Senate panel to consider port security bill News
Senate panel to consider port security bill

[JURIST] The US Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee [official website] will vote in April on legislation [S. 2008 text] to improve port security at American ports, according to committee chair Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) [official website]. Collins hopes that the recent controversy over the purchase of control of several major US ports [JURIST report] by Dubai-based DP World [corporate website] will encourage passage of the bill. The bill was written last year by Collins and Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) and is supported by Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-CT), ranking Democrat on the Senate Committee. The bill would authorize $835 million per year for five years to improve port security, would create an office of cargo security policy and would require more stringent examination of inbound cargo. The bill would also call for creation of an emergency plan in event of a terrorist attack upon US ports. There is no current plan.

DP World's purchase of terminal operations from British company P&O [corporate website] moved forward Monday after British courts rejected objections [JURIST report] by Miami firm Eller & Co. P&O has announced that the takeover will become effective on Thursday [press release, PDF]. Amy Fagan of the Washington Times has more.

THIS DAY @ LAW

Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, murdered by Henry II's knights

On December 29, 1170, Archbishop Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral by knights acting in the name of Henry II.

Becket and Henry had been entangled in a power struggle over, among other things, criminal jurisdiction over clergy. Read a contemporary account of the murder of Thomas Becket.

Texas attains US statehood

On December 29, 1845, Texas became the twenty-eighth state to join the United States of America when US President James K. Polk signed the Ordinance of Annexation. Texas had a complicated path to statehood because it had formerly been part of Mexico and then an independent republic. The US Congress passed the Annexation of the Republic of Texas Joint Resolution on March 1, 1845. Voters in Texas then approved the Ordinance of Annexation in October, before it was approved by the US Congress and signed into law by President Polk on this day in 1845. The US Supreme Court later ruled in Texas v. White that, despite its unique path to statehood, Texas did not have the right to secede from the union.