The Cabinet of the United States is a body consisting of the vice president of the United States and the heads of the executive branch's federal executive departments in the federal government of the United States, which is regarded as the principal advisory body to the president of the United States. The president is not formally a member of the Cabinet. The heads of departments, appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate, are members of the Cabinet, and acting department heads also sit at Cabinet meetings whether or not they have been officially nominated for Senate confirmation. The president may designate heads of other agencies and non-Senate-confirmed members of the Executive Office of the President as Cabinet-level members of the Cabinet.
The United States Department of Labor (DOL) is a cabinet-level department of the U.S. federal government responsible for occupational safety and health, wage and hour standards, unemployment benefits, reemployment services, and some economic statistics; many U.S. states also have such departments. The department is headed by the U.S. Secretary of Labor.
The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a federal executive department of the United States government responsible for the enforcement of the law and administration of justice in the United States. It is equivalent to the justice or interior ministries of other countries. The department was formed in 1870 during the Ulysses S. Grant administration, and administers several federal law enforcement agencies, including the U.S. Marshals Service, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and the Drug Enforcement Administration. The DOJ is responsible for investigating instances of financial fraud, representing the U.S. government in legal matters, and running the federal prison system. The department is also responsible for reviewing the conduct of local law enforcement as directed by the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994.
The Reciprocal Tariff Act provided for the negotiation of tariff agreements between the United States and separate nations, particularly Latin American countries. The Act served as an institutional reform intended to authorize the president to negotiate with foreign nations to reduce tariffs in return for reciprocal reductions in tariffs in the United States up to 50%. It resulted in a reduction of duties. This was the policy of the low tariff Democrats in response to the high tariff Republican program which produce the Hawley Smoot tariff of 1930 that raised rates, and sharply reduced international trade. The Reciprocal Tariff Act was promoted heavily by Secretary of State Cordell Hull.
The United States Department of Commerce is an executive department of the U.S. federal government concerned with promoting economic growth. Among its tasks are gathering economic and demographic data for business and government decision-making, and helping to set industrial standards. This organization's main purpose is to create jobs, promote economic growth, encourage sustainable development and block harmful trade practices of other nations. The Department of Commerce is headquartered in the Herbert C. Hoover Building in Washington, DC.
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is an independent agency of the United States 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 Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) is an agency of the United States federal government responsible for developing and promoting American trade policy. Part of the Executive Office of the President, it is headed by the U.S. Trade Representative, a Cabinet-level position that serves as the U.S. President's primary advisor, negotiator, and spokesperson on trade matters. USTR has more than two hundred employees, with offices in Geneva, Switzerland, and Brussels, Belgium.
The International Trade Administration (ITA) is an agency in the United States Department of Commerce that promotes United States exports of nonagricultural U.S. services and goods.
The Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity (Libertad) Act of 1996, Pub.L. 104–114 (text)(pdf), 110 Stat. 785, 22 U.S.C. §§ 6021–6091) is a United States federal law which strengthens and continues the United States embargo against Cuba. The act extended the territorial application of the initial embargo to apply to foreign companies trading with Cuba, and penalized foreign companies allegedly "trafficking" in property formerly owned by U.S. citizens but confiscated by Cuba after the Cuban revolution. The act also covers property formerly owned by Cubans who have since become U.S. citizens.
The 104th United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, composed of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It met in Washington, D.C. from January 3, 1995, to January 3, 1997, during the third and fourth years of Bill Clinton's presidency. Apportionment of seats in the House of Representatives was based on the 1990 United States census. Both chambers had Republican majorities for the first time since the 1950s. Major events included passage of elements of the Contract with America and a budget impasse between Congress and the Clinton administration that resulted in the federal government shutdown of 1995 and 1996.
The term New Frontier was used by Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kennedy in his acceptance speech in the 1960 United States presidential election to the Democratic National Convention at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum as the Democratic slogan to inspire America to support him. The phrase developed into a label for his administration's domestic and foreign programs.
We stand today on the edge of a New Frontier—the frontier of the 1960s, the frontier of unknown opportunities and perils, the frontier of unfilled hopes and unfilled threats. ... The pioneers gave up their safety, their comfort, and sometimes their lives to build our new west. They were determined to make the new world strong and free - an example to the world. ... Some would say that those struggles are all over, that all the horizons have been explored, that all the battles have been won. That there is no longer an American frontier. ... And we stand today on the edge of a new frontier, the frontier of unknown opportunities and perils. ... Beyond that frontier are uncharted areas of science and space, unsolved problems of peace and war, unconquered problems of ignorance and prejudice, unanswered questions of poverty and surplus. ... I'm asking each of you to be pioneers towards that New Frontier. My call is to the young in heart, regardless of age. ... Can we carry through in an age where we will witness not only new breakthroughs in weapons of destruction, but also a race for mastery of the sky and the rain, the ocean and the tides, the far side of space, and the inside of men's minds? ... All mankind waits upon our decision. A whole world waits to see what we shall do. And we cannot fail that trust, and we cannot fail to try.
The United States embargo against Cuba prevents American businesses, and businesses with commercial activities in the United States, from conducting trade with Cuban interests. It is the most enduring trade embargo in modern history. The United States first imposed an embargo on the sale of arms to Cuba on March 14, 1958, during the Fulgencio Batista regime. Again on October 19, 1960 the U.S. placed an embargo on exports to Cuba except for food and medicine after Cuba nationalized American-owned Cuban oil refineries without compensation. On February 7, 1962 the embargo was extended to include almost all exports. Since the year 2000, the embargo no longer prohibits the trade of food and humanitarian supplies.
The Foreign Assistance Act is a United States Act of Congress. The Act reorganized the structure of existing U.S. foreign assistance programs, distinguishing between military from non-military aid, and created a new agency, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to administer non-military, economic assistance programs. President John F. Kennedy signed the Act on November 3, 1961, and issued Executive Order 10973, detailing the reorganization.
The United States Commercial Service (CS) is the trade promotion arm of the U.S. Department of Commerce's International Trade Administration. CS is a part of the U.S. Foreign Service and its commercial officers are diplomats. The CS global network of trade professionals helps thousands of U.S. companies to export goods and services worth billions of dollars every year. CS trade specialists are located throughout the United States, as well as in U.S. embassies and consulates in over 75 countries around the world. The mission of CS is to advance and protect strategic U.S. commercial and economic interests around the world.
Cuba–United States relations, also knows as Cuban-American relations, refers to the bilateral relations between Cuba and the United States. Cuba and the United States restored diplomatic relations on 20 July 2015, relations which had been severed in 1961 during the Cold War. U.S. diplomatic representation in Cuba is handled by the United States Embassy in Havana, and there is a similar Cuban Embassy in Washington, D.C. The United States, however, continues to maintain its commercial, economic, and financial embargo, making it illegal for U.S. corporations to do business with Cuba.
In different administrative and organizational forms, the Food for Peace program of the United States has provided food assistance around the world for more than 50 years. Approximately 3 billion people in 150 countries have benefited directly from U.S. food assistance. The Office of Food for Peace within the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is the U.S. Government's largest provider of overseas food assistance. The food assistance programming is funded primarily through the Food for Peace Act. The Office of Food for Peace also receives International Disaster Assistance Funds through the Foreign Assistance Act (FAA) that can be used in emergency settings.
The presidency of John F. Kennedy began at noon EST on January 20, 1961, when Kennedy was inaugurated as the 35th President of the United States, and ended on November 22, 1963, upon his assassination, a span of 1,036 days. A Democrat from Massachusetts, he took office following the 1960 presidential election, in which he narrowly defeated Richard Nixon, the then–incumbent Vice President. He was succeeded by Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson.
The space policy of the United States includes both the making of space policy through the legislative process, and the implementation of that policy in the civilian and military US space programs through regulatory agencies. The early history of United States space policy is linked to the US–Soviet Space Race of the 1960s, which gave way to the Space Shuttle program. There is a current debate on the post-Space Shuttle future of the civilian space program.
Travel Act or International Travel Act of 1961, 18 U.S.C. § 1952, is a Federal criminal statute which forbids the use of the U.S. mail, or interstate or foreign travel, for the purpose of engaging in certain specified criminal acts.
The Arms Control and Disarmament Act of 1961, 22 U.S.C. § 2551, was created to establish a governing body for the control and reduction of apocalyptic armaments with regards to protect a world from the burdens of armaments and the scourge of war. The Act provided an important aspect for the Kennedy Administration's foreign policy which was coherent with the United States national security policy.
