Squire Cheyney Farm is a historic farm and national historic district located in Thornbury Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania, Thomas "Squire" Cheyney, was later appointed to the Pennsylvania Ratifying Convention to ratify the United States Constitution, the supreme law of which country?
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Squire Cheyney Farm Squire Cheyney Farm is a historic farm and national historic district located in Thornbury Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania. The district encompasses two contributing buildings, three contributing sites, one contributing structure, and contributing object. They are the farmhouse, barn (c. 1804, c. 1820, c. 1875, 1881, and c. 1910), ruins of a granary, remains of an ice house, a spring house (1799), stone retaining wall, and family cemetery (established c. 1803). The house was built in four periods, with the oldest dated to about 1797. The oldest section is a 2 1/s-story, three bay, stuccoed stone structure with a gable roof. The additions were built about 1815, about 1830, and about 1850, making it a seven-bay-wide dwelling. It is "L"-shaped and has a slate gable roof. During the American Revolution, Thomas "Squire" Cheyney [II] informed General George Washington during the Battle of Brandywine that the British were flanking him to the north. He was later appointed to the Pennsylvania Ratifying Convention to ratify the United States Constitution. The site is now a township park known as Squire Cheyney Farm Park.
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United States Constitution The United States Constitution is the supreme law of the United States of America. The Constitution, originally comprising seven articles, delineates the national frame of government. Its first three articles entrench the doctrine of the separation of powers, whereby the federal government is divided into three branches: the legislative, consisting of the bicameral Congress; the executive, consisting of the President; and the judicial, consisting of the Supreme Court and other federal courts. Articles Four, Five and Six entrench concepts of federalism, describing the rights and responsibilities of state governments and of the states in relationship to the federal government. Article Seven establishes the procedure subsequently used by the thirteen States to ratify it.
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Cheyney University of Pennsylvania Cheyney University of Pennsylvania is a public, co-educational historically black university that is a member of the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education. Cheyney University has a 275 acre campus that is located in Cheyney, Pennsylvania, a community within Thornbury Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania and Thornbury Township, Delaware County (school straddles both counties), in the state of Pennsylvania. Cheyney University is a member-school of Thurgood Marshall College Fund. The university offers bachelor's and master's degrees. In November 2015, the Middle States Commission on Higher Education placed Cheyney University on probation. Administrators are required to address a variety of issues including finances, leadership, and assessment of learning.
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Maryland in the American Civil War During the American Civil War, Maryland, a slave state, was one of the border states, straddling the South and North. Because of its strategic location, bordering the capital city of Washington D.C., and the strong desire of the opposing factions within the state to sway public opinion towards their respective causes, Maryland would play an important role in the American Civil War. Abraham Lincoln's suspension of "habeas corpus" in Maryland, and his dismissal of the Supreme Court's decision that the suspension was unconstitutional, would leave lasting scars. The court was led by Chief Justice Roger Brooke Taney, a Marylander.
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Massachusetts Constitutional Convention of 1778 The Constitutional Convention of 1778 was the first constitutional convention held in Massachusetts to draft a new state constitution following the state's declaration of independence in 1776. The convention that drafted the proposed constitution was composed of the elected members of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress and the Governor's Council meeting as a single body. The document drafted by this convention was approved in February 1778, and submitted to the voters of the state for ratification, the first constitution to be submitted for such a vote. It was soundly rejected by voters, leading to a second convention in 1779, whose proposed constitution was accepted.
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Albany Antifederal Committee The Albany Antifederal Committee was a group formed in 1788 in Albany, New York by several Anti-federalist politicians and business leaders critical of the proposed United States Constitution. The committee sought to sway public opinion and influence who would be selected to participate in the upcoming constitutional ratifying convention. On April 10, 1788, the committee published a circular in "The Albany gazette" that included over thirty objections to the constitution and answers to five common Federalist assertions. The stated objections included: the powers of Congress, the president, and the courts; the long term of federal officers; counting slaves in apportioning representation; the lack of a bill of rights; and the Supremacy Clause of Article Six.
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John Marshall John Marshall (September 24, 1755July 6, 1835) was an American politician. He was the fourth Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (1801–1835). His court opinions helped lay the basis for United States constitutional law and many say he made the Supreme Court of the United States a coequal branch of government along with the legislative and executive branches. Previously, Marshall had been a leader of the Federalist Party in Virginia and served in the United States House of Representatives from 1799 to 1800. He was Secretary of State under President John Adams from 1800 to 1801 and, at the age of 45, became the last of the chief justices to be born in Colonial America.
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Congressional Apportionment Amendment The Congressional Apportionment Amendment (originally titled Article the First) is a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution, one of twelve proposed amendments to the United States Constitution approved by the 1st Congress on September 25, 1789, and sent to the legislatures of the several states for ratification. If adopted, it would establish a formula for determining the appropriate size of the House of Representatives following each constitutionally mandated decennial census. It is the only one of the twelve that has not been adopted, as it has not been ratified by enough states for it to become part of the Constitution. Ten of the proposed amendments (numbers 3 through 12) were adopted in 1791, becoming the First through Tenth Amendments to the Constitution, and collectively known as the Bill of Rights. The second of the twelve proposed amendments was adopted in 1992, becoming the Twenty-seventh Amendment.
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Indian Country Jurisdiction Indian country jurisdiction, or the extent which tribal powers apply to legal situations in the United States, has undergone many drastic shifts since the beginning of European settlement in America. Over time, federal statutes and Supreme Court rulings have designated more or less power to tribal governments, depending on federal policy toward Indians. Numerous Supreme Court decisions have created important precedents in Indian country jurisdiction, such as "Worcester v. Georgia", "Oliphant v. Suquamish Tribe", and "Montana v. United States".
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Brown v. Maryland Brown v. Maryland, 25 U.S. (12 Wheat.) 419 (1827), was a significant United States Supreme Court case which interpreted the Import-Export and Commerce Clauses of the U.S. Constitution to prohibit discriminatory taxation by states against imported items after importation, rather than only at the time of importation. The state of Maryland passed a law requiring importers of foreign goods to obtain a license for selling their products. Brown was charged under this law and appealed. It was the first case in which the U.S. Supreme Court construed the Import-Export Clause. Chief Justice John Marshall delivered the opinion of the court, ruling that Maryland's statute violated the import-export and commerce clauses and the federal law was supreme. He alleged that the power of a state to tax goods did not apply if they remained in their "original package". A license tax on the importer was essentially the same as a tax on an import itself. Despite arguing the case for Maryland, future chief justice Roger Taney admitted that the case was correctly decided.
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Federal lands Federal lands are lands in the United States for which ownership is claimed by the U.S. federal government, pursuant to of the United States Constitution. The United States Supreme Court has repeatedly held that this section empowers Congress to retain federal lands, to regulate federal lands such as by limiting cattle grazing, and to sell such lands. As of March 2012, out of the 2.27 billion acres (918.6 million hectares) in the country, about 28% of the total was owned by the Federal government according to the Interior Department. The United States Supreme Court has upheld the broad powers of the federal government to deal with federal lands, for example having unanimously held in "Kleppe v. New Mexico" that "the complete power that Congress has over federal lands under this clause necessarily includes the power to regulate and protect wildlife living there, state law notwithstanding."
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Cheyney, Pennsylvania Cheyney is an unincorporated community that sits astride Chester and Delaware counties in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. It corresponds to the census-designated place known as Cheyney University, which had a population of 988 at the 2010 census. It is the home of Cheyney University of Pennsylvania. The university derive their name from George Cheyney's Farm, which became the current campus of Cheyney University in 1902. George Cheyney's Farm and the surrounding area was part of the original land grant given to William Penn in 1681.
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Amos Singletary Amos Singletary (September 1721 – October 30, 1806) was an Anti-Federalist mill operator, lawyer, and justice of the peace from Sutton, Massachusetts. He was often a Representative in the Massachusetts General Court, and was a delegate to the Massachusetts Ratifying Convention. Singletary supported Shays' Rebellion, an armed uprising that catalyzed the calling for the Constitutional Convention. He became furious with perceived Federalist arrogance, asking them to "not play round the subject with their fine stories, like a fox round a trap, but come to it.
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Constitution of the Netherlands The Constitution for the Kingdom of the Netherlands (Dutch: "Grondwet voor het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden" ) is one of two fundamental documents governing the Kingdom of the Netherlands as well as the fundamental law of the European territory of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The present constitution is generally seen as directly derived from the one issued in 1815, constituting a constitutional monarchy. A revision in 1848 instituted a system of parliamentary democracy. In 1983, a major revision of the constitution was undertaken, almost fully rewriting the text and adding new civil rights. The text is very sober, devoid of legal or political doctrine. It includes a bill of rights. The constitution prohibits the judiciary to test laws and treaties against the constitution, as this is considered a prerogative of the legislature. There is no constitutional court in the Netherlands, except for the Constitutional Court of Sint Maarten which only governs the Sint Maarten legislator. The Kingdom of the Netherlands also includes Aruba, Curaçao and Sint Maarten: there is an overarching instrument of the entire kingdom that has constitution characterisics: the Statute of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
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Signing of the United States Constitution The Signing of the United States Constitution occurred on September 17, 1787, at Independence Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, when 39 delegates to the Constitutional Convention, representing 12 states (all but Rhode Island, which declined to send delegates), endorsed the Constitution created during the four-month-long convention. In addition to signatures, this endorsement, the Constitution's eschatocol, included a brief declaration that the delegates’ work has been successfully completed and that those whose signatures appear on it subscribe to the final document. Included are, a statement pronouncing the document's adoption by the states present, a formulaic dating of its adoption, along with the signatures of those endorsing it. Additionally, the convention's secretary, William Jackson, signed the document to authenticate the validity of the delegate signatures. He also made a few secretarial notes.
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William Clingan William Clingan (c.1721 – May 9, 1790) was a delegate in the Continental Congress for Pennsylvania from 1777 to 1779. He signed the Articles of Confederation. Upon his death he was buried in the Upper Octorara Church Cemetery in Parkesburg, Pennsylvania.
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Federal judiciary of the United States The federal judiciary of the United States is one of the three co-equal branches of the federal government of the United States organized under the United States Constitution and laws of the federal government. Article III of the Constitution requires the establishment of a Supreme Court and permits the Congress to create other federal courts, and place limitations on their jurisdiction. Article III federal judges are appointed by the President with the consent of the Senate to serve until they resign, are impeached and convicted, retire, or die.
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William Biles William Biles (1644 – 19 May 1710) was an American judge, attorney, legislator, sheriff, land speculator and merchant. Born in England and educated in law, Biles brought his family to America in 1679 and settled in what would become Falls Township, Bucks County, Pennsylvania, before the charter of William Penn. The Biles family had been persecuted for their religious dissension in England, and William became a prominent Quaker minister. "After the withdrawal of the Declaration of Indulgence dissenters were more often punished for being absent from their parish churches... Quakers were always fair game and in the following spring (1674) two of them, William Biles and Thomas Strong, were presented at the Assizes." Presumably punishment for being absent from their parish church and attending Quaker ceremonies.
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Jesse Root Jesse Root (December 28, 1736 – March 29, 1822) was an American minister and lawyer from Coventry, Connecticut. During the American Revolution he served on the Connecticut Council of Safety and in the Connecticut militia. Originally appointed as a lieutenant colonel in Peekskill in 1777, he rose to the rank of Adjustant-General of the Connecticut Line. He was a delegate to the Continental Congress for Connecticut from 1778 until 1782, and sat as chief justice of the Connecticut Supreme Court from 1796 to 1807 as well as a state court judge. He served in the Connecticut House of Representatives and served in the Connecticut Constitutional Convention. He was also a member of the First Company, Governor's Foot Guard, serving as its commandant between May 1798 and October 1802.
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Jury nullification in the United States Jury nullification in the United States has its origins in colonial British America. Similar to British law, in the United States jury nullification occurs when a jury in a criminal case reaches a verdict contrary to the weight of evidence, sometimes because of a disagreement with the relevant law. The American jury draws its power of nullification from its right to render a general verdict in criminal trials, the inability of criminal courts to direct a verdict no matter how strong the evidence, the Fifth Amendment’s Double Jeopardy Clause, which prohibits the appeal of an acquittal, and the fact that jurors can never be punished for the verdict they return.
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Titles of Nobility Amendment The Titles of Nobility Amendment is a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution. The 11th Congress passed it on May 1, 1810, and submitted to the state legislatures for ratification. It would strip United States citizenship from any citizen who accepted a title of nobility from an "emperor, king, prince or foreign power." On two occasions between 1812 and 1816 it was within two states of the number needed to become a valid part of the Constitution. Congress did not set a time limit for its ratification, so the amendment is still pending before the states. Ratification by an additional 26 states is needed for this amendment to be adopted.
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Treaty of Fort Pitt The Treaty of Fort Pitt — also known as the Treaty With the Delawares, the Delaware Treaty, or the Fourth Treaty of Pittsburgh, — was signed on September 17, 1778 and was the first written treaty between the new United States of America and any American Indians—the Lenape (Delaware Indians) in this case. Although many informal treaties were held with Native Americans during the American Revolution years of 1775–1783, this was the only one that resulted in a formal document. It was signed at Fort Pitt, Pennsylvania, site of present-day downtown Pittsburgh. It was essentially a formal treaty of alliance.