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force bill

(Encyclopedia)force bill, popular name for several laws in U.S. history, notably the act of Mar. 2, 1833, and the Reconstruction acts of May 31, 1870; Feb. 28, 1871; and Apr. 20, 1871. The first force bill, passed ...

Jenkins of Hillhead, Roy Harris Jenkins, Baron

(Encyclopedia)Jenkins of Hillhead, Roy Harris Jenkins, Baron, 1920–2003, British politician, b. Abersychan, Wales; grad. Oxford. He entered the House of Commons in 1948 as a Labour member and soon became one of t...

Lerdo de Tejada, Miguel

(Encyclopedia)Lerdo de Tejada, Miguel mēgĕlˈ lĕrˈᵺō dā tāhäˈᵺä [key], d. 1861, Mexican liberal statesman, a leader of the Revolution of Ayutla, cabinet member under Juan Álvarez. As minister under C...

Lucretius

(Encyclopedia)Lucretius (Titus Lucretius Carus) lo͞okrēˈshəs [key], c.99 b.c.–c.55 b.c., Roman poet and philosopher. Little is known about his life. A chronicle of St. Jerome speaks of the loss of his reason ...

Brahe, Tycho

(Encyclopedia)Brahe, Tycho tīˈkō brä [key], 1546–1601, Danish astronomer. The most prominent astronomer of the late 16th cent., he paved the way for future discoveries by improving instruments and by his prec...

Kongo, kingdom of

(Encyclopedia)Kongo, kingdom of kôngˈgō, kŏngˈ– [key], former state of W central Africa, founded in the 14th cent. In the 15th cent. the kingdom stretched from the Congo River in the north to the Loje River ...

Catholic Emancipation

(Encyclopedia)Catholic Emancipation, term applied to the process by which Roman Catholics in the British Isles were relieved in the late 18th and early 19th cent. of civil disabilities. They had been under oppressi...

Dilke, Sir Charles Wentworth

(Encyclopedia)Dilke, Sir Charles Wentworth dĭlk [key], 1843–1911, British statesman. A radical leader in the Liberal party, he helped pass the parliamentary Reform Acts of 1884–85 as well as laws giving the mu...

Ferdinand I, Spanish king of Castile and León

(Encyclopedia)Ferdinand I or Ferdinand the Great, d. 1065, Spanish king of Castile (1035–65) and León (1037–65). He inherited Castile from his father, Sancho III of Navarre, conquered León, and took parts of ...

Hume, Joseph

(Encyclopedia)Hume, Joseph, 1777–1855, English politician and reformer. Although a Tory in early life, he sat in Parliament from 1818 to 1855 (with only one interruption) as an indefatigable Radical. Hume was a l...