QUES: Hamilton argued that the natural faculties of blacks were as good as those of free whites, and he warned that the British would arm the slaves if the patriots did not. In his 21st-century biography, Chernow cites this incident as evidence that Hamilton and Laurens saw the Revolution and the struggle against slavery as inseparable. Hamilton attacked his political opponents as demanding freedom for themselves and refusing to allow it to blacks. In January 1785, Hamilton attended the second meeting of the New York Manumission Society (NYMS). John Jay was president and Hamilton was the first secretary and later became president. Chernow notes how the membership soon included many of Hamilton's friends and associates. Hamilton was a member of the committee of the society that petitioned the legislature to end the slave trade, and that succeeded in passing legislation banning the export of slaves from New York. In the same period, Hamilton felt bound by the rule of law of the time and his law practice facilitated the return of a fugitive slave to Henry Laurens of South Carolina. He opposed the compromise at the 1787 Constitutional Convention by which the federal government could not abolish the slave trade for 20 years, and was disappointed when he lost that argument. Hamilton never supported forced emigration for freed slaves. Horton has argued from this that he would be comfortable with a multiracial society, and that this distinguished him from his contemporaries. In international affairs, he supported Toussaint L'Ouverture's black government in Haiti after the revolt that overthrew French control, as he had supported aid to the slaveowners in 1791--both measures hurt France. Scant evidence has been interpreted by a few to indicate Hamilton may have owned household slaves, as did many wealthy New Yorkers (the evidence for this is indirect; McDonald interprets it as referring to paid employees).
Do you have any questions?
MY QUESTION: Hamilton was the first president of what New York, abolitionist organization?

QUES: If you have a mass of 50 kg on Earth, what is your weight in newtons? An object with more mass is pulled by gravity with greater force. Mass and weight are closely related. However, the weight of an object can change if the force of gravity changes. On Earth, the force of gravity is the same everywhere. So how does the force of gravity change? It doesnt if you stay on Earth. What if we travel to another planet or moon in our solar system? Look at the photo of astronaut Edwin E. Aldrin Jr. taken by fellow astronaut Neil Armstrong in the Figure. They were the first humans to walk on the moon. An astronaut weighs less on the moon than he would on Earth. This is because the moons gravity is weaker than Earths. The astronauts mass, on the other hand, did not change. He still contained the same amount of matter on the moon as he did on Earth. If the astronaut weighed 175 pounds on Earth, he would have weighed only 29 pounds on the moon. If his mass on Earth was 80 kg, what would his mass have been on the moon? [Figure 3]
Do you have any questions?
MY QUESTION: Why is it that a man on the moon who weighs 175lbs would only weight 29 pounds on the moon?

QUES: (CNN) -- Beyond skateboards, Silicon Valley and hippies, California has a trendsetting streak of a different kind. The state has been first to pass major public health initiatives that have spread throughout the country. California was first to require smog checks for clean air, pass anti-tobacco initiatives and bike helmets laws. While these laws were met with skepticism and ridicule, they've often become standard practice in other states. The Golden State was first to ban smoking in workplaces, bars and restaurants in 1998. Now similar rules exist throughout the country. Some advocates tout the state as a forward-thinking vanguard in which its health and safety laws are routinely emulated by other states. "There have been progressive legislations in tobacco, environment and obesity prevention," said Mark Horton, a lecturer at the University of California Berkeley School of Public Health. "In some respect, the rest of the country looks to California as a laboratory for moving forward with those various types of initiatives." But some critics liken the Golden State to a nanny state. California has 151,002 health and safety laws. "It never ends," said Laer Pearce, who works in public affairs in Orange County. "Every year, several hundred bills come through and dozens of them tell us how to live our lives." Starting in January, 760 new California laws went into effect -- for example, the importing of shark fins is prohibited, student athletes are required to have medical clearance after suffering a head injury, teens are banned from using tanning booths and the sale of caffeinated beer is forbidden. There's a perception that California has "more folks who are health-oriented and more health-minded," said Horton, former director of the California Department of Public Health. It's not just workout fanatics hanging out at Muscle Beach, Sierra Club members hiking mountains or the uber-health-conscious touting organic foods. Californians in general tend to have healthier habits, ranking 10th for physical activity, fourth for healthy blood pressure and fifth for a diet high in fruits and vegetables compared with other states, according to America's Health Rankings.
Do you have any questions?
MY QUESTION: What major public health initiatives were first passed in California?

QUES: In chapters 3 and 4 we described how the U.S. government adjusted its existing agencies and capacities to address the emerging threat from Usama Bin Laden and his associates. After the August 1998 bombings of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, President Bill Clinton and his chief aides explored ways of getting Bin Laden expelled from Afghanistan or possibly capturing or even killing him. Although disruption efforts around the world had achieved some successes, the core of Bin Laden's organization remained intact. President Clinton was deeply concerned about Bin Laden. He and his national security advisor, Samuel "Sandy" Berger, ensured they had a special daily pipeline of reports feeding them the latest updates on Bin Laden's reported location. In public, President Clinton spoke repeatedly about the threat of terrorism, referring to terrorist training camps but saying little about Bin Laden and nothing about al Qaeda. He explained to us that this was deliberate-intended to avoid enhancing Bin Laden's stature by giving him unnecessary publicity. His speeches focused especially on the danger of nonstate actors and of chemical and biological weapons. As the millennium approached, the most publicized worries were not about terrorism but about computer breakdowns-the Y2K scare. Some government officials were concerned that terrorists would take advantage of such breakdowns. On November 30, 1999, Jordanian intelligence intercepted a telephone call between Abu Zubaydah, a longtime ally of Bin Laden, and Khadr Abu Hoshar, a Palestinian extremist. Abu Zubaydah said, "The time for training is over." Suspecting that this was a signal for Abu Hoshar to commence a terrorist operation, Jordanian police arrested Abu Hoshar and 15 others and informed Washington. One of the 16, Raed Hijazi, had been born in California to Palestinian parents; after spending his childhood in the Middle East, he had returned to northern California, taken refuge in extremist Islamist beliefs, and then made his way to Abu Zubaydah's Khaldan camp in Afghanistan, where he learned the fundamentals of guerrilla warfare. He and his younger brother had been recruited by Abu Hoshar into a loosely knit plot to attack Jewish and American targets in Jordan. After late 1996, when Abu Hoshar was arrested and jailed, Hijazi moved back to the United States, worked as a cabdriver in Boston, and sent money back to his fellow plotters. After Abu Hoshar's release, Hijazi shuttled between Boston and Jordan gathering money and supplies. With Abu Hoshar, he recruited inTurkey and Syria as well as Jordan; with Abu Zubaydah's assistance, Abu Hoshar sent these recruits to Afghanistan for training.
Do you have any questions?
MY QUESTION:
What was breaking down in 2000 and why was that a concern to government officials?