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In its first year of existence, MetroNation raised $1015 in donations for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. MetroNation also raised funds for victims of Hurricane Katrina. When evacuees from New Orleans resettled temporarily in the New York City area, MetroNation hosted them at a MetroStars match on September 17, 2005 – a wild 5–4 MetroStars victory over New England Revolution. |
RagingBullNation is known for their "RoadSide Roundup" (formerly "MetroGate") game day tailgate parties, located in parking lot 15 outside the South Tower entrance of Giants Stadium. On the occasion of USA international matches being scheduled on the same day as Red Bulls matches, Raging Bull Nation has organized watch parties in the parking lot using portable satellite equipment. |
Raging Bull Nation organizes its away game road trips to D.C. United and New England Revolution in coordination with other Red Bulls supporters clubs, such as Empire Supporters Club and First Row Idiots. |
Raging Bull Nation has an official theme song written by Mike Apple. |
On Red Bulls home opening day 2006, Raging Bull Nation unveiled its tribute entitled “From the Stars and Stripes to the Red and Black.” It will be a tribute to the MetroStars who played in the 1994 FIFA World Cup and it will be kept at the Pride and Passion Pub at Giants Stadium until its move to the new stadium pub at Red Bull Arena. The players honored include Hall of Famer Tab Ramos and future Hall of Famers Tony Meola and Alexi Lalas. |
MSG Network color commentator Shep Messing has taken to referring to all Red Bulls supporters as "The MetroNation" after noticing MetroNation scarves held aloft at games. However the largest and most influential Red Bulls supporters club is the Empire Supporters Club. |
MetroNation member John "Johnny Metro" Russo was named 2004 MetroStars Fan of the Year. It has become tradition for all newly signed MetroStars players to sign Johnny Metro's shaved head. |
= = = Devicescape = = = |
Devicescape develops client/server software services for wireless networking connectivity, analytics, and context-awareness. Founded in 2001 as Instant802 Networks, the company was renamed to Devicescape in January 2005. Devicescape is a venture backed private company. |
Instant802 Networks was founded in 2001 by Eduardo de-Castro and Roy Petruschka in San-Francisco, and Simon Barber had joined as a third founder a few months after company incorporation. In 2004 the company began development of packaged software products, including security for emerging devices and complete access point packages. The software was used in devices ranging from LCD projectors, televisions and digital video recorders to PDAs and SOHO access points. The company also provided software for the Wi-Fi Alliance test bed. |
Dave Fraser joined as CEO in 2004, and in 2005 the company was renamed Devicescape Software. The company continued to develop additional client security products. In 2006, Devicescape exited the access point business by licensing its "Wireless Infrastructure Platform" technology to LVL7, which was subsequently sold to Broadcom. |
In 2007, Devicescape introduced Connect, a client-server system which allowed embedded devices to automatically authenticate against a large number of public Wi-Fi networks. The company released a variety of consumer applications for PCs and smartphones under the Devicescape Easy Wi-Fi brand. In 2009, Devicescape launched the Easy WiFi Network. |
In 2010, Devicescape applied server-based analysis to curate Wi-Fi networks discovered by client applications, so that Wi-Fi networks could be assessed for quality, location, sharing status and other factors. The company referred to this as a "Curated Virtual Network" (CVN) and became a mechanism for offloading traffic from cellular networks. Late in 2010, MetroPCS (now T-Mobile) became the first major publicly-announced customer to use the Devicescape CVN. |
From 2011 through 2014, Devicescape announced several additional US mobile operator customers, including US Cellular and Cricket Wireless, as well as some Wi-Fi centric operators such as Republic Wireless. In 2012, Devicescape expanded the CVN into Europe and subsequently announced an agreement with Virgin Media (UK) in 2014. |
In March 2016, Devicescape announced Liberty Global as their first major customer in Europe. |
In 2017, Devicescape launched Engage, a proximity-based marketing service, with Universal Pictures as one of their customers. |
In 2018, Devicescape launched Presence, a service for client applications to determine venue awareness - leveraging Devicescape's worldwide database of access point metadata. |
Devicescape licenses software and operates its services for service providers, device makers, and application makers. Devicescape provides the following: |
= = = South Gippsland railway line = = = |
The South Gippsland railway line is a partially closed railway line in Victoria, Australia. It was first opened in 1892, branching from the Orbost line at Dandenong, and extending to Port Albert. Much of it (the section up to Leongatha) remained in use until July 1993. Today, only the section between Dandenong and Cranbourne remains open for use. The section of the line from Nyora to Leongatha was used by the South Gippsland Tourist Railway until it ceased operations in 2016. The section from Leongatha to Toora, and a portion of the former line at Koo Wee Rup, have been converted into the Great Southern Rail Trail. |
The Melbourne and Suburban Railway Company opened a line from Princes Bridge railway station to Punt Road (Richmond) and South Yarra in 1859 and extended to Dandenong in 1879. The South Gippsland railway line was opened from Dandenong to Cranbourne in 1888 and extended to Koo Wee Rup, Nyora and Loch in 1890, Korumburra and Leongatha in 1891 and Welshpool, Alberton and Port Albert in 1892. The section from Alberton to Port Albert was closed in the 1940s. A branch line was built from Alberton to Yarram and Woodside in 1921. |
The line was well known for its sharp curves and spectacular scenery and was also one of the last lines to offer a 'Mixed Passenger and Goods' service in Victoria. The section from Yarram to Woodside was closed on 26 May 1953, with the section from Welshpool to Yarram closed on 26 October 1987 when the superphosphate freight services ceased. From this point until 30 June 1992, the track beyond Agnes, referred to as Barry Beach Junction received minimal usage, although a short branch leading from Agnes to Barry Beach was used extensively for goods traffic to serve the oil platforms in Bass Strait. After the withdrawal of this freight service the railway line beyond Leongatha was booked out of use for all rail traffic. This section of track was then dismantled in 1994, in which required the strengthening of the line's derelict trestle bridges in order to allow the track removal machine to dismantle the tracks. |
On 24 July 1993, the last regular V/Line passenger train operated to Leongatha with P Class diesel locomotive number 18 hauling the return passenger train with a set of 4 H-Set carriages. Following the withdrawal of all rail service beyond Koala Siding, the section of track from Nyora to Leongatha was transferred to the South Gippsland Railway in 1994, The South Gippsland Railway was founded in 1990 as the "Great Southern Railway Society", based at Nyora, with the intention of preserving the line in case of closure. On 15 January 1998, all regular V/Line services ceased on the line after the withdrawal of the Australian Glass Manufacturing sand train, that operated between the sand mine at Koala Siding, situated between Lang Lang and Nyora railway stations, and the AGM siding at Spotswood. Since April 1998, no trains have operated beyond Cranbourne. |
A 5 km-long narrow-gauge horse-drawn tramway was opened from Welshpool to Welshpool Jetty in 1905. It was closed in 1941. |
The mountainous Strzelecki branch line, which opened in 1922, was built from Koo Wee Rup to Strzelecki. The line was closed in stages throughout the 1930s, '40s and '50s. |
The Wonthaggi branch line was built from Nyora to Wonthaggi, opening in 1910, to serve the State Coal Mine, a small extension to the line was opened in 1917. The Wonthaggi line was closed in 1978. |
The Outtrim branch line was built from Korumburra to the coal mine at Outtrim in two stages: the initial stage to Jumbunna was opened in 1894, with the final section to Outtrim opening in 1896. The line was closed in two stages: the first from Jumbunna to Outtrim on 4 September 1951 and then from Jumbunna to Korumburra on 1 October 1953. |
Passenger services operated on the line from its opening. Services from Melbourne to Leongatha and Yarram were withdrawn on 6 June 1981, with replacement buses starting three days later. The Yarram train was a loco hauled train, while the Leongatha train was a DRC railcar hauling MTH carriages. To fill the gaps between those services, local trains were introduced on a three-month trial from Dandenong to Lang Lang, but were withdrawn on 3 October 1981, due to insufficient patronage. Services to Leongatha were restored on 9 December 1984, and free train shuttles to Korumburra were provided to mark the occasion. The 1984 timetable included two round trips per day from Monday to Saturday, and one round trip on Sundays. However, the services were again withdrawn on 24 July 1993. With the withdrawal of freight services from Koala siding in January 1998, the line became unused beyond Cranbourne. The exception was a tourist operation, which commenced operation between Nyora and Leongatha. It later became known as South Gippsland Railway. In 1995 the section between Dandenong and Cranbourne was electrified and a station added at Merinda Park, as part of a $27 million Federal Government-funded project. |
The Barry Beach freight service ceased in 1992. The line beyond Leongatha was booked out of service on 30 June 1992, effectively ending all traffic on the line beyond Leongatha. V/Line passenger services ceased to Leongatha on 24 July 1993, after last train to Melbourne. By the mid-1990s only T, Y and P class diesel locomotives were used on the line, due to their low axle loads, with a 15 km/h speed limit applying to parts of the track. This continued until 15 January 1998, when the Koala Siding (near Nyora) to Spotswood sand train ceased operation. On average, it took a passenger train 2 hours and 15 minutes to travel from Spencer Street station to Leongatha during the final 10 years of service, with the replacement bus service completing the journey in an average time of 2 hours and 30 minutes. |
A number of special railway enthusiast services were operated along the line during the 1980s and 1990s, given that the line was near closure. Notable special journeys included K.153 hauling the last steam special to Yarram on 24 October 1987, as well as an earlier Vintage Train journey to Foster and return on 6 September 1987. The last steam hauled train to run beyond Leongatha was on 13 November 1988, when steam locomotives D3.639 and K.153 travelled to Foster. That was the last time the locomotive turntable at Foster would be available for usage prior to its relocation to Korumburra railway station for the South Gippsland Tourist Railway in 1994. Local Melbourne community groups continued to organise chartered special diesel and railcar-hauled trains beyond Leongatha until 1991. A steam and diesel special to Barry Beach and Welshpool on 11 November 1989, which was organised to celebrate the 100th anniversary since the Dandenong to Nyora section of the Great Southern Railway Line opened. Heritage steam locomotive J515 hauled the special to Leongatha and return later one in the day while then V/Line diesel locomotive T368 took over for the section of track beyond Leongatha due to the turntable at Foster not being available for operation. D.E.R.M. 58 ran the last advertised special train available to the public beyond Leongatha to Welshpool and Barry Beach on May the 12th 1990. |
During the 1990s, steam tours only operated as far as Leongatha, with the first being run on 9 September 1990, again hauled by steam locomotive K.153, which coincided with the steam locomotive's 50th anniversary since being introduced into service. In 1993 there were two notable steam -hauled trips to Leongatha. Both specials were operated by Steamrail Victoria, and hauled 11-car consists of Victorian Railways E-Type and W-Type wooden carriages, which ran numerous shuttles between Korumburra and Leongatha stations. The first one was on 2 May, which was supposed to be a triple header of K Class steam locomotives. However, one of the scheduled locomotives, K190, suffered a defective main internal steampipe failure at Caulfield, leaving locomotives K153 and K183 to double-head the train. On 25 July 1993, the apparent "Last Lament to Leongatha" was run, operated by K190 and K183. |
After the withdrawal of passenger services to Leongatha, a few more steam-hauled trips were organised before the line was booked out of regular use between Cranbourne and Nyora. On 17 April 1994, K190 and K183 again travelled to Leongatha with the "South Gippsland Rambler", with a consist of seven wooden carriages. Steam locomotive J515 journeyed to Leongatha on 14 October 1995, for the first time since November 1989, organised by the Seymour Railway Heritage Centre and the ARHS. During the tour, J515 derailed due to a missing guide rail on the locomotive turntable at Korumburra that had been recently relocated from Foster. |
The last locomotive to traverse the South Gippsland main line before its closure was steam locomotive K190 operated by Steamrail Victoria. It returned to Steamrail Victoria's base at Newport on 29 April 1998, after it was leased to the South Gippsland Tourist Railway (SGTR) in December 1996. The South Gippsland Tourist Railway had first loaned the locomotive during the summer of 1995-1996. The locomotive again returned for the summer of 1996-1997. K190 was leased to the South Gippsland Tourist Railway on 7 December 1996, when Steamrail Victoria operated another steam special to Leongatha. Diesel loco T345 was also loaned to the tourist railway at the time, and was part of the train from Newport workshops. K183 double-headed with K190 to Nyora, with T345 attached to the special. K190 and T345 were detached at Nyora station. Shortly afterwards K183 journeyed solo to Leongatha. K190 followed to Leongatha with a consist of the tourist railway's carriages. T342, T345 and the DERM RM55 combined for a Saturday tourist railway service. Later, K183 returned to Newport Workshops with the Steamrail Victoria train. However, steam locomotives D3639 and K183 combined for the last steam excursion to traverse the South Gippsland rail line on 25 September 1997. During this time D3.639, along with K190, were both on loan to the South Gippsland Tourist Railway. |
The track beyond Leongatha, to Yarram and the Barry Beach branch line, was dismantled in 1994, but removal of other infrastructure, such as level crossing signals, took place around mid to late 1992, soon after the last train ran to Barry Beach. The section between Leongatha and Foster was turned into the Great Southern Rail Trail in 1998. In 2011, the Tarra Rail Trail from Alberton to Yarram was completed. , the section between Foster and Toora had been complete, leaving the final section from there to Alberton being converted into the Great Southern Rail Trail. |
The section from Dandenong to Cranbourne was electrified in 1995 and, as the Cranbourne Line, is now part of the Melbourne suburban rail network. The first level crossing on the closed section of the line, the South Gippsland Highway crossing in Cranbourne has since been paved over. The Victorian Transport Plan of 2009 stated that the Cranbourne line would be extended two kilometres to a new station at Cranbourne East by 2015. The new Cranbourne East station would be built near Renyard Street and the Casey Fields complex. The line from Nyora to Leongatha was used by the South Gippsland Tourist Railway until 2016. The branch line from Nyora to Wonthaggi was closed in 1978 and dismantled by 1990. It is now the Bass Coast Rail Trail. Since its closure, a significant section of the former Wonthaggi Line has been leased or sold to farmers, while other sections have been cut away to widen highways and main roads in the coastal South Gippsland region. The former branch lines to both Outtrim and Strezlecki have become a distant memory. |
The remaining section of track from Cranbourne to Nyora is disused but mostly still intact. A length of track was pulled up at Koo Wee Rup in 2009 to allow the construction of toilets for the bus and coach stop. Construction of the pipeline for Wonthaggi Desalination Plant made it necessary to remove three sections of the line. The first is about 100 metres on the down side of Monomeith Road, where about 50 metres of track were removed. The second is on the up side of Caldermeade Road, where about thirty metres of track were removed, and the third is about halfway between Caldermeade and Lang Lang stations. |
Much of the operational and safeworking infrastructure remains in place in this section, including signalling equipment, level crossings, and easements. Station platforms are also in place, but mostly without station buildings, for example at Lang Lang, Koo-Wee-Rup, and Tooradin. Parts of the track have warped due to erosion, ground movement or the displacement of sleepers. This is especially evident near Lang Lang, Tooradin, and north of Koo-Wee-Rup. There are also questions about the integrity of some bridges and culverts along the route. |
Prior to the 1999 Victorian election, the state Labor Party promised to return passenger services to Leongatha. In 2008, a report commissioned by the Victorian Department of Transport found the cost of returning passenger services to Leongatha to be unjustifiably high, estimating the cost at $72 million. The report stated that only 20 per cent of respondents surveyed about their transport needs considered restoring train services to be the main priority. Instead $14.7 million was allocated to road coach service upgrades. The then Minister for Public Transport Lynne Kosky said that the State Government had provided funding for development of a rail trail between Cranbourne East and Nyora to support tourism in South Gippsland in May 2008. |
On February 24, 2016 South Gippsland Shire Council unanimously carried motions to support the return of rail services to Leongatha on the back of a petition initiated by the South & West Gippsland Transport Group, which attracted 2,420 supporters. The successful motion means that the data gathered from the petition and documents prepared by South Gippsland Shire Council investigating the returning rail to South Gippsland have now been passed onto Public Transport Victoria with a call to provide for South Gippsland rail services in the forthcoming Regional Network Development Plan. After the disbandment of the South Gippsland Tourist Railway on January 16, 2016 it had also been announced that VicTrack will continue to leave the disused rail line between Cranbourne and Leongatha intact and available for future use by freight and passenger trains. |
Reopening the South Gippsland railway line as far as Leongatha continues to be a prominent issue in the region. A South Gippsland Shire Council Priority Projects document, released in June 2013, acknowledged that the return of a rail service was a major community priority, with funding and support sought from all levels of government. In early 2014, a report into possible extensions of the Melbourne metropolitan rail system identified the population growth corridor from Cranbourne to Koo-Wee-Rup, along the disused Leongatha line, as a key planning priority. The South and West Gippsland Transport Group, a public transport and rail lobby group, established in April 2011, which is closely associated with the South Gippsland Shire Council and other local government bodies, has campaigned for an integrated transport plan in the region, which includes rail at the forefront of the proposal. The group had been known as the South Gippsland Transport Users Group and had amalgamated with numerous rail lobby groups in 1994 shortly after the rail passenger service to Leongatha was withdrawn in July 1993. One notable milestone for the group was running a successful campaign that saw passenger rail services reinstated to Leongatha on December 9, 1984. Despite the promise to revive the railway line for freight and passenger services by the Bracks Labor government in 1999 being abandoned by his successor John Brumby in 2008, a community campaign involving the South and West Gippsland Transport Group continued to lobby, in collaboration with key stakeholders and governments, to achieve the reinstatement of rail services, and the improvement of transport accessibility in the region. |
= = = Round-tripping (finance) = = = |
Round-tripping, also known as round-trip transactions or "Lazy Susans", is defined by "The Wall Street Journal" as a form of barter that involves a company selling "an unused asset to another company, while at the same time agreeing to buy back the same or similar assets at about the same price." Swapping assets on a round-trip produces no net economic substance, but may be fraudulently reported as a series of productive sales and beneficial purchases on the books of the companies involved, violating the substance over form accounting principle. The companies appear to be growing and very "busy", but the round-tripping "business" does not generate profits. Growth is an attractive factor to speculative investors, even if profits are lacking; such investment benefits companies and motivates them to undertake the illusory growth of round-tripping. |
Round trips are characteristic of the New Economy companies. They played a crucial part in temporarily inflating the market capitalization of energy traders such as Enron, CMS Energy, Reliant Energy, and Dynegy. |
In international scenarios, round tripping is used for tax evasion and money laundering. |
Other companies making unconventional round-tripping deals include AOL with Sun Microsystems and Global Crossing with Qwest Communications. It is alleged that when some telecommunications companies swapped capacity, they booked the value of the incoming capacity as revenue and the value of the outgoing capacity as an investment. These transactions had the effect of inflating profits. The SEC ruled that booking revenues from swaps in telecommunications capacity was improper. |
Many such companies have used round-tripping to distort the market by establishing false revenue benchmarks, aiming to meet or beat the numbers put out by Wall Street stock analysts. As a result of abusive round trips, barter between publicly held companies has become discredited among professional investors. |
= = = Militia (United States) = = = |
The militia of the United States, (Not be confused with Militia of one of the several states) as defined by the U.S. Congress, has changed over time. |
During colonial America, all able-bodied men of certain ages were members of the militia, depending on the respective states rule. Individual towns formed local independent militias for their own defense. The year before the US Constitution was ratified, "The Federalist Papers" detailed the founders' paramount vision of the militia in 1787. The new Constitution empowered Congress to "organize, arm, and discipline" this national military force, leaving significant control in the hands of each state government. |
Today, as defined by the Militia Act of 1903, the term "militia" is used to describe two classes within the United States: |
A third militia is a state defense force. It is authorized by state and federal laws. |
Congress has organized the National Guard under its power to "raise and support armies" and not its power to "Provide for organizing, arming and disciplining the Militia". This Congress chose to do in the interests of organizing reserve military units which were not limited in deployment by the strictures of our power over the constitutional militia, which can be called forth only "to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions." The modern National Guard was specifically intended to avoid status as the constitutional militia, a distinction recognized by 10 U.S.C. Sec 311(a). |
The term "militia" derives from Old English "milite" meaning soldiers (plural), "militisc" meaning military and also classical Latin "milit-, miles" meaning soldier. |
The Modern English term "militia" dates to the year 1590, with the original meaning now obsolete: "the body of soldiers in the service of a sovereign or a state". Subsequently, since approximately 1665, "militia" has taken the meaning "a military force raised from the civilian population of a country or region, especially to supplement a regular army in an emergency, frequently as distinguished from mercenaries or professional soldiers". The U.S. Supreme Court adopted the following definition for "active militia" from an Illinois Supreme Court case of 1879: " 'a body of citizens trained to military duty, who may be called out in certain cases, but may not be kept on service like standing armies, in times of peace'. . . when not engaged at stated periods . . . they return to their usual avocations . . . and are subject to call when public exigencies demand it." |
The spelling of "millitia" is often observed in written and printed materials from the 17th century through the 19th century. |
"See article: Colonial American military history" |
The early colonists of America considered the militia an important social institution, necessary to provide defense and public safety. |
"See article: Provincial troops in the French and Indian Wars" |
During the French and Indian Wars, town militia formed a recruiting pool for the Provincial Forces. The legislature of the colony would authorize a certain force level for the season's campaign and set recruitment quotas for each local militia. In theory, militia members could be drafted by lot if there were inadequate forces for the Provincial Regulars; however, the draft was rarely resorted to because provincial regulars were highly paid (more highly paid than their regular British Army counterparts) and rarely engaged in combat. |
In September 1755, George Washington, then adjutant-general of the Virginia militia, upon a frustrating and futile attempt to call up the militia to respond to a frontier Indian attack: |
See New Hampshire Provincial Regiment for a history of a Provincial unit during the French and Indian War. |
Just prior to the American Revolutionary War, on October 26, 1774, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, observing the British military buildup, deemed their militia resources to be insufficient: the troop strength, "including the sick and absent, amounted to about seventeen thousand men ... this was far short of the number wanted, that the council recommended an immediate application to the New England governments to make up the deficiency": |
"See article: List of United States militia units in the American Revolutionary War" |
The American Revolutionary War began near Boston, Massachusetts with the Battles of Lexington and Concord, in which a group of local militias constituted the American side (the "Patriots"). On April 19, 1775, a British force 800 strong marched out of Boston to Concord intending to destroy patriot arms and ammunition. At 5:00 in the morning at Lexington, they met about 70 armed militiamen whom they ordered to disperse, but the militiamen refused. Firing ensued; it is not clear which side opened fire. This became known as "the shot heard round the world". Eight militiamen were killed and ten wounded, whereupon the remainder took flight. The British continued on to Concord and were unable to find most of the arms and ammunition of the patriots. As the British marched back toward Boston, patriot militiamen assembled along the route, taking cover behind stone walls, and sniped at the British. At Meriam's Corner in Concord, the British columns had to close in to cross a narrow bridge, exposing themselves to concentrated, deadly fire. The British retreat became a rout. It was only with the help of an additional detachment of 900 troops that the British force managed to return to Boston. This marked the beginning of the war. It was "three days after the affair of Lexington and Concord that any movement was made towards embodying a regular army". |
In 1777, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation, which contained a provision for raising a confederal militia that consent would be required from nine of the 13 States. Article VI of the Articles of Confederation states, |
Some militia units appeared without adequate arms, as evidenced in this letter from John Adams to his wife, dated August 26, 1777: |
The militia are turning out with great alacrity both in Maryland and Pennsylvania. They are distressed for want of arms. Many have none, we shall rake and scrape enough to do Howe's business, by favor of the Heaven. |
The initial enthusiasm of Patriot militiamen in the beginning days of the war soon waned. The historian Garry Wills explains, |
The fervor of the early days in the reorganized militias wore off in the long grind of an eight-year war. Now the right to elect their own officers was used to demand that the men not serve away from their state. Men evaded service, bought substitutes to go for them as in the old days, and had to be bribed with higher and higher bounties to join the effort – which is why Jefferson and Samuel Adams called them so expensive. As wartime inflation devalued the currency, other pledges had to be offered, including land grants and the promise of "a healthy slave" at the end of the war. Some men would take a bounty and not show up. Or they would show up for a while, desert, and then, when they felt the need for another bounty, sign up again in a different place. ... This practice was common enough to have its own technical term – "bounty jumping". |
The burden of waging war passed to a large extent to the standing army, the Continental Army. The stay-at-home militia tended then to perform the important role of the internal police to keep order. British forces sought to disrupt American communities by instigating slave rebellions and Indian raids. The militia fended off these threats. Militias also spied on Loyalists in the American communities. In Albany County, New York, the militia established a Committee for Detecting and Defeating Conspiracies to look out for and investigate people with suspicious allegiances. |
Politically, the militia was highly popular during the postwar period, though to some extent, based more on pride of victory in the recent war than on the realities. This skepticism of the actual value of relying upon the militia for national defense, versus a trained regular army was expressed by Gouverneur Morris: |
An overweening vanity leads the fond many, each man against the conviction of his own heart, to believe or affect to believe, that militia can beat veteran troops in the open field and even play of battle. This idle notion, fed by vaunting demagogues, alarmed us for our country, when in the course of that time and chance, which happen to all, she should be at war with a great power. |
Robert Spitzer, citing Daniel Boorstin, describes this political dichotomy of the public popularity of the militia versus the military value: |
While the reliance upon militias was politically satisfying, it proved to be an administrative and military nightmare. State detachments could not be easily combined into larger fighting units; soldiers could not be relied on to serve for extended periods, and desertions were common; officers were elected, based on popularity rather than experience or training; discipline and uniformity were almost nonexistent. |
General George Washington defended the militia in public, but in correspondence with Congress expressed his opinion of the militia quite to the contrary: |
To place any dependence on the Militia, is, assuredly, resting upon a broken staff. Men just dragged from the tender Scenes of domestic life; unaccustomed to the din of Arms; totally unacquainted with every kind of military skill, which being followed by a want of confidence in themselves, when opposed to Troops regularly trained, disciplined, and appointed, superior in knowledge and superior in Arms, makes them timid, and ready to fly from their own shadows ... if I was called upon to declare upon Oath, whether the Militia have been most serviceable or hurtful upon the whole, I should subscribe to the latter. |
In Shays' Rebellion, a Massachusetts militia that had been raised as a private army defeated the main Shays site force on February 3, 1787. There was a lack of an institutional response to the uprising, which energized calls to reevaluate the Articles of Confederation and gave strong impetus to the Constitutional Convention which began in May 1787. |
At the end of the Revolutionary War, a political atmosphere developed at the local level where the militia was seen with fondness, despite their spotty record on the battlefield. Typically, when the militia did act well was when the battle came into the locale of the militia, and local inhabitants tended to exaggerate the performance of the local militia versus the performance of the Continental Army. The Continental Army was seen as the protector of the States, though it also was viewed as a dominating force over the local communities. Joseph Reed, president of Pennsylvania viewed this jealousy between the militia forces and the standing army as similar to the prior frictions between the militia and the British Regular Army a generation before during the French and Indian War. Tensions came to a head at the end of the war when the Continental Army officers demanded pensions and set up the Society of the Cincinnati to honor their own wartime deeds. The local communities did not want to pay national taxes to cover the Army pensions, when the local militiamen received none. |
The delegates of the Constitutional Convention (the founding fathers/framers of the United States Constitution) under Article 1; section 8, clauses 15 and 16 of the federal constitution, granted Congress the power to "provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the Militia", as well as, and in distinction to, the power to raise an army and a navy. The US Congress is granted the power to use the militia of the United States for three specific missions, as described in Article 1, section 8, clause 15: "To provide for the calling of the militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections, and repel invasions." The Militia Act of 1792 clarified whom the militia consists of: |
At the time of the drafting of the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights, a political sentiment existed in the newly formed United States involving suspicion of peacetime armies not under civilian control. This political belief has been identified as stemming from the memory of the abuses of the standing army of Oliver Cromwell and King James II, in Great Britain in the prior century, which led to the Glorious Revolution and resulted in placing the standing army under the control of Parliament. |
During the Congressional debates, James Madison discussed how a militia could help defend liberty against tyranny and oppression. (Source I Annals of Congress 434, June 8, 1789) Though during his presidency, after enduring the failures of the militia in the War of 1812, Madison came to favor the maintenance of a strong standing army. |
A major concern of the various delegates during the constitutional debates over the Constitution and the Second Amendment to the Constitution revolved around the issue of transferring militia power held by the States (under the existing Articles of Confederation) to Federal control. |
Records of the constitutional debate over the early drafts of the language of the Second Amendment included significant discussion of whether service in the militia should be compulsory for all able bodied men, or should there be an exemption for the "religiously scrupulous" conscientious objector. |
The concern about risks of a "religiously scrupulous" exemption clause within the second amendment to the Federal Constitution was expressed by Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts (from 1 Annals of Congress at 750, 17 August 1789): |
The "religiously scrupulous" clause was ultimately stricken from the final draft of second amendment to the Federal Constitution though the militia clause was retained. The Supreme Court of the United States has upheld a right to conscientious objection to military service. |
William S. Fields & David T. Hardy write: |
While in The Federalist No. 46, Madison argued that a standing army of 25,000 to 30,000 men would be offset by "a militia amounting to near a half million of citizens with arms in their hands, officered by men chosen from among themselves ..." [119] The Antifederalists were not persuaded by these arguments, in part because of the degree of control over the militia given to the national government by the proposed constitution. The fears of the more conservative opponents centered upon the possible phasing out of the general militia in favor of a smaller, more readily corrupted, select militia. Proposals for such a select militia already had been advanced by individuals such as Baron Von Steuben, Washington's Inspector General, who proposed supplementing the general militia with a force of 21,000 men given government- issued arms and special training. [120] An article in the Connecticut Journal expressed the fear that the proposed constitution might allow Congress to create such select militias: "[T]his looks too much like Baron Steuben's militia, by which a standing army was meant and intended." [121] In Pennsylvania, John Smiley told the ratifying convention that "Congress may give us a select militia which will in fact be a standing army", and worried that, [p.34] with this force in hand, "the people in general may be disarmed". [122] Similar concerns were raised by Richard Henry Lee in Virginia. In his widely-read pamphlet, Letters from the Federal Farmer to the Republican, Lee warned that liberties might be undermined by the creation of a select militia that "[would] answer to all the purposes of an army", and concluded that "the Constitution ought to secure a genuine and guard against a select militia by providing that the militia shall always be kept well organized, armed, and disciplined, and include, according to the past and general usage of the states, all men capable of bearing arms. |
Note: In Federalist Paper 29 Hamilton argued the inability to train the whole Militia made select corps inevitable and, like Madison, paid it no concern. |
In 1794, a militia numbering approximately 13,000 was raised and personally led by President George Washington to quell the Whiskey Rebellion in Pennsylvania. From this experience, a major weakness of a States-based citizen militia system was found to be the lack of systematic army organization, and a lack of training for engineers and officers. George Washington repeatedly warned of these shortcomings up until his death in 1799. Two days before his death, in a letter to General Alexander Hamilton, George Washington wrote: "The establishment of a Military Academy upon a respectable and extensive basis has ever been considered by me as an object of primary importance to this country; and while I was in the chair of government, I omitted no proper opportunity of recommending it in my public speeches, and otherwise to the attention of the legislature." |
In 1802, the federal military academy at West Point was established, in part to rectify the failings of irregular training inherent in a States-based militia system. |
In the War of 1812, the United States militia, because of a lack of discipline and poor training, were often routed in battle on open ground by British regulars. They fared better and proved more reliable when protected behind defensive entrenchments and fixed fortifications, as was effectively shown at Plattsburgh, Baltimore, and New Orleans. Because of their overall ineffectiveness and failure during the war, militias were not adequate for the national defense. Military budgets were greatly increased at this time and a smaller, standing federal army, rather than States' militias, was deemed better for the national defense. |
By the 1830s the American frontier expanded Westwards with Indian wars in the Eastern United States ending. Many states let their unorganised militia lapse in favour of volunteer militia units such as city guards who carried on in functions such as assisting local law enforcement, providing troops for ceremonies and parades or as a social club. The groups of company size were usually uniformed and armed through their own contributions. Volunteer units of sufficient size could elect their own officers and apply for a state charter under names that they themselves chose. |