Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) airmail, transport of mail by airplanes. Demonstration flights that showed the feasibility of carrying mail by air were made in Great Britain and in the United States in 1911. In the United States, af...

(Encyclopedia) Zedillo Ponce de León, Ernesto ĕrnĕsˈtō zĕdēˈyō pōnˈsā ᵺā lāônˈ [key], 1951–, Mexican politician, president of Mexico (1994–2000). Educated as an economist in Mexico and the Unit...

(Encyclopedia) Thirteen Colonies, the, term used for the colonies of British North America that joined together in the American Revolution against the mother country, adopted the Declaration of Independence in 1776,...

(Encyclopedia) Whitney, Asa, 1797–1872, American merchant and transcontinental railroad projector, b. North Groton, Conn. He entered the mercantile business in New York City, acted as a foreign buyer for several y...

(Encyclopedia) Ellsworth, Oliver, 1745–1807, American political leader, 3d chief justice of the United States (1796–1800), b. Windsor, Conn. A Hartford lawyer, he was (1778–83) a member of the Continental Cong...

(Encyclopedia) McKinley, William, 1843–1901, 25th president of the United States (1897–1901), b. Niles, Ohio. He was educated at Poland (Ohio) Seminary and Allegheny College. After service in the Union army in t...

(Encyclopedia) Red River. 1 River, 1,222 mi (1,967 km) long, southernmost of the large tributaries of the Mississippi River. It rises in two branches in the Texas Panhandle and flows SE between Texas and Oklahoma an...

(Encyclopedia) veto [Lat.,=I forbid], power of one functionary (e.g., the president) of a government, or of one member of a group or coalition, to block the operation of laws or agreements passed or entered into by ...

(Encyclopedia) administrative law, law governing the powers and processes of administrative agencies. The term is sometimes used also of law (i.e., rules, regulations) developed by agencies in the course of their op...

(Encyclopedia) Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a fraudulent document that reported the alleged proceedings of a conference of Jews in the late 19th cent., at which they discussed plans to overthrow Christianity thr...