U.S. Steel

The United States Steel Corporation (NYSE: X), more commonly known as U.S. Steel, is an American integrated steel producer with major production operations in the United States, Canada, and Central Europe. The company was the world's 15th largest steel producer in 2014.

The company was renamed USX Corporation in 1986 and back to United States Steel Corporation in 2001 when the company spun off the oil & gas business of Marathon Oil and the steel business of U. S. Steel to shareholders. In 2001 it was still the largest domestically owned integrated steel producer in the United States, although it produced only slightly more steel than it did in 1902, after significant downsizing in the 1980s.

History

Formation

J. P. Morgan and the attorney Elbert H. Gary founded U.S. Steel on March 2, 1901 (incorporated on February 25) by combining Andrew Carnegie's Carnegie Steel Company with Gary's Federal Steel Company and William Henry "Judge" Moore's National Steel Company for $492 million ($13.99 billion today). At one time, U.S. Steel was the largest steel producer and largest corporation in the world. It was capitalized at $1.4 billion ($39.82 billion today), making it the world's first billion-dollar corporation. The company headquarters was established in 1901 in the Empire Building, purchased from the estate of Orlando B. Potter for $5 million. In 1907 it bought its largest competitor, the Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad Company, which was headquartered in Birmingham, Alabama. This led to Tennessee Coal's being replaced in the Dow Jones Industrial Average by the General Electric Company. The federal government attempted to use federal antitrust laws to break up U.S. Steel in 1911, but that effort ultimately failed. In its first full year of operation, U.S. Steel made 67 percent of all the steel produced in the United States. One hundred years later, its shipments accounted for only about 8 percent of domestic consumption.

Medical ultrasound

Medical ultrasound (also known as diagnostic sonography or ultrasonography) is a diagnostic imaging technique based on the application of ultrasound. It is used to see internal body structures such as tendons, muscles, joints, vessels and internal organs. Its aim is often to find a source of a disease or to exclude any pathology. The practice of examining pregnant women using ultrasound is called obstetric ultrasound, and is widely used.

Ultrasound is sound waves with frequencies which are higher than those audible to humans (>20,000Hz). Ultrasonic images also known as sonograms are made by sending pulses of ultrasound into tissue using a probe. The sound echoes off the tissue; with different tissues reflecting varying degrees of sound. These echoes are recorded and displayed as an image to the operator.

Many different types of images can be formed using sonographic instruments. The most well-known type is a B-mode image, which displays the acoustic impedance of a two-dimensional cross-section of tissue. Other types of image can display blood flow, motion of tissue over time, the location of blood, the presence of specific molecules, the stiffness of tissue, or the anatomy of a three-dimensional region.

United States v. White

United States v. White, 401 U.S. 745 (1971), was a United States Supreme Court decision which held that recording conversations using concealed radio transmitters worn by informants does not violate the Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable searches and seizures, and thus does not require a warrant.

Facts and Procedural History

Criminal defendant White was convicted of narcotics charges in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. The conviction was based on evidence obtained from recorded conversations in 1965 and 1966 between the defendant White and a government informant wearing a concealed radio transmitter. White appealed the conviction, claiming the conversations were recorded without his permission, that he had a reasonable expectation of privacy (see Katz), and the conversations were recorded without a warrant, violating his Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable searches and seizures. Thus, White argued that the recorded conversations should not have been admitted as evidence. The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, 405 F.2d 838, reversed the district court and remanded, and certiorari was granted.

Blanton v. City of North Las Vegas

Blanton v. North Las Vegas, 489 U.S. 538 (1989), was a decision issued by the United States Supreme Court clarifying the limitations of the Right to Trial by Jury.

Background

Melvin R. Blanton was charged with Driving under the influence of alcohol. His petition for a jury trial was denied and he was instead given a bench trial. Blanton appealed, arguing that his sixth amendment right to trial by jury had been violated.

Decision of the Court

The US Supreme Court ruled that Blanton did not have the right to a jury trial because the crime he was charged with was "petty". The court went on to elaborate: "offenses for which the maximum period of incarceration is six months, or less, are presumptively petty...a defendant can overcome this, and become entitled to a jury trial,..by showing that additional penalties [such as monetary fines]...are...so severe [as to indicate] that the legislature clearly determined that the offense is a serious one."

See also