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134-524: The kilogram (also spelled kilogramme ) is the base unit of mass in the International System of Units (SI), having the unit symbol kg . 'Kilogram' means 'one thousand grams ' and is colloquially abbreviated to kilo . The kilogram is an SI base unit , defined ultimately in terms of three defining constants of the SI, namely a specific transition frequency of Cs, the speed of light, and

268-478: A federal structure with two overlapping power centers so that each citizen as an individual is subject to the powers of state government and national government. To protect against abuse of power, each branch of government – executive, legislative, and judicial – had a separate sphere of authority and could check other branches according to the principle of the separation of powers . Furthermore, there were checks and balances within

402-611: A revision in November 2018 that defines the kilogram by defining the Planck constant to be exactly 6.626 070 15 × 10 kg⋅m⋅s , effectively defining the kilogram in terms of the second and the metre. The new definition took effect on 20 May 2019. Prior to the redefinition, the kilogram and several other SI units based on the kilogram were defined by a man-made metal artifact: the Kilogramme des Archives from 1799 to 1889, and

536-490: A "remarkably resilient institution". Congress is the "heart and soul of our democracy", according to this view, even though legislators rarely achieve the prestige or name recognition of presidents or Supreme Court justices ; one wrote that "legislators remain ghosts in America's historical imagination." One analyst argues that it is not a solely reactive institution but has played an active role in shaping government policy and

670-541: A Late Latin term for "a small weight", itself from Greek γράμμα . The word kilogramme was written into French law in 1795, in the Decree of 18 Germinal , which revised the provisional system of units introduced by the French National Convention two years earlier, where the gravet had been defined as weight ( poids ) of a cubic centimetre of water, equal to 1/1000 of a grave . In

804-685: A kilogram is 1   mg (one milligram), not 1   μkg (one microkilogram). International System of Units#Base units The SI comprises a coherent system of units of measurement starting with seven base units , which are the second (symbol s, the unit of time ), metre (m, length ), kilogram (kg, mass ), ampere (A, electric current ), kelvin (K, thermodynamic temperature ), mole (mol, amount of substance ), and candela (cd, luminous intensity ). The system can accommodate coherent units for an unlimited number of additional quantities. These are called coherent derived units , which can always be represented as products of powers of

938-502: A kilogram is a milligram , not a microkilogram . The BIPM specifies 24 prefixes for the International System of Units (SI): The base units and the derived units formed as the product of powers of the base units with a numerical factor of one form a coherent system of units . Every physical quantity has exactly one coherent SI unit. For example, 1 m/s = 1 m / (1 s) is the coherent derived unit for velocity. With

1072-408: A list of non-SI units accepted for use with SI , including the hour, minute, degree of angle, litre, and decibel. Although the term metric system is often used as an informal alternative name for the International System of Units, other metric systems exist, some of which were in widespread use in the past or are even still used in particular areas. There are also individual metric units such as

1206-589: A political party does not mean that such members are unable to caucus with members of the political parties. Members can also switch parties at any time, although this is quite uncommon. Article One of the United States Constitution states, "All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives." The House and Senate are equal partners in

1340-410: A positive or negative power. It can also be combined with other unit symbols to form compound unit symbols. For example, g/cm is an SI unit of density , where cm is to be interpreted as ( cm ) . Prefixes are added to unit names to produce multiples and submultiples of the original unit. All of these are integer powers of ten, and above a hundred or below a hundredth all are integer powers of

1474-444: A powerful effect of waking up a somewhat dormant Congress which investigated presidential wrongdoing and coverups; the scandal "substantially reshaped" relations between the branches of government, suggested political scientist Bruce J. Schulman . Partisanship returned, particularly after 1994; one analyst attributes partisan infighting to slim congressional majorities which discouraged friendly social gatherings in meeting rooms such as

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1608-524: A revised constitution with a two-chamber or bicameral Congress. Smaller states argued for equal representation for each state. The two-chamber structure had functioned well in state governments. A compromise plan, the Connecticut Compromise , was adopted with representatives chosen by population (benefiting larger states) and exactly two senators chosen by state governments (benefiting smaller states). The ratified constitution created

1742-539: A specification for units of measurement. The International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM) has described SI as "the modern form of metric system". In 1971 the mole became the seventh base unit of the SI. After the metre was redefined in 1960, the International Prototype of the Kilogram (IPK) was the only physical artefact upon which base units (directly the kilogram and indirectly

1876-634: A state's at-large representation to the federal government by senators. Most incumbents seek re-election, and their historical likelihood of winning subsequent elections exceeds 90 percent. The historical records of the House of Representatives and the Senate are maintained by the Center for Legislative Archives, which is a part of the National Archives and Records Administration . Congress

2010-411: A thousand. For example, kilo- denotes a multiple of a thousand and milli- denotes a multiple of a thousandth, so there are one thousand millimetres to the metre and one thousand metres to the kilometre. The prefixes are never combined, so for example a millionth of a metre is a micrometre , not a millimillimetre . Multiples of the kilogram are named as if the gram were the base unit, so a millionth of

2144-613: A version of the CGPM document (NIST SP 330) which clarifies usage for English-language publications that use American English . The concept of a system of units emerged a hundred years before the SI. In the 1860s, James Clerk Maxwell , William Thomson (later Lord Kelvin), and others working under the auspices of the British Association for the Advancement of Science , building on previous work of Carl Gauss , developed

2278-445: A weight measurement to a mass and therefore require precise measurement of the strength of gravity in laboratories ( gravimetry ). All approaches would have precisely fixed one or more constants of nature at a defined value. Because an SI unit may not have multiple prefixes (see SI prefix ), prefixes are added to gram , rather than the base unit kilogram , which already has a prefix as part of its name. For instance, one-millionth of

2412-421: A wide range. For example, driving distances are normally given in kilometres (symbol km ) rather than in metres. Here the metric prefix ' kilo- ' (symbol 'k') stands for a factor of 1000; thus, 1 km = 1000 m . The SI provides twenty-four metric prefixes that signify decimal powers ranging from 10 to 10 , the most recent being adopted in 2022. Most prefixes correspond to integer powers of 1000;

2546-609: A written specification. At the 94th Meeting of the CIPM in 2005, it was recommended that the same be done with the kilogram. In October 2010, the CIPM voted to submit a resolution for consideration at the General Conference on Weights and Measures (CGPM), to "take note of an intention" that the kilogram be defined in terms of the Planck constant , h (which has dimensions of energy times time, thus mass × length / time) together with other physical constants. This resolution

2680-482: Is a decimal and metric system of units established in 1960 and periodically updated since then. The SI has an official status in most countries, including the United States , Canada , and the United Kingdom , although these three countries are among the handful of nations that, to various degrees, also continue to use their customary systems. Nevertheless, with this nearly universal level of acceptance,

2814-766: Is an accepted version of this page Minority (49) Minority (212) Vacant (3) [REDACTED] [REDACTED] The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States . It is bicameral , composed of a lower body, the United States House of Representatives , and an upper body, the United States Senate . It meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. Members are chosen through direct election , though vacancies in

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2948-651: Is described as "a common informal name" on Russ Rowlett's Dictionary of Units of Measurement. When the United States Congress gave the metric system legal status in 1866, it permitted the use of the word kilo as an alternative to the word kilogram , but in 1990 revoked the status of the word kilo . The SI system was introduced in 1960 and in 1970 the BIPM started publishing the SI Brochure , which contains all relevant decisions and recommendations by

3082-693: Is directly responsible for the governing of the District of Columbia , the current seat of the federal government. The First Continental Congress was a gathering of representatives from twelve of the Thirteen Colonies . On July 4, 1776, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence , referring to the new nation as the "United States of America". The Articles of Confederation in 1781 created

3216-440: Is elected and gives each House the power to create its own structure. Section Seven lays out the process for creating laws, and Section Eight enumerates numerous powers. Section Nine is a list of powers Congress does not have, and Section Ten enumerates powers of the state, some of which may only be granted by Congress. Constitutional amendments have granted Congress additional powers. Congress also has implied powers derived from

3350-493: Is essentially charged with reconciling our many points of view on the great public policy issues of the day. Congress is constantly changing and is constantly in flux. In recent times, the American South and West have gained House seats according to demographic changes recorded by the census and includes more women and minorities . While power balances among the different parts of government continue to change,

3484-433: Is extraordinarily sensitive to public pressure. Several academics described Congress: Congress reflects us in all our strengths and all our weaknesses. It reflects our regional idiosyncrasies, our ethnic, religious, and racial diversity, our multitude of professions, and our shadings of opinion on everything from the value of war to the war over values. Congress is the government's most representative body   ... Congress

3618-515: Is generally consistent with previous definitions: the mass remains within 30 ppm of the mass of one litre of water. The kilogram is the only base SI unit with an SI prefix ( kilo ) as part of its name. The word kilogramme or kilogram is derived from the French kilogramme , which itself was a learned coinage, prefixing the Greek stem of χίλιοι khilioi "a thousand" to gramma ,

3752-464: Is important not to use the unit alone to specify the quantity. As the SI Brochure states, "this applies not only to technical texts, but also, for example, to measuring instruments (i.e. the instrument read-out needs to indicate both the unit and the quantity measured)". Furthermore, the same coherent SI unit may be a base unit in one context, but a coherent derived unit in another. For example,

3886-556: Is not coherent. The principle of coherence was successfully used to define a number of units of measure based on the CGS, including the erg for energy , the dyne for force , the barye for pressure , the poise for dynamic viscosity and the stokes for kinematic viscosity . A French-inspired initiative for international cooperation in metrology led to the signing in 1875 of the Metre Convention , also called Treaty of

4020-410: Is not fundamental or even unique – it is a matter of convention. The system allows for an unlimited number of additional units, called derived units , which can always be represented as products of powers of the base units, possibly with a nontrivial numeric multiplier. When that multiplier is one, the unit is called a coherent derived unit. For example, the coherent derived SI unit of velocity

4154-530: Is not the only way in which a base unit can be determined: the SI Brochure states that "any method consistent with the laws of physics could be used to realise any SI unit". Various consultative committees of the CIPM decided in 2016 that more than one mise en pratique would be developed for determining the value of each unit. These methods include the following: The International System of Units, or SI,

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4288-468: Is otherwise identical to the SI Brochure. For example, since 1979, the litre may exceptionally be written using either an uppercase "L" or a lowercase "l", a decision prompted by the similarity of the lowercase letter "l" to the numeral "1", especially with certain typefaces or English-style handwriting. The American NIST recommends that within the United States "L" be used rather than "l". Metrologists carefully distinguish between

4422-532: Is required before an impeached person can be removed from office. The term Congress can also refer to a particular meeting of the legislature. A Congress covers two years; the current one, the 118th Congress , began on January 3, 2023, and will end on January 3, 2025. Since the adoption of the Twentieth Amendment to the United States Constitution , the Congress has started and ended at noon on

4556-427: Is the metre per second , with the symbol m/s . The base and coherent derived units of the SI together form a coherent system of units ( the set of coherent SI units ). A useful property of a coherent system is that when the numerical values of physical quantities are expressed in terms of the units of the system, then the equations between the numerical values have exactly the same form, including numerical factors, as

4690-424: Is the inverse of electrical resistance , with the consequence that the siemens is the inverse of the ohm, and similarly, the ohm and siemens can be replaced with a ratio of an ampere and a volt, because those quantities bear a defined relationship to each other. Other useful derived quantities can be specified in terms of the SI base and derived units that have no named units in the SI, such as acceleration, which has

4824-529: The tabloidization of media coverage. Others saw pressure to squeeze a political position into a thirty-second soundbite. A report characterized Congress in 2013 as unproductive, gridlocked, and "setting records for futility". In October 2013, with Congress unable to compromise, the government was shut down for several weeks and risked a serious default on debt payments, causing 60% of the public to say they would "fire every member of Congress" including their own representative. One report suggested Congress posed

4958-544: The Board of Education . Congress began reasserting its authority. Lobbying became a big factor despite the 1971 Federal Election Campaign Act . Political action committees or PACs could make substantive donations to congressional candidates via such means as soft money contributions. While soft money funds were not given to specific campaigns for candidates, the money often benefited candidates substantially in an indirect way and helped reelect candidates. Reforms such as

5092-524: The CGPM concerning units. The SI Brochure states that "It is not permissible to use abbreviations for unit symbols or unit names ...". For use with east Asian character sets, the SI symbol is encoded as a single Unicode character, U+338F ㎏ SQUARE KG in the CJK Compatibility block. The replacement of the International Prototype of the Kilogram (IPK) as the primary standard

5226-541: The Commerce Clause , the enumerated power to regulate commerce, in rulings such as McCulloch v. Maryland , have effectively widened the scope of Congress's legislative authority far beyond that prescribed in Section Eight. Constitutional responsibility for the oversight of Washington, D.C. , the federal district and national capital, and the U.S. territories of Guam , American Samoa , Puerto Rico ,

5360-650: The Congress of the Confederation in its legislative function. Although not legally mandated, in practice since the 19th century, members of Congress are typically affiliated with one of the two major parties , the Democratic Party or the Republican Party , and only rarely with a third party or independents affiliated with no party. In the case of the latter, the lack of affiliation with

5494-469: The Congress of the Confederation , a unicameral body with equal representation among the states in which each state had a veto over most decisions. Congress had executive but not legislative authority, and the federal judiciary was confined to admiralty and lacked authority to collect taxes, regulate commerce, or enforce laws. Government powerlessness led to the Convention of 1787 which proposed

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5628-609: The Conservative Coalition . Democrats maintained control of Congress during World War II . Congress struggled with efficiency in the postwar era partly by reducing the number of standing congressional committees. Southern Democrats became a powerful force in many influential committees although political power alternated between Republicans and Democrats during these years. More complex issues required greater specialization and expertise, such as space flight and atomic energy policy. Senator Joseph McCarthy exploited

5762-432: The General Conference on Weights and Measures (CGPM) is: The kilogram, symbol kg, is the SI unit of mass. It is defined by taking the fixed numerical value of the Planck constant h to be 6.626 070 15 × 10 when expressed in the unit J⋅s, which is equal to kg⋅m⋅s, where the metre and the second are defined in terms of c and Δ ν Cs . Defined in term of those units, the kg is formulated as: This definition

5896-534: The ISO/IEC 80000 series of standards, which define the International System of Quantities (ISQ), specifies base and derived quantities that necessarily have the corresponding SI units. Many non-SI units continue to be used in the scientific, technical, and commercial literature. Some units are deeply embedded in history and culture, and their use has not been entirely replaced by their SI alternatives. The CIPM recognised and acknowledged such traditions by compiling

6030-523: The Northern Mariana Islands . These six members of Congress enjoy floor privileges to introduce bills and resolutions, and in recent Congresses they vote in permanent and select committees, in party caucuses and in joint conferences with the Senate. They have Capitol Hill offices, staff and two annual appointments to each of the four military academies. While their votes are constitutional when Congress authorizes their House Committee of

6164-408: The U.S. census results, provided that each state has at least one congressional representative. Each senator is elected at-large in their state for a six-year term, with terms staggered , so every two years approximately one-third of the Senate is up for election. Each state, regardless of population or size, has two senators, so currently, there are 100 senators for the 50 states. Article One of

6298-399: The centimetre–gram–second system of units or cgs system in 1874. The systems formalised the concept of a collection of related units called a coherent system of units. In a coherent system, base units combine to define derived units without extra factors. For example, using meters per second is coherent in a system that uses meter for length and seconds for time, but kilometre per hour

6432-449: The second-wave feminism movement , when activists moved into electoral politics. Beginning in the 1970s, donors and political action committees like EMILY's List began recruiting, training and funding women candidates. Watershed political moments like the confirmation of Clarence Thomas and the 2016 presidential election created momentum for women candidates, resulting in the Year of

6566-620: The speed of light in vacuum c , the hyperfine transition frequency of caesium Δ ν Cs , the Planck constant h , the elementary charge e , the Boltzmann constant k , the Avogadro constant N A , and the luminous efficacy K cd . The nature of the defining constants ranges from fundamental constants of nature such as c to the purely technical constant K cd . The values assigned to these constants were fixed to ensure continuity with previous definitions of

6700-419: The sverdrup and the darcy that exist outside of any system of units. Most of the units of the other metric systems are not recognised by the SI. Sometimes, SI unit name variations are introduced, mixing information about the corresponding physical quantity or the conditions of its measurement; however, this practice is unacceptable with the SI. "Unacceptability of mixing information with units: When one gives

6834-484: The "biggest risk to the U.S. economy" because of its brinksmanship , "down-to-the-wire budget and debt crises" and "indiscriminate spending cuts", resulting in slowed economic activity and keeping up to two million people unemployed. There has been increasing public dissatisfaction with Congress, with extremely low approval ratings which dropped to 5% in October 2013. In 2009, Congress authorized another delegate for

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6968-439: The 1960s opened the possibility for Black, Asian American, Latina and other non-white women candidates to run for Congress. Racially polarized voting, racial stereotypes and lack of institutional support still prevent women of color from reaching Congress as easily as white people . Senate elections, which require victories in statewide electorates, have been particularly difficult for women of color. Carol Moseley Braun became

7102-790: The 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act limited campaign donations but did not limit soft money contributions. One source suggests post-Watergate laws amended in 1974 meant to reduce the "influence of wealthy contributors and end payoffs" instead "legitimized PACs" since they "enabled individuals to band together in support of candidates". From 1974 to 1984, PACs grew from 608 to 3,803 and donations leaped from $ 12.5   million to $ 120   million along with concern over PAC influence in Congress. In 2009, there were 4,600 business, labor and special-interest PACs including ones for lawyers , electricians , and real estate brokers . From 2007 to 2008, 175 members of Congress received "half or more of their campaign cash" from PACs. From 1970 to 2009,

7236-574: The American response as a "police action". According to Time magazine in 1970, "U.S. presidents [had] ordered troops into position or action without a formal congressional declaration a total of 149 times." In 1993, Michael Kinsley wrote that "Congress's war power has become the most flagrantly disregarded provision in the Constitution," and that the "real erosion [of Congress's war power] began after World War   II." Disagreement about

7370-500: The BIPM publishes a mises en pratique , ( French for 'putting into practice; implementation', ) describing the current best practical realisations of the unit. The separation of the defining constants from the definitions of units means that improved measurements can be developed leading to changes in the mises en pratique as science and technology develop, without having to revise the definitions. The published mise en pratique

7504-462: The Constitution's Necessary and Proper Clause . Congress has authority over financial and budgetary policy through the enumerated power to "lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States". There is vast authority over budgets, although analyst Eric Patashnik suggested that much of Congress's power to manage

7638-604: The Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof". Article Four gives Congress the power to admit new states into the Union. One of Congress's foremost non-legislative functions is the power to investigate and oversee the executive branch. Congressional oversight is usually delegated to committees and is facilitated by Congress's subpoena power. Some critics have charged that Congress has in some instances failed to do an adequate job of overseeing

7772-546: The House expanded delegates, along with their powers and privileges representing U.S. citizens in non-state areas, beginning with representation on committees for Puerto Rico's resident commissioner in 1970. In 1971, a delegate for the District of Columbia was authorized, and in 1972 new delegate positions were established for U.S. Virgin Islands and Guam . In 1978, an additional delegate for American Samoa were added. In

7906-510: The House of Representatives are elected for the two-year term of a Congress. The Reapportionment Act of 1929 established that there be 435 representatives, and the Uniform Congressional Redistricting Act requires that they be elected from single-member constituencies or districts . It is also required that the congressional districts be apportioned among states by population every ten years using

8040-477: The House of Representatives have equal legislative authority, although only the House may originate revenue and appropriation bills . Congress has an important role in national defense , including the exclusive power to declare war, to raise and maintain the armed forces , and to make rules for the military. Some critics charge that the executive branch has usurped Congress's constitutionally defined task of declaring war. While historically presidents initiated

8174-463: The IPK from 1889 to 2019. In 1960, the metre , previously similarly having been defined with reference to a single platinum-iridium bar with two marks on it, was redefined in terms of an invariant physical constant (the wavelength of a particular emission of light emitted by krypton , and later the speed of light ) so that the standard can be independently reproduced in different laboratories by following

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8308-429: The IPK. During extraordinary verifications carried out in 2014 preparatory to redefinition of metric standards, continuing divergence was not confirmed. Nonetheless, the residual and irreducible instability of a physical IPK undermined the reliability of the entire metric system to precision measurement from small (atomic) to large (astrophysical) scales. By avoiding the use of an artefact to define units, all issues with

8442-606: The International Committee for Weights and Measures (CIPM ), and the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM ). All the decisions and recommendations concerning units are collected in a brochure called The International System of Units (SI) , which is published in French and English by the BIPM and periodically updated. The writing and maintenance of the brochure is carried out by one of

8576-625: The Jeffersonian Republican Party and began the era of the First Party System . In 1800, Thomas Jefferson 's election to the presidency marked a peaceful transition of power between the parties. John Marshall , 4th chief justice of the Supreme Court , empowered the courts by establishing the principle of judicial review in law in the landmark case Marbury v. Madison in 1803, effectively giving

8710-483: The Metre Convention". This working document was Practical system of units of measurement . Based on this study, the 10th CGPM in 1954 defined an international system derived six base units: the metre, kilogram, second, ampere, degree Kelvin, and candela. The 9th CGPM also approved the first formal recommendation for the writing of symbols in the metric system when the basis of the rules as they are now known

8844-475: The Metre, by 17 nations. The General Conference on Weights and Measures (French: Conférence générale des poids et mesures – CGPM), which was established by the Metre Convention, brought together many international organisations to establish the definitions and standards of a new system and to standardise the rules for writing and presenting measurements. Initially the convention only covered standards for

8978-533: The Planck constant. A properly equipped metrology laboratory can calibrate a mass measurement instrument such as a Kibble balance as a primary standard for the kilogram mass. The kilogram was originally defined in 1795 during the French Revolution as the mass of one litre of water . The current definition of a kilogram agrees with this original definition to within 30 parts per million . In 1799,

9112-402: The SI "has been used around the world as the preferred system of units, the basic language for science, technology, industry, and trade." The only other types of measurement system that still have widespread use across the world are the imperial and US customary measurement systems . The international yard and pound are defined in terms of the SI. The quantities and equations that provide

9246-509: The SI Brochure notes that the name of the unit with the symbol °C is correctly spelled as 'degree Celsius ': the first letter of the name of the unit, 'd', is in lowercase, while the modifier 'Celsius' is capitalised because it is a proper name. The English spelling and even names for certain SI units and metric prefixes depend on the variety of English used. US English uses the spelling deka- , meter , and liter , and International English uses deca- , metre , and litre . The name of

9380-455: The SI unit m/s . A combination of base and derived units may be used to express a derived unit. For example, the SI unit of force is the newton (N), the SI unit of pressure is the pascal (Pa) – and the pascal can be defined as one newton per square metre (N/m ). Like all metric systems, the SI uses metric prefixes to systematically construct, for the same physical quantity, a set of units that are decimal multiples of each other over

9514-430: The SI units. The ISQ is formalised, in part, in the international standard ISO/IEC 80000 , which was completed in 2009 with the publication of ISO 80000-1 , and has largely been revised in 2019–2020. The SI is regulated and continually developed by three international organisations that were established in 1875 under the terms of the Metre Convention . They are the General Conference on Weights and Measures (CGPM ),

9648-464: The Senate may be filled by a governor 's appointment. Congress has 535 voting members: 100 senators and 435 representatives. The vice president of the United States , as President of the Senate, has a vote in the Senate only when there is a tie. The House of Representatives has six non-voting members . Congress convenes for a two-year term , commencing every other January. Elections are held every even-numbered year on Election Day . The members of

9782-635: The Supreme Court a power to nullify congressional legislation. The Civil War , which lasted from 1861 to 1865, which resolved the slavery issue and unified the nation under federal authority but weakened the power of states' rights . The Gilded Age (1877–1901) was marked by Republican dominance of Congress. During this time, lobbying activity became more intense, particularly during the administration of President Ulysses S. Grant in which influential lobbies advocated for railroad subsidies and tariffs on wool. Immigration and high birth rates swelled

9916-449: The U.S. Constitution requires that members of Congress be at least 25 years old for the House and at least 30 years old for the U.S. Senate, be a U.S. citizen for seven years for the House and nine years for the Senate, and be an inhabitant of the state which they represent. Members in both chambers may stand for re-election an unlimited number of times. The Congress was created by the U.S. Constitution and first met in 1789, replacing

10050-554: The White House a little more in favor of the executive branch", according to one account. Past presidents, including Ronald Reagan , George H. W. Bush , Bill Clinton , and George W. Bush , have made public statements when signing congressional legislation about how they understand a bill or plan to execute it, and commentators, including the American Bar Association , have described this practice as against

10184-504: The Whole votes, recent Congresses have not allowed for that, and they cannot vote when the House is meeting as the House of Representatives. On January 6, 2021, the Congress gathered to confirm the election of Joe Biden, when supporters of the outgoing president Donald Trump attacked the building . The session of Congress ended prematurely, and Congress representatives evacuated. Trump supporters occupied Congress until D.C police evacuated

10318-552: The Woman and the election of members of The Squad , respectively. Women of color faced additional challenges that made their ascension to Congress even more difficult. Jim Crow laws , voter suppression and other forms of structural racism made it virtually impossible for women of color to reach Congress prior to 1965. The passage of the Voting Rights Act that year , and the elimination of race-based immigration laws in

10452-521: The ampere is a base unit when it is a unit of electric current, but a coherent derived unit when it is a unit of magnetomotive force. According to the SI Brochure, unit names should be treated as common nouns of the context language. This means that they should be typeset in the same character set as other common nouns (e.g. Latin alphabet in English, Cyrillic script in Russian, etc.), following

10586-428: The ampere, mole and candela) depended for their definition, making these units subject to periodic comparisons of national standard kilograms with the IPK. During the 2nd and 3rd Periodic Verification of National Prototypes of the Kilogram, a significant divergence had occurred between the mass of the IPK and all of its official copies stored around the world: the copies had all noticeably increased in mass with respect to

10720-662: The area. The event was the first time since the Burning of Washington by the British during the War of 1812 that the United States Congress was forcefully occupied. Various social and structural barriers have prevented women from gaining seats in Congress. In the early 20th century, women's domestic roles and the inability to vote forestalled opportunities to run for and hold public office. The two party system and

10854-515: The base units. The SI selects seven units to serve as base units , corresponding to seven base physical quantities. They are the second , with the symbol s , which is the SI unit of the physical quantity of time ; the metre , symbol m , the SI unit of length ; kilogram ( kg , the unit of mass ); ampere ( A , electric current ); kelvin ( K , thermodynamic temperature ); mole ( mol , amount of substance ); and candela ( cd , luminous intensity ). The base units are defined in terms of

10988-445: The base units. After the redefinition, the SI is defined by fixing the numerical values of seven defining constants. This has the effect that the distinction between the base units and derived units is, in principle, not needed, since all units, base as well as derived, may be constructed directly from the defining constants. Nevertheless, the distinction is retained because "it is useful and historically well established", and also because

11122-416: The base units. Twenty-two coherent derived units have been provided with special names and symbols. The seven base units and the 22 coherent derived units with special names and symbols may be used in combination to express other coherent derived units. Since the sizes of coherent units will be convenient for only some applications and not for others, the SI provides twenty-four prefixes which, when added to

11256-417: The budget has been lost when the welfare state expanded since "entitlements were institutionally detached from Congress's ordinary legislative routine and rhythm." Another factor leading to less control over the budget was a Keynesian belief that balanced budgets were unnecessary. The Sixteenth Amendment in 1913 extended congressional power of taxation to include income taxes without apportionment among

11390-401: The coherent set and the multiples and sub-multiples of coherent units formed by using the SI prefixes. The kilogram is the only coherent SI unit whose name and symbol include a prefix. For historical reasons, the names and symbols for multiples and sub-multiples of the unit of mass are formed as if the gram were the base unit. Prefix names and symbols are attached to the unit name gram and

11524-416: The committees of the CIPM. The definitions of the terms "quantity", "unit", "dimension", etc. that are used in the SI Brochure are those given in the international vocabulary of metrology . The brochure leaves some scope for local variations, particularly regarding unit names and terms in different languages. For example, the United States' National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has produced

11658-485: The context in which the SI units are defined are now referred to as the International System of Quantities (ISQ). The ISQ is based on the quantities underlying each of the seven base units of the SI . Other quantities, such as area , pressure , and electrical resistance , are derived from these base quantities by clear, non-contradictory equations. The ISQ defines the quantities that are measured with

11792-595: The corresponding equations between the physical quantities. Twenty-two coherent derived units have been provided with special names and symbols as shown in the table below. The radian and steradian have no base units but are treated as derived units for historical reasons. The derived units in the SI are formed by powers, products, or quotients of the base units and are unlimited in number. Derived units apply to some derived quantities , which may by definition be expressed in terms of base quantities , and thus are not independent; for example, electrical conductance

11926-468: The decree of 1795, the term gramme thus replaced gravet , and kilogramme replaced grave . The French spelling was adopted in Great Britain when the word was used for the first time in English in 1795, with the spelling kilogram being adopted in the United States. In the United Kingdom both spellings are used, with "kilogram" having become by far the more common. UK law regulating

12060-448: The defining constants. For example, the kilogram is defined by taking the Planck constant h to be 6.626 070 15 × 10  J⋅s , giving the expression in terms of the defining constants All units in the SI can be expressed in terms of the base units, and the base units serve as a preferred set for expressing or analysing the relationships between units. The choice of which and even how many quantities to use as base quantities

12194-410: The definition of a unit and its realisation. The SI units are defined by declaring that seven defining constants have certain exact numerical values when expressed in terms of their SI units. The realisation of the definition of a unit is the procedure by which the definition may be used to establish the value and associated uncertainty of a quantity of the same kind as the unit. For each base unit

12328-403: The definitions. A consequence is that as science and technologies develop, new and superior realisations may be introduced without the need to redefine the unit. One problem with artefacts is that they can be lost, damaged, or changed; another is that they introduce uncertainties that cannot be reduced by advancements in science and technology. The original motivation for the development of the SI

12462-517: The development of the CGS system. The International System of Units consists of a set of defining constants with corresponding base units, derived units, and a set of decimal-based multipliers that are used as prefixes. The seven defining constants are the most fundamental feature of the definition of the system of units. The magnitudes of all SI units are defined by declaring that seven constants have certain exact numerical values when expressed in terms of their SI units. These defining constants are

12596-612: The early years as political parties became pronounced. With the passage of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights , the anti-federalist movement was exhausted. Some activists joined the Anti-Administration Party that James Madison and Thomas Jefferson were forming about 1790–1791 to oppose policies of Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton ; it soon became the Democratic-Republican Party or

12730-487: The electorate. Lame duck reforms according to the Twentieth Amendment reduced the power of defeated and retiring members of Congress to wield influence despite their lack of accountability. The Great Depression ushered in President Franklin Roosevelt and strong control by Democrats and historic New Deal policies. Roosevelt 's election in 1932 marked a shift in government power towards

12864-537: The electrical units in terms of length, mass, and time using dimensional analysis was beset with difficulties – the dimensions depended on whether one used the ESU or EMU systems. This anomaly was resolved in 1901 when Giovanni Giorgi published a paper in which he advocated using a fourth base unit alongside the existing three base units. The fourth unit could be chosen to be electric current , voltage , or electrical resistance . Electric current with named unit 'ampere'

12998-439: The exception of the kilogram (for which the prefix kilo- is required for a coherent unit), when prefixes are used with the coherent SI units, the resulting units are no longer coherent, because the prefix introduces a numerical factor other than one. For example, the metre, kilometre, centimetre, nanometre, etc. are all SI units of length, though only the metre is a coherent SI unit. The complete set of SI units consists of both

13132-425: The exclusive power of removal , allowing impeachment and removal of the president, federal judges and other federal officers. There have been charges that presidents acting under the doctrine of the unitary executive have assumed important legislative and budgetary powers that should belong to Congress. So-called signing statements are one way in which a president can "tip the balance of power between Congress and

13266-595: The executive branch. Numerous New Deal initiatives came from the White House rather initiated by Congress. President Roosevelt pushed his agenda in Congress by detailing Executive Branch staff to friendly Senate committees (a practice that ended with the Legislative Reorganization Act of 1946). The Democratic Party controlled both houses of Congress for many years. During this time, Republicans and conservative southern Democrats formed

13400-463: The extent of congressional versus presidential power regarding war has been present periodically throughout the nation's history. Congress can establish post offices and post roads, issue patents and copyrights , fix standards of weights and measures, establish Courts inferior to the Supreme Court , and "make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in

13534-564: The fear of communism during the Second Red Scare and conducted televised hearings. In 1960, Democratic candidate John F. Kennedy narrowly won the presidency and power shifted again to the Democrats who dominated both chambers of Congress from 1961 to 1980, and retained a consistent majority in the House from 1955 to 1994. Congress enacted Johnson's Great Society program to fight poverty and hunger. The Watergate Scandal had

13668-412: The first woman of color to reach the Senate in 1993. The second, Mazie Hirono , won in 2013. In 2021, Kamala Harris became the first female President of the Senate , which came with her role as the first female Vice President of the United States . Article One of the Constitution creates and sets forth the structure and most of the powers of Congress. Sections One through Six describe how Congress

13802-402: The internal structure of Congress is important to understand along with its interactions with so-called intermediary institutions such as political parties , civic associations , interest groups , and the mass media . The Congress of the United States serves two distinct purposes that overlap: local representation to the federal government of a congressional district by representatives and

13936-486: The lack of term limits favored incumbent white men, making the widow's succession – in which a woman temporarily took over a seat vacated by the death of her husband – the most common path to Congress for white women. Women candidates began making substantial inroads in the later 20th century, due in part to new political support mechanisms and public awareness of their underrepresentation in Congress. Recruitment and financial support for women candidates were rare until

14070-430: The late 20th century, the media became more important in Congress's work. Analyst Michael Schudson suggested that greater publicity undermined the power of political parties and caused "more roads to open up in Congress for individual representatives to influence decisions". Norman Ornstein suggested that media prominence led to a greater emphasis on the negative and sensational side of Congress, and referred to this as

14204-488: The law. Generally militia forces are controlled by state governments, not Congress. Congress also has implied powers deriving from the Constitution's Necessary and Proper Clause which permit Congress to "make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof". Broad interpretations of this clause and of

14338-408: The legislative process – legislation cannot be enacted without the consent of both chambers. The Constitution grants each chamber some unique powers. The Senate ratifies treaties and approves presidential appointments while the House initiates revenue -raising bills. The House initiates impeachment cases, while the Senate decides impeachment cases. A two-thirds vote of the Senate

14472-441: The legislature since there were two separate chambers. The new government became active in 1789. Political scientist Julian E. Zelizer suggested there were four main congressional eras, with considerable overlap, and included the formative era (1780s–1820s), the partisan era (1830s–1900s), the committee era (1910s–1960s), and the contemporary era (1970–present). Federalists and anti-federalists jostled for power in

14606-499: The loss, damage, and change of the artefact are avoided. A proposal was made that: The new definitions were adopted at the 26th CGPM on 16 November 2018, and came into effect on 20 May 2019. The change was adopted by the European Union through Directive (EU) 2019/1258. Prior to its redefinition in 2019, the SI was defined through the seven base units from which the derived units were constructed as products of powers of

14740-582: The metre and the kilogram. This became the foundation of the MKS system of units. At the close of the 19th century three different systems of units of measure existed for electrical measurements: a CGS-based system for electrostatic units , also known as the Gaussian or ESU system, a CGS-based system for electromechanical units (EMU), and an International system based on units defined by the Metre Convention for electrical distribution systems. Attempts to resolve

14874-431: The name and symbol of a coherent unit produce twenty-four additional (non-coherent) SI units for the same quantity; these non-coherent units are always decimal (i.e. power-of-ten) multiples and sub-multiples of the coherent unit. The current way of defining the SI is a result of a decades-long move towards increasingly abstract and idealised formulation in which the realisations of the units are separated conceptually from

15008-453: The only ones that do not are those for 10, 1/10, 100, and 1/100. The conversion between different SI units for one and the same physical quantity is always through a power of ten. This is why the SI (and metric systems more generally) are called decimal systems of measurement units . The grouping formed by a prefix symbol attached to a unit symbol (e.g. ' km ', ' cm ') constitutes a new inseparable unit symbol. This new symbol can be raised to

15142-584: The other branches of government. In the Plame affair , critics including Representative Henry A. Waxman charged that Congress was not doing an adequate job of oversight in this case. There have been concerns about congressional oversight of executive actions such as warrantless wiretapping , although others respond that Congress did investigate the legality of presidential decisions. Political scientists Ornstein and Mann suggested that oversight functions do not help members of Congress win reelection. Congress also has

15276-429: The platinum Kilogramme des Archives replaced it as the standard of mass. In 1889, a cylinder composed of platinum–iridium , the International Prototype of the Kilogram (IPK), became the standard of the unit of mass for the metric system and remained so for 130 years, before the current standard was adopted in 2019 . The kilogram is defined in terms of three defining constants: The formal definition according to

15410-597: The process for going to war, they asked for and received formal war declarations from Congress for the War of 1812 , the Mexican–American War , the Spanish–American War , World War I , and World War II , although President Theodore Roosevelt 's military move into Panama in 1903 did not get congressional approval. In the early days after the North Korean invasion of 1950 , President Truman described

15544-486: The quantity symbols, formatting of numbers and the decimal marker, expressing measurement uncertainty, multiplication and division of quantity symbols, and the use of pure numbers and various angles. In the United States, the guideline produced by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) clarifies language-specific details for American English that were left unclear by the SI Brochure, but

15678-703: The ranks of citizens and the nation grew at a rapid pace. The Progressive Era was characterized by strong party leadership in both houses of Congress and calls for reform; sometimes reformers said lobbyists corrupted politics. The position of Speaker of the House became extremely powerful under leaders such as Thomas Reed in 1890 and Joseph Gurney Cannon . By the beginning of the 20th century, party structures and leadership emerged as key organizers of Senate proceedings. A system of seniority, in which long-time members of Congress gained more and more power, encouraged politicians of both parties to seek long terms. Committee chairmen remained influential in both houses until

15812-504: The reforms of the 1970s. Important structural changes included the direct popular election of senators according to the Seventeenth Amendment , ratified on April 8, 1913. Supreme Court decisions based on the Constitution's commerce clause expanded congressional power to regulate the economy. One effect of popular election of senators was to reduce the difference between the House and Senate in terms of their link to

15946-500: The reproducible production of new, kilogram-mass prototypes on demand (albeit with extraordinary effort) using measurement techniques and material properties that are ultimately based on, or traceable to, physical constants. Others were based on devices that measured either the acceleration or weight of hand-tuned kilogram test masses and that expressed their magnitudes in electrical terms via special components that permit traceability to physical constants. All approaches depend on converting

16080-413: The several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration. The Constitution also grants Congress the exclusive power to appropriate funds, and this power of the purse is one of Congress's primary checks on the executive branch. Congress can borrow money on the credit of the United States, regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the states, and coin money. Generally, the Senate and

16214-736: The spirit of the Constitution. There have been concerns that presidential authority to cope with financial crises is eclipsing the power of Congress. In 2008, George F. Will called the Capitol building a "tomb for the antiquated idea that the legislative branch matters". The Constitution enumerates the powers of Congress in detail. In addition, other congressional powers have been granted, or confirmed, by constitutional amendments. The Thirteenth (1865), Fourteenth (1868), and Fifteenth Amendments (1870) gave Congress authority to enact legislation to enforce rights of African Americans, including voting rights , due process , and equal protection under

16348-401: The third day of January of every odd-numbered year. Members of the Senate are referred to as senators; members of the House of Representatives are referred to as representatives, congressmen, or congresswomen. Scholar and representative Lee H. Hamilton asserted that the "historic mission of Congress has been to maintain freedom" and insisted it was a "driving force in American government" and

16482-465: The unit symbol g respectively. For example, 10  kg is written milligram and mg , not microkilogram and μkg . Several different quantities may share the same coherent SI unit. For example, the joule per kelvin (symbol J/K ) is the coherent SI unit for two distinct quantities: heat capacity and entropy ; another example is the ampere, which is the coherent SI unit for both electric current and magnetomotive force . This illustrates why it

16616-560: The unit whose symbol is t and which is defined according to 1 t = 10  kg is 'metric ton' in US English and 'tonne' in International English. Symbols of SI units are intended to be unique and universal, independent of the context language. The SI Brochure has specific rules for writing them. In addition, the SI Brochure provides style conventions for among other aspects of displaying quantities units:

16750-601: The units to be used when trading by weight or measure does not prevent the use of either spelling. In the 19th century the French word kilo , a shortening of kilogramme , was imported into the English language where it has been used to mean both kilogram and kilometre. While kilo as an alternative is acceptable, to The Economist for example, the Canadian government's Termium Plus system states that "SI (International System of Units) usage, followed in scientific and technical writing" does not allow its usage and it

16884-435: The usual grammatical and orthographical rules of the context language. For example, in English and French, even when the unit is named after a person and its symbol begins with a capital letter, the unit name in running text should start with a lowercase letter (e.g., newton, hertz, pascal) and is capitalised only at the beginning of a sentence and in headings and publication titles . As a nontrivial application of this rule,

17018-400: The value of a quantity, any information concerning the quantity or its conditions of measurement must be presented in such a way as not to be associated with the unit." Instances include: " watt-peak " and " watt RMS "; " geopotential metre " and " vertical metre "; " standard cubic metre "; " atomic second ", " ephemeris second ", and " sidereal second ". United States Congress This

17152-508: Was accepted by the 24th conference of the CGPM in October 2011 and further discussed at the 25th conference in 2014. Although the Committee recognised that significant progress had been made, they concluded that the data did not yet appear sufficiently robust to adopt the revised definition, and that work should continue to enable the adoption at the 26th meeting, scheduled for 2018. Such a definition would theoretically permit any apparatus that

17286-409: Was capable of delineating the kilogram in terms of the Planck constant to be used as long as it possessed sufficient precision, accuracy and stability. The Kibble balance is one way to do this. As part of this project, a variety of very different technologies and approaches were considered and explored over many years. Some of these approaches were based on equipment and procedures that would enable

17420-465: Was chosen as the base unit, and the other electrical quantities derived from it according to the laws of physics. When combined with the MKS the new system, known as MKSA, was approved in 1946. In 1948, the 9th CGPM commissioned a study to assess the measurement needs of the scientific, technical, and educational communities and "to make recommendations for a single practical system of units of measurement, suitable for adoption by all countries adhering to

17554-402: Was established by the Metre Convention of 1875, brought together many international organisations to establish the definitions and standards of a new system and to standardise the rules for writing and presenting measurements. The system was published in 1960 as a result of an initiative that began in 1948, and is based on the metre–kilogram–second system of units (MKS) combined with ideas from

17688-464: Was laid down. These rules were subsequently extended and now cover unit symbols and names, prefix symbols and names, how quantity symbols should be written and used, and how the values of quantities should be expressed. The 10th CGPM in 1954 resolved to create an international system of units and in 1960, the 11th CGPM adopted the International System of Units , abbreviated SI from the French name Le Système international d'unités , which included

17822-524: Was motivated by evidence accumulated over a long period of time that the mass of the IPK and its replicas had been changing; the IPK had diverged from its replicas by approximately 50 micrograms since their manufacture late in the 19th century. This led to several competing efforts to develop measurement technology precise enough to warrant replacing the kilogram artefact with a definition based directly on physical fundamental constants. The International Committee for Weights and Measures (CIPM) approved

17956-399: Was the diversity of units that had sprung up within the centimetre–gram–second (CGS) systems (specifically the inconsistency between the systems of electrostatic units and electromagnetic units ) and the lack of coordination between the various disciplines that used them. The General Conference on Weights and Measures (French: Conférence générale des poids et mesures – CGPM), which

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