highlighted in the movies is sovereignty. It is very elementary to say that in the democratic and liberal forms of government, the sovereign power resides in the people. Under this concept, it cannot be denied that men are only equal before the law and of God. Aside from it, there is no equality. By this, it only means that men are protected only as far as laws and God is concerned. Body Noting this kind of principle is the apparent absence of equality in terms of the social, political and even economic aspects of human being. In terms of the social aspect, it can be seen that men are distinct from women. There is a status quo that should be adhered upon especially when treating men and women. They are not equal under the social order of the society. Men are considered higher in terms of intelligence, capabilities and social status. As per women, they are made to be inside their houses and taking care of the children and of their husbands. It is as if saying that women and men played totally different roles in the society. One is for the house while the other is for the working. Such difference in the social standing of men and women is apparent and to remind people of the principle that aside from law and God, no equality can be measured outside such borders. Women cannot and must not force the society to accept and treat them in the same manner that men are being t reated because it will never be in that way under the conservative theory of governance (Garcia, 2008). The basic foundation of governance that has been tackled in the movies is comprised of the idealism that a just and humane society must be formed. It must be understood that the State should promote a just and dynamic social order. This is accomplished through policies that provide adequate social services. Every society must ensure the prosperity and independence of the nation and free the people from poverty. Hence, it means all people not just the aristocratic few. The goal is to reduce the political and economic power of the privileged few by equalizing widely differing standards and opportunities for advancement and to raise the masses of the people from their poverty to a qualitative life worthy of human dignity. With the eradication of mass poverty being experienced of a nation, the State solves at the same time a chain of social problems that comes with it; social unrest, breakdown of family systems, diseases, ignorance, criminality, and low productivity. Policies must only be created to promote social justice in all phases of national development. In the fulfillment of this duty, the State must give preferential attention to the welfare of the less fortunate members of the community—the poor, the underprivileged and those who have less in life for the benefit of the whole nation. On the issue of economic equality, on the other hand, the movies have made it clear that there are economic differences between the poor and the rich. No equality are being afforded to them. The rich people are getting more privileges in the society as compared to the poor. The poor can never get such privileges because it is just for the rich to experience and enjoy. Since there is no equality, the poor gets poorer with each passing day while the rich gets richer by the hour. There is a distinct role that separates the rich and the poor. While the rich pose as the employers, the poor works as slaves to earn a living. There is equality and hence, no growth and improvement is being afforded to the latter (Funnel, 2009). Conclusion Undeniably, there is an inherent advantage in adopting a development strategy that promotes industrialization and full employment without giving more importance on gender issues. An important aspect of industrializations is that it generates a high level of employment. Factories and industrial sites create job opportunities and thus create sources of livelihood for the people. The high incidence of poverty in the country is rooted in the social scourge that is unemployment. The nation will never recover economically, and social peace and political stability will never come to our land as long as the problem of mass poverty persists. The first step towards the solution of the problem is therefore, the creation of massive work opportunities that will absorb millions of unemployed and underemployed labor in the country, and this can only be done through full and rapid industrialization. But nevertheless, despite the different trajectories that has impacted the lives of the nation and the people inhabiting the place. Ironically, it can be said that whatever the advocates of conservatism have fought for in their lifetimes it has all been gone because of the fact that changes have constantly brought liberalism to the nation. It is one that completely rejects advice or assistance from without. To be realistic, a policy must have global outlook in view of the deleterious effect on the country’s relations with other countries with policies that revolve only on the relations with select members of the international community. Bibliography Funnel, W. (2009). In Government We Trust: Market failure and the Delusions of Privatization. Sydney: University of New South Wales Press. Garcia, J. (2008). Up to our Eyeballs: How Shady Lenders and Failed Econoimc Policies are Drowning Americans in Debt. New York: The New Press.

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1.0 Company Background Empress Luxury Lines is a company that offered cruise vacations to the vacationers. In 1990s, this company had achieved high demand from the customers and they had increased their cruises in order to meet the demand during the stock market bubble. However, this increment of the demand did not last for long time. Unfortunately, the company had to face with several problems which caused the decrease of its demand. Like, in the year 2000, there was a dramatic fall in the stock market due to the incident of September 11 that badly affected the nation, sudden drop of bookings caused by the Norwalk virus and also the strike of the hurricanes at the Caribbean and Gulf ports in 2005 caused a huge amount of refunds. Early age of Empress Sunward left Southampton for the first time on June 25th 1966. Unfortunately, bookings were very low. A disagreement between Spain and Great Britain regarding Gibralter –Spain saw Gibraltar as a part of Spain- didn’t help matters either. Part of her brochure when sailing as The Empress for Empress Cruise Line Ted Arison, an Israeli, managed several Israeli passenger ships cruising out of American ports in the sixties. These ships were gradually sold however, so Arison was facing a situation in which he would be left without a ship. He saw many possibilities for cruises out of Florida to the Caribbean. It was his foresight that started Caribbean Cruising. He contacted Kloster and unfolded his plans for Caribbean cruising. Kloster agreed and the Sunward started sailing out of Miami on short cruise to the Bahamas for the newly formed Norwegian Cruise Lines. She was now used as a cruise ship, although her car deck was still in use so passengers could take their cars to th e Bahamas. So... ...ormer Sunward seemed to have found her niche. Although a one ship operation, Empress was a rather successful small firm, holding her own in a market dominated by competitor Star Cruises. There was even talk of a second ship, but Empress wanted to develop step by step and was not in a hurry to add further tonnage. Suddenly, Empress Cruise Lines ceased operations. The exact reasons remained somewhat obscure, which happens more often in the Asian cruise scene. The Empress was laid up. Then, (summer of 2003) there were rumours of several (Asian) parties being interested in her while reports that she had already sailed for the breakers turned out to be incorrect. Other reports indicated that she had been sold for $ 1.3 million for further cruise service in Indian waters. Her planned refit did not materialize however and she was suddenly sold to Indian scrappers in 2004.

Slavery in Brazil

Edmund Burke, the acclaimed author and philosopher once said, â€Å"Slavery is a weed that grows on every soil. † Between the 16th and 19th century in the Americas, millions on millions of slaves were brought to the New World. There purpose was to work. The economy of most European colonies in America was dependent on slaves. The land that was discovered in Americas was useless with out sufficient slave labor to exploit it. In this essay, I will focus on two nations where slavery played an enormous role in the development of that country. First, The United States, where in 1860 in South Carolina over 50 percent of the population were slaves.Next, Brazil, the nation where about one third of all salves from Africa were brought. In this essay I will compare slavery in The United States to slavery in Brazil, I will dissect the similarities and differences while focusing on why and how the slaves came, the demographic and religious aspects, the treatment of the slaves, and the afte rmath on both countries due to slavery. Around the year 1530 the Portuguese came to Brazil in search of land and natural resources, specifically sugar. As the Portuguese and the indigenous people of Brazil battled for land, the Brazilians resisted against being enslaved.As the Portuguese presence grew in Brazil so did disease, causing the death of most of the working indigenous people. As the number of sugar plantations grew, the demand for workers did as well. This is the main reason why Brazil began to import slaves from Africa. Although the origin of slaves in The United States was similar to Brazil, there were some differences. In the year 1619, only around 10 years after the British began to colonize US, a Dutch slave trader exchanged about 20 Africans for food in Jamestown, Virginia. Like Brazil, the U. S needed workers for plantations, but while Brazil focused on the sugar plantations, the U.S was focused on the tobacco plantations. In general, both Brazil and the U. S lacked a major resource in order to maintain a strong economy, that resource being workers. Although Brazil used more slaves towards sugar and the U. S used more towards tobacco, in general the slaves worked in mines or they worked in a sugar, rice, tobacco, or cotton plantation. Although the U. S played a larger role in the process, both Brazil and the U. S participated in the Triangular Slave Trade. Some say the Triangular Slave Trade is the reason why 10 to 15 million of Africans were shipped to the Americas between 1650 and 1860.The slave trade was simple yet wrong on so many levels. The slave trade took several different routes, but there were two popular ones. The most common route would first start in Europe where the Europeans would trade manufactured goods for slaves in Africa. Next, the slaves were transported across the Atlantic Ocean to Brazil and the Caribbean where the slaves were sold for huge profits or traded for sugar, coffee, and tobacco. The journey from Africa to the Americas was known as the middle passage. Olaudah Equiano was a slave captured and sold into slavery.In his book, The Life of Olaudah Equiano the African, when describing the middle passage he writes, â€Å"I was soon put down under the decks, and there I received such a greeting in my nostrils as I had never experienced in my life; I became so sick and low that I was not able to eat. I now wished for the last friend, death, to relieve me; but soon, to my grief, two of the white men offered me eatables; and, on my refusing to eat, one of them held me fast by the hands, and laid me across, The white people looked and acted, as I thought, in so savage a manner; for I had never seen among my people such instances of brutal cruelty.The closeness of the place, and the heat of the climate, almost suffocated us. The air soon became unfit for respiration, from a variety of loathsome smells, and brought on a sickness among the slaves, of which many died. The shrieks of the women, and the gr oans of the dying, rendered the whole a scene of horror almost inconceivable. As you can tell, the conditions were brutal to say the least. Another popular triangular route taken was ships from the U. S colonies would take rum and other products to Africa in exchange for Slaves.From there, the slaves were taken to Brazil and the Caribbean and sold for profit or sold for sugar and molasses to take back to the U. S where then the sugar and molasses was sold to rum makers. In general, the slave trade was horrific and inhumane, however, it is the reason that the U. S and Brazil were able to maintain a steady economy. Although there were many similarities between the Brazilian slaves and the U. S slaves, there were quite a few specific differences as well. One of the largest differences in slavery between Brazil and the U. S was demographic.Generally speaking, the Brazilian slaves were usually decreasing while the U. S slaves were usually increasing. This is due to several reasons. First , the Brazilians had a much lower proportion of female slaves compared to the U. S who had an equal sex ratio. In Brazil, due to the lack of female slaves, they had a much lower birth rate then the U. S did. Both the death rate and suicide rate was also higher in Brazil compared to the U. S. Due to the low birthrate and the high death rate, Brazil had trouble to maintain a population resulting in having to continuously import slaves.On the other hand, the average number of children born to an early 19th century U. S slave woman was 9. 2; this is twice as many as Brazil and the Caribbean. All these reasons are why Brazil had a much larger number of recent arrivals from Africa while the U. S had a predominately American slave born population. Also, this is why out of the millions and millions of Africans who were brought to the New World, over one-third landed in Brazil and between 60 and 70 percent ended up in Brazil or the sugar colonies of the Caribbean.According to Henry John Temp le, the well-known British Prime Minister of the 19th century, he suggests that there were about 3,000,000 slaves in Brazil in the 19th century. Although it is hard to know the exact number, most historians agree that it was around 3,000,000, which would be about forty percent of the whole population. On the other side, in 1860, the slaves in the U. S were only about 13 percent of the entire population. Generally speaking, in Brazil slaves worked on much larger plantations then in the U. S.Most Brazilian plantations held about 150 slaves per plantation. In the U. S, it was quite different. According to Carl Deglar, who wrote, Slavery in Brazil and the United States, he states, â€Å"Out of all the plantations in the U. S, more the half the slaves worked on units with 20 slaves or less. † In the U. S it would not be uncommon for the slaves to deal with their owners on a daily basis, while in Brazil some worked on plantations with hundreds and hundreds of other slaves where it would be rare to encounter your owner. When comparing Brazil and the U.S today, the demographic differences during the days of slavery is one of the main reasons why the two countries are so different One may think that since the slaves were brought to the U. S and Brazil for similar reasons then they all were treated the same, had the same rights, and were viewed the same. Although this is by no means entirely false, there are a few specific differences on how the slaves were treated in the US compared to how the slaves were treated in Brazil. Religion among the slaves was vital for some while non-existent for others. In the U.S, religion was discouraged for the slaves. The average white American slave owner thought there was no need to ever have a slave practice a religion. This could be due to the fact that nowhere in the Catholic Christian teachings does it say it’s acceptable to enslave and treat a fellow Christian as the owners were treating their slaves. In 1831, Virgi nia passed a law stating, â€Å"Slaves and free Negroes were forbidden to preach, exhort or teach in any prayer-meeting or other association for worship where slaves of different families are collected together on penalty of not more than thirty-nine lashes. In Brazil, the Christianity of a slave was viewed quite different. Some slave owners even viewed it as an essential for a slave to work on his farm. In some cases the slaves would even have to perform a religious ritual even before they stepped foot in Brazil. Instead of being viewed as complete property, the slaves in Brazil were given a chance to practice a religion, in particular, practice the teachings of the Catholic Church. The slaves that departed from Angola, Africa to Brazil were baptized before they got on board the ship.When they arrived in Brazil, the slaves were acknowledged as baptized and had to begin learning the prayers, doctrines, and functions of the Church. In Brazil, marriage was actually acceptable and val id. In 1711, the Constituicoes Primeiras of the Archbishopric of Bahia reaffirmed the legitimacy of marriages between slaves, and between free persons and slaves. According to the Constituicoes, masters could not prevent their slaves from marrying, nor could they separate them once they had wed. Although this may sound promising, it sounds better then it actually was.Most slave owners did not abide by the law that you could not separate a married slave. In general, they still viewed them more as property then people. According to Fernando Henrique Cardoso, the former president of Brazil, he states, â€Å"Of the 660,000 slaves in all of Brazil in 1875, who were 14 years or older, only about 1 out of 6 was recorded as married or widowed. † In terms of religion, it is true that the Brazilian slaves had more rights then the U. S slaves, but not by much. As you can see both the U.S and Brazilian slave owners were more determined on making profit by making the slaves strenuously wo rk then anything else. Although both Brazil and U. S slave owners had complete ownership and control over their slave, the way they treated them did differ between countries. Theoretically, both Brazil and the U. S had laws against murder, abuse, and over working the slave. The difference is, generally speaking, in Brazil some of those laws were carried out while in the U. S, it was rare to see anyone ever defend a slave. In the U. S, the slave owner acted as the judge and jury for any issue involving his slave.In Brazil, a slave had somewhat of a right to a jury. For instance, say a slave owner murdered his slave in the U. S. In most cases it would go unheard of, but even if it were taken to court, it would have been extremely rare if the owner were prosecuted for anything. Now, if a slave owner murdered his slave in Brazil, by law the court should have prosecuted the case as if the slave was a free man. Although it may sound that slavery in Brazil was a lot less harsh, in reality, this judicial approach in Brazil is what should have happened, but as you can guess, it rarely ever did.Henry Koster, a famous German author and film director, in his novel, Travels to Brazil, he states, â€Å"occasionally a cruel master was fined for maltreating his slaves but, I have never heard of a punishment having been carried farther then this trifling manner of correction. † Although by law, the Brazilians compared to the U. S had stricter laws protecting the slaves, when it comes down to the truth, in both countries the slave was viewed more as property then human, mistreating your slave was seen as mistreating your property. One of the biggest differences when comparing U.S slavery to Brazilian slavery concerns manumission. Manumission, meaning the act of freeing a slave, was undoubtedly less common in the U. S compared to Brazil. The number proportion of free slaves in Brazil compared to the number proportion to free slaves in the U. S proves that manumission was more frequent in Brazil. In 1818, for every one free African in Brazil, there were only three slaves. This ratio is compared to with that in the U. S in 1860, when for every one free African, there were eight slaves. By 1872, the number of free Africans in Brazil was more then double the amount that were still slaves.The numbers show that there’s indisputable evidence to prove that manumission was more frequent in Brazil. It is important to note that Brazilian slave owners were freeing the sick and the old more so then the U. S, however, the sick and the old simply would not have been capable to produce offspring in numbers to explain the large number of free Africans in Brazil. Marvin Harris, the famous American anthropologist, along with many other historians suggests another explanation to why there were such a higher percentage of free Africans in Brazil compared to The United States.As stated before, in Brazil in the late 19th century, the free Africans greatly outnumber ed the slaves. The big difference was that Brazil needed those free Africans in order to maintain their economy. The free black slaves in Brazil produced food, were craftsmen, and even slave catchers. They performed the tasks that slave labor was too hard to achieve and the whites thought they were too good to do. This was not the occurrence in The United States. First, the U. S was importing more food rather then growing it like Brazil did, and the food that was being produced in the U.S was produced by whites in the South and Northwest. Also, the U. S had enough white men to perform the tasks that the free Africans in Brazil were doing. Therefore, for the U. S there was no economic reason for the whites to turn towards manumission as Brazil did. It did not matter if you were a slave in Brazil, The United States, Caribbean, Central America, or anywhere else, something that they all had in common was the attempt to run and become a free man. Some succeeding, some did not. In Brazil, escaped slaves formed communities like the ones they were forced to leave in their homeland.These communities were called quilombos. Compared to the U. S, the slaves in Brazil had a greater and a better chance for escape. The number of escaped slaves, the number of revolts, and the size of the quilombos were all greater in Brazil. Although there were plenty of revolts and escapes in the US, generally speaking, there were fewer participants then Brazil. In most of The United States, the climate was to cold in the winter to survive on your own compared to Brazil where the climate was reasonable. Also, Brazil was full of forests to hide in compared to the U. S where the areas were policed heavier.The large quilomobs communities in Brazil may contribute to the fact that today, in Brazil the blacks are seen as Brazilians while in certain parts of The United States, the blacks are still seen as Africans. During the days of slavery, discrimination towards blacks was clearly brutal and rut hless. The horrific and saddest result of slavery in The United States is that race prejudice still exists today. I am not saying that blacks are thought of as they were in the 18th century, but in The United States today, especially in the South, there is still discrimination towards colored people.After slavery was abolished in The United States, by no mean did that make the whites and blacks have equal rights. Even after the abolition of slavery, a black man still could not vote, give testimony in court for a white man, marry white women, hold office, and many other terrible things. Brazil, on the other hand, as writer Herbert Alexander puts it, â€Å"the race problem had been allowed to solve itself. † For example, in the seventeenth century, one of the three main officers when the Brazilians fought the Dutch was Henrique Diaz, a black man.This is something you would have never saw in The United States. The United States and Brazil were one of the last nations to abolish slavery in all of the Americas. The Civil War, which lasted from 1861 to 1865, ended slavery in the United States. In 1888, due to international political pressure, Brazil being the last nation to do it in the Americas, finally abolished slavery. Unlike The United States, Brazil was able to abolish slavery with out catastrophic violence. In both Brazil and The United States, the horrific terror of slavery in the 16th to 19th century is something everyone would want to forget.However, during that time period slavery was the reason why both The United States and Brazil’s economies were both stable and on the rise. Overall, when looking into the history of slavery in both The United States and Brazil, although there are differences and similarities, the time period of slavery explains greatly to why present day life in both unique countries is what it is. Bibliography Alexander, Herbert B. â€Å"Brazilian and United States Slavery Compared. † – Wikisource, the Free Online Library. N. p. , 2 Feb. 2001. Web. 12 Dec. 2012. Bergad, Laird W.The Comparative Histories of Slavery in Brazil, Cuba, and the United States. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007. Print. Brogan, Hugh. The Penguin History of the United States of America. London: Penguin, 2001. Print. Carmody, Padraig. â€Å"Unit Three: Studying Africa through the Humanities. † Exploring Africa. N. p. , 4 Nov. 2002. Web. 12 Dec. 2012. Carter, Tom. â€Å"Race and Slavery in America. † Opinion Forum RSS. N. p. , 28 Feb. 2009. Web. 12 Dec. 2012. Davis, David Brion. Inhuman Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World. New York: Oxford UP, 2008. Print. Degler, Carl N.Slavery in Brazil and the United States: An Essay in Comparative History. 4th ed. Vol. 75. Washington, D. C.? : American Historical Association. , 1970. Print. â€Å"Differences In Slave Laws In Colonial Brazil And Colonial British North. † 123HelpMe. com. 10 Dec 2012 Dodson, Howard. â€Å"How Slavery Helped B uild a World Economy. † National Geographic. N. p. , 3 Feb. 2003. Web. 12 Dec. 2012. Equiano, Olaudah, and Shelly Eversley. The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or, Gustavus Vassa, the African. New York: Modern Library, 2004. Print. Foner, Eric. Give Me Liberty! An American History. New York: W. W. Norton &, 2008. Print. Gomez, Flavio S. Africans and Slave Marriages in Eighteenth-century Rio De Janeiro. N. p. : Sheridan, n. d. Print. Koster, Henry. Travels to Brazil. New York: Kessinger, 2012. Print. Mattoso, Katia MAE. To Be a Slave in Brazil, 1550-1888. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers UP, 1986. Print. Mintz, Sean. â€Å"American Slavery in Comparative Perspective. † Digital History Copyright. Mintz S and McNeil S, 3 Jan. 2003. Web. 12 Dec. 2012. Paine, Thomas. â€Å"African Slavery in America. † Pennsylvania Journal and the Weekly Advertiser. Philadelphia] 14 Apr. 1775: n. pag. Print. Reis, Joao Jose. Slave Rebellion in Brazil: The Muslim Uprisi ng of 1835 in Bahia. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1995. Print. Tony, Dunnel. â€Å"History of African Slavery in Brazil. † Suite101. com. The University of Nottingham, 8 Sept. 2009. Web. 12 Dec. 2012. ——————————————– [ 1 ]. Laird W Bergad. The Comparative Histories of Slavery in Brazil, Cuba, and the United States. Print. 115-120 [ 2 ]. Herbert B. Alexander â€Å"Brazilian and United States Slavery Compared. † Web. 12 Dec. 2012. [ 3 ]. Olaudah Equiano.The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano. Print. 35 [ 4 ]. Sean Mintz. â€Å"American Slavery in Comparative Perspective. † Web. 12 Dec. 2012. [ 5 ]. Laird W Bergad. The Comparative Histories of Slavery in Brazil, Cuba, and the United States. Print. 115-120 [ 6 ]. Jose Joao Reis. Slave Rebellion in Brazil: The Uprising of 1835 in Bahia. Print. 8 [ 7 ]. Laird W Bergad. The Comparative Histories of Slavery in Brazil, Cuba, and the United States. Print. 117 [ 8 ]. Carl N. Degler. Slavery in Brazil and the United States: An Essay in Comparative History. Print. 006 [ 9 ]. Herbert B. Alexander â€Å"Brazilian and United States Slavery Compared. † Web. 12 Dec. 2012. [ 10 ]. Flavio S. Gomez. Africans and Slave Marriages in Eighteenth-century Rio De Janeiro. Print. 42-50 [ 11 ]. Carl N. Degler. Slavery in Brazil and the United States: An Essay in Comparative History. Print. 1009 [ 12 ]. Henry Koster. Travels to Brazil. Print. 77 [ 13 ]. Carl N. Degler. Slavery in Brazil and the United States: An Essay in Comparative History. Print. 1012 [ 14 ]. Herbert B. Alexander â€Å"Brazilian and United States Slavery Compared. † Web. 12 Dec. 2012.

Timeline and History of the Imperial Presidency