Bush vs. Gore

For our last research project of the year, I chose to learn about the Supreme Court case of Bush v. Gore in December 2000. I had heard a little about it from earlier years but I had never expected to find this much about the impact it had on our country. If the Supreme Court had ruled differently, Al Gore would have been the president of the United States! What impact would Gore have had if he were to be president? Why did the state of Florida have so much trouble with their ballots? And what the heck is a hanging chad?!? These were all questions I had about my topic and wanted to learn. This was a truly crazy happening in the US and will go down in history as one of the most important Supreme Court case rulings ever.

Our story begins around November during the 2000 election and both George Bush and Al Gore are the republican and democrat candidates running for the presidency. Bush has the citizens votes from the Midwestern states and the Southern states while Gore has the Northeast and the Pacific coast. It was all going to come down to the last states to give their votes to, Florida. Florida's 25 electoral votes would ultimately decide who our president would be and the stress was high on the state to choose. Each day, the media would report a new winner as one candidate gained popularity. Some days they would declare Bush the next president and then the next day they would declare it was too close. Throughout the election, Florida had gotten faulty ballots and messed up chads, the hole punch thing, so recounts were being run in the state. So, the Florida Supreme Court issued a 9,000 ballot recount in the Miami-Dade county, a primarily democratic county. I found the legal summary of the court case here at the Cornell University legal information institute.

Obviously by now the nation was getting word of the Florida recounts and the drama was high. The Florida Supreme Court had rejected the Miami-Dade county recount and decided that a state-wide recount of votes was necessary to get all the kinks out of the hose. George Bush and Dick Cheney imediately filed for an emergency stay on the Florida recount as word got to them that Al Gore was gaining popularity in the state. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Al Gore was all for the recount. I found the day-to-day conflicts of the issue here on US News. So we go to the Supreme Court. I found the actual recording of the trial right here at American Rhetoric Online Speech Bank. After many days, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to go with Bush and Cheney and do not recount the votes in Florida. This would make George W. Bush the next president of the United States. Here is how close the voting was between the two candidates, found on an external link on Wikipedia. The Florida votes on George Bush and Al Gore differed by less than 1%. Before Florida gave their 25 electoral votes to Bush, Al Gore was winning 266 to 246. One electoral college member abstained from voting. Al Gore also had received more votes in the country than Bush and had become the first president to lose the election and win the popular vote.

As we all know, our president from 2000-2008 was George W. Bush and the runner-up, Al Gore, was pegged as the Global Warming guy. One question I came in with before researching was, "What if Al Gore was president?" Obviously no one could really determine this as so many misfortunes struck in the first year of Bush's presidency, like 911. But, I thought it would be humorous to see what the Internet said so I searched it. Here I found a radical democrat's view on how Gore would have done as president on the Huffington Post. Brent Budowsky states that Al Gore could have prevented 911, avoided the war on terror, avoided debt, and clean the Earth as well. These are all hypothetical comments but this writer believes Al Gore would have been the better leader to put it lightly. On the contrary, I stumbled upon a website which actually calls Budowsky out on his opinions here on Redstate.com. Judging by the name, the republican website simply states that coincidence ruined the Bush legacy and maybe he would have been a decent president if it had not been for 911. These were some of the more wound back comments on the 2000 election, and I found it funny to see evryone's thoughts.

So how did this crazy Florida hoopla affect our elections for the future? Well first off, the Supreme court received great criticism for their decision and the case has become an "unspoken case" to many politicians. I found this here on the New York times. The case proves that actual law is more of a guideline when making a nationwide ruling. After the Florida recounts, the Florida Supreme Court issued for electronic voting rather than ballots because for some reason, and this is quoted, "the voters did not understand the ballots". I myself am just glad Alabama did not mess up their voting. We would never be able to live that one down. My tip for upcoming candidates is to not wait for Florida to be your deciding state.

Throughout my researching campaign I learned so much about this election. I thought that this project would be dumb but I had an epiphany and finally saw the light on how much fun this was. The hardest thing about my research was finding credible sources to use, because obviously this topic is open for opinion on the Internet. I don't really have an opinion on the subject, but i believe that the candidate who has the most total votes should win. The Wyoming and Maine votes should count too. The Electoral votes make many votes unseen and I think it is a bad method of picking the next leader of this country. This project made me a lot more politically aware of voting and stuff so thanks Mrs. Lawson!

Research Project

I am doing my research project on the Bush v Gore supreme court case. Here are the the directions! We will sign this contract.

Great Depression Picture

Dorothea Lange. Oklahoma migratory workers washing in a hot spring in the desert. Imperial Valley, California. March 1937. 

I think the photographer, Dorothea Lange, was trying to capture the reality of what the Great Depression caused people to do during desperate times. By reality, I mean that the Great Depression made people almost forget the new technologies and amenities that the 20th century had brought them. These people are bathing in a spring in the desert where they are working, and they may not have running water or a clean place to live because of unemployment and drought. This group of people moved to California from Oklahoma maybe because of the Dust Bowl and had no other choice. This is what some people in the USA faced during this time of financial crisis. It seems as if just when the standard of living was going up for many Americans earlier in the 20's, it all came crashing down during the 30's and things like showers and running water were not something that everyone was able to have anymore.

The 369th Infantry in WWI

The topic that I picked from a hat-thingy was the 369th Infantry. I had one of the last picks, so it is a miracle I received a great topic like this one. While researching, I had a hard time finding a lot of specific information about the Infantry, but with perseverance and the help from Mrs. Lawson, I finally found the information to write a six-paragraph essay! The story of the 369th Infantry is an untold classic which should definitely be made into a movie!!!!!

The 369th Infantry getting there picture taken!!!

The first thing I wanted to know is how this ^ group of African American soldiers were any different form the other 2,000,000 African American soldiers that signed up to fight in WWI. Boy, was I in for a surprise, but I will go into that later. One thing that was true for black soldiers throughout WWI was discrimination. In camps that trained the soldiers, many black soldiers were beaten, like Noble Sissle, who would later become a member of the 369th Infantry and later appear on Broadway!! WOW!!! Another bad time for African American soldiers was when racial tensions rose in Houston, Texas. A group of black soldiers fired on whites after receiving harsh racism. After the tragedy, 17 people died and 64 members of the soldiers were court-martialled. I found it quite interesting that even though the Jim Crow era was over, African Americans could not escape racism anywhere in the US.

In my research, I found that African Americans were not allowed to join the Marines, Coast Guard, or Air Force. They were allowed to join the Navy, but only as mess men. I found this here. If you have clicked on the link and scrolled down, you will find that there was actually a propaganda poster recruiting black men to join the Navy. How many mess men do you need??? I find it crazy that at this time our country was known as the free world and yet we did not allowed some of our own citizens to fight with us. That is mind-blowing to me. Luckily, African Americans were able to fight in the Army and do their part in ending the war in Europe. What I found was that instead of being able to fight alongside there fellow Americans, African American soldiers were sent to fight with the French on the western front. In France, my main men, the 369th Infantry strutted their stuff and showed the world that black men were just as well-trained and qualified to fight in the army.

This was the 369th Infantry insignia

When I read what the 369th Infantry did on the battlefield,  I was shocked that they were humans and not super heroes. While in France, the Infantry never lost one foot of ground AND no members were ever captured!!! This statistic alone would only be heard in a movie, but I promise it is true. The website in the purple letters will tell you all about some of the "Black Rattlers" accomplishments. These soldiers were the first black regiment in WWI, but fought better than any other regiment the US had to offer. When I heard that they were the first Allies to push to the Rhine River, I nearly passed out. If you are still somehow reading this, pinch me because I must be dreaming how these men overcame adversity and still were incredible fighters!!! Just to give a  summary to the feeble-minded, they were discriminated against, went to France, kicked butt. These soldiers were the McCoy (not in relation to the popular youtube video) of toughness and resilience.

Sergeant Henry Johnson in all his glory 

When researching my topic, I found an amazing story that I had to tell all of my readers about. This is for you guys. It was a normal day in the trenches with Sergeant Henry John (^up there^) and private Needham Roberts patrolling the area. All of a sudden, twenty Germans had ambushed them and they were at risk of losing their record of not losing a foot of ground and never being captured. Johnson knew the risk and immediately fired all of his bullets at the attacking forces. When he ran out of bullets, the Germans were still there and were capturing Needham Roberts. Immediately, Johnson freed his fellow troop by using his gun as a baseball bat and with hand-to-hand combat, killed five Germans and sent the rest running. This became known as the Battle of Henry Johnson. On AVL, I found on the smiley face :) that sergeant Johnson, now deceased, would be receiving the Distinguished Service Cross for his bravery in WWI. It took a long time, but finally the US had realized the true greatness of the 369th Infantry's sergeant and troops. 

A parade for the returning Harlem Hellfighters 

The French had given every member of the 369th Infantry the Croix de Guerre, for gallantry under fire. This was the first time an American had received this award. What is so incredible in my findings is that this is the first time I have ever heard of the 369th Infantry. It seems like they should go down in history as the US's greatest fighters, but maybe because of race this is not so well-known. I found in an old New York newspaper here that all of the soldiers were nationally recognized for receiving the Croix de Guerre. It is the least that they could do for such great soldiers. One crazy fact hat I found is that the "Harlem Hellfighters" were credited with being the first people to introduce jazz to Europe!! If your jaw is not dropped right now then you need a reality check because these men are not human. This website over here goes into further detail of there jazz group. This topic was so informative and really opened my eyes up to racism in the 20th century. These men did what heroic acts on a daily basis and helped end WWI. It is amazing how before their awards, they were an old regiment that the US did not want to fight with.

The 369th Infantry's jazz band

Book Source:

9780517550724 - A pictorial history of Black Americans by Langston Hughes 

Indians on the Western Front in France

I watched some footage of Indians on the Western front in France with the British army. I picked this clip because I had no idea that Indians had anything to do with the Great War. One tribe in the clip, the Sikhs, were seen building trenches, operating machine guns, and dancing around. They had their own regiments, but still got to go out into combat like the rest of the soldiers. One thing that the Indians would do a lot in the clip was build things such as periscopes in workshops. They seemed to be doing more manual labor than any other soldiers. The fact that native Americans were helping in the war not only in the shops, but in the battlefield as well as very interesting. http://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/ww1lit/education/pathways/path/kd7bq7/16

Bibliography for Great White Fleet

http://web.ebscohost.com/src/detail?sid=37a2578c-607d-4c42-b54d-08e991a228ee%40sessionmgr110&vid=1&hid=105&bdata=JnNpdGU9c3JjLWxpdmU%3d#db=khh&AN=27523189
http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq42-1.htm
http://web.ebscohost.com/src/detail?sid=88da6b81-3575-4dc3-a308-13caaccba5ec%40sessionmgr110&vid=1&hid=105&bdata=JnNpdGU9c3JjLWxpdmU%3d#db=nfh&AN=2W62W61038004795
http://www.greatwhitefleet.info/

Great White Fleet Day 2

Today I found some great templates for my postcard. For example, I found a picture of the crew jumping off the bow into the water in the Red Sea. It shows the story of the Great White Fleet from the crews perspective and how they joined to go on adventure. I also found the path of the Great White Fleet around the world and where they went. http://www.greatwhitefleet.info/