title: Handgun

text: The inventions of the metallic cartridge and then smokeless powder had allowed for dramatic improvements in handgun ballistics. Standardization and adherence to cartridge standards originating in the black powder cartridge era resulted in cartridge capacity in excess of peak combustion pressure standards. Smokeless powder did not take up as much volume as black powder and cases like the .38 Special and .45 Colt were much larger than 9×19mm and .45 ACP which had similar ballistics respectively. As metallurgy was improved, handloaders began experimenting with loading the .38 Special and .44 Special cartridges with fuller cases of smokeless propellants. By 1929, the ".38-44" cartridge and a large N-framed Smith & Wesson .38/44 revolver chambered for this cartridge was available. By the 1930s, automobiles with heavy steel bodies had become popular and the improved ballistics of more powerful handguns was in demand. Colt had similarly introduced the .38 Super, simply a .38 ACP loaded to higher pressure with more powder. In 1935, Smith and Wesson released the Registered Magnum (later referred to as the Smith & Wesson Model 27) which was the first revolver chambered for .357 Magnum. It was designed as a more powerful handgun for law enforcement officers. The Registered Magnum marked the beginning of the "Magnum Era" of handguns. Notably, Elmer Keith continued to demonstrate and advocate the use of the .44 Special at higher pressures. The high point of the Magnum Era was in 1955 when Smith & Wesson released the Smith & Wesson Model 29 in .44 Magnum. Two decades later the Dirty Harry movies made this gun a cultural icon. The S&W Model 19 was also introduced in 1955, it is a .357 Magnum revolver produced by Smith & Wesson on its K-frame design. The Model 19 is smaller and lighter than the original the S&W Model 27 .357 Magnums. It was made at the behest of retired Assistant Chief Patrol Inspector of the U.S. Border Patrol, famous gunfighter, and noted firearms and shooting skills writer Bill Jordan.


title: Handgun

text: The original Philadelphia Deringer was a single-shot muzzleloading percussion cap pistol introduced in 1852, by Henry Deringer. In total, approximately 15,000 Deringer pistols were manufactured. All were single barrel pistols with back action percussion locks, typically .41 caliber with rifled bores, and walnut stocks. Barrel length varied from 1" to 6", and the hardware was commonly a copper-nickel alloy known as "German silver".


title: Handgun

text: The term derringer () has become a genericized misspelling of the last name of Henry Deringer. Many copies of the original Philadelphia Deringer pistol were made by other gun makers worldwide, and the name was often misspelled; this misspelling soon became an alternative generic term for any pocket pistol, along with the generic phrase palm pistol, which Deringer's competitors invented and used in their advertising. With the advent of metallic cartridges, pistols produced in the modern form are still commonly called "derringers".


title: Handgun

text: Daniel Moore patented a single shot metallic cartridge .38 Rimfire derringer in 1861. These pistols have barrels that pivoted sideways on the frame to allow access to the breech for reloading. Moore would manufacture them until 1865, when he sold out to National Arms Company which produced single shot .41 Rimfire derringers until 1870, when it was acquired by Colt's Patent Firearms Manufacturing Company. Colt continued to produce the .41 Rimfire derringer after the acquisition, as an effort to help break into the metallic-cartridge gun market, but also introduced its own three single shot Colt Derringer Models, all of them also chambered in the .41 Rimfire cartridge. The last model to be in production, the third Colt Derringer, was not dropped until 1912. The third Colt Derringer Model was re-released in the 1950s for western movies, under the name of Fourth Model Colt Deringer.


title: Handgun

text: The Remington Model 95 derringer was one of the first metallic cartridge handguns. Small and easy to use, Remington manufactured more than 150,000 of these over-under, double-barreled derringers from 1866 until the end of their production in 1935. The Remington derringer doubled the capacity of the derringers designed by Daniel Moore, while maintaining a compact size. The Remington Model 95 has achieved such widespread popularity, that it has completely overshadowed its predecessors, becoming synonymous with the word "derringer". The Model 95 was made only in .41 Rimfire. Its barrels pivoted upwards to reload and a cam on the hammer alternated between top and bottom barrels. The .41 Rimfire bullet moved very slowly, at about , around half the speed of a modern .45 ACP. It could be seen in flight, but at very close range, such as at a casino or saloon card table, it could easily kill. There were four models with several variations. The Remington derringer design is still being made; in a variety of calibers from .22 long rifle to .45 Long Colt and .410 gauge, by several manufacturers. The current production of derringers are used by Cowboy Action Shooters as well as a concealed-carry weapon.


title: Handgun

text: While the classic Remington design is a single-action derringer with a hammer and tip-up action, the High Standard D-100 introduced in 1962, is a hammer-less, double-action derringer with a half-trigger-guard and a standard break action design. These double-barrel derringers were chambered for .22 Long Rifle and .22 Magnum and were available in blued, nickel, silver, and gold plated finishes. Although, they were discontinued in 1984, American Derringer would obtain the High Standard design in 1990 and produce a larger .38 Special version. These derringers called the DS22 and DA38 are still being made and are popular concealed carry handguns.


title: Handgun

text: The COP .357 is a modern 4-shot Derringer-type pistol chambered for .357 Magnum. Introduced in 1983, it is a double-action weapon about twice as wide, and substantially heavier than the typical .25 automatic pistol. Still, it is relatively compact size and a powerful cartridge makes it an effective defensive weapon or a police backup gun. The COP .357 is quite robust in design and construction. It is made of solid stainless steel components. Cartridges are loaded into the four separate chambers by sliding a latch that "pops-up" the barrel for loading purposes, similar to top-break shotguns. Each of the four chambers has its own dedicated firing pin. It uses an internal hammer, which is activated by depressing the trigger to hit a ratcheting/rotating striker that in turn strikes one firing pin at a time. Older "pepperboxes" also used multiple barrels, but the barrels were the part that rotated. The COP .357 operates similarly to the Sharps derringer of the 1850s, in that it uses the ratcheting/rotating striker, which is completely internal, to fire each chamber in sequence.


title: Handgun

text: In 1896, Paul Mauser introduced the Mauser C96, the first mass-produced and commercially successful semi-automatic pistol, which uses the recoil energy of one shot to reload the next. The distinctive characteristics of the C96 are the integral 10-round, box magazine in front of the trigger, the long barrel, the wooden shoulder stock which gives it the stability of a short-barreled rifle and doubles as a holster or carrying case, and a unique grip shaped like the handle of a broom. The grip earned the gun the nickname "broomhandle" in the English-speaking world, because of its round wooden handle.


title: Handgun

text: The Pistole Parabellum, also known in the United States as just the Luger, is a toggle-locked recoil-operated semi-automatic pistol produced in several models and by several nations from 1898 to 1948. It was one of the first semi-auto pistols to use a detachable magazine housed in the pistol-grip. The design was first patented by Georg Luger as an improvement upon the Borchardt Automatic Pistol, and was produced as the "Parabellum Automatic Pistol, Borchardt-Luger System" by the German arms manufacturer "Deutsche Waffen und Munitionsfabriken" (DWM). The first production model was known as the "Modell 1900 Parabellum". Later versions included the Pistol Parabellum Model 1908 or P08 which was produced by DWM and other manufacturers. The first Parabellum pistol was adopted by the Swiss army in May 1900. In German Army service, the Parabellum was later adopted in modified form as the Pistol Model 1908 (P08) in caliber 9×19mm Parabellum.


title: Handgun

text: The Colt Model 1911 is a 7+1-round, single-action, semi-automatic, magazine-fed, recoil-operated pistol chambered for the .45 ACP cartridge. It served as the standard-issue sidearm for the United States Armed Forces from 1911 to 1986, however, due to its popularity, it has not been completely phased out. Designed by John Browning, the M1911 is the best-known of his designs to use the short recoil principle in its basic design. The pistol was widely copied, and this operating system rose to become the preeminent type of the 20th century and of nearly all modern centerfire pistols. It is popular with civilian shooters in competitive events such as USPSA, IDPA, International Practical Shooting Confederation, and Bullseye shooting. Compact variants are popular civilian concealed carry weapons in the U.S. because of the design's relatively slim width and stopping power of the .45 ACP cartridge.


title: Handgun

text: The Walther PP ("Polizeipistole", or police pistol) series were introduced in 1929 and are among the world's first successful double action, blowback-operated, semi-automatic pistols developed by the German arms manufacturer Carl Walther GmbH Sportwaffen. They feature exposed hammers, a traditional double-action trigger mechanism, a single-stack 8-round magazine (for .32 ACP version), and a fixed barrel that also acts as the guide rod for the recoil spring. The Walther PP and smaller PPK models were both popular with European police and civilians for being reliable and concealable. They would remain the standard issue police pistol for much of Europe well into the 1970s and 80s. During World War II, they were issued to the German military, including the Luftwaffe.


title: Handgun

text: The Browning Hi Power is a 13+1-round, single-action, semi-automatic handgun available in 9mm. Introduced in 1935, it is based on a design by American firearms inventor John Browning, and completed by Dieudonné Saive at "Fabrique Nationale" (FN) of Herstal, Belgium. Browning died in 1926, several years before the design was finalized. The Hi-Power is one of the most widely used military pistols in history, having been used by over 50 countries' armed forces. The name "Hi Power" alludes to the 13-round magazine capacity, almost twice that of contemporary designs such as the Luger or Colt M1911. The Browning was one of the first pistols to use high capacity, detachable magazines.


title: Handgun

text: The Heckler & Koch VP70 is an 18+1 round, 9×19mm, blowback-operated, double-action-only, select-fire, polymer frame pistol manufactured by German arms firm Heckler & Koch GmbH, introduced in 1970. The VP70 was a revolutionary pistol, introducing the polymer frame, predating the Glock by 12 years. It also uses a spring-loaded striker, instead of a conventional firing pin and has a relatively heavy double-action-only trigger pull. It also uses a high-capacity 18-round magazine, twice as many rounds as the single-column magazine designs of the era, and 5 more rounds than the Browning Hi-Power. In lieu of a blade front sight, the VP70 uses a polished ramp with a central notch in the middle to provide the illusion of a dark front post. Contrary to a common misconception, the VP70 does indeed have a manual safety. It is the circular button located immediately behind the trigger and it is a common crossblock safety. One unique feature of this weapon involved the combination stock/holster for the military version of the VP70. The stock incorporates a selector switch that, when mounted, allows for a three-round-burst mode of fire. Cyclic rate of fire for the burst is 2200 rounds per minute. When not mounted, the stock acts as a holster. VP stands for Volkspistole (literally "People's Pistol"), and the designation 70 was for the first year of production: 1970.


title: Handgun

text: The Smith & Wesson Model 59 was a 14+1-round, semi-automatic pistol introduced in 1971. It was the first standard double-action pistol to use a high-capacity 14-round staggered-magazine. It went out of production a decade later in 1980 when the improved second generation series was introduced (the Model 459). The Model 459 was again improved into the third generation series, the 5904. Stainless steel versions of the second and third generation models were also widely popular, and were designated the Models 659 and 5906, respectively. The original Model 59 was manufactured in 9×19mm Parabellum caliber with a wider anodized aluminum frame (to accommodate a double-stack magazine), a straight backstrap, a magazine disconnect (the pistol will not fire unless a magazine is in place), and a blued carbon steel slide that carries the manual safety. The grip is of three pieces made of two nylon plastic panels joined by a metal backstrap. It uses a magazine release located to the rear of the trigger guard, similar to the Colt M1911.


title: Handgun

text: The Beretta 92 is a 15+1-round, 9mm Parabellum, double-action, semi-automatic pistol introduced in 1975. It has an open slide design, an alloy frame and locking block barrel, originally used on the Walther P38, and previously used on the M1951. The grip angle and the front sight integrated with the slide were also common to earlier Beretta pistols. What may be the Beretta 92's two most important advanced design features had first appeared on its immediate predecessor, the 1974 .380 caliber Model 84. These improvements both involved the magazine, which featured direct feed; that is,


title: Handgun

text: The United States' military replaced the M1911A1 .45 ACP pistol with the Beretta 92FS, designated as the M9 in 1985.


title: Handgun

text: The Glock 17, is a 17+1-round, 9mm Parabellum, polymer–framed, safe-action, short recoil-operated, locked-breech semi-automatic pistol designed and produced by Glock Ges.m.b.H., located in Deutsch-Wagram, Austria. In 1982, the Glock 17 entered the Austrian military and police service after performing the best out of other models in an exhaustive series of reliability and safety tests. Despite initial hesitation from the market to accept a "plastic gun" due to durability and reliability concerns, as well as fears that metal detectors in airports may not detect the polymer frame, Glock pistols have become the company's most profitable line of products, commanding 65% of the market share of handguns for United States law enforcement agencies, as well as supplying numerous national armed forces, security agencies, and police forces in at least 48 countries. Glocks are also popular firearms among civilians for recreational and competition shooting, home and self-defense, and concealed carry or open carry.


title: Handgun

text: The FN Five-seveN, is a 20+1-round, semi-automatic pistol designed and manufactured by Fabrique Nationale d'Armes de Guerre-Herstal (FN Herstal) in Belgium. The Five-seveN pistol was introduced in 1998. It was developed together with the FN P90 personal defense weapon and the FN 5.7×28mm cartridge. Developed as a companion pistol to the P90, the Five-seveN shares many of its design features:


title: Handgun

text: The Five-seveN is currently in service with military and police forces in over 40 nations. In the United States, the Five-seveN is in use with numerous law enforcement agencies, including the U.S. Secret Service. In the years since the pistol's introduction to the civilian market in the United States, it has also become increasingly popular with civilian shooters.


title: Handgun

text: A machine pistol is generally defined as a handgun capable of fully automatic or selective fire. During World War I, the Austrians introduced the world's first machine gun, the Steyr Repetierpistole M1912/P16. The Germans would quickly follow suit with machine gun versions of the Luger P08 "Artillery Pistol" and later models of the Mauser C96. Their light weight, small size, and extremely high rates of fire made machine pistols difficult to control in full-auto. Most machine pistols support a shoulder stock to improve control, like the Heckler & Koch VP70. Others, such as the Beretta 93R also have a forward hand-grip.


title: Handgun

text: Many handguns are easily concealed — a trait that is useful both to civilians wishing to bear arms for self-defense and to criminals wishing to carry a handgun for illegal purposes. For these reasons, handguns are a particular focus of debates on gun politics, and in many jurisdictions handguns fall under specific restrictions.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Ramon del Fierro Magsaysay Sr. (August 31, 1907 – March 17, 1957) was a Filipino statesman who served as the seventh president of the Philippines, from December 30, 1953, until his death in an aircraft disaster on March 17, 1957. An automobile mechanic by profession, Magsaysay was appointed military governor of Zambales after his outstanding service as a guerrilla leader during the Pacific War. He then served two terms as Liberal Party congressman for Zambales's at-large district before being appointed Secretary of National Defense by President Elpidio Quirino. He was elected president under the banner of the Nacionalista Party.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: He was the first Philippine president born in the 20th century and the first to be born after the Spanish colonial era.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Ramon del Fierro Magsaysay, of mixed Tagalog, Ilocano, Spanish, and Chinese descent, was born in Iba, Zambales on August 31, 1907, to Exequiel Magsaysay y de los Santos (April 18, 1874 in San Marcelino, Zambales – January 24, 1969 in Manila), a blacksmith, and Perfecta del Fierro y Quimson (April 18, 1886 in Castillejos, Zambales – May 5, 1981 in Manila), a Chinese mestizo schoolteacher, nurse.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: He spent his grade school life somewhere in Castillejos and his high school life at Zambales Academy in San Narciso, Zambales. After college, Magsaysay entered the University of the Philippines in 1927, where he enrolled in a pre-medical course. He first worked as a chauffeur to support himself as he studied engineering; and later, he transferred to the Institute of Commerce at José Rizal College (now José Rizal University) from 1928 to 1932, where he received a baccalaureate in commerce. He then worked as an automobile mechanic for a bus company and shop superintendent.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: At the outbreak of World War II, he joined the motor pool of the 31st Infantry Division of the Philippine Army.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: When Bataan surrendered in 1942, Magsaysay escaped to the hills, narrowly evading Japanese arrest on at least four occasions. There he organised the Western Luzon Guerrilla Forces, and was commissioned captain on April 5, 1942. For three years, Magsaysay operated under Col. Merrill's famed guerrilla outfit & saw action at Sawang, San Marcelino, Zambales, first as a supply officer codenamed "Chow" and later as commander of a 10,000-strong force.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Magsaysay was among those instrumental in clearing the Zambales coast of the Japanese prior to the landing of American forces together with the Philippine Commonwealth troops on January 29, 1945.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: He was married to Luz Rosauro Banzon on June 16, 1933, and they had three children: Teresita (1934–1979), Milagros (b. 1936) and Ramon Jr. (b. 1938).


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: On April 22, 1946, Magsaysay, encouraged by his fellow ex-guerrillas, was elected under the Liberal Party to the Philippine House of Representatives. In 1948, President Manuel Roxas chose Magsaysay to go to Washington, D.C. as Chairman of the Committee on Guerrilla Affairs, to help to secure passage of the Rogers Veterans Bill, giving benefits to Philippine veterans. In the so-called "dirty election" of 1949, he was re-elected to a second term in the House of Representatives. During both terms, he was Chairman of the House National Defense Committee.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: In early August 1950, he offered President Elpidio Quirino a plan to fight the Communist guerrillas, using his own experiences in guerrilla warfare during World War II. After some hesitation, Quirino realized that there was no alternative and appointed Magsaysay Secretary of National Defence in September 1950. He intensified the campaign against the Hukbalahap guerrillas. This success was due in part to the unconventional methods he took up from a former advertising expert and CIA agent, Colonel Edward Lansdale. In the counterinsurgency the two utilized deployed soldiers distributing relief goods and other forms of aid to outlying, provincial communities. Prior to Magsaysay's appointment as Defense Secretary, rural citizens perceived the Philippine Army with apathy and distrust. However, Magsaysay's term enhanced the Army's image, earning them respect and admiration.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: In June 1952, Magsaysay made a goodwill tour to the United States and Mexico. He visited New York, Washington, D.C. (with a medical check-up at Walter Reed Hospital) and Mexico City, where he spoke at the Annual Convention of Lions International.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: By 1953, President Quirino thought the threat of the Huks was under control and Secretary Magsaysay was becoming too weak. Magsaysay met with interference and obstruction from the President and his advisers, in fears they might be unseated at the next presidential election. Although Magsaysay had at that time no intention to run, he was urged from many sides and finally was convinced that the only way to continue his fight against communism, and for a government for the people, was to be elected president, ousting the corrupt administration that, in his opinion, had caused the rise of the communist guerrillas by bad administration. He resigned his post as defense secretary on February 28, 1953, and became the presidential candidate of the Nacionalista Party, disputing the nomination with Senator Camilo Osías at the Nacionalista national convention.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: When news reached Magsaysay that his political ally Moises Padilla was being tortured by men of provincial governor Rafael Lacson, he rushed to Negros Occidental, but was too late. He was then informed that Padilla's body was drenched in blood, pierced by fourteen bullets, and was positioned on a police bench in the town plaza. Magsaysay himself carried Padilla's corpse with his bare hands and delivered it to the morgue, and the next day, news clips showed pictures of him doing so. Magsaysay even used this event during his presidential campaign in 1953.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: The trial against Lacson started in January 1952; Magsaysay and his men presented enough evidence to convict Lacson and his 26 men for murder. In August 1954, Judge Eduardo Enríquez ruled the men were guilty and Lacson, his 22 men and three other mayors of Negros Occidental municipalities were condemned to the electric chair.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Magsaysay was also the general manager of the Manila Railroad Company between October and December 1951. His tenure later motivated him to modernize the rail operator's fleet after stepping into presidency. He also set the first steps in building what has been the discontinued Cagayan Valley Railroad Extension project.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Presidential elections were held on November 10, 1953, in the Philippines. Incumbent President Elpidio Quirino lost his opportunity for a second full term as President of the Philippines to former Defense Secretary Magsaysay. His running mate, Senator José Yulo lost to Senator Carlos P. García. Vice President Fernando López did not run for re-election. This was the first time that an elected Philippine President did not come from the Senate. Moreover, Magsaysay began the practice in the Philippines of "campaign jingles" during elections, for one of his inclinations and hobbies was dancing.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: The United States Government, including the Central Intelligence Agency, had strong influence on the 1953 election, and candidates in the election fiercely competed with each other for U.S. support.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: In the election of 1953, Magsaysay was decisively elected president over the incumbent Elpidio Quirino. He was sworn into office wearing the "Barong Tagalog", a first by a Philippine President. He was then called "Mambo Magsaysay".


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: As President, he was a close friend and supporter of the United States and a vocal spokesman against communism during the Cold War. He led the foundation of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, also known as the Manila Pact of 1954, that aimed to defeat communist-Marxist movements in Southeast Asia, South Asia and the Southwestern Pacific.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: During his term, he made Malacañang literally a "house of the people", opening its gates to the public. One example of his integrity followed a demonstration flight aboard a new plane belonging to the Philippine Air Force (PAF): President Magsaysay asked what the operating costs per hour were for that type of aircraft, then wrote a personal check to the PAF, covering the cost of his flight. He restored the people's trust in the military and in the government.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Ushering a new era in Philippine government, President Magsaysay placed emphasis upon service to the people by bringing the government closer to the former.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: This was symbolically seen when, on inauguration day, President Magsaysay ordered the gates of Malacañan Palace be opened to the general public, who were allowed to freely visit all parts of the Palace complex. Later, this was regulated to allow weekly visitation.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: created the Presidential Complaints and Action Committee. This body immediately proceeded to hear grievances and recommend remedial action. Headed by soft-spoken, but active and tireless, Manuel Manahan, this committee would come to hear nearly 60,000 complaints in a year, of which more than 30,000 would be settled by direct action and a little more than 25,000 would be referred to government agencies for appropriate follow-up. This new entity, composed of youthful personnel, all loyal to the President, proved to be a highly successful morale booster restoring the people's confidence in their own government. He appointed Zotico "Tex" Paderanga Carrillo in 1953 as PCAC Chief for Mindanao and Sulu. He became a close friend to the president because of his charisma to the common people of Mindanao.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Zotico was a local journalist and an esteemed writer from a prominent family on Camiguin, (then sub-province of Misamis Oriental), Zotico become a depository of complaints and an eye of the president in the region his diplomatic skills helped the government, moro and the rebels to learn the true situation in every city and municipalities. With his zero corruption mandate he recognized a turn of achievement of Zotico that made him his "compadre" when Zotico named his fifth child after the President when he was elected in 1953, even making the President godfather to the boy. Magsaysay personally visited Mindanao several times because of this friendship, becoming the first President to visit Camiguin, where he was warmly received by thousands of people who waited for his arrival.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: To amplify and stabilize the functions of the Economic Development Corps (EDCOR), President Magsaysay worked for the establishment of the National Resettlement and Rehabilitation Administration (NARRA). This body took over from the EDCOR and helped in the giving some sixty-five thousand acres to three thousand indigent families for settlement purposes. Again, it allocated some other twenty-five thousand to a little more than one thousand five hundred landless families, who subsequently became farmers.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: As further aid to the rural people, the president established the Agricultural Credit and Cooperative Financing Administration (ACCFA). The idea was for this entity to make available rural credits. Records show that it did grant, in this wise, almost ten million dollars. This administration body next devoted its attention to cooperative marketing.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Along this line of help to the rural areas, President Magsaysay initiated in all earnestness the artesian wells campaign. A group-movement known as the Liberty Wells Association was formed and in record time managed to raise a considerable sum for the construction of as many artesian wells as possible. The socio-economic value of the same could not be gainsaid and the people were profuse in their gratitude.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Finally, vast irrigation projects, as well as enhancement of the Ambuklao Power plant and other similar ones, went a long way towards bringing to reality the rural improvement program advocated by President Magsaysay.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: In early 1954, Benigno Aquino Jr. was appointed by President Magsaysay to act as his personal emissary to Luis Taruc, leader of the rebel group, Hukbalahap. Also in 1954, Lt. Col. Laureño Maraña, the former head of Force X of the 16th PC Company, assumed command of the 7th BCT, which had become one of the most mobile striking forces of the Philippine ground forces against the Huks, from Colonel Valeriano. Force X employed psychological warfare through combat intelligence and infiltration that relied on secrecy in planning, training, and execution of attack. The lessons learned from Force X and Nenita were combined in the 7th BCT.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: With the all out anti-dissidence campaigns against the Huks, they numbered less than 2,000 by 1954 and without the protection and support of local supporters, active Huk resistance no longer presented a serious threat to Philippine security. From February to mid-September 1954, the largest anti-Huk operation, "Operation Thunder-Lightning" was conducted that resulted in Taruc's surrender on May 17. Further cleanup operations of the remaining guerrillas lasted throughout 1955, cutting their number to less than 1,000 by year's end.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: The administration of President Magsaysay was active in the fight against the expansion of communism in Asia. He made the Philippines a member of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), which was established in Manila on September 8, 1954, during the "Manila Conference". Members of SEATO were alarmed at the possible victory of North Vietnam over South Vietnam, which could spread communist ideology to other countries in the region. The possibility that a communist state can influence or cause other countries to adopt the same system of government is called the domino theory.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: The active coordination of the Magsaysay administration with the Japanese government led to the Reparation Agreement. This was an agreement between the two countries, obligating the Japanese government to pay $550 million as reparation for war damages to the Philippines.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Taking the advantage of the presence of U.S. Secretary John Foster Dulles in Manila to attend the SEATO Conference, the Philippine government took steps to broach with him the establishment of a Joint Defense Council. Vice-President and Secretary of Foreign Affairs Carlos P. Garcia held the opportune conversations with Secretary Dulles for this purpose. Agreement was reached thereon and the first meeting of the Joint United States–Philippines Defense Council was held in Manila following the end of the Manila Conference. Thus were the terms of the Mutual Defense Pact between the Philippines and the United States duly implemented.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: The Magsaysay administration negotiated the Laurel-Langley Agreement which was a trade agreement between the Philippines and the United States which was signed in 1955 and expired in 1974. Although it proved deficient, the final agreement satisfied nearly all of the diverse Filipino economic interests. While some have seen the Laurel-Langley agreement as a continuation of the 1946 trade act, Jose P. Laurel and other Philippine leaders recognized that the agreement substantially gave the country greater freedom to industrialize while continuing to receive privileged access to US markets.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: The agreement replaced the unpopular Bell Trade Act, which tied the economy of the Philippines to that of United States.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Billed as an all-Oriental meet to promote Afro-Asian economic and cultural cooperation and to oppose colonialism or neocolonialism by either the United States or the Soviet Union in the Cold War, or any other imperialistic nations, the Asian–African Conference was held in Bandung, Java in April 1955, upon invitation extended by the Prime Ministers of India, Pakistan, Burma, Ceylon, and Indonesia. This summit is commonly known as the Bandung Conference. Although, at first, the Magsaysay Government seemed reluctant to send any delegation. Later, however, upon advise of Ambassador Carlos P. Rómulo, it was decided to have the Philippines participate in the conference. Rómulo was asked to head the Philippine delegation. At the very outset indications were to the effect that the conference would promote the cause of neutralism as a third position in the current cold war between the capitalist bloc and the communist group. John Kotelawala, Prime Minister of Ceylon, however, broke the ice against neutralism. He was immediately joined by Rómulo, who categorically stated that his delegation believed that "a puppet is a puppet", no matter whether under a Western Power or an Oriental state.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: At one time in the course of the conference, Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru acidly spoke against the SEATO. Quick to draw, Ambassador Rómulo delivered a stinging, eloquent retort that prompted Prime Minister Nehru to publicly apologize to the Philippine delegation.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Records had it that the Philippine delegation ably represented the interests of the Philippines and, in the ultimate analysis, succeeded in turning the Bandung Conference into a victory against the plans of its socialist and neutralist delegates.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Following the reservations made by Ambassador Rómulo, on the Philippines' behalf, upon signing the Japanese Peace Treaty in San Francisco on September 8, 1951, for several years of series of negotiations were conducted by the Philippine government and that of Japan. In the face of adamant claims of the Japanese government that it found impossible to meet the demand for the payment of eight billion dollars by the way of reparations, President Magsaysay, during a so-called "cooling off" period, sent a Philippine Reparations Survey Committee, headed by Finance Secretary Jaime Hernandez, to Japan for an "on the spot" study of that country's possibilities.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: When the Committee reported that Japan was in a position to pay, Ambassador Felino Neri, appointed chief negotiator, went to Tokyo. On May 31, 1955, Ambassador Neri reached a compromise agreement with Japanese Minister Takazaki, the main terms of which consisted in the following: The Japanese government would pay eight hundred million dollars as reparations. Payment was to be made in this wise: Twenty million dollars would be paid in cash in Philippine currency; thirty million dollars, in services; five million dollars, in capital goods; and two hundred and fifty million dollars, in long-term industrial loans.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: On August 12, 1955, President Magsaysay informed the Japanese government, through Prime Minister Ichiro Hatoyama, that the Philippines accepted the Neri-Takazaki agreement. In view of political developments in Japan, the Japanese Prime Minister could only inform the Philippine government of the Japanese acceptance of said agreement on March 15, 1956. The official Reparations agreement between the two government was finally signed at Malacañang Palace on May 9, 1956, thus bringing to a rather satisfactory conclusion this long drawn controversy between the two countries.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Magsaysay's term, which was to end on December 30, 1957, was cut short by a plane crash. On March 16, 1957, Magsaysay left Manila for Cebu City where he spoke at three educational institutions. That same night, at about 1 am, he boarded the presidential plane "Mt. Pinatubo", a C-47, heading back to Manila. In the early morning hours of March 17, the plane was reported missing. By late afternoon, newspapers had reported the airplane had crashed on Mt. Manunggal in Cebu, and that 36 of the 56 aboard were killed. The actual number on board was 25, including Magsaysay. Only newspaperman Nestor Mata survived. Vice-President Carlos García, who was on an official visit to Australia at the time, returned to Manila and acceded to the presidency to serve out the remaining eight months of Magsaysay's term.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: An estimated 2 million people attended Magsaysay's state funeral on March 22, 1957. He was posthumously referred to as the "Champion of the Masses" and "Defender of Democracy".


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: Magsaysay's administration was considered as one of the cleanest and most corruption-free in modern Philippine history; his rule is often cited as the Philippines's "Golden Years". Trade and industry flourished, the Philippine military was at its prime, and the country gained international recognition in sports, culture, and foreign affairs. The Philippines placed second on a ranking of Asia's clean and well-governed countries.


title: Ramon Magsaysay

text: His presidency is seen as people-centered as government trust was high among the Filipino people, earning him the nickname "Champion of the masses" and his sympathetic approach to the Hukbalahap rebellion that the Huk rebels were not Communists; they were simple peasants who thought that rebellion was the only answer to their sufferings. He also gained nationwide support for his agrarian reforms on farmers and took action on government corruption that his administration inherited from prior administrations.


title: Patrick O'Neal (sportscaster)

text: Patrick O'Neal (born September 14, 1967) is an American actor and sports broadcaster who has been serving as a studio host/reporter for Bally Sports West/SoCal. He is also the secondary TV play-by-play announcer for the Los Angeles Angels whenever Matt Vasgersian is not available for telecasts.


title: Patrick O'Neal (sportscaster)

text: O'Neal is the son of actor Ryan O'Neal and actress Leigh Taylor-Young. He is the half-brother of Griffin O'Neal, Tatum O'Neal and Redmond O'Neal. His paternal ancestry is Irish, English, and Ashkenazi Jewish.


title: Patrick O'Neal (sportscaster)

text: Most of his appearances come during pregame and postgame shows of the Los Angeles Angels and Los Angeles Kings. He also provides game breaks for Fox College Football.


title: Patrick O'Neal (sportscaster)

text: On August 21 and August 28 of 2005, he was the studio host of "Fox Saturday Baseball" when regular host Jeanne Zelasko was on maternity leave, and he was a sideline reporter for two "NFL on Fox" games during the 2005 NFL Season. He was also the dugout reporter for Games 3 and 5 of the 2005 National League Championship Series and Game 5 of the 2005 American League Championship Series. For one season he was the ingame highlights host for Fox NFL Sunday before being succeeded by Joel Klatt. Since 2021, O’Neal has been the secondary TV play-by-play commentator with the Los Angeles Angels alongside Mark Gubicza whenever Matt Vasgersian is not available. Whenever Vasgersian is broadcasting for the Angels, O’Neal works as the sideline reporter during the Angels telecast or studio host for the team’s pre-game/post-game show.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. (March 8, 1841 – March 6, 1935) was an American jurist and legal scholar who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1902 to 1932. He is one of the most widely cited U.S. Supreme Court justices and most influential American common law judges in history, noted for his long service, pithy opinions—particularly those on civil liberties and American constitutional democracy—and deference to the decisions of elected legislatures. Holmes retired from the court at the age of 90, an unbeaten record for oldest justice on the Supreme Court. He previously served as a Brevet Colonel in the American Civil War, in which he was wounded three times, as an associate justice and chief justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, and as Weld Professor of Law at his alma mater, Harvard Law School. His positions, distinctive personality, and writing style made him a popular figure, especially with American progressives.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: During his tenure on the U.S. Supreme Court, to which he was appointed by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1902, he supported the constitutionality of state economic regulation and came to advocate broad freedom of speech under the First Amendment, after, in "Schenck v. United States" (1919), having upheld for a unanimous court criminal sanctions against draft protestors with the memorable maxim that "free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic" and formulating the groundbreaking "clear and present danger" test. But later that same year, in his famous dissent in "Abrams v. United States" (1919), he wrote that "the best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market... That, at any rate, is the theory of our Constitution. It is an experiment, as all life is an experiment." He added that "we should be eternally vigilant against attempts to check the expression of opinions that we loathe and believe to be fraught with death..."


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: He was one of only a handful of justices known as a scholar; "The Journal of Legal Studies" has identified Holmes as the third-most cited American legal scholar of the 20th century. Holmes was a legal realist, as summed up in his maxim, "The life of the law has not been logic: it has been experience", and a moral skeptic opposed to the doctrine of natural law. His jurisprudence and academic writing influenced much subsequent American legal thinking, including the judicial consensus upholding New Deal regulatory law and the influential American schools of pragmatism, critical legal studies, and law and economics.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Holmes was born in Boston, Massachusetts, to the prominent writer and physician Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. and abolitionist Amelia Lee Jackson. Both of his parents were of entirely English descent, and all his ancestors had come to North America from England during the early colonial period as part of the Puritan migration to New England. Dr. Holmes was a leading figure in Boston intellectual and literary circles. Mrs. Holmes was connected to the leading families; Henry James Sr., Ralph Waldo Emerson, and other transcendentalists were family friends. Known as "Wendell" in his youth, Holmes became lifelong friends with the brothers William James and Henry James Jr. Holmes accordingly grew up in an atmosphere of intellectual achievement and early on formed the ambition to be a man of letters like Emerson. While still in Harvard College he wrote essays on philosophic themes and asked Emerson to read his attack on Plato's idealist philosophy. Emerson famously replied, "If you strike at a king, you must kill him". He supported the abolitionist movement that thrived in Boston society during the 1850s. At Harvard, he was a member of the Hasty Pudding and the Porcellian Club; his father had also been a member of both clubs. In the Pudding, he served as Secretary and Poet, as had his father. Holmes graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard in 1861, and, in the spring of that year, after President Abraham Lincoln called for volunteers following the firing on Fort Sumter, he enlisted in the Massachusetts militia but returned briefly to Harvard College to participate in commencement exercises.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: During his senior year of college, at the outset of the American Civil War, Holmes enlisted in the Fourth Battalion of Infantry in the Massachusetts militia, then in July 1861, with his father's help, received a commission as second lieutenant in the Twentieth Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry. He saw considerable combat during his service, taking part in the Peninsula Campaign, and the Wilderness, suffering wounds at the Battle of Ball's Bluff, Antietam, and Chancellorsville, and suffered from a near-fatal case of dysentery. He particularly admired and was close to Henry Livermore Abbott, a fellow officer in the 20th Massachusetts. Holmes rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel, but eschewed command of his regiment upon his promotion. Abbott took command of the regiment in his place and was later killed.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In September 1863, while recovering at the Holmes family home on Charles Street in Boston from his third major combat injury, Holmes was promoted to colonel, but never returned to the 20th Massachusetts because the unit had been decimated. Upon his recovery, in January 1864 Holmes was appointed aide-de-camp of General Horatio Wright, then Division Commander of VI Corps, and later in command of the Corps. Holmes served with Wright during General Grant's campaign down to Petersburg, returning to Washington with the Sixth Corps when the Capital was threatened in July 1864. On July 17, 1864 Holmes was mustered out at the end of his enlistment term, returning to Boston and enrolling at Harvard Law School later that year.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Holmes is said to have shouted to Abraham Lincoln to take cover during the Battle of Fort Stevens, although this is commonly regarded as apocryphal. Holmes himself expressed uncertainty about who had warned Lincoln ("Some say it was an enlisted man who shouted at Lincoln; others suggest it was General Wright who brusquely ordered Lincoln to safety. But for a certainty, the 6 foot 4 inch Lincoln, in frock coat and top hat, stood peering through field glasses from behind a parapet at the onrushing rebels.") and other sources state he likely was not present on the day Lincoln visited Fort Stevens.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In the summer of 1864, Holmes returned to the family home in Boston, wrote poetry, and debated philosophy with his friend William James, pursuing his debate with philosophic idealism, and considered re-enlisting. By the fall, when it became clear that the war would soon end, Holmes enrolled in Harvard Law School, "kicked into the law" by his father, as he later recalled. He attended lectures there for a single year, reading extensively in theoretical works, and then clerked for a year in his cousin Robert Morse’s office. In 1866, he received a Bachelor of Laws degree from Harvard, was admitted to the Massachusetts bar, and after a long visit to London to complete his education went into law practice in Boston. He joined a small firm, and in 1872 married a childhood friend, Fanny Bowditch Dixwell, buying a farm in Mattapoisett, Massachusetts, the following year. Their marriage lasted until her death on April 30, 1929. They never had children together. They did adopt and raise an orphaned cousin, Dorothy Upham. Fanny disliked Beacon Hill society, and devoted herself to embroidery. She was described as devoted, witty, wise, tactful, and perceptive.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Whenever he could, Holmes visited London during the social season of spring and summer, and during the years of his work as a lawyer and judge in Boston he formed romantic friendships with English women of the nobility, with whom he corresponded while at home in the United States. The most important of these was his friendship with the Anglo-Irish Clare Castletown, the Lady Castletown, whose family estate in Ireland, Doneraile Court, he visited several times, and with whom he may have had a brief affair. He formed his closest intellectual friendships with British men, and became one of the founders of what was soon called the "sociological" school of jurisprudence in Great Britain, followed a generation later by the "legal realist" school in America.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Holmes practiced admiralty law and commercial law in Boston for fifteen years. It was during this time that he did his principal scholarly work, serving as an editor of the new "American Law Review", reporting decisions of state supreme courts, and preparing a new edition of Kent's "Commentaries", which served practitioners as a compendium of case law, at a time when official reports were scarce and difficult to obtain. He summarized his hard-won understanding in a series of lectures, collected and published as "The Common Law" in 1881.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: "The Common Law" has been continuously in print since 1881 and remains an important contribution to jurisprudence. The book also remains controversial, for Holmes begins by rejecting various kinds of formalism in law. In his earlier writings he had expressly denied the utilitarian view that law was a set of commands of the sovereign, rules of conduct that became legal duties. He rejected as well the views of the German idealist philosophers, whose views were then widely held, and the philosophy taught at Harvard, that the opinions of judges could be harmonized in a purely logical system. In the opening paragraphs of the book, he famously summarized his own view of the history of the common law:


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: The life of the law has not been logic: it has been experience. The felt necessities of the time, the prevalent moral and political theories, intuitions of public policy, avowed or unconscious, even the prejudices which judges share with their fellow-men, have had a good deal more to do than the syllogism in determining the rules by which men should be governed. The law embodies the story of a nation’s development through many centuries, and it cannot be dealt with as if it contained only the axioms and corollaries of a book of mathematics.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In "The Common Law", Holmes wrote that, even though the law ”uses the language of morality, it necessarily ends in external standards not dependent on the consciousness of the individual” or on his moral culpability. Foreseeability of harm was the key: ”the general basis of criminal liability was knowledge, at the time of action, of facts from which common experience showed that certain harmful results were likely to follow.” Tort liability, similarly, was imposed when circumstances were ”such as would have led a prudent man to perceive danger, although not necessarily to foresee the specific harm”. Likewise, with respect to contracts, ”The law has nothing to do with the actual state of the parties’ minds. In contract, as elsewhere, it must go by externals, and judge parties by their conduct.”


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In the book, Holmes set forth his view that the only source of law, properly speaking, was a judicial decision enforced by the state. Judges decided cases on the facts, and then wrote opinions afterward presenting a rationale for their decision. The true basis of the decision was often an ”inarticulate major premise”, however. A judge was obliged to choose between contending legal arguments, each posed in absolute terms, and the true basis of his decision was sometimes drawn from outside the law, when precedents were lacking or were evenly divided.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: The common law evolves because civilized society evolves, and judges share the common preconceptions of the governing class. These views endeared Holmes to the later advocates of legal realism, and made him one of the early founders of law and economics jurisprudence. Holmes famously contrasted his own scholarship with the abstract doctrines of Christopher Columbus Langdell, dean of Harvard Law School, who viewed the common law as a self-enclosed set of doctrines. Holmes viewed Langdell’s work as akin to the German philosophic idealism he had for so long resisted, opposing it with his own scientific materialism.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Holmes was considered for a federal court judgeship in 1878 by President Rutherford B. Hayes, but Massachusetts Senator George Frisbie Hoar persuaded Hayes to nominate another candidate. In the fall of 1882, Holmes became a professor at Harvard Law School, accepting an endowed professorship that had been created for him, largely through the efforts of Louis D. Brandeis. On Friday, December 8, 1882, Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts associate justice Otis Lord decided to resign, giving outgoing Republican governor John Davis Long a chance to appoint his successor, if he could do so before the Massachusetts Governor's Council adjourned at 3 pm. Holmes's partner George Shattuck proposed him for the vacancy, Holmes quickly agreed, and there being no objection by the council, he took the oath of office on December 15, 1882. His resignation from his professorship, after only a few weeks and without notice, was resented by the law school faculty, with James Bradley Thayer finding Holmes's conduct "selfish" and "thoughtless". On August 2, 1899, Holmes became Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court following the death of Walbridge A. Field.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: During his service on the Massachusetts court, Holmes continued to develop and apply his views of the common law, usually following precedent faithfully. He issued few constitutional opinions in these years, but carefully developed the principles of free expression as a common-law doctrine. He departed from precedent to recognize workers' right to organize trade unions and to strike, as long as no violence was involved, and coercion was not exerted through impermissible means such as secondary boycotts, stating in his opinions that fundamental fairness required that workers be allowed to combine to compete on an equal footing with employers. He continued to give speeches and to write articles that added to or extended his work on the common law, most notably "Privilege, Malice and Intent", in which he presented his view of the pragmatic basis of the common-law privileges extended to speech and the press, which could be defeated by a showing of malice, or of specific intent to harm. This argument would later be incorporated into his famous opinions concerning the First Amendment.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: He also published an address, "The Path of the Law", which is best known for its prediction theory of law, that "[t]he prophecies of what the courts will do in fact, and nothing more pretentious, are what I mean by law", and for its "bad man" perspective on the law that "[i]f you really want to know the law and nothing else, you must look at it as a bad man, who cares only for the material consequences which such knowledge enables him to predict".


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Soon after the death of Associate Justice Horace Gray in July 1902, President Theodore Roosevelt made known his intention to appoint Holmes as Gray's successor; it was the president's stated desire to fill the vacancy with someone from Massachusetts. The nomination was supported by Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, the junior senator from Massachusetts, but was opposed by its senior senator, George Frisbie Hoar, who was also chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Hoar was a strenuous opponent of imperialism, and the legality of the annexation of Puerto Rico and the Philippines was expected to come before the Court. Lodge, like Roosevelt, was a strong supporter of imperialism, which Holmes was expected to support as well.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Despite Hoar's opposition, the president moved ahead on the matter. On December 2, 1902, he formally submitted the nomination and Holmes was confirmed by the United States Senate on December 4. He was sworn into office on December 8.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: On the bench, Holmes did vote to support the administration's position favoring the annexation of former Spanish colonies in the "Insular Cases". However, he later disappointed Roosevelt by dissenting in "Northern Securities Co. v. United States", a major antitrust prosecution; the majority of the court opposed Holmes and sided with Theodore Roosevelt’s belief that Northern Securities violated the Sherman Antitrust Act. The dissent by Holmes permanently damaged his formerly close relationship with Theodore Roosevelt.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Holmes was known for his pithy, frequently quoted opinions. In more than twenty-nine years on the Supreme Court bench, he ruled on cases spanning the whole range of federal law. He is remembered for prescient opinions on topics as varied as copyright law, the law of contempt, the antitrust status of professional baseball, and the oath required for citizenship. Holmes, like most of his contemporaries, viewed the Bill of Rights as codifying privileges obtained over the centuries in English and American common law, and he established that view in numerous opinions for the Court. He is considered one of the greatest judges in American history and embodies for many the traditions of the common law.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: From the departure of William Howard Taft on February 3, 1930, until Charles Evans Hughes took office on February 24, 1930, Holmes briefly acted as the Chief Justice and presided over court sessions.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Beginning with his first opinion for the Court in "Otis v. Parker," Holmes declared that ”due process of law”, the fundamental principle of fairness, protected people from unreasonable legislation but was limited only to those fundamental principles enshrined in the common law and did not protect most economic interests.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In a series of opinions surrounding the World War I Espionage Act of 1917 and the Sedition Act of 1918, he held that the freedom of expression guaranteed by federal and state constitutions simply declared a common-law privilege for speech and the press, even when those expressions caused injury, but that privilege would be defeated by a showing of malice or intent to do harm. Holmes came to write three unanimous opinions for the Supreme Court that arose from prosecutions under the 1917 Espionage Act because in an earlier case, "Baltzer v. United States", he had circulated a powerfully expressed dissent, when the majority had voted to uphold a conviction of immigrant socialists who had circulated a petition criticizing the draft. Apparently learning that he was likely to publish this dissent, the government (perhaps alerted by Justice Louis D. Brandeis, newly appointed by President Woodrow Wilson) abandoned the case, and it was dismissed by the Court. The Chief Justice then asked Holmes to write opinions that could be unanimous, upholding convictions in three similar cases, where there were jury findings that speeches or leaflets were published with an intent to obstruct the draft, a crime under the 1917 law. Although there was no evidence that the attempts had succeeded, Holmes, in "Schenck v. United States" (1919), held for a unanimous Court that an attempt, purely by language, could be prosecuted if the expression, in the circumstances in which it was uttered, posed a "clear and present danger" that the legislature had properly forbidden. In his opinion for the Court, Holmes famously declared that the First Amendment would not protect a person "falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic". Although much criticized, "Schenck" remained an important precedent until it was superseded by the 1969 Supreme Court decision in "Brandenburg v. Ohio", which held that "advocacy of the use of force or of law violation" is protected unless "such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action".


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Later in 1919, however, in "Abrams v. United States", Holmes was again in dissent. The Wilson Administration was vigorously prosecuting those suspected of sympathies with the recent Russian Revolution, as well as opponents of the war against Germany. The defendants in this case were socialists and anarchists, recent immigrants from Russia who opposed the apparent efforts of the United States to intervene in the Russian Civil War. They were charged with violating the Sedition Act of 1918, which was an amendment to the Espionage Act of 1917 that made criticisms of the government or the war effort a crime. Abrams and his co-defendants were charged with distributing leaflets (one in English and one in Yiddish) that called for a "general strike" to protest the U.S. intervention in Russia. A majority of the Court voted to uphold the convictions and sentences of ten and twenty years, to be followed by deportation, while Holmes dissented. The majority claimed to be following the precedents already set in Schenck and the other cases in which Holmes had written for the Court, but Holmes insisted that the defendants' leaflets neither threatened to cause any harm, nor showed a specific intent to hinder the war effort. Holmes condemned the Wilson Administration's prosecution and its insistence on draconian sentences for the defendants in passionate language: "Even if I am technically wrong [regarding the defendants' intent] and enough can be squeezed from these poor and puny anonymities to turn the color of legal litmus paper ... the most nominal punishment seems to me all that possibly could be inflicted, unless the defendants are to be made to suffer, not for what the indictment alleges, but for the creed that they avow ... ." Holmes then went on to explain the importance of freedom of thought in a democracy:


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: [W]hen men have realized that time has upset many fighting faiths, they may come to believe ... that the best test of truth is the power of the thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market, and that truth is the only ground upon which their wishes safely can be carried out. That, at any rate, is the theory of our Constitution. It is an experiment, as all life is an experiment.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In writing this dissent, Holmes may have been influenced by Zechariah Chafee’s article ”Freedom of Speech in War Time”. Chafee had criticized Holmes’s opinion in "Schenck" for failing to express in more detail and more clearly the common-law doctrines upon which he relied. In his "Abrams" dissent, Holmes did elaborate somewhat on the decision in "Schenck", roughly along the lines that Chafee had suggested. Although Holmes evidently believed that he was adhering to his own precedent, some later commentators accused Holmes of inconsistency, even of seeking to curry favor with his young admirers. In "Abrams", the majority opinion relied on the clear-and-present-danger formulation of "Schenck", claiming that the leaflets showed the necessary intent, and ignoring that they were unlikely to have any effect. In later opinions, the Supreme Court departed from this line of reasoning where the validity of a statute was in question, adopting the principle that a legislature could properly declare that some forms of speech posed a clear and present danger, regardless of the circumstances in which they were uttered. Holmes continued to dissent.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In "Silverthorne Lumber Co. v. United States" (1920), Holmes ruled that any evidence obtained, even indirectly, from an illegal search was inadmissible in court. He reasoned that otherwise, police would have an incentive to circumvent the Fourth Amendment to obtain derivatives of the illegally obtained evidence, so any evidence resulting indirectly from an illegal search must be similarly suppressed. This later became known as the "fruit of the poisonous tree" doctrine.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In 1927, Holmes wrote the 8–1 majority opinion in "Buck v. Bell", a case that upheld the Virginia Sterilization Act of 1924 and the forced sterilization of Carrie Buck, who was claimed to be mentally defective. Later scholarship has shown that the suit was collusive, in that "two eugenics enthusiasts ... had chosen Buck as a bit player in a test case that they had devised", and "had asked Buck's guardian to challenge [the Virginia sterilization law]". In addition, Carrie Buck was probably of normal intelligence. The argument made on her behalf was principally that the statute requiring sterilization of institutionalized persons was unconstitutional, as a violation of what today is called "substantive due process". Holmes repeated familiar arguments that statutes would not be struck down if they appeared on their face to have a reasonable basis. In support of his argument that the interest of "public welfare" outweighs the interest of individuals in their bodily integrity, he argued:


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Sterilization rates under eugenics laws in the United States climbed from 1927 until "Skinner v. Oklahoma", 316 U.S. 535 (1942), in which the U.S. Supreme Court declared unconstitutional an Oklahoma statute that provided for the sterilization of "habitual criminals".


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: "Buck v. Bell" continues to be cited occasionally in support of due process requirements for state interventions in medical procedures. For instance, in 2001, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit cited "Buck v. Bell" to protect the constitutional rights of a woman coerced into sterilization without procedural due process. The court stated that error and abuse will result if the state does not follow the procedural requirements, established by "Buck v. Bell", for performing an involuntary sterilization. "Buck v. Bell" was also cited briefly, though not discussed, in "Roe v. Wade", in support of the proposition that the Court does not recognize an "unlimited right to do with one's body as one pleases". However, although "Buck v. Bell" has not been overturned, ”the Supreme Court has distinguished the case out of existence”.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: From his earliest writings, Holmes demonstrated a lifelong belief that the decisions of judges were consciously or unconsciously result-oriented and reflected the mores of the class and society from which judges were drawn. Holmes accordingly argued that legal rules are not deduced through formal logic but rather emerge from an active process of human self-government. He explored these theories in his 1881 book "The Common Law." His philosophy represented a departure from the prevailing jurisprudence of the time: legal formalism, which held that law was an orderly system of rules from which decisions in particular cases could be deduced. Holmes sought to consciously reinvent the common law – to modernize it as a tool for adjusting to the changing nature of modern life, as judges of the past had done more or less unconsciously. He has been classed with the philosophic pragmatists, although pragmatism is what he attributed to the law, rather than his personal philosophy.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Central to his thought was the notion that the law, as it had evolved in modern societies, was concerned with the material results of a defendant's actions. A judge's task was to decide which of two parties before him would bear the cost of an injury. Holmes argued that the evolving common law standard was that liability would fall upon a person whose conduct failed to reflect the prudence of a "reasonable man". If a construction worker throws a beam onto a crowded street:


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: This ”objective standard” adopted by common-law judges, Holmes thought, reflected a shift in community standards, away from condemnation of a person’s act toward an impersonal assessment of its value to the community. In the modern world, the advances made in biology and the social sciences should allow a better conscious determination of the results of individual acts and the proper measure of liability for them. This belief in the pronouncements of science concerning social welfare, although he later doubted its applicability to law in many cases, accounts for his enthusiastic endorsement of eugenics in his writings, and his opinion in the case of "Buck v. Bell".


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In 1881, in "The Common Law", Holmes brought together into a coherent whole his earlier articles and lectures concerning the history of the common law (judicial decisions in England and the United States), which he interpreted from the perspective of a practicing lawyer. What counted as law, to a lawyer, was what judges did in particular cases. Law was what the state would enforce, through violence if necessary; echoes of his experience in the Civil War were always present in his writings. Judges decided where and when the force of the state would be brought to bear, and judges in the modern world tended to consult facts and consequences when deciding what conduct to punish. The decisions of judges, viewed over time, determined the rules of conduct and the legal duties by which all are bound. Judges did not and should not consult any external system of morality, certainly not a system imposed by a deity.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Holmes brought himself into constant conflict with scholars who believed that legal duties rested upon natural law, a moral order of the kind invoked by Christian theologians and other philosophic idealists. He believed instead "that men make their own laws; that these laws do not flow from some mysterious omnipresence in the sky, and that judges are not independent mouthpieces of the infinite." ”The common law is not a brooding omnipresence in the sky. ... ” Rather than a set of abstract, rational, mathematical, or in any way unworldly set of principles, Holmes said: "[T]he prophecies of what the courts will do in fact, and nothing more pretentious, are what I mean by the law."


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: His belief that law, properly speaking, was a set of generalizations from what judges had done in similar cases, determined his view of the Constitution of the United States. As a justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Holmes rejected the argument that the text of the Constitution should be applied directly to cases that came before the court, as if it were a statute. He shared with most of his fellow judges the belief that the Constitution carried forward principles derived from the common law, principles that continued to evolve in American courts. The text of the Constitution itself, as originally understood, was not a set of rules, but only a directive to courts to consider the body of the common law when deciding cases that arose under the Constitution. It followed that constitutional principles adopted from the common law were evolving, as the law itself evolved: "A word [in the Constitution] is not a crystal, transparent and unchanged, it is the skin of a living thought..."


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: The provisions of the Constitution are not mathematical formulas that have their essence in form, they are organic, living institutions transplanted from English soil. Their significance is vital, not formal; it is to be gathered not simply by taking the words and a dictionary but by considering their origin and the line of their growth.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Holmes also insisted on the separation of "ought" and "is", confusion of which he saw as an obstacle in understanding the realities of the law. "The law is full of phraseology drawn from morals, and talks about "rights" and "duties", "malice", "intent", and "negligence" – and nothing is easier in legal reasoning than to take these words in their moral sense". "Therefore nothing but confusion can result from assuming that the rights of man in a moral sense are equally rights in the sense of the Constitution and the law". Holmes said, ”I think our morally tinted words have caused a great deal of confused thinking”.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Nevertheless, in rejecting morality as a form of natural law outside of and superior to human enactments, Holmes was not rejecting moral principles that were the "result" of enforceable law: "The law is the witness and external deposit of our moral life. Its history is the history of the moral development of the race. The practice of it, in spite of popular jests, tends to make good citizens and good men. When I emphasize the difference between law and morals I do so with reference to a single end, that of learning and understanding the law." Holmes's insistence on the material basis of law, on the facts of a case, has led some to characterize him as unfeeling, however. George Washington University law professor Jeffrey Rosen summarized Holmes's views this way: "Holmes was a cold and brutally cynical man who had contempt for the masses and for the progressive laws he voted to uphold ... an aristocratic nihilist who once told his sister that he loathed 'the thick-fingered clowns we call the people'."


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Although Holmes did not dissent frequently — during his 29 years on the U.S. Supreme Court, he wrote only 72 separate opinions, whereas he penned 852 majority opinions — his dissents were often prescient and acquired so much authority that he became known as "The Great Dissenter". Chief Justice Taft complained that "his opinions are short, and not very helpful". Two of his most famous dissents were in "Abrams v. United States" and "Lochner v. New York".


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Only Holmes’s legal writings were readily available during his life and in the first years after his death, but he confided his thoughts more freely in talks, often to limited audiences, and more than two thousand letters that have survived. Holmes's executor, John Gorham Palfrey, diligently collected Holmes’s published and unpublished papers and donated them (and their copyrights) to Harvard Law School. Harvard Law Professor Mark De Wolfe Howe undertook to edit the papers and was authorized by the school to publish them and to prepare a biography of Holmes. Howe published several volumes of correspondence, beginning with Holmes’s correspondence with Frederick Pollock, and a volume of Holmes's speeches, before his untimely death. Howe's work formed the basis of much subsequent Holmes scholarship.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Holmes's speeches were divided into two groups: public addresses, which he gathered into a slim volume, regularly updated, that he gave to friends and used as a visiting card, and less formal addresses to men's clubs, dinners, law schools, and Twentieth Regiment reunions. All of the speeches are reproduced in the third volume of "The Collected Works of Justice Holmes". The public addresses are Holmes’s effort to express his personal philosophy in Emersonian, poetic terms. They frequently advert to the Civil War and to death, and express a hope that personal sacrifice, however pointless it may seem, serves to advance the human race toward some as-yet unforeseen goal. This mysterious purpose explained the commitment to duty and honor that Holmes felt deeply himself and that he thought was the birthright of a certain class of men. As Holmes stated at a talk upon receiving an honorary degree from Yale:


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In the 1890s, at a time when "scientific" anthropology that spoke of racial differences was in vogue, his observations took on a bleakly Darwinist cast:


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: This talk was widely reprinted and admired at the time, and may have contributed to the popular name given by the press to the 1st United States Volunteer Cavalry (the "Rough Riders") during the Spanish–American War.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: On May 30, 1895, Holmes gave the address at a Memorial Day function held by the Graduating Class of Harvard University in Boston, Massachusetts. The speech, which came to be known as "The Soldier's Faith", expressed Holmes's view of the nature of war, and the conflict between the high ideals that motivated his generation to fight in the civil war, and the reality of a soldier's experience and personal pledge to follow orders into battle. Holmes stated:


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Theodore Roosevelt reportedly admired Holmes's "Soldier's Faith" speech, and it is believed to have contributed to his decision to nominate Holmes to the Supreme Court.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Many of Holmes's closest male friends were in England and he corresponded with them regularly and at length, speaking usually of his work. Letters to friends in England such as Harold Laski and Frederick Pollock contain frank discussion of his decisions and his fellow justices. In the United States, letters to male friends Morris R. Cohen, Lewis Einstein, Felix Frankfurter, and Franklin Ford are similar, although the letters to Frankfurter are especially personal. Holmes’s correspondence with women in Great Britain and the U.S. was at least as extensive, and in many ways more revealing, but these series of letters have not been published. An extensive selection of letters to Claire Castletown, in Ireland, is included in "Honorable Justice: The Life of Oliver Wendell Holmes", by Sheldon Novick. These letters are closer to Holmes’s conversation and cast light upon the style he adopted in judicial opinions, which were often designed to be read aloud.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In a letter to a contemporary, Holmes made this comment on international comparisons: "Judge not a people by the ferocity of its men, but by the steadfastness of its women."


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Holmes was widely admired during his last years, and on his ninetieth birthday he was honored on one of the first coast-to-coast radio broadcasts, during which Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes, Dean of Yale Law School Charles Edward Clark, and the president of the American Bar Association read encomia; the Bar Association presented him with a gold medal. Holmes served on the Court until January 12, 1932, when his brethren on the Court, citing his advanced age, suggested that the time had come for him to step down. By that time, at 90 years and 10 months of age, he was the oldest justice to serve in the Court's history. (His record has been challenged only by John Paul Stevens, who in 2010 retired at 8 months younger than Holmes had been at his own retirement.) On Holmes’s ninety-second birthday, newly inaugurated President Franklin D. Roosevelt and his wife, Eleanor, called on Holmes at his home in Washington, D.C. Holmes died of pneumonia in Washington on March 6, 1935, two days short of his 94th birthday. He was the last living justice of the Fuller Court; he had been between 1925 and 1932 the last justice of that Court to remain on the bench.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: In his will, Holmes left his residuary estate to the United States government (he had earlier said that "taxes are what we pay for civilized society" in "Compañia General de Tabacos de Filipinas" vs. "Collector of Internal Revenue", 275 U.S. 87, 100 (1927).) After his death, his personal effects included his Civil War officer’s uniform still stained with his blood and ’torn with shot’ as well as the Minié balls that had wounded him three times in separate battles. Holmes was buried beside his wife in Arlington National Cemetery.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: The United States Postal Service honored Holmes with a Prominent Americans series (1965–1978) 15¢ postage stamp.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Holmes's papers, donated to Harvard Law School, were kept closed for many years after his death, a circumstance that gave rise to somewhat fanciful accounts of his life. Catherine Drinker Bowen's fictionalized biography "Yankee from Olympus" was a long-time bestseller, and the 1946 Broadway play and 1950 Hollywood motion picture "The Magnificent Yankee" were based on a biography of Holmes by Francis Biddle, who had been one of his secretaries. Much of the scholarly literature addressing Holmes's opinions was written before much was known about his life, and before a coherent account of his views was available. The Harvard Law Library eventually relented and made available to scholars the extensive Holmes papers, collected and annotated by Mark DeWolfe Howe, who died before he was able to complete his own biography of the justice. In 1989, the first full biography based on Holmes's papers was published, and several other biographies have followed.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Congress established the U.S. Permanent Committee for the Oliver Wendell Holmes Devise within the Library of Congress with the funds he left to the United States in his will, which were used to create a memorial garden at the Supreme Court building and to publish an ongoing series on the history of the Supreme Court.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Holmes' summer house in Beverly, Massachusetts, was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1972, recognition for his contributions to American jurisprudence.


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: "Many secretaries formed close friendships with one another", wrote Tony Hiss, son of Alger Hiss, about the special club of clerks of Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. They included:


title: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

text: Second, on the sterilization laws enacted in Virginia and upheld by the Supreme Court in "Buck v. Bell":


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: William Thomas Ward (born 5 May 1948) is an English drummer. He was a co-founder and the original drummer for the heavy metal band Black Sabbath. Ward helped found Black Sabbath in 1969 alongside bandmates Ozzy Osbourne (lead singer), Tony Iommi (guitarist) and Geezer Butler (bass).


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Bill started to play drums as a child, listening to the big bands of the 1940s; his early major influences were Gene Krupa, Buddy Rich and Louie Bellson. Later he was influenced by drummers such as Larrie Londin, Bernard Purdie, Joe Morello, Keef Hartley, Hughie Flint, John Bonham, Ringo Starr, Jim Capaldi and Clive Bunker. In the mid-1960s Ward sang and played drums in a band called the Rest, before he and guitarist Tony Iommi played together in a band called Mythology, and upon that band's dissolution joined vocalist Ozzy Osbourne and bassist Geezer Butler, who had previously played together in a band called Rare Breed. The new band called themselves Earth, but were soon renamed Black Sabbath.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Ward's drug and alcohol use increased throughout Black Sabbath's heyday. By the late 1970s he was drinking during gigs, something he had never done before. He also began experiencing panic attacks. Ward has said he cannot remember the recording of the 1980 album "Heaven and Hell" due to his alcohol abuse. According to Black Sabbath bandmate Iommi, Ward disappeared on 21 August 1980, without saying goodbye, other than a telephone call to then-Black Sabbath vocalist Ronnie James Dio informing him "I'm off then, Ron." He then briefly played in a band called Max Havoc. He sat out one album (1981's "Mob Rules") before returning to Black Sabbath for 1983's "Born Again" album. Ward once again left for health reasons before the band toured in support of "Born Again". He again rejoined Black Sabbath in 1984 to record new material with David Donato but after several demo tapes, he once again left Sabbath.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: According to Tony Iommi, he and the band would often set Ward's beard on fire and perform other harmful pranks on him. On one occasion, Ward even received third-degree burns.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Iommi claims that Ward almost died after a prank-gone-wrong during recording of "Vol. 4" in 1972. The band were renting a Bel Air mansion belonging to John DuPont of the DuPont chemical company. The band found several spray cans of gold DuPont paint in a room of the house; finding Ward naked and unconscious after a night of heavy drinking, they thought it would be funny to cover the drummer from head to toe in gold paint. Ward soon became violently ill and had a seizure and an ambulance had to be called. The paint had blocked all of Ward's pores, which his bandmates were subsequently informed can be fatal.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: After a few years in hiatus, Ward decided to return to playing music in the late 1980s. In 1989 he went to work on a solo album, which featured a huge array of guest musicians, including former Black Sabbath bandmate Ozzy Osbourne and his guitarist, Zakk Wylde. Released in January 1990, "" showcased Ward's versatility in musical tastes and abilities; he even sang vocals on some of the songs. It would be seven years before he released his second solo album, "When the Bough Breaks", in 1997.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: In 2002 he released the song "Straws" as a single for charity. The song would reappear on his 2015 album "Accountable Beasts".


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Before the full Black Sabbath reunion, Ward and the original Sabbath had reunited twice for short sets, first for Live Aid in 1985 and then at a Costa Mesa, California Ozzy Osbourne show on 15 November 1992. Sabbath, with Judas Priest singer Rob Halford replacing Ronnie James Dio who had recently left the band, opened the show for Osbourne. The Ozzy Osbourne band (Osbourne, Zakk Wylde, Mike Inez, Randy Castillo and John Sinclair) then did a full set before Osbourne was reunited with Iommi, Butler and Ward for four numbers.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Ward made a brief return to the band for a South American tour in 1994 with Tony Martin fronting, before finally rejoining the band for the two shows at the Birmingham NEC, England on 4 and 5 December 1997, which made up the "Reunion" album. When what was billed as the original line-up reunited for the Ozzfest tour in 1997, Mike Bordin played drums.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Ward was forced to skip all but the last two Black Sabbath appearances in 1998 while he recovered from a heart attack suffered during the tour rehearsals that May. As the band rehearsed, Ward stopped and asked if he could lie down for a spell. He then asked for his assistant and informed the band that his arm had gone numb. Iommi and Butler then left for a short time, not knowing the severity of Ward's condition. Outside, they saw an ambulance pass but weren't aware what was happening. Upon returning to the rehearsal space a short time later, a frantic Osbourne informed them "Bill has had a heart attack! Bill has had a heart attack!" As was the case in 1980, he was replaced at short notice by Vinny Appice, although this time it was always intended to be a temporary absence for Ward, health permitting.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: In 2000, Ward participated in a partial Black Sabbath reunion of sorts, joining Iommi and Osbourne to record the track "Who's Fooling Who" for Iommi's first solo album.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Since mid-2002, Ward has done a monthly internet-only radio show named "Rock 50" on radio station WPMD from Cerritos College in California. Ward plays a variety of metal, hard rock, and some classic rock.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: In October 2006, news leaked that Ward would be reuniting with Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Ronnie James Dio for a tour though under the moniker Heaven & Hell. However, Ward later decided not to participate in the tour or continue participation in the band because of musical differences with "a couple of the other bandmembers" and a reported concern about extended touring. His spot in the band was filled by Vinny Appice.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: On 11 November 2011, Iommi, Butler, Osbourne, and Ward announced that they were reuniting to record a new album with producer Rick Rubin and to start touring in 2012. In February 2012, however, Ward left before work commenced on "13", the first studio recording to include original band members Iommi, Osbourne and Butler since the live album "Reunion" (1998), which contained two new studio tracks. Ward said that he had failed to reach an agreement regarding his contract. However, he did later admit that his weight would have been an issue in a 2013 tour. Osbourne also suggested in an open letter that Ward's decision not to take part was down to his health. In April 2015, Ward criticised Osbourne on his Facebook fan page via a letter to his and the band's fans. This prompted a rebuttal from Osbourne on his Facebook page:


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Ward's surgery on his shoulder prevented him from playing drums again until May 2014, delaying his third studio album "Accountable Beasts". He had also expressed a desire to tour behind the album once it is released, provided that sales were acceptable.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Ward reunited with Sabbath members Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler to accept the "Lifetime Achievement" award at the May 2015 Ivor Novello Awards.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: In 2016, Ward debuted with a new band called "Day of Errors", which played its first gig in June that year at Gaslamp in Long Beach, California and also features Joe Amodea on guitar/vocals and Kill Devil Hill singer Jason "Dewey" Bragg on vocals.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Ward was due to play a string of dates with his new band in December 2017 but had to cancel these when he was hospitalised with heart problems in November.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: He once again reunited with Iommi and Butler in Los Angeles in May 2019, as Black Sabbath were awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy. Though Sabbath did not perform, Rival Sons performed a set of their songs for the occasion. A short time later, Osbourne said in an interview that he wants to play one last show with the band's original line-up. Ward announced three weeks later on his Instagram that he loved all three of his former Black Sabbath bandmates very much and was open-minded to playing a final show with them. The last show Black Sabbath played was on 4 February 2017 in their native Birmingham, with Tommy Clufetos on drums instead of Ward. He also says, "I would love to do a studio album with Sabbath, with all the original members. I'm just saying that I'm just floating that out there – I haven't talked to anybody about that or anything else."


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: According to his Black Sabbath bandmates Tony Iommi and Ozzy Osbourne, Ward has dramatically changed his lifestyle since Black Sabbath's 1970s and early 80s heyday. Iommi says he stopped smoking, gave up alcohol, became a vegan, and does not use drugs of any kind. Osbourne says that Ward has been sober for approximately 30 years. However, more recently Osbourne has criticised Ward's health, describing him in 2013 as "incredibly overweight" and suggesting that he would have been unable to drum for Black Sabbath had he stayed in the band following their 2011 reunion, given his physical condition, although Ward himself has insisted his health has not affected his ability to play the drums.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Ward later admitted he underwent gastrointestinal surgery in 2013, and is still recovering. "Currently my health is not bad but it's certainly not good enough to play in any band, never mind Black Sabbath." By 2021, he admitted that he was no longer able to play his drum parts for Black Sabbath, but was open to recording another studio album with them.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Ward stated in an interview he "lost a friend" in Osbourne after his statements about Ward's health in 2012, but maintained contact with Butler and Iommi. However, they appear to have reconciled since then, as Osbourne named Ward as one of the people that kept in touch with him during his health problems in 2019.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: In 2016, Ward expressed his distaste for religion saying that he grew up in a "heathen" family and did not believe in a "fire and brimstone god [...] bloody rubbish!" He did however enjoy singing in Sunday church choirs growing up.


title: Bill Ward (musician)

text: Drumming website Totaldrumsets has listed Ward among "The 100 Most Influential Drummers Ever!" and has defined him "the mastermind behind the unholy birth of heavy metal drumming".


title: Ghana Empire

text: The Ghana Empire, also known as Wagadou () or Awkar, was a West African empire based in the modern-day southeast of Mauritania and western Mali that existed from c. 300 until 1100. The Empire was founded by the Soninke people, and was based in the capital city of Koumbi Saleh.


title: Ghana Empire

text: Complex societies, some based on trans-Saharan trade in salt and gold had existed in the region for centuries at the time of the empire's formation. The introduction of the camel to the western Sahara in the 3rd century AD served as a major catalyst for the transformative social changes that resulted in the empire's formation. By the time of the Muslim conquest of North Africa in the 7th century the camel had changed the ancient, more irregular trade routes into a trade network running from Morocco to the Niger River. The Ghana Empire grew rich from this increased trans-Saharan trade in gold and slaves and salt, allowing for larger urban centers to develop. The traffic furthermore encouraged territorial expansion to gain control over the different trade routes.


title: Ghana Empire

text: When Ghana's ruling began remains uncertain among historians. The first identifiable mention of the imperial dynasty in written records was made by Muḥammad ibn Mūsā al-Khwārizmī in 830. Further information about the empire was provided by the accounts of Cordoban scholar Al-Bakri when he wrote about the region in the 11th century.


title: Ghana Empire

text: After centuries of prosperity, the empire began its decline in the second millennium, and would finally become a vassal state of the rising Mali Empire at some point in the 13th century. Despite its collapse, the empire's influence can be felt in the establishment of numerous urban centers throughout its former territory. In 1957, the British colony of the Gold Coast under the leadership of Kwame Nkrumah named itself Ghana upon independence in honor and remembrance of the historic empire, although their geographic boundaries never overlapped.


title: Ghana Empire

text: The word "ghana" means "warrior" or "war chief" and was the title given to the rulers of the original kingdom whose Soninke name was "Ouagadou". "Kaya Maghan" (king of gold) was another title for these kings.


title: Ghana Empire

text: Theorizing concerning the origins of Ghana has been dominated by disputes between "ethnohistoric accounts" and "archaeological interpretations". The earliest discussions of its origins are found in the Sudanese chronicles of Mahmud Kati and Abd al-Rahman as-Sadi. According to Kati's "Tarikh al-Fettash" in a section probably composed by the author around 1580, but citing the authority of the chief judge of Messina, Ida al-Massini who lived somewhat earlier, twenty kings ruled Ghana before the advent of the prophet Muhammad, and the empire extended until the century after the prophet. In addressing the rulers' origin, the "Tarikh al-Fettash" provides three different opinions: that they were Soninke, Wangara (which are a Soninke group), or Sanhaja Berbers.


title: Ghana Empire

text: Al-Kati favored another interpretation in view of the fact that their genealogies linked them to this group, adding "What is certain is that they were not Soninke” ("min al-Zawadi"). While the 16th-century versions of genealogies might have linked Ghana to the Sanhaja, earlier versions, for example as reported by the 11th-century writer al-Idrisi and the 13th-century writer ibn Said, noted that rulers of Ghana in those days traced their descent from the clan of the Prophet Muhammad either through his protector Abi Talib, or through his son-in-law Ali. He says that 22 kings ruled before the Hijra and 22 after.


title: Ghana Empire

text: While these early views lead to many exotic interpretations of a foreign origin of Wagadu, these views are generally disregarded by scholars. Levtzion and Spaulding, for example, argue that al-Idrisi's testimony should be looked at very critically due to demonstrably gross miscalculations in geography and historical chronology, while they themselves associate Ghana with the local Soninke. In addition, the archaeologist and historian Raymond Mauny argues that al-Kati's and al-Saadi's view of a foreign origin cannot be regarded as reliable. He argues that the interpretations were based on the later presence (after Ghana's demise) of nomadic interlopers from Libya, on the assumption that they were the historic ruling caste, and that the writers did not adequately consider contemporary accounts such as those of Ya'qubi (872 CE), al-Masudi (c. 944 CE), Ibn Hawqal (977 CE), and al-Biruni (c. 1036 CE), as well as al-Bakri, all of whom describe the population and rulers of Ghana as "negroes".