Campaign finance laws in the United States have been a contentious political issue since the early days of the union. The most recent major federal law affecting campaign finance was the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) of 2002, also known as "McCain-Feingold". Key provisions of the law prohibited unregulated contributions to national political parties and limited the use of corporate and union money to fund ads discussing political issues within 60 days of a general election or 30 days of a primary election; However, provisions of BCRA limiting corporate and union expenditures for issue advertising were overturned by the Supreme Court in Federal Election Commission v. Wisconsin Right to Life.
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is an independent agency of the U.S. federal government that is primarily responsible for administering civilian foreign aid and development assistance. With a budget of over $27 billion, USAID is one of the largest official aid agencies in the world and accounts for more than half of all U.S. foreign assistance—the highest in the world in absolute dollar terms.
The Boland Amendment is a term describing two U.S. legislative amendments between 1982 and 1984, both aimed at limiting U.S. government assistance to the Contras in Nicaragua. The first Boland Amendment was part of the House Appropriations Bill of 1982, which was attached as a rider to the Defense Appropriations Act of 1983, named for the Massachusetts Democrat, Representative Edward Boland, who authored it. The House of Representatives passed the Defense Appropriations Act 411–0 on December 8, 1982, and it was signed by President Ronald Reagan on December 21, 1982. The amendment outlawed U.S. assistance to the Contras for the purpose of overthrowing the Nicaraguan government, while allowing assistance for other purposes.
The Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 is a United States federal law that governs the role of the Congress in the United States budget process.
The power of the purse is the ability of one group to control the actions of another group by withholding funding, or putting stipulations on the use of funds. The power of the purse can be used positively or negatively. The power of the purse is most often utilized by forces within a government that do not have direct executive power, but have control over budgets and taxation.
The Cooper–Church Amendment was introduced in the United States Senate during the Vietnam War. The amendment sought to cut off all funding to American war efforts in Cambodia. Its proposal was the first time that Congress had restricted the deployment of troops during a war against the wishes of the president.
The Inter-American Foundation, or IAF, is an independent agency of the United States government that funds community-led development in Latin America and the Caribbean. It was created through the Foreign Assistance Act of 1969 as an alternative to traditional foreign assistance that operates government-to-government on a much larger scale. The IAF receives its funds through annual appropriations by Congress. Until 2019, the agency also received annual reflows from the Social Progress Trust Fund administered by the Inter-American Development Bank consisting of repayments on U.S. government loans extended under the Alliance for Progress to various Latin American and Caribbean governments. Since beginning operations in 1972, the IAF has awarded more than 5,700 grants worth more than $940 million.
In the United States, a presidential finding, more formally known as a Memorandum of Notification (MON), is a presidential directive required by statute to be delivered to certain Congressional committees to justify the commencement of covert operations by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
The Hughes–Ryan Amendment was an amendment to the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, passed as section 32 of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1974. The amendment was named for its co-authors, Senator Harold E. Hughes (D-Iowa) and Representative Leo Ryan (D-CA). The amendment required the President of the United States to report all covert actions of the Central Intelligence Agency to one or more Congressional committees.
The Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974 (JJDPA) is a United States federal law providing formula grants to states that follow a series of federal protections on the care and treatment of youth in the juvenile justice and criminal justice systems.
The Foreign Assistance Act is a United States law governing foreign aid policy. It outlined the political and ideological principles of U.S. foreign aid, significantly overhauled and reorganized the structure U.S. foreign assistance programs, legally distinguished military from nonmilitary aid, and created a new agency, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to administer nonmilitary economic assistance programs. Following its enactment by Congress on September 4, 1961, President John F. Kennedy signed the Act into law on November 3, 1961, issuing Executive Order 10973 detailing the reorganization.
The Leahy Laws or Leahy amendments are U.S. human rights laws that prohibit the U.S. Department of State and Department of Defense from providing military assistance to foreign security force units that violate human rights with impunity. It is named after its principal sponsor, Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont).
The International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 was passed to promote religious freedom as a foreign policy of the United States, to promote greater religious freedom in countries which engage in or tolerate violations of religious freedom, and to advocate on the behalf of individuals persecuted for their religious beliefs and activities in foreign countries. The Act was signed into law by President Bill Clinton on October 27, 1998. Three cooperative entities have been maintained by this act to monitor religious persecution.
- An Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom within the Department of State, who is the highest-ranking US diplomat on international religious freedom, and who is tasked with carrying out the provisions of IRFA: the Annual Report, negotiations with foreign governments to bring about greater religious freedom, and the determination of Countries of Particular Concern (CPC's) under IRFA, which entails further actions.
- A bipartisan United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, designed to provide independent policy recommendations and fact-finding, and
- A Special Adviser on International Religious Freedom within the National Security Council.
In U.S. politics, the Hyde Amendment is a legislative provision barring the use of federal funds to pay for abortion, except to save the life of the woman, or if the pregnancy arises from incest or rape. Before the Hyde Amendment took effect in 1980, an estimated 300,000 abortions were performed annually using federal funds.
Taiwan is primarily a destination for men, women, and children trafficked for the purposes of forced labor and sexual exploitation. It is also a source of women trafficked to Japan, Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Women and girls from the People's Republic of China (P.R.C.) and Southeast Asian countries are trafficked to Taiwan through fraudulent marriages, deceptive employment offers, and illegal smuggling for sexual exploitation and forced labor. Many trafficking victims are workers from rural areas of Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines, employed through recruitment agencies and brokers to perform low skilled work in Taiwan’s construction, fishing, and manufacturing industries, or to work as domestic servants. Such workers are often charged high job placement and service fees, up to $14,000, resulting in substantial debt that labor brokers or employers use as a tool for involuntary servitude. Many foreign workers remain vulnerable to trafficking because legal protections, oversight by authorities and enforcement efforts are inadequate.
The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for Fiscal Year 2013 is a United States federal law which specifies the budget and expenditures of the United States Department of Defense for fiscal year 2013. The full title is An Act to Authorize Appropriations for fiscal year 2013 for military activities of the Department of Defense, for military construction, and for defense activities of the Department of Energy, to prescribe military personnel strengths for such fiscal year, and for other purposes. This law has been assigned the number PL 112–239.
The Foreign Military Sales Act of 1971, Pub. L. 91–672, 84 Stat. 2053, enacted January 12, 1971, was created as an amendment to the Foreign Military Sales Act of 1968. The Act of 1971 established declarations to promote international peace and national security for economic, political, and social progress. The declaration provided coordination for international armament appropriations meeting the objectives of the Nixon Administration's foreign policy.
The Vietnam Humanitarian Assistance and Evacuation Act of 1975 was U.S. congressional legislation that proposed to designate financial resources for the evacuation and humanitarian aid of South Vietnam preceding the Fall of Saigon. The Act was not passed, however, it began the debate in Congress over how best to evacuate Vietnam and the extent of the President's power to use military troops in order to safely evacuate refugees. These conversations led to the Indochina Migration and Refugee Assistance Act which was introduced shortly after H.R. 6096 failed to pass.
Special Central American Assistance Act of 1979 was a United States federal statute established by the 96th United States Congress amending the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961. The Caribbean Basin statute appropriated conditions for cultivating civility, democratization, human rights, and non-interventionism in Central America. The Act of Congress endorsed the Organization of American States embodied by Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama. The international organization would serve to exemplify multilateralism in pursuance of denouncing left-wing terrorism, political violence, and third world socialism.
The Newspaper and Printing Presses Act 1974 is a statute of the Parliament of Singapore that enables authorities to license the publication and distribution of newspaper and other printed media such as magazines and journals in Singapore. The law is designed to ensure that there is no foreign control of Singaporean newspapers, and limits the circulation of foreign printed media.
