Members of the Catholic Church have been active in the elections of the United States since the mid 19th century. The United States has never had religious parties (unlike much of the world, especially in Europe and Latin America). There has never been an American Catholic religious party, either local, state or national.

In 1776 Catholics comprised less than 1% of the population of the new nation, but their presence grew rapidly after 1840 with immigration from Germany, Ireland, and later from Italy, Poland and elsewhere in Catholic Europe from 1840 to 1914, and also from Latin America in the 20th and 21st centuries. Catholics now comprise 25% to 27% of the national vote, with over 68 million members today. 85% of today's Catholics report their faith to be "somewhat" to "very important" to them. From the mid-19th century down to 1964 Catholics were solidly Democratic, sometimes at the 80–90% level. From the 1930s to the 1950s Catholics formed a core part of the New Deal Coalition, with overlapping memberships in the church, labor unions, big city machines, and the working class, all of which promoted liberal policy positions in domestic affairs and anti-communism during the Cold War.

Since the election of the nation's first Catholic president in 1960, Catholics have split about 50–50 between the two major parties in national elections. Beginning with the decline of unions and big city machines, increased suburbanization and with upward mobility into the middle classes, Catholics have drifted away from liberalism of the Democratic Party and toward conservatism on economic issues (such as taxes). Since the end of the Cold War, their strong anti-Communism has faded in importance. On social issues the Catholic Church takes strong positions against abortion and same-sex marriage and has formed coalitions with Protestant evangelicals. In 2015 Pope Francis declared that man-made climate change is caused by burning fossil fuels. The Pope stated the warming of the planet is rooted in "a throwaway culture" and the developed world's indifference to the destruction of the planet as it pursues short-term economic gains. However, the Pope's statements on climate change were generally met with indifference among Catholics while Catholic commentaries ranged from praise to dismissal, with some stating that it was not binding or magisterial due to its scientific nature. The Pope's statements on these issues were most prominently laid out in encyclical Laudato si'. The publication by Francis had put pressure on Catholics seeking the Republican Party nomination for president of the United States in 2016, including Jeb Bush and Rick Santorum, who "have questioned or denied the established science of human-caused climate change, and have harshly criticized policies designed to tax or regulate the burning of fossil fuels."

Religious tensions were major issues in the presidential election of 1928 when the Democrats nominated Al Smith, a Catholic who was defeated, and in 1960 when the Democrats also nominated John F. Kennedy, a Catholic who was elected. For the next three elections, a Catholic would be nominated for the vice presidency by one of the two major parties (Bill Miller in 1964, Ed Muskie in 1968, Tom Eagleton and then Sargent Shriver in 1972), but the ticket would lose. Geraldine Ferraro would continue the tradition in 1984, but she also lost, and the non-Catholic vice-presidential streak was broken in 2008. A Catholic, John Kerry, lost the 2004 election to incumbent George W. Bush, a Methodist, who may have won the majority of Catholic vote. The 2012 election was the first where both major party vice presidential candidates were Catholic, Joe Biden and Paul Ryan.

, there are 27 (out of 100) Catholics in the United States Senate, and 122 (out of 435) Catholics in the United States House of Representatives, including House Majority Leader Steve Scalise. In 2008, Joe Biden became the first Catholic to be elected Vice President of the United States. His successor Mike Pence was raised as a Catholic but he converted to evangelical Protestantism later in his life. In 2020, Biden went on to be elected as the second Roman Catholic president of the United States.

19th century

Before 1840, Catholics constituted a small minority and as a result, they played a relatively minor role in early American history. Catholics only constituted a significant community in Maryland and Baltimore became an early center of Catholicism. From the American Revolution until the end of the 18th century, about 1% of the American population (about 30,000) was Catholic. Still, Catholics were among the Founding Fathers and they were also a part of the First Congress; Daniel Carroll serving Maryland's 6th congressional district, and Charles Carroll of Carrollton serving as the first senator from Maryland. Presidential candidates did not seek Catholic votes until Andrew Jackson and Henry Clay did so in 1832.

Catholics and urban America
The role of Catholics in American culture and elections dramatically changed as a result of the mass immigration of Catholics from Europe, especially from Germany and Ireland. By 1840, there were about 600,000 Catholics in the United States. In the 1840s, 200,000 Irish immigrated to escape poverty. The Great Famine of Ireland which lasted from 1845 to 1852 caused the Irish population in America to number 962,000, the number doubled in the next ten years. Even larger numbers of immigrants came from traditionally Catholic regions of Germany and traditionally Catholic regions of other parts of Europe. Because most of these new arrivals lived in ethnic communities, they typically joined the local Catholic church that was in communion with Rome through the local diocese; how many of them cut their ties with the Catholic Church is a matter of speculation. The Irish Catholics took controlling positions in the Catholic Church, labor unions, and Democratic organizations in the big cities, thus forming overlapping centers of strength. The sudden new arrival of so many Catholics, charges of political corruption, and fears of papal interference caused anti-Catholicism to grow, including the short-lived Know Nothings party in the 1850s which demanded a purification of elections and statutes from Catholic influence.

Many Catholics served in the Civil War armies, they served in both the North and the South, and the bishops rejected the antiwar and anti-draft sentiments of some Catholics. The rapid rise of the Irish out of poverty, and the continuing growth in membership, especially in industrial and urban areas, made the church the largest denomination in the U.S. Distrusting public schools which were dominated by Protestants, Catholics built their own network of parochial elementary schools (and, later, they built high schools), as well as colleges, and public funding of parochial schools was a controversial issue. As the Bennett Law episode in 1890 in Wisconsin demonstrated, Catholics were willing to cooperate politically with German Lutherans to protect their parochial schools. A distinct Catholic vote existed, however; in the late 19th century, 75% of Irish and German Catholics in America voted for Democratic presidential candidates.  The Irish increasingly controlled the Democratic party machinery in major cities.

Religious lines were sharply drawn in the North in the Third Party System that lasted from the 1850s to the 1890s. (In the South the Catholics voted the same as Protestants, with race as the main dividing line.) Methodists, Congregationalists, Presbyterians, Scandinavian Lutherans and other Protestant pietists in the North were tightly linked to the GOP. In sharp contrast, liturgical groups, especially the Catholics, Episcopalians, and German Lutherans, looked to the Democratic Party for protection from pietistic moralism, especially prohibition. While both parties cut across economic class structures, the Democrats were supported more heavily by its lower tiers.

Cultural issues, especially prohibition and foreign language schools, became important because of the sharp religious divisions in the electorate. In the North, about 50% of the voters were pietistic Protestants who believed that the government should be used to reduce the pervasiveness of social sins, such as drinking. Liturgical churches comprised over a quarter of the vote and they wanted the government to stay out of personal morality issues. Prohibition debates and referendums heated up elections in most states over a period of decades, as national prohibition was finally passed in 1918 (and it was repealed in 1932), serving as a major issue between the wet Democrats and the dry GOP.

Source: Paul Kleppner, The Third Electoral System 1853-1892 (1979) p. 182

Labor union movement

The Catholic Church exercised a prominent role in shaping America's labor movement. From the onset of significant immigration in the 1840s, the church in the United States was predominantly urban, with both its leaders and congregants usually of the laboring classes. Over the course of the second half of the nineteenth century, nativism, anti-Catholicism, and anti-unionism coalesced in Republican elections, and Catholics gravitated toward unions and the Democratic Party.

The Knights of Labor was the earliest labor organization in the United States, and in the 1880s, this was the largest labor union in the United States. It is estimated that at least half its membership was Catholic (including Terence Powderly, its president from 1881 onward).

In Rerum novarum (1891), Pope Leo XIII criticized the concentration of wealth and power, spoke out against the abuses that workers faced and demanded that workers should be granted certain rights and safety regulations. He upheld the right of voluntary association, specifically commending labor unions. At the same time, he reiterated the church's defense of private property, condemned socialism, and emphasized the need for Catholics to form and join unions that were not compromised by secular and revolutionary ideologies.

Rerum novarum provided new impetus for Catholics to become active in the labor movement, even if its exhortation to form specifically Catholic labor unions was widely interpreted as irrelevant to the pluralist context of the United States. While atheism underpinned many European unions and stimulated Catholic unionists to form separate labor federations, the religious neutrality of unions in the U.S. provided no such impetus. American Catholics seldom dominated unions, but they exerted influence across organized labor. Catholic union members and leaders played important roles in steering American unions away from socialism.

20th century

By 1900, Catholics represented 14 percent of the total U.S. population, soon became the single largest religious denomination in the country. Still, Catholics did not hold many high offices in government. Only one of the first 54 justices on the United States Supreme Court was Catholic, Roger B. Taney, appointed in 1836.  From the 1930s to the 1950s Catholics formed a core part of the New Deal Coalition, with overlapping memberships in the church, labor unions, big city machines, and the working class, all of which promoted liberal policy positions in domestic affairs and anti-communism during the Cold War. This New Deal Coalition formed under Franklin Roosevelt was led by his Postmaster General and the nation's first Irish American Roman Catholic Cabinet member James Farley.

Bishops' Program of Social Reconstruction

Following World War I, many hoped that a new commitment to social reform would characterize the ensuing peace. The Council saw an opportunity to use its national voice to shape reform and in April 1918 created a Committee for Reconstruction. John A. Ryan wrote the Bishops' Program of Social Reconstruction. Combining Progressive thought and Catholic theology, Ryan believed that government intervention was the most effective means of affecting positive change for his church as well as working people and the poor. On February 12, 1919, the National Catholic War Council issued the "Bishops' Program of Social Reconstruction".

The Program received a mixed reception both within the church and outside it. The National Catholic War Council was a voluntary organization with no canonical status. Its ability to speak authoritatively was therefore questioned. Many bishops threw their support behind the Program, but some, including Bishop William Turner of Buffalo and William Henry O'Connell of Boston, opposed it. O'Connell believed some aspects of the plan smacked too much of socialism. Response outside the church was also divided: labor organizations backed it, for example, and business groups criticized it.

Defense of parochial school system

After World War I, some states concerned about the influence of immigrants and "foreign" values looked to public schools for help. The states drafted laws designed to use schools to promote a common American culture.

In 1921, the Ku Klux Klan arrived in Oregon and quickly attracted as many as 14,000 members, establishing 58 klaverns by the end of 1922. Given the small population of non-white minorities outside Portland, the Oregon Klan directed its attention almost exclusively against Catholics, who numbered about 8% of the population.

In 1922, the Masonic Grand Lodge of Oregon sponsored a bill to require all school-age children to attend public schools. With support of the Klan and Democratic Governor Walter M. Pierce, endorsed by the Klan, the Compulsory Education Act was passed by a vote of 115,506 to 103,685. Its primary purpose was to shut down Catholic schools in Oregon, but it also affected other private and military schools. The constitutionality of the law was challenged in court and ultimately struck down by the US Supreme Court in Pierce v. Society of Sisters (1925) before it went into effect, in a ruling that has been called "the Magna Carta of the parochial school system." The law caused outraged Catholics to organize locally and nationally for the right to send their children to Catholic schools.

Pope Pius XI, in 1929, explicitly referenced this Supreme Court case in his encyclical Divini illius magistri on Catholic education. He quoted in a footnote the part of the case:

The fundamental theory of liberty upon which all governments in this Union repose excludes any general power of the State to standardize its children by forcing them to accept instruction from public teachers only. The child is not the mere creature of the State; those who nurture him and direct his destiny have the right coupled with the high duty, to recognize, and prepare him for additional duties.

Catholic Worker Movement

The Catholic Worker movement began as a means to combine Dorothy Day's history in American social activism, anarchism, and pacifism with the tenets of Catholicism (including a strong current of distributism), five years after her 1927 conversion.

The group started with the Catholic Worker newspaper, created to promote Catholic social teaching and stake out a neutral, pacifist position in the wartorn 1930s. It grew into a "house of hospitality" in the slums of New York City and then a series of farms for people to live together communally. The movement quickly spread to other cities in the United States and to Canada and the United Kingdom; more than 30 independent but affiliated CW communities had been founded by 1941. Well over 100 communities exist today, including several in Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, The Netherlands, the Republic of Ireland, Mexico, New Zealand, and Sweden.

Similar houses of hospitality were established by Russian immigrant and Catholic social worker, Catherine Doherty, founder of Madonna House.

National Catholic Welfare Conference

1930s
Historian John McGreevey notes, "Priests across the country in the 1930s encouraged their parishioners to join unions, and some like Pittsburgh's Charles Rice, Detroit's Frederick Siedenberg, and Buffalo's John P. Boland, served on regional labor boards and played key roles in workplace negotiations." The Catholic Worker Movement and Dorothy Day grew out of the same impetuses to put Catholic social teaching into action.

The Catholic Church encouraged Catholic workers to join the unions such as the Congress of Industrial Organizations "to improve their economic status and to act as a moderating force in the new labor movement". Catholic clergy promoted and founded moderate trade unions, such as the Association of Catholic Trade Unionists and the Archdiocesan Labor Institute in 1939. American Catholics of that era were generally New Deal liberals who actively supported the CIO, viewed government as a positive force for social reform and often participated in non-communist trade unions, becoming a prominent group of the United Auto Workers. According to Colleen Doody, Catholics were the "backbone and the bane of New Deal liberalism".

Catholic Conference on Industrial Problems
The Catholic Conference on Industrial Problems (1923–1937) was conceived by Raymond McGowan as a way of bringing together Catholic leaders in the fields of theology, labor, and business, with a view to promoting awareness and discussion of Catholic social teaching. Its first meeting was held in Milwaukee. While it was the venue for important discussions during its existence, its demise was due partly by lack of participation by business executives who perceived the dominant tone of the group as anti-business.

21st century

Religion plays a part in American elections. Religion is part of the political debate over LGBT rights, abortion, the right to die/assisted suicide, universal health care, workers rights and immigration.

According to Dr. John Green of University of Akron, "There isn't a Catholic vote anymore; there are several Catholic votes." A survey conducted by the Gallup organization in 2009 revealed that, despite the opposition of the church to abortion and embryonic stem-cell research, there is no significant difference between the opinions of Catholics and non-Catholics on these questions.

Voting guides

In 2004, Catholic Answers, a private lay Catholic apostolate, published its Voter's Guide for Serious Catholics. It also published Voter's Guide for Serious Christians for non-Catholics. In 2006, it revamped the guides and published them on its Catholic Answers Action web site.

In 2016 another Catholic organization, Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good, published the Pope Francis Voter Guide  to help inform the faithful about their specifically political vocation as Catholics in the United States.

In January 2016, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops produced an updated version of their 2007 voter's guide, Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship. It is a summary of the USCCB's public policies based on church teachings.

In September 2016, Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted of the Diocese of Phoenix issued the fourth edition of his guide, Catholics in the Public Square. In it, he suggests to politicians supporting abortion that they would need to repent and go to Confession before receiving Holy Communion, in contrast with other bishops such as Cardinals Timothy Dolan and Donald Wuerl, who say that the church does not deny communion over issues of legislation.

Marriage and family
The Roman Catholic Church defines marriage as a covenant "by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of the whole of life and which is ordered by its nature to the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring." The church teaches that "homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered. They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved." Nevertheless, homosexuals "must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided." Some Roman Catholics take this to mean that voting in favor of "benefits for lifelong partners" is a compassionate act, whereas others see voting in favor of "benefits for lifelong partners" as merely promoting behavior contrary to natural law. According to a 2009 survey, 59% of practicing Catholics oppose same-sex marriage, while those who are not practicing support it by 51%. Cardinal John Joseph O'Connor was an outspoken critic of homosexuality; other prominent Catholics who were outspoken critics have included John Boehner, David Vitter, Paul Ryan, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum, Bobby Jindal, Jeb Bush, Bob McDonnell, Marco Rubio, Michael Steele, Donald Carcieri and Sam Brownback. Catholics Rudolph Giuliani, Chris Christie, Tim Kaine, James Martin, Cardinal Joseph W. Tobin, Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, Cardinal Blase Cupich, Patrick J. Conroy (Jesuit chaplain to the U. S. House of Representatives), and Bob Casey Jr. have supported gay rights and civil unions but not same-sex marriage. Liberal Catholics have generally supported repeal of sodomy laws that called for jail time for homosexuals and Employment Non-Discrimination laws that would prohibit large employers from firing workers because of sexual orientation. Conservative Catholics have taken the contrary view, rejecting claims that these are examples of "unjust discrimination" and that because homosexual act is an intrinsic evil, it must always be opposed.

Abortion

In accordance with its teachings, the Catholic Church opposes abortion in all circumstances and often leads the national debate on abortion. The Roman Catholic Church has been a fierce opponent of liberalized abortion laws and has organized political resistance to such legislation in several Western countries.

Before the Roe v. Wade decision making abortion legal in the United States, the anti-abortion movement in the United States consisted of elite lawyers, politicians, and doctors, almost all of whom were Catholic. The only coordinated opposition to abortion during the early 1970s came from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Family Life Bureau, also a Catholic organization. Mobilization of a wide-scale anti-abortion movement among Catholics began quickly after the Roe v. Wade decision with the creation of the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC). The NRLC also organized non-Catholics, eventually becoming the largest anti-abortion organization in the United States. The anti-abortion wing of the Democratic Party was also led by Catholic Robert P. Casey, Sr. other anti-abortion Democrats including, Sargent Shriver, Raymond Flynn and Bob Casey Jr.

Reception of communion by Catholic politicians who support abortion rights is controversial in the United States. Such cases typically involve a bishop who prepares to withhold communion from a Catholic politician, though in some cases excommunication has been suggested, and in others, a bishop has instructed a politician to refrain from receiving communion. The first such case was that of Lucy Killea, though such incidents have subsequently occurred during national elections.

In 2004, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, then-prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (who would later become Pope Benedict XVI), instructed American bishops in a confidential memorandum that communion must be denied to Catholic politicians who support legal abortion. However, Cardinals O'Malley, Egan, McCarrick, Wuerl, Mahony and George have said they would not deny communion to a person in public life who supports abortion rights. Cardinal Burke and Charles Chaput, Archbishop of Philadelphia, have shown support for Ratzinger's position, but , neither has followed through on this.

During the 2004 presidential campaign, four bishops planned to deny communion to Catholic politicians who had voted for John Kerry. This provoked a negative reaction, and the Catholic Church took a different approach for the 2008 election. The new message was compiled into a brochure titled "Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship," which "emphasized that issues involving 'intrinsically evil' actions could not be equated morally with others," according to the Times. The brochure cites abortion as the "prime example," and it also mentions euthanasia, torture, genocide, unjust war and racism.

In the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign, as many as 89 Catholic bishops proclaimed that Catholics should make abortion their defining issue in the election.

In November 2009, Rhode Island Rep. Patrick Kennedy disclosed that Thomas Tobin had ordered priests in the diocese to deny him communion because of Kennedy's position in favor of unrestricted abortion.

Michael Humphrey of the National Catholic Reporter viewed the 54-45% majority of Catholic voters choosing Obama in the 2008 presidential election as a repudiation of bishops who had warned that voting for Obama would constitute grave matter. The University of Notre Dame, a Catholic institution, named President Barack Obama commencement speaker at its 2009 graduation and bestowed an honorary doctorate degree on him. The invitation drew criticism from Catholics and some members of the church hierarchy because of Obama's policies in favor of promoting and funding abortion.

Polling results show that a majority of Catholics classify themselves as anti-abortion; a 2009 poll showed a 52% majority identifying as anti-abortion. Pew Research, combining polls from 2011 and 2013, notes that over half (53%) of white Catholics believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases, with 41% saying it should be illegal in all or most cases. Among Hispanic Catholics, 43% say it should be legal in all or most cases, while 52% say it should be illegal in all or most cases.

Birth control

In 1948, Archbishop Richard Cushing campaigned against a Massachusetts referendum to loosen the state's ban on birth control. While the referendum failed, "deployment of the Church's political muscle," according to historian Leslie Tentler, offended non-Catholics and led Cushing to relax his position when the issue was debated again in the 1960s.

The Catholic church hierarchy forbids birth control such as condoms or the pill because it views them as separating sexual intercourse from its intended consequence of reproduction.

In 2012, when the Obama administration proposed regulations that required employer-provided health insurance plans to cover contraception, Catholic companies such as affiliated universities and EWTN Broadcasting, which believed they should be exempt from the law, sued the government, while Catholic religious leaders campaigned against it in church. The regulation was later altered so that an employee of a religious institution which did not wish to provide coverage for reproductive health care could seek it directly from the insurer at no additional cost. Catholic religious authorities continued to oppose the plan, while the Catholic Health Association supported it.

While the pope and the bishops have opposed birth control, the majority of American Catholics disagree with them, and believe the church should change its teaching on birth control. A Pew Research poll conducted in 2013 found that three-quarters of U.S. Catholics (76%) say the church should permit birth control.

Immigration
The immigration debate has opened a chasm with Republican hardliners who want restrictions. Some 30% of the Roman Catholic population is Hispanic and that percentage continues to rise steadily. Pope John Paul II advocated that countries should accommodate people fleeing from economic hardship. Cardinal Raymond Burke has been involved in rallies to allow undocumented workers a chance at citizenship. By welcoming migrant workers, many of whom are Catholic, Burke says, "we obey the command of Our Lord, who tells us that when we welcome the stranger, we welcome Christ Himself."

In addressing the Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion & Public Life in 2009, Archbishop Charles J. Chaput of Denver discussed the need when talking about reforming immigration law, to do so "...in a comprehensive way, so that justice is done and our borders are protected. It's always both/and; it's not either/or from my perspective." "[N]o one can claim to be Catholic and think it's okay to treat immigrants unjustly or inhumanly. But you can disagree on immigration policies because you think that one works and one doesn't."

Most immigration to the U.S. is from predominantly Roman Catholic nations and about  of all lapsed Catholics have been replaced by immigrant Catholics in the United States.

In 2006, Cardinal Roger Mahony announced that he would order the clergy and laity of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles to ignore H.R. 4437 if it were to become law. Cardinal Mahony personally lobbied senators Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein to have the Senate consider a comprehensive immigration reform bill, rather than the enforcement-only bill that passed the House of Representatives. Cardinal Mahony also blamed the Congress for the illegal immigration crisis due to their failure to act on the issue in the previous 20 years, opposed H.R. 4437 as punitive and open to abusive interpretation, and supported the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006 (S. 2611).

Transgender Rights
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops have openly opposed the Equality Act which serves to address discrimination towards members of the LGBTQ+ community. They claim that the legislation discourages differing opinions on marriage and sexuality and would codify gender ideology in federal law.

Party affiliation
Before the 1960s, when cultural changes lead to an incremental liberalization of the Democratic Party, Catholics were seen as staunch Democrats. The Democratic Party ran Al Smith, the first Catholic presidential candidate by a major party, in 1928, and, except when the ticket was headed by a Southern candidate, has nominated a Catholic for president or vice president in every election since 1960 except for 1988 (where a Greek Orthodox, Michael Dukakis, was the presidential nominee).

Since the 1960s, the Catholic vote has come to reflect the nation as a whole instead of being predominantly Democratic. In the 60s and early 70s, a number of Catholics and Southern whites abandoned their traditional affiliation with the Democratic Party and began to support the Republican Party. This shift is evidenced by the fact that Nixon received 33% of the Catholic vote in the 1968 election compared to 52% in 1972. As a group, Catholics represented a quarter of the nation's electorate and were now one of the nation's largest swing groups. Both parties began to aggressively woo the Catholic voters. Although the Catholic hierarchy could not dictate who Catholics voted for, they did have a substantial influence over the faithful in their dioceses. Politicians were aware that the bishops could direct significant time, energy and money to support the issues that were important to them. From their perspective, the bishops were eager to regain some of the influence that their predecessors had wielded in the earlier part of the 20th century. Since the 1970s non-Hispanic white Catholics have voted majority Republican very reliably while a majority of Hispanic or Latino Catholics have voted Democrat.

In his successful 1980 campaign against Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan won about half of the Catholic vote and a majority of Catholics who were non-Hispanic whites. "Reagan Democrats", many of them non-Hispanic white, blue-collar Catholics, often from a white ethnic background, comprised 25% of the Democrats who voted for Reagan, and formed an important part of his support in 1984 as well. Despite Catholic Geraldine Ferraro's presence on the Democratic ticket as Walter Mondale's vice-presidential running mate that year Reagan won 54 to 61% of the Catholic vote, only slightly different from the overall 59%. Although the majority of Catholics in 1984 remained Democrats, compared to 1980 Catholic votes switched to Reagan at about the same level as most Protestant groups. Reagan's vice president George H. W. Bush won about the same number of votes as Michael Dukakis, making 1988 the third presidential election in a row in which Catholics failed to support the Democratic candidate as they traditionally did.

Although about one third of Catholics voted for Bush's reelection in 1992, most Catholic defectors switched to independent Ross Perot, not the successful Democrat Bill Clinton. Unlike previous elections (such as in 1972, when George McGovern's Catholic support was eight percentage points higher than overall) the Catholic vote was not more Democratic than the overall electorate, but split almost identically to it. The trend away from a Democratic dominance of the Catholic vote continued in 1994, when for the first time in history Democrats did not receive a majority of Catholic votes in elections for the House of Representatives; as with 1992, the Catholic vote split resembled that of the overall electorate. White non-Hispanic Catholics however, remained majority Republican. This trend reversed slightly in 1996, when Clinton's share of Catholics in general was four percentage points ahead of overall, and they comprised about half of the margin between him and the unsuccessful challenger Robert Dole. The 1990s ended, however, with Catholics as "the largest swing vote in American politics" and with white non-Hispanic Catholics continuing to vote consistently Republican.

Their party independence continued into 2000, and Catholics became the large religious grouping that most closely reflected the total electorate, ahead of mainline Protestants. 50% of Catholics voted for Al Gore versus 47% for George W. Bush in the very close 2000 election. 52% of Catholics voted for Bush's successful reelection compared to 47% for the Catholic John Kerry in 2004, versus 51% to 48% overall. Amongst white Catholics the figure was higher, with George W Bush receiving 56% of white Catholic votes. Barack Obama, who chose the Catholic Joe Biden as his running mate, received 54% of the Catholic vote in 2008 compared to John McCain's 45%, close to the overall 52% to 46%. In 2012 Obama and Biden faced Mitt Romney and the Catholic Paul Ryan. Obama won 50% of the Catholic vote to Romney's 48%, close to their 51% and 47%, respectively, of the overall vote. In 2016 the Republicans' Donald Trump chose Mike Pence—who describes himself as evangelical Catholic—as his running mate, while the Democrats' Hillary Clinton chose the Catholic Tim Kaine as hers. The victorious Trump-Pence ticket received 52% of Catholics' votes compared to Clinton-Kaine's 45%.

In some regions such as the "Mountain West" region, it is estimated that since the 1980s 42% of white Catholics vote Republican whereas only 20% vote Democratic. White Catholics who are registered Democrats are also shown to defect to the Republican party in massive numbers during election years. This was particularly true during both of Ronald Reagan's presidential elections, as well as the Nixon-McGovern race. White Catholics who are registered as Republicans are substantially less likely to defect to the Democrats during election years.

Presidential elections

1928

In 1928, Al Smith became the first Roman Catholic to gain a major party's nomination for president. His religion became an issue during the campaign and was one of the factors in his loss. Many feared that he would answer to the pope and not the constitution.
Another major controversial issue was the continuation of Prohibition. Smith was personally in favor of relaxation or repeal of Prohibition laws despite its status as part of the nation's Constitution, but the Democratic Party split north and south on the issue. During the campaign Smith tried to duck the issue with noncommittal statements. He was also criticized for being a drunkard because of the stereotypes placed on Irish Catholics of the day.

Smith swept the entire Catholic vote, which had been split in 1920 and 1924, and brought millions of Catholics to the polls for the first time, especially women. The fact that Smith was Catholic garnered him support from immigrant populations in New England, which may explain his narrow victories in traditionally Republican Massachusetts and Rhode Island, as well as his narrow 2% loss in New York (which previous Democratic presidential candidates had lost by double digits).

1960

Religion became a divisive issue during the presidential campaign of 1960. Senator John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts was vying to become the nation's first Catholic president. A key factor that was hurting Kennedy in his campaign was the widespread prejudice against his Roman Catholic religion; some Protestants believed that, if he were elected president, Kennedy would have to take orders from the Pope in Rome. When offered the opportunity to speak before a convention of Baptist ministers, he decided to try to put the issue to rest.

To address fears that his Roman Catholicism would influence his decision-making, John F. Kennedy famously told the Greater Houston Ministerial Association on September 12, 1960, "I am not the Catholic candidate for President. I am the Democratic Party's candidate for President who also happens to be a Catholic. I do not speak for my Church on public matters — and the Church does not speak for me." He promised to respect the separation of church and state and not to allow Catholic officials to dictate public policy to him. Kennedy also raised the question of whether one-quarter of Americans were relegated to second-class citizenship just because they were Roman Catholic.

Even so, it was widely believed after the election that Kennedy lost some heavily Protestant states because of his Catholicism. His address did not please everyone: many non-Catholics remained unconvinced that a Catholic could be president without divided loyalties; and many Catholics thought he conceded too much in his profession of belief in an absolute separation of church and state. The speech is widely considered to be an important marker in the history of Catholicism (and anti-Catholicism) in the United States.

Kennedy went on to win the national popular vote over Richard Nixon by just one tenth of one percentage point (0.1%) - the closest popular-vote margin of the 20th century. In the electoral college, Kennedy's victory was larger, as he took 303 electoral votes to Nixon's 219 (269 were needed to win). There was a "narrow consensus" among the experts that Kennedy had won more votes than he lost as a result of his Catholicism, as Catholics rallied to Kennedy as an affirmation of their religion and their right to have a Catholic president.

Summary of results
This chart shows the estimated Democrat/Republican split of the Catholic vote in elections since 1948. Catholic candidates and elections in which Catholics voted for the national winner are in bold.

Representation in government

Congress
According to the Pew Research Center, Catholics represent 30.5% of the United States Congress as of January 2019. There are 141 Representatives and 22 Senators that are Catholic, which split as 99 Democrats and 64 Republicans.

Edward Kavanagh was nationally noticed as the first Catholic elected from New England in 1830. Kavanagh was elected as a Jacksonian to the Twenty-second and Twenty-third Congresses, serving from March 4, 1831, to March 3, 1835.

On January 4, 2007, Nancy Pelosi, a Catholic, became the first woman elected as the Speaker of the House. She was elected again as Speaker of the House on January 3, 2019, after serving as House Minority Leader for the Democrats from 2003 to 2007 and 2011–2019. Paul Ryan is Catholic as well and served recently as Speaker of the House from 2015 to 2019.

Supreme Court
A majority of the Supreme Court has been Catholic since 2005.

The first Catholic Supreme Court appointment was Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, appointed by Andrew Jackson in 1836. The second, Edward Douglass White, joined the Court in 1894 and was elevated to Chief Justice in 1910. He was joined on the Court by Catholic Joseph McKenna in 1898. After White's death in 1921, there became an informally recognized tradition of holding one seat on the Court for a Catholic justice, though not necessarily the same seat.

Pierce Butler was appointed to the Court in 1923 and succeeded by Frank Murphy in 1940. Both were Catholic. During Murphy's time on the Court, he was briefly joined by James F. Byrnes, who was raised Catholic but had converted to Episcopalianism many years before his appointment.

After Murphy died in 1949, he was not succeeded directly by a Catholic. However, President Harry Truman appointed Sherman Minton to a different vacant seat, and his appointment was seen as in keeping with the tradition, as Minton's wife was Catholic. He would convert five years after his retirement from the Court.

Upon Minton's retirement, Cardinal Francis Spellman successfully lobbied Dwight Eisenhower to replace him with William J. Brennan, a practicing Catholic.

The traditional one-seat rule was abandoned by President Ronald Reagan, who nominated two Catholics to serve together: Antonin Scalia in 1986 and Anthony Kennedy in 1988. They joined Brennan to give the Court a then-high of three Catholic justices.

President George H.W. Bush nominated Clarence Thomas in 1991. At the time of his appointment, Thomas was a confirmed Catholic attending Episcopalian services, but he has since returned to active Catholicism. He replaced the retiring Catholic Brennan with David Souter, an Episcopalian.

President George W. Bush appointed John Roberts and Samuel Alito, both Catholics, in 2005. Alito's appointment gave the Court its first ever Catholic majority, which it has maintained since. In 2009, President Barack Obama appointed Catholic Sonia Sotomayor, raising the number of Catholic justices to six.

In 2018, President Donald Trump appointed Catholic Brett Kavanaugh to replace Anthony Kennedy. Trump's other appointment thus far, Neil Gorsuch, is a practicing Episcopalian who had attended Catholic Mass and Catholic schools as a child. He joined the Episcopal Church upon marriage to his wife. It is unclear whether he still identifies as Catholic, and he is not typically included among the Catholic justices. In 2020, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died; President Donald Trump nominated Amy Coney Barrett, a Catholic, to fill the vacancy; she was subsequently confirmed by the Senate and sworn in to the bench.

Executive branch
There have been two Catholic President of the United States, John F. Kennedy and Joe Biden and two Vice Presidents of the United States, Joe Biden and Mike Pence (raised Catholic, self-described Evangelical Catholic).

First Lady Melania Trump was the first Catholic to live in the White House since First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, who remained there for two weeks after her husband's death 53 years earlier.

Cabinet members

Past Catholic Postmaster General (formerly a cabinet post) James Farley (1933-1940)

Past Catholic Secretaries of State include Edmund Muskie, Alexander Haig, and John Kerry. Secretary James G. Blaine had Catholic roots. Secretary James F. Byrnes was raised Catholic but converted to Episcopalianism.

Past Catholic U.S. Attorneys General include Roger B. Taney, Joseph McKenna, Charles Bonaparte, Frank Murphy, James McGranery, J. Howard McGrath, Robert F. Kennedy, William Barr, and Alberto Gonzales.

Past Catholic Secretaries of Defense include James Forrestal, Leon Panetta, and James Mattis. Secretary Chuck Hagel was raised Catholic but converted to Episcopalianism.

Past Catholic Secretaries of Labor include Maurice Tobin, Martin Durkin, James P. Mitchell, Ann McLaughlin Korologos, Alexis Herman, Hilda Solis, and Tom Perez.

Past Catholic Secretaries of Housing and Urban Development include Moon Landrieu, Henry Cisneros, Andrew Cuomo, Mel Martínez, and Julián Castro.

Past Catholic Secretaries of Energy include Bill Richardson.

Secretary of the Treasury and of the Interior Thomas Ewing married a Catholic woman, attended services for many years, and was formally baptized on his deathbed. Treasury Secretary Donald Regan also had Catholic roots, but it is unclear whether he actively practiced while in office.

The Catholic secretaries in the Biden administration are Lloyd Austin (Defense), Deb Haaland (Interior), Gina Raimondo (Commerce), Marty Walsh (Labor), Xavier Becerra (Health and Human Services), and Jennifer Granholm (Energy). Haaland is the first Native American in a presidential cabinet and also the first Native Catholic within it. Granholm converted to Catholicism while at Harvard Law School in the mid-1980s.

Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg was baptized in the Catholic Church as an infant and he attended Catholic schools, but began to attend the Church of England's Christ Church Cathedral during his term at the University of Oxford and said he felt "more-or-less Anglican" by the time he returned to the U.S. Buttigieg has since been an Episcopalian.

See also

 Anti-abortion movement
 Anti-Catholicism
 Anti-Catholicism in the United States
 Catholic Church in the United States
 History of the Catholic Church in the United States
 Catholic Democrats
 Christianity and politics
 Christianity in the United States
 History of Christianity in the United States
 Identity politics
 Jewish views and involvement in US politics
 Latino vote
 Political Catholicism
 Religion in politics
 Religion in the United States
 Freedom of religion in the United States
 History of religion in the United States
 Religious discrimination in the United States
 Third Way (centrism)

Notes

References

Bibliography

 Casey, Shaun. The Making of a Catholic President: Kennedy vs. Nixon 1960 (2009)
 Cochran, Clarke E. and David Carroll Cochran. Catholics, Politics, and Public Policy: Beyond Left and Right (2003)
 Dolan, Jay. The Irish Americans: A History (2008)
 Heyer, Kristin E., Mark J. Rozell, and Michael A. Genovese. Catholics and Politics: The Dynamic Tension Between Faith and Power (2008)
 Marlin, George J., and Michael Barone, American Catholic Voter: Two Hundred Years Of Political Impact (2006)
 Morris, Charles. American Catholic: The Saints and Sinners Who Built America's Most Powerful Church (1998)
 Prendergast, William B. The Catholic Voter in American Politics: The Passing of the Democratic Monolith (1999)
 Woolner, David B., and Richard G. Kurial. FDR, the Vatican, and the Roman Catholic Church in America, 1933-1945 (2003)

Further reading

 Blanshard, Paul. American Freedom and Catholic Power (Beacon Press, 1949) online, influential Protestant attack on Catholic political power
 Brenner, Saul. "Patterns of Jewish-Catholic Democratic Voting and the 1960 Presidential Vote." Jewish Social Studies (1964): 169–178. in JSTOR
 Byrnes, Timothy A. Catholic bishops in American politics (Princeton University Press, 1991)
 Casey, Shaun A. The Making of a Catholic President: Kennedy vs. Nixon 1960 (Oxford University Press, 2009) online
 Cooney, John. The American Pope: The Life and Times of Francis Cardinal Spellman (1984).
 Flynn, George Q. Roosevelt and Romanism: Catholics and American Diplomacy, 1937-1945 (1976) online
 Graziano, Manlio. In Rome We Trust: The Rise of Catholics in American Political Life (Stanford UP, 2017), 242 pp.
 Green, John Clifford. The faith factor: How religion influences American elections (Greenwood, 2007)
 Heineman, Kenneth J. A Catholic New Deal: Religion and Reform in Depression Pittsburgh (2005) excerpt and text search; online
 Hennesey, James. American Catholics: A History of the Roman Catholic Community in the United States (Oxford University Press, 1981), puts politics in context
 Heyer, Kristin E.; Rozell, Mark J.; Genovese, Michael A. Catholics and politics: the dynamic tension between faith and power (Georgetown University Press, 2008). online
 Jelen, Ted G. "Catholic priests and the political order: The political behavior of Catholic pastors." Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 42.4 (2003): 591–604.
 McAndrews, Lawrence J. What They Wished For: American Catholics and American Presidents, 1960-2004 (University of Georgia Press; 2014) 503 pages; influence of Catholics on domestic and foreign policy
 Marlin George J. and Michael Barone. American Catholic Voter: Two Hundred Years Of Political Impact (2006)
 Moore, Edmund A. A Catholic Runs for President: The Campaign of 1928 (1956) online
 Noll, Mark A. and Luke E. Harlow. Religion and American Politics: From the Colonial Period to the Present (2nd ed. 2007) online pp 244–66, 345-66
 Prendergast, William B.  The Catholic Voter in American Politics: The Passing of the Democratic Monolith  (Georgetown University Press. 1999)
 Schultz, Jeffrey D. et al. eds.  Encyclopedia of Religion in American Politics (1999) online
 Smith, Gregory Allen. Politics in the Parish: The Political Influence of Catholic Priests (Georgetown University Press, 2008) online
 Wald, Kenneth D., and Allison Calhoun-Brown. Religion and politics in the United States (Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2010) wide-ranging
 Zeitz, Joshua M. White ethnic New York: Jews, Catholics, and the shaping of postwar politics (Univ of North Carolina Press, 2007)

Historiography
 Gleason, Philip. "The Historiography of American Catholicism as Reflected in The Catholic Historical Review, 1915–2015." Catholic Historical Review 101#2 (2015) pp: 156–222. online
 Thomas, J. Douglas. "A Century of American Catholic History." US Catholic Historian (1987): 25–49. in JSTOR

External links
 United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB)
 Catholic Bishops' Conference and Vatican Statements on Abortion
 NETWORK, A National Catholic Social Justice Lobby

United States
Catholicism-related controversies
Politics
Politics of the United States
Holy See–United States relations
Christianity and politics in the United States
History of religion in the United States

Catholic Church and politics in the United States


"Song for Athene" (also known as "Alleluia. May Flights of Angels Sing Thee to Thy Rest") is a musical composition by British composer John Tavener with lyrics by Mother Thekla, an Orthodox nun, which is intended to be sung a cappella by a four-part (soprano, alto, tenor and bass) choir. It is Tavener's best known work, having been performed by the Westminster Abbey Choir conducted by Martin Neary at the funeral service of Diana, Princess of Wales, on 6 September 1997 as her cortège departed from Westminster Abbey.

Commissioned by the BBC, the piece was written in April 1993 by Tavener as a tribute to Athene Hariades, a young half-Greek actress who was a family friend killed in a cycling accident. At the time that she died, Athene Hariades was working as a teacher of English and Drama at the Hellenic College of London. Tavener said of Hariades: "Her beauty, both outward and inner, was reflected in her love of acting, poetry, music and of the Orthodox Church." He had heard her reading Shakespeare in Westminster Abbey, and after her funeral, developed the idea of composing a song which combined words from the Orthodox funeral service and Shakespeare's Hamlet. The work was published by Chester Music in 1997.

Music and lyrics
"Song for Athene", which has a performance time of about seven minutes, is an elegy consisting of the Hebrew word alleluia ("let us praise the LORD") sung monophonically six times as an introduction to texts excerpted and modified from the funeral service of the Eastern Orthodox Church and from Shakespeare's Hamlet (probably 1599–1601). The lyrics were written by Mother Thekla (18 July 1918 – 7 August 2011), an Orthodox nun who co-founded the Orthodox Monastery of the Assumption near Whitby, North Yorkshire, and whom Tavener called his "spiritual mother". Tavener had come away from the funeral of Athene Hariades with the music of Song for Athene fully formed in his mind. He called Mother Thekla the same day, and said to her: "I want words." She sent him the lyrics by post, which arrived the next day.

The music reaches a climax after the sixth intonation of alleluia with the lines "Weeping at the grave creates the song: Alleluia. Come, enjoy rewards and crowns I have prepared for you." Alleluia is then sung a seventh time as a coda. Following the example of traditional Byzantine music, a continuous ison or drone underlies the work.

Significant recordings
The song has appeared on, among others, a number of recordings of Tavener's work by various choirs, including Ikons (Cala, 1994) by the BBC Singers, Tavener: Innocence (Classics, 1995) by the Westminster Abbey Choir, John Tavener: Byzantia (Classical, 1999) by the Winchester Cathedral Choir, John Tavener: Song for Athene, Svyati and Other Choral Works (Naxos Records, 2000) by the Choir of St John's College, Cambridge, The John Tavener Collection (Universal Classics Group, 2003) by the Choir of the Temple Church and the Holst Singers, and Ikon (Decca, 2006) by The Sixteen.

The Westminster Abbey Choir's performance of the work at the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales, appears in a recording of the service released by the BBC as Diana, Princess of Wales, 1961–1997: The BBC Recording of the Funeral Service (Uni/London Classics, 1997).

In 2007, Scottish violinist Nicola Benedetti released an album entitled Nicola Benedetti: Vaughan Williams; Tavener which contained an arrangement of the song for solo violin and string orchestra.

Notes

References
.
.
Tavener's The Beautiful Names, the programme of a concert by the BBC Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony Chorus and Trinity College of Music Chamber Choir at the Birmingham Town Hall on 15 March 2008.

Further reading

Musical score
.

Articles
.
.
.

Audiovisual material
 – in a programme called Manifestations of God on the DVD, Tavener speaks about his choral music, and the parents of Athene Hariades talk about the inspiration behind "Song for Athene".

External links
John Tavener: Song for Athene - Gabrieli Consort - Paul McCreesh

1993 compositions
A cappella songs
Choral compositions
Christian songs
Classical music in the United Kingdom
Compositions by John Tavener
Eastern Orthodox liturgical music
Funerary and memorial compositions
Works based on Hamlet

Song for Athene


Halixfax Place Wesleyan Chapel was a former Methodist Chapel in Nottingham from 1798 to 1930. The building dating from 1847 had the highest ceiling of any Wesleyan Methodist church in England.
The building was finally demolished in 1966.

History

First chapel of 1798
From the early days of Methodism in Nottingham around 1740, services were held in a variety of locations as the society grew. In 1782 they moved to Hockley Chapel in Goose Gate. When the New Connexion took over this chapel, the Wesleyans left and purchased some land in Halifax Place.
A foundation stone was laid on 13 June 1798 and the chapel opened on 2 December 1798. It was 84.5 ft long and 53 ft broad and could seat 1,600 people.

Second chapel of 1847

The congregation expanded and by 1846 it was no longer large enough. It was replaced by a larger chapel opened on 23 February 1847 built by Mr. Simpson, an architect of Leeds. This new chapel was 63.5 ft by 95.6 ft, and contained a gallery extending entirely round the wall, with semi-circular ends, and a space of 20 ft in length in the middle. It was constructed by the contractors Elliott and Simpson and Mr. Dale of Nottingham.

It was in these premises that the commemoration of the Wesleyan centenary took place on 25 October 1839.

The final service was held on 29 June 1930 and the congregation then united with Broad Street Wesleyan Church.

It was demolished in 1966.

Organ

On the opening of the new chapel in 1847, a pipe organ was installed by Gray and Davison. A specification of the organ can be found on the National Pipe Organ Register.

References

Methodist churches in Nottingham
Churches completed in 1798
Churches completed in 1847
Former Methodist churches in the United Kingdom
1798 establishments in England
18th-century Methodist church buildings
18th-century churches in the United Kingdom

Halifax Place Wesleyan Chapel


The United States Navy occupational rating of gunner's mate (GM) is given by the Bureau of Naval Personnel (BUPERS) to enlisted sailors. They must either complete school training or by showing they are familiar with the field of ordnance.

The Gunner's Mate school is held at Naval Training Center Great Lakes, Illinois.  The school was originally very hands-on. It is now primarily conducted through self-study computer-based training (CBT). The training focuses on the operation, maintenance, and troubleshooting of Naval guns, missile launchers, and torpedoes. It has a strong emphasis on basic explosives, guidance and tracking systems, small arms, Naval ammunition classification, and safety. Upon completion of this school enlisted members often continue on to a specialized school. At the specialized school they learn a particular weapons system.

A GM will specialize in weapons such as the M500 shotgun, M60 machine gun, M14 rifle, M2 Browning machine gun, M9 pistol, M11 pistol, M16 rifle, M240 machine gun, M203 grenade launcher, M79 grenade launcher, M1911 pistol, M1 Garand, Mk 19 grenade launcher, Mk 18 Mod 0 Carbine Rifle, 5"/54 caliber Mark 45 gun, M242 Bushmaster chain gun, Vertical launching system, Missiles, torpedoes, pyrotechnics, hand grenades, non-lethal weapons, force protection & anti-terrorism, as well as operating shooting ranges, armories, and the storage and issue of ammunition.

Notes

Other websites

 GM from Navy Personnel Command (NPC): Bureau of Naval Personnel (BUPERS)
 Enlisted Ratings and Jobs in the US Navy (Historical)
 Navy Ratings, Past and present
 Navy Speciality ratings & Emergency ratings

Military ranks

Gunner's mate


Mattersey Priory is a former monastery of the Gilbertine Order, located near the village of Mattersey, Nottinghamshire, England. It is managed by English Heritage.

History
The priory was founded by Roger FitzRalph (son of Ranulph de Mattersey) in around 1185, and was dedicated to St Helen. It was constructed on a gravel island in the River Idle, and the area surrounding would have been mostly marshland at the time. The priory was designed to be home to six canons of the Gilbertine Order, although it could accommodate up to ten canons. Unlike many other Gilbertine priories, Mattersey was not a "mixed-house"; it was home to only canons (male), and not to canonesses (female).

The priory's church was destroyed by fire in 1279 and not rebuilt.

The priory is described as "never prosperous". In 1291, it was recorded as having an income of £52. The 1534 Valor Ecclesiasticus records the priory's income as £61 16s. 7d. with a clear annual value of £55 2s. 5d. One possession was the church at Misson, Nottinghamshire.

In 1403, King Henry IV granted the priory permission to hold a weekly Monday market at Mattersey. He also gave permission to hold annual fairs on St John of Beverley's day (7 May) and St Simon and St Jude's day (28 October).

The priory was dissolved as part of King Henry VIII's Dissolution of the Monasteries. It was surrendered on 3 October 1538 by Robert Holgate, Bishop of Llandaff; the Prior, Thomas Norman; the sub-prior, Thomas Bell; and by the three canons: John Garton, William Schylton, and Richard Watson. The following year the former Prior was awarded an annual pension of £12 the sub-prior £2 13s. 4d., and each of the canons 40s.

In 1539, the priory and its estate were given to Anthony Nevill. Around the year 1605, Mrs Margaret Nevill wrote to Lady Ann Holles at Haughton, inviting her to come and "visit the poor old Abbey of Mattersley".

The site was taken under the guardianship of the Commissioners of Works in 1912, and is currently managed by English Heritage.

List of known Priors
 Walter, c.1247
 John, c.1303
 Thomas Norman, c.1538

Description
The priory church is described as "a short, narrow, rectangular, aisleless building, without transepts". To the north stood a tower which was built in the 15th century. To the south of the church was the cloisters: a covered passageway around a courtyard, which was in turn surrounded by ranges of buildings on three sides. The eastern range of the cloisters was built after the fire of 1279. The ground floor consisted of a single vaulted room. This was subdivided to form a chapel, chapter house, and a day or warming room. Above was the "dorter" or "sleeping quarters" with the reredorter (communal toilet) at the end of the building. The southern range of the cloisters was slightly larger than the east, but had two stories again: the ground floor was an under-croft whilst the upper floor was occupied by the "frater" or refectory, where the canons ate. The west range was originally the lay-brothers accommodation (refectory on the ground-floor, sleeping quarters above). However, it is thought to have been converted into accommodation for the Prior. To the South-West was a square building housing the monastic kitchens.

Remains
The ruins of the priory sit next to the River Idle, east of the village of Mattersey. The ruins consist mainly of foundations but also include the remains of the 12th-century priory church, three arches from the canon's refectory, the foundations of the 14th-century monastic kitchens and the remains of a 15th-century tower. The foundations of the monastic service buildings (barns, bakehouse, infirmary etc.) are thought to remain under the area currently occupied by the farm buildings and yards of the adjacent Abbey Farm.

In 1914, a partial excavation located the buried foundations of the cloister's east and south ranges. A small amount of restoration work was also undertaken during these excavations.

References

External links

Detailed historical record for Mattersey Priory
 Mattersey Priory: English Heritage
Plan and History of the Priory: English Heritage

Religious organizations established in the 1180s
1538 disestablishments in England
English Heritage sites in Nottinghamshire
Gilbertine nunneries
Monasteries in Nottinghamshire
Ruins in Nottinghamshire
Christian monasteries established in the 12th century
1180s establishments in England
Monasteries dissolved under the English Reformation

Mattersey Priory


Carpetbagger is a term from the United States political history. A carpetbagger was a northerner  who moved to the South after the American Civil War. This period is called the "reconstruction era".

White southerners feared they would loot the defeated South. Sixty carpetbaggers were elected to Congress. Among them were most Republican governors in the South during reconstruction. A historian said:

"Carpetbagger" referred to the cheap carpet bags (a form of luggage) which many of the newcomers carried. The term came to be associated with opportunism and exploitation by outsiders.  It is used today for a "parachute candidate": a political candidate for public office in an area far from home.

References

Politics of the United States
Migration
American Civil War

Carpetbagger


A Woman Called Golda is a 1982 American made-for-television film biopic of Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir directed by Alan Gibson and starring Ingrid Bergman. It also features Ned Beatty, Franklin Cover, Judy Davis, Anne Jackson, Robert Loggia, Leonard Nimoy, and Jack Thompson.

A Woman Called Golda was produced by Paramount Domestic Television for syndication and was distributed by Operation Prime Time. The film premiered on April 26, 1982.

Plot

In 1977, Golda Meir returns to her old school in Milwaukee, Wisconsin where she tells the students her life story. She recounts her early years in Russia, and how her family emigrated to America to avoid the persecution of Jews throughout Europe. As a young woman, Golda dreams of fighting for a country for all Jews of the world. She marries Morris Meyerson, and they eventually move to Palestine to work in a kibbutz, although they soon end up leaving, much to Golda's disappointment. They move to Jerusalem and have two children, but Golda's tremendous ambition soon drives her and Morris apart, although they remain married until his death in 1951.

Golda is elected Prime Minister of Israel in 1969, resigning after the Yom Kippur War in 1974.

The film ends with President Anwar Sadat of Egypt arriving in Israel.

Cast
 Ingrid Bergman as Golda Meir
 Ned Beatty as Senator Durward
 Franklin Cover as Hubert Humphrey
 Judy Davis as Young Golda
 Anne Jackson as Lou Kaddar
 Robert Loggia as Anwar Sadat
 Leonard Nimoy as Morris Meyerson
 Jack Thompson as Ariel
 Anthony Bate as Sir Stuart Ross
 Ron Berglas as Stampler
 Bruce Boa as Mr. Macy
 David de Keyser as David Ben-Gurion
 Barry Foster as Major Orde Wingate
 Nigel Hawthorne as King Abdullah
 Yossi Graber as Moshe Dayan
 Oded Teomi as David Elazar

Reception

Christian Science Monitor critic Arthur Unger wrote that Bergman gave "the best television performance of this year or, perhaps, any other year," and that Davis "plays the young Golda with such believable intensity that she has already created an indelible character for Miss Bergman to take over as the older Golda." Unger wrote:"Without resorting to globs of makeup, somehow arranging her own Swedish accent to imply the Meir accent without making it an imitation or a parody, Miss Bergman manages to convey the essence of Mrs. Meir's character and the strength of her all-consuming dedication to her cause."

New York Times critic John J. O'Connor said the Bergman gave "a truly remarkable performance" but faulted the film for "gimmicks" and for giving a selective view of history, saying the film  "makes little or no effort to assuage critics of Zionism."

In some countries the film was broadcast as a 2-part or 4-part mini series.

Awards and accolades
At the 34th Primetime Emmy Awards, the film received seven Emmy nominations and won three awards, including the Outstanding Drama Special and Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or Movie for Ingrid Bergman, which was awarded posthumously (the award was accepted by Bergman's daughter Pia Lindström). Leonard Nimoy received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited Series or a Special as well as Judy Davis (as the young Golda Meir) for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Limited Series or Special.

The film was also nominated for two Golden Globes and won the award for Best Performance by an Actress for Bergman, again awarded posthumously.

See also
Golda (film)

References

External links

1982 films
1982 television films
1980s biographical drama films
American biographical drama films
Biographical films about prime ministers
1980s English-language films
Films directed by Alan Gibson
Films produced by Harve Bennett
Films produced by Gene Corman
Films scored by Michel Legrand
Films set in the 1960s
Films set in the 1970s
Films set in Israel
Films set in Milwaukee
Operation Prime Time
Paramount Pictures films
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Made for Television Movie winners
American political drama films
Cultural depictions of Golda Meir
Cultural depictions of Anwar Sadat
Cultural depictions of David Ben-Gurion
1982 drama films
American drama television films
1980s American films

A Woman Called Golda


The Projector, 2.5 inch—more commonly known as the Northover Projector—was an ad hoc anti-tank weapon used by the British Army and Home Guard during the Second World War.

With a German invasion of Great Britain seeming likely after the defeat in the Battle of France, most available weaponry was diverted to the regular British Army, leaving the Home Guard short on supplies, particularly anti-tank weaponry. The Northover Projector was designed by Home Guard officer Robert Harry Northover to act as a makeshift anti-tank weapon, and was put into production in 1940 following a demonstration to the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill.

The weapon consisted of a hollow metal tube attached to a tripod, with a rudimentary breech at one end. Rounds were fired with the use of black powder ignited by a standard musket percussion cap, and it had an effective range of between 100 and 150 yards. Although it was cheap and easy to manufacture, it did have several problems; it was difficult to move and the No. 76 Special Incendiary Grenades it used as one type of ammunition had a tendency to break inside the breech, damaging the weapon and injuring the crew. Production began in late 1940, and by the beginning of 1943 nearly 19,000 were in service. Like many obsolete Home Guard weapons, it was eventually replaced by other weapons, such as the 2-pounder anti-tank gun.

Development
With the end of the Battle of France and the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force from the port of Dunkirk between 26 May and 4 June 1940, a German invasion of Great Britain seemed likely. However, the British Army was not well-equipped to defend the country in such an event; in the weeks after the Dunkirk evacuation it could field only twenty-seven divisions. The Army was particularly short of anti-tank guns, 840 of which had been left behind in France, leaving only 167 available in Britain; ammunition was so scarce for the remaining guns that regulations forbade even a single round being used for training purposes.

Given these shortcomings, any modern weapons that were available were allocated to the British Army, and the Home Guard was forced to supplement the meagre amount of outdated weapons and ammunition they had with ad hoc weapons. One such weapon was the Northover Projector, the invention of Major Robert Harry Northover. Northover, an officer in the Home Guard, designed it to be an easily manufactured and cheap anti-tank weapon, costing just under £10 to produce, excluding the required tripod. The Major wrote directly to the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, with his design and arranged for Churchill to attend a demonstration of the Northover Projector. The Prime Minister approved of the weapon and gave it his personal endorsement, ordering in October 1940 that the weapon be mass-produced on a scale of one for every Home Guard platoon.

Design

The Northover Projector—which was officially labelled the "Projector, 2.5 inch" by the War Office—was formed of a hollow metal tube, resembling a drain pipe, mounted on top of a cast-iron tripod. It weighed approximately 27.2 kilograms. A simple breech was attached to one end of the tube, and rounds were fired from the Projector with a small quantity of black powder ignited by a "top hat" copper cap as used in muzzle loading rifles <Curtis (HBSA)2014>; any recoil from the weapon was absorbed by the legs of the tripod, which were also hollow. It had a maximum range of approximately 300 yards but was accurate only to between 100 and 150 yards Home Guard units often added their own modifications to the weapon, which included mounting it on carriages or even the sidecars of motorcycles. It was served by a crew of three. Ammunition for the weapon consisted of the No. 76 Special Incendiary Grenade, a glass bottle "containing a phosphorus mixture which burst into livid flames, giving off quantities of suffocating smoke upon exposure to the air", as well as normal hand and rifle grenades.

The Projector had a number of defects. It was difficult to move, the tripod had the tendency to damage itself if it was dropped, and its discharge pressure has been described as "feeble." The phosphorus grenades exhibited a number of faults when used in the Projector; they could often explode inside the weapon if too much black powder were added, or fall short if too little were used, or even fail to explode. They could also break inside the barrel when fired which often led to the weapon being damaged and its crew injured. Even when fired properly, the Projector gave off a large cloud of smoke which could take up to a minute to clear and revealed the weapon's position. Bishop argues that its anti-tank abilities would have been 'doubtful' when it fired hand and rifle grenades, although he considers that the phosphorus grenades might have been more successful. To make handling easier, a lighter version of the weapon, the Northover Projector Mk 2 was developed in 1941, but few were produced.

Operational history
The Northover Projector was issued to both Home Guard and regular British Army units, and by August, 1941 over 8,000 Northover Projectors were in service. This number had increased to 18,919 by the beginning of 1943.

Initial reactions to the Northover Projector were varied, with a number of Home Guard volunteers uncertain about the weapon's unusual design, and some officers never accepted that it could be useful. However, most Home Guard units came to accept the weapon and have confidence in it, aided by large amounts of what Mackenzie terms "War Office propaganda" which cited the positive qualities of the weapon, such as its simplicity of use, ease of manufacture and low maintenance requirements. It was, as one Home Guard volunteer put it, "something to be accepted gratefully until something better arrived."

Like many of the obsolete weapons designed for the Home Guard, the Northover Projector was only taken out of service when it could be replaced with "marginally less ineffective" weapons provided by the Army, such as the 2-pounder anti-tank gun.

See also
 Ampulomet — similar Soviet weapon of World War II
 Smith gun
 Blacker Bombard

References

Bibliography

 Hogg, Ian. Twentieth-Century Artillery. New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 2000.  Pg.143

Official documents

External links

 UK Anti-Invasion Defences

World War II infantry weapons of the United Kingdom
Anti-tank weapons
Grenade launchers of the United Kingdom
Weapons and ammunition introduced in 1940

Northover Projector


Robert Andrew Lloyd  (born 2 March 1940) is an English operatic bass.

Early life and education
Born in Southend-on-Sea, Essex, Lloyd was educated at Keble College, Oxford, and studied in London with the baritone Otakar Kraus.

Career
He made his  debut with University College Opera in 1969 as Don Fernando in Leonore, the early version of Fidelio. From 1969 to 1972 he was Principal Bass with the Sadler's Wells Opera Company (now English National Opera), and from 1972 to 1982 was a member of the Royal Opera, Covent Garden. He made 195 appearances with the Metropolitan Opera, New York City, during the period 1988-2008.

He has sung leading roles at Glyndebourne and with other British opera companies, and has appeared in major opera houses throughout the world. He sings roles in British, German, Italian, French and Russian works (Claggart and Superintendent Budd in Benjamin Britten's Billy Budd and Albert Herring, the Priest and Angel of Agony in Edward Elgar's The Dream of Gerontius; Sarastro in The Magic Flute, Osmin in The Abduction from the Seraglio, Rocco in Fidelio, Seneca in The Coronation of Poppea, Gurnemanz in Parsifal, Fasolt in Das Rheingold; Don Basilio in The Barber of Seville, Fiesco in Simon Boccanegra, Philippe II in Don Carlos; Arkel in Pelléas et Mélisande, Comte des Grieux in Manon, Narbal in Les Troyens; the title-role in Boris Godunov).  He also sings sacred music and has recorded as bass soloist in the Mozart Requiem.

Adult life
He was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1991 for his services to music.

Lloyd has four children.   The eldest is Marcus Lloyd, a playwright and dramatist.

Recordings
Robert Lloyd has made numerous recordings, including:

Albert Herring [as Superintendent Budd] (conductor:  Steuart Bedford), 1996, Naxos
Il barbiere di Siviglia (conductor:  Sir Neville Marriner), 1983, Philips
Béatrice et Bénédict (conductor: Sir Colin Davis), 1977, Philips
La bohème (conductor:  Sir Colin Davis), 1979, Philips
I Capuleti e i Montecchi (conductor:  Giuseppe Patanè, 1975, EMI
Carmen (conductor: Claudio Abbado), 1977, DG
Les contes d'Hoffmann [as Crespel] (conductor:  Julius Rudel), 1972, Westminster
Don Giovanni (conductor:  Sir Neville Marriner), 1990, Philips
Don Carlo (conductor: Bernard Haitink), 1997, Philips
The Dream of Gerontius (conductor:  Sir Adrian Boult), 1975, EMI
Die Entführung aus dem Serail (conductor:  Sir Colin Davis), 1978, Philips
La fanciulla del West (conductor:  Zubin Mehta), 1977, DG
Fidelio (conductor:  David Parry), 2005, Chandos
Lucia di Lammermoor (conductor:  Nicola Rescigno), 1983, EMI
Macbeth (conductor: Giuseppe Sinopoli), 1983, Philips
Great Mass in C Minor - Mozart (chorus master: László Heltay), 1994, Philips
Messiah - Haendel (conductor: Sir Neville Marriner), Dublin 1992, Philips DVD
A Midsummer Night's Dream (conductor:  Sir Colin Davis), 1996, Philips
Missa da Requiem - Verdi (conductor: Richard Hickox), 1996, Chandos
Le nozze di Figaro (conductor:  Sir Neville Marriner), 1986, Philips
Parsifal (conductor:  Armin Jordan), 1981, Erato
Requiem - Mozart (conductor: Sir Neville Marriner), 1991, Philips
Das Rheingold (conductor:  Sir Reginald Goodall), 1975, Chandos
Werther (conductor:  Sir Colin Davis), 1981, Philips
Die Zauberflöte (conductor:  Sir Charles Mackerras), 1991, Telarc

He can be seen on video as Boris Godunov, Rocco, Gurnemanz, Seneca and as Daland in The Flying Dutchman. He sang the title role in the 1988 film (director, Lesley Megahey) of Béla Bartók's opera Duke Bluebeard's Castle.

See also
 Massenet: Werther (Colin Davis recording)
 Mozart: La clemenza di Tito (Colin Davis recording)

References

External links

Biography and photo
Interview with Robert Lloyd, January 22, 1991
Singing in FIDELIO (YouTube video)
King Philip II in DON CARLO

1940 births
Living people
English opera singers
Operatic basses
Commanders of the Order of the British Empire
Music in Southend-on-Sea
Alumni of Keble College, Oxford
Fellows of Keble College, Oxford
People from Southend-on-Sea
Musicians from Essex
English basses
Presidents of the Independent Society of Musicians

Robert Lloyd (bass)


A wall plan is a drawing which consists of complete details with dimensions (with an accuracy of an inch) about all four sides and ceiling of each and every room in a building. It is drawn with the help of a floor plan as the basic input.

The main contents in a Wall Plan are:
Electrical points (like Switch Board Position, Light Position, etc.)
Doors and windows (like position of doors and windows in the wall, etc.)
Wardrobes and shelves (like size and position, etc.)
Plumbing points (like faucet position, toilet position, sink position, etc.)
Electronic points (like cable television points, telephone points, LAN points, etc.)
Household items (like where to put where)
Aesthetic items (like wall painting, clock, mirror, photos, etc.)
Kitchen items (like positioning of microwave oven, water purifier, chimney, etc.)

References
 FAQs on Wall Plan

Technical drawing
Building

Wall plan


Jack Arthur Walrath (born May 5, 1946) is an American post-bop jazz trumpeter and musical arranger known for his work with Ray Charles, Gary Peacock, Charles Mingus, and Glenn Ferris, among others.

Biography
Walrath was born in Stuart, Florida. He began playing the trumpet at the age of nine in 1955 while living in the small town of Edgar, Montana. He attributes his wide range of musical appreciation to a "lack of negative peer pressure which so often happens in cities".

In 1969 Walrath relocated to the West Coast and found work in Los Angeles's jazz scene. Soon he was a member of the band Revival, with trombonist Glenn Ferris, and the West Coast MotownOrchestra. He worked with Ray Charles for one tour of the U.S. In 1970 Walrath relocated to New York City. For a year and a half he was a columnist of the International Musician and Recording World, which had its US department there. He also wrote liner notes and articles for DownBeat.

Walrath spent the next several years working with mainstream and Latin jazz bands.

With Mingus he recorded Changes One and Changes Two, both for Atlantic Records in 1974. The latter album features Walrath's composition "Black Bats and Poles" (originally entitled "Rats and Moles" until Mingus decided it needed a darker name).

Discography

As leader or co-leader
 Demons in Pursuit, (Gatemouth, 1979)
 In Montana, (Labor, 1980, reissued 2001)
 Revenge of the Fat People, (Stash, 1981)
 In Europe, (SteepleChase, 1982)
 A Plea for Sanity, (Stash, 1982)
 Jack Walrath Quintet at Umbria Jazz Festival, Vol. 1, (Red, 1983)
 Jack Walrath Quintet at Umbria Jazz Festival, Vol. 2, (Red, 1983)
 Killer Bunnies, (Spotlite, 1986)
 Wholly Trinity, (Muse, 1986 [1988])
 Master of Suspense, (Blue Note, 1986)
 A-Free-K & Jack Walrath, (Justine Records, 1986) with Jorge Rossy, Perico Sambeat
 Neohippus, (Blue Note, 1988)
 Out of the Tradition, (Muse, 1990 [1992])
 Gut Feelings, (Muse, 1990 [1992]))
 Serious Hang, (Muse, 1992)
 Portraits in Ivory and Brass, (Mapleshade, 1994) with Larry Willis and Steve Novosel
 Journey, Man!, (Evidence, 1995)
 Hip Gnosis, (TCB, 1996)
 Solidarity, (ACT, 1996)
 "Vongole!" Live In Ancona (w/ Ares Tavolazzi b, Fabio Grandi d, Andrea Pozza p, Riccardo Mei voc), GoFour 1996)
 Sonage by Duplexus, (Rara, 2000)
 Get Hit in Your Soul, (ACT, 2000)
 Invasion of the Booty Shakers, (Savant, 2001)
 Ballroom, (SteepleChase, 2008)
 Heavy Mirth, (SteepleChase, 2008)
 Forsooth, (SteepleChase, 2011)
 To Hellas and Back, (SteepleChase, 2013)
 Montana Wild Cats (w/ pianist Philip Aaberg and bassist Kelly Roberti), Sweetgrass Music, 2013)
 You Got My Wife, But I Got Your Dog (w/ Upper Austrian Jazz Orchestra; ATS Records 2014)
 Unsafe at Any Speed, (SteepleChase, 2015)

As sideman

 The King Arrives, King Errisson, (Canyon, 1970)
 Changes One, Charles Mingus, (Atlantic, 1974)
 Changes Two, Charles Mingus, (Atlantic, 1974)
 Three or Four Shades of Blues, Charles Mingus, (Atlantic, 1977)
 Lionel Hampton Presents Charles Mingus, Charles Mingus, (Who's Who in Jazz, 1977)
 Cumbia & Jazz Fusion, Charles Mingus, (Atlantic, 1978)
 Live at Montreux, Mingus Dynasty, (Collectables, 1980)
 Dannie Richmond Plays Charles Mingus, Dannie Richmond, (Timeless, 1980)
 Tenor for the Times, Ricky Ford, (Muse, 1981)
 Something Like a Bird, Charles Mingus, (Atlantic, rec. 1979, issued 1981)
 Dannie Richmond Quintet, Dannie Richmond, (Gatemouth, 1981)
 Sax Maniac, James White, (Warner Bros., 1982)
 Dionysius, Dannie Richmond, (Red, 1983)
 In Case You Missed It, Charli Persip Superband, (Soul Note, 1984)
 No Dummies Allowed, Charli Persip Superband, (Soul Note, 1987)
 Give the Drummer Some, Mike Clark, (Stash, 1989)
 Hearinga Suite, Muhal Richard Abrams, (Black Saint, 1989)
 At Last, Lou Rawls, (Blue Note, 1989)
 The Jazz Tribe, Jazz Tribe, (Red, 1990)
 Blu Blu Blu, Muhal Richard Abrams, (Black Saint, 1991)
 Miles & Quincy: Live at Montreux, Miles Davis and Quincy Jones, (Warner Bros., 1991)
 Beyond Another Wall: Live in China, George Gruntz Concert Jazz Band, (TCB, 1992)
 Blues and the Abstract Truth, Suzanne Pittson, (Vineland, 1992)
 Blues Mission, Pee Wee Ellis, (Gramavision, 1992)
 Single Petal of a Rose, John Hicks (Mapleshade, 1992)
 Why I Like Coffee, Bob Nell, (New World, 1992)
 Mood Swing, Manhattan New Music Project, (Soul Note, 1992)
 Nostalgia In Times Square, Mingus Big Band 93, (Dreyfus, 1993)
 Rush Hour, Joe Lovano, (Blue Note, 1994)

References

External links

Official website

1946 births
Living people
American jazz bandleaders
American jazz composers
American male jazz composers
American jazz trumpeters
American male trumpeters
Jazz arrangers
Berklee College of Music alumni
Muse Records artists
21st-century trumpeters
21st-century American male musicians
Mingus Big Band members
Clean Feed Records artists
SteepleChase Records artists
ACT Music artists
Mapleshade Records artists
Red Records artists
Blue Note Records artists

Jack Walrath


Simon Lindley (born 10 October 1948) is an English organist, choirmaster, conductor and composer. He was Leeds City Organist from 1976 to 2017 (named City Organist Emeritus in Summer 2017) and is Organist Emeritus of Leeds Minster, having been organist and Master of the Music Leeds Minster from 1975 until his retirement in 2016.

Early life
Lindley was born in London. His father was an Anglican priest, and his mother was a writer, the daughter of Belgian poet and art historian Emile Cammaerts. After early education at Magdalen College School, Oxford, and graduation from the Royal College of Music in London, Lindley began an organ career in 1969, playing at various London churches and recording organ music.

Career
Lindley served as an organ tutor at the Royal School of Church Music and later as Assistant Master of Music at St Albans Cathedral to Peter Hurford and Director of Music at St Albans School. From 1975/6 he became Leeds City Organist and Organist & Master of the Music at Leeds Minster, and directed the Choir of Leeds Parish Church. From 1977, he has served a Music Director of Saint Peter's Singers of Leeds, a post he held until 2020. He was Senior Lecturer in Music at Leeds Polytechnic - now Leeds Beckett University from 1976 to 1987 and held the post of Senior Assistant Music Officer for Leeds City Council from 1987 to 2011. During the 1970s and 80s he was Chorus Master to Halifax Choral Society and Leeds Philharmonic Society. Since 1991 he has served as Secretary of the Church Music Society. From 2009 and 2010 respectively, Lindley has held posts as conductor of Sheffield Bach Society and Doncaster Choral Society. From 1997 until 2022 he served as Music Director of Overgate Hospice Choir Halifax.

Awards and Honorary Posts
Lindley was president of the Royal College of Organists from 2000 to 2003, and of the Incorporated Association of Organists from 2003 to 2005. In 2001 he received an honorary doctorate from Leeds Metropolitan University now Leeds Beckett University and a similar distinction was conferred upon him in 2012 by the University of Huddersfield. He served on the editorial panel for New English Praise (2006), a supplement to the New English Hymnal, and he worked extensively on compilation of the supplement. He has been chairman of the Ecclesiastical Music Trust from 2004 and was Chairman of the Yorkshire College of Music and Drama from 2006 to 2013. He was in office as Grand Organist to the United Grand Lodge of England from 2010 to 2012 and has held office since 2010 in the Masonic Province of Yorkshire West Riding as Provincial Grand Organist. Lindley is the recipient of the "Spirit of Leeds"  award from Leeds Civic Trust presented in 2006 and The Leeds Award from Leeds City Council in 2016.

Recordings and Voluntary Work
Lindley has recorded as organ soloist with orchestras including the BBC Philharmonic and Northern Sinfonia, with Huddersfield Choral Society, and as accompanist to such musicians as violinists David Greed and Marat Bisengaliev and cornet virtuoso Phillip McCann. He also holds office as conductor of choirs and choral societies in Doncaster, Halifax, Leeds and Sheffield and since retirement from full time work in 2016, has in recent times assisted with the music at Halifax Minster, St Michael and All Angels Church, Headingley and St Wilfrid's Church, Harrogate. From 2006 until 2019 he gave a monthly Organ Concert each month in Fulneck Moravian Church.

References

External links
Official website
[ Simon Lindley at Allmusic.com]
Leeds International Concert Season
St Peter's Singers
Leeds Town Hall
Sheffield Bach Choir
Doncaster Choral Society
Overgate Hospice Choir
Church Music Society
One Equal Music

1948 births
English classical organists
British male organists
People from the London Borough of Bexley
English people of Belgian descent
English people of German descent
Alumni of Leeds Beckett University
Living people
Alumni of the Royal College of Music
21st-century organists
21st-century British male musicians
Musicians from Leeds
English choral conductors
Musicians from Sheffield
Male classical organists

Simon Lindley


Crimea (Russian: Крым, Ukrainian: Крим) is a peninsula in the Black Sea that separates it from the Sea of Azov. Crimea has a surface of . It is about  by . About 2.4 million people live there. On the Crimean peninsula live Russians, Ukrainians, Crimean Tatars, Crimean Karaites, Krymchaks and Xoraxane Roma.

In 2014 Russia took control of the peninsula and annexed it. Most countries still say it is part of Ukraine. In 2018 Russia built the Kerch Bridge to connect it to Russia.

In 2022, the government of Ukraine recognized the Crimean Tatar indigenous people of Ukraine on the territory of the Crimean peninsula.

History
The Crimean Khanate ruled Crimea from the 15th to the 18th centuries. Late in the 18th century, the Russian Empire won a war against the Ottoman Empire and took control. The Crimean War was fought here in the 19th century.

Crimea was part of Russia until the Soviet Union gave it to Ukraine in 1954. Ukraine gave it a limited self-rule as an autonomous — Autonomous Republic of Crimea. The seat of the government is Simferopol, which is also the biggest city. Other major cities are Sevastopol and Kerch.

In March 2014, after a series of protests in Ukraine the month before, Russian troops took control of Crimea. A referendum in Crimea by Russia was held in which over 95% of voters voted to join the Russian Federation. The Crimean Parliament quickly proclaimed independence from Ukraine as a result. The area became the Republic of Crimea, a federal subject of Russia.

The referendum is not recognized by Ukraine or the international community. They still consider Crimea de jure Ukrainian territory. On March 24, Russia was expelled from the G8 (which became the G7), and on March 27, the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 68/262, which states that the referendum was invalid and Crimea still belongs to Ukraine. In later months, the United States, the European Union, and other places started economic sanctions to prevent Russian people and goods from entering those countries.

Autonomous areas
Geography of Ukraine
Peninsulas of Europe
2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine
Territorial disputes

Crimea


Edith Matilda Thomas (August 12, 1854 – September 13, 1925) was an American poet who "was one of the first poets to capture successfully the excitement of the modern city."

Life
Born in Chatham Center, Ohio, Edith Thomas was  educated at the normal school of Geneva, Ohio, and attended Oberlin College (though she had to drop out). She taught school for two years, and then became a typesetter.

She began writing early for the local newspapers, then was encouraged by author Helen Hunt Jackson to send verse to more important periodicals. She "gained national attention with her poetry....  Scribner's, The Atlantic Monthly, The Century and other prominent magazines published her poems." Jackson's "enthusiasitic endorsement produced almost immediate literary celebrity."

In 1884, Canadian poet Charles G.D. Roberts wrote of her that "as far as I am aware her poems are not yet gathered in book form, and are therefore only to be obtained, few in number, by gleaning from the magazines and periodicals. Yet so red-blooded are these verses, of thought and of imagination all compact, so richly individual and so liberal in promise, that the name of their author is already become conspicuous.... We are justified in expecting much from her genius."

Her first volume appeared in 1885 entitled A New Year's Masque and Other Poems.

In 1887 she moved to New York City, where she worked for Harper's and Century Dictionary. She lived in New York for the rest of her life. She published over 300 poems between 1890 and 1909, although "the demands of the leading literary magazines constantly exceeded her supply."

On her death she was called "one of the most distinguished American poets" by The New York Times.

Her Selected Poems came out in 1926, a year after her death.

Writing
Canadian poet Sir Charles G.D. Roberts wrote that "Miss Thomas's work, in some of its best characteristics, recalls to me Shakespeare's sonnets."

In Modern American Poetry, Louis Untermeyer called her "the author of some dozen books of verse, most of them lightly lyrical in mood, although a few of her poems have a more dramatic quality. The best of her work may be found in Lyrics and Sonnets (1887), The Inverted Torch (1890), and The Flower from the Ashes (1915).

Thomas acknowledged Helen Hunt Jackson as a major influence on her work.

The biographical dictionary Notable American Women says that "she drew her principal literary inspiration from the lyrics of John Keats. She was a classic poet in her prosodic regularity and in her continuing attention to Greek subjects. She was romantic in her emphasis on the self, although an aura of sentiment and pathos kept her from developing  a constructive romantic position.... She was one of the first poets to capture successfully the excitement (the "ardent bulbs") of the modern city, and one of the most consistent in crying out against the inroads of the dollar sign on American culture."

Publications
 A New Year's Masque and Other PoemsBoston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., 1885. Cambridge, MA: Riverside Press, 1885.
 The Round Year. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., 1886.
 Lyrics and Sonnets. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., 1887.
 Babes of the Year. New York: F.A. Stokes, 1888.
 Babes of the Nations. New York: F.A. Stokes, 1889.
 Heaven and Earth (1889)
 The Inverted Torch. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., 1890.
 Fair Shadow Land. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., 1893.
 In Sunshine Land. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., 1895.
 In the Young World. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., 1896.
 A Winter Swallow, With Other Verse. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1896.
 The Dancers. Boston: R.G. Badger, 1903.
 Cassia, and other Verse. Boston: R.G. Badger, 1905.
 Children of Christmas. Boston: R.G. Badger, 1907.
 The Guest at the Gate. Boston: R.G. Badger, 1909.
 The Flower from the Ashes. Portland, ME: T.B. Mosher, 1915.
 The White Messenger, and Other War Poems. Boston: R.G. Badger, 1915.
 Selected Poems, ed. Jessie Belle Rittenhouse ed. New York, London: Harper Brothers, 1926.

References

For an essay on Thomas by Kevin De Ornellas see Early American Nature Writers: A Biographical Encyclopedia by Daniel Patterson (Editor), Greenwood Press (2007), .

Notes

External links

 Works by Edith Matilda Thomas at Harvard University Library
  (including 7 "from old catalog")

1854 births
1925 deaths
19th-century American poets
20th-century American poets
American women poets
People from Ashtabula County, Ohio
20th-century American women writers
19th-century American women writers
Wikipedia articles incorporating text from A Woman of the Century

Edith M. Thomas


Black Orpheus was a Nigeria-based literary journal founded in 1957 by German expatriate editor and scholar Ulli Beier that has been described as "a powerful catalyst for artistic awakening throughout West Africa". Its name derived from a 1948 essay by Jean-Paul Sartre, "Orphée Noir", published as a preface to Anthologie de la nouvelle poésie nègre et malgache, edited by Léopold Sédar Senghor. Beier wrote in an editorial statement in the inaugural volume that "it is still possible for a Nigerian child to leave a secondary school with a thorough knowledge of English literature, but without even having heard of Léopold Sédar Senghor or Aimé Césaire", so Black Orpheus became a platform for Francophone as well as Anglophone writers.

The Congress for Cultural Freedom, a front group set up by the Central Intelligence Agency, was a funder of the magazine.

History
Black Orpheus was "a journal of African and Afro-American literature" established in 1957 by university professor Ulli Beier. It was produced in Ibadan, Nigeria, and was groundbreaking as the first African literary periodical in English, publishing poetry, art, fiction, literary criticism, and commentary. Its editors included Wole Soyinka and Es'kia Mphahlele (1960–64).

Characterised by its pan-African reach, Black Orpheus also published in English translation the work of Francophone writers, among them Léopold Senghor, Camara Laye, Aimé Césaire, and Hampâté Bâ, as well as playing a significant role in the careers of such notable authors and artists as Wole Soyinka, John Pepper Clark, Gabriel Okara, Dennis Brutus, Kofi Awoonor, Andrew Salkey, Léon Damas, Ama Ata Aidoo, Cyprian Ekwensi, Alex La Guma, Bloke Modisane, Birago Diop, D. O. Fagunwa, Wilson Harris, Valente Malangatana, and Ibrahim el-Salahi. Many of them featured in a 1964 anthology edited by Beier, Black Orpheus: An Anthology of New African and Afro-American Stories, which was published in Lagos, London, Toronto, and New York.

Black Orpheus was highly influential; Abiola Irele – the magazine's editor from 1968 – wrote in the Journal of Modern African Studies: "The steady development of Black Orpheus over the last seven years amounts to a remarkable achievement. It has succeeded in breaking the vicious circle that seems to inhibit the development of a proper reading public by its continued existence, by its very availability; more than that, it has also gone on to establish itself as one of the most important formative influences in modern African literature.…It can be said, without much exaggeration, that the founding of Black Orpheus, if it did not directly inspire new writing in English-speaking Africa, at least coincided with the first promptings of a new, modern, literary expression and re-inforced it by keeping before the potential writer the example of the achievements of the French-speaking and Negro American writers."

Beier also founded the Mbari Club, in 1961, a cultural hub for African writers that was closely connected with Black Orpheus, and during the 1960s also acted as a publisher — considered to be the only African-based publisher of African literature at the time — producing 17 titles by African writers.

Having earned a reputation as "the doyen of African literary magazines", Black Orpheus eventually ceased publication in 1975.

See also
 Présence Africaine
 Transition Magazine

References

Further reading
 Mark Wollaeger with Matt Eatough, "Black Orpheus, or, the Rise of the Little Magazine in Africa", in The Oxford Handbook of Global Modernisms, Oxford University Press, 2012, pp. 274–280.
 Peter Benson, Black Orpheus, Transition, and Modern Cultural Awakening in Africa, University of California Press, 1986.

1957 establishments in Nigeria
1975 disestablishments in Nigeria
Congress for Cultural Freedom
Defunct literary magazines
Defunct magazines published in Nigeria
Magazines established in 1957
Magazines disestablished in 1975
Mass media in Ibadan
CIA activities in Africa
Cold War propaganda
Propaganda newspapers and magazines

Black Orpheus (magazine)