jewelry and other objects.
#More to explore
Fossil Jewelry and Gems
Millions of years ago, insects were trapped
in resin. The resin eventually hardened into
amber.
92 Amber BRITANNICA STUDENT ENCYCLOPEDIA
Ambulance
An ambulance is a vehicle used to transport
people who are sick or injured.
Most ambulances are either trucks with
space for patients or cargo vans with
raised roofs. Ambulances usually take
patients to a hospital.
Specially trained people called emergency
medical technicians, or EMTs,
ride in ambulances. They give sick or
injured people emergency medical care
before they reach the hospital.
Ambulances have many types of
equipment that are used to move and to
treat patients. Equipment for moving
patients includes stretchers and cots with
wheels. An ambulances medical
equipment helps to treat breathing
problems, heart attacks, broken bones,
and burns right away.
Large cities have hundreds of ambulances.
They are owned by public and
private hospitals, fire departments, and
private emergency medical services.
Some places use airplanes or helicopters
as ambulances. These air ambulances
have the same equipment as ground
ambulances. Air ambulances reach
people in out-of-the-way areas. They
also transport patients more quickly
than ground vehicles.
Most ambulance developments took
place during wartime. In the early 1800s
the French army used two-wheeled,
horse-drawn wagons to bring soldiers to
battlefield hospitals. In the 1860s public
hospitals began keeping their own horsedrawn
ambulances. The first motorized
ambulance was built in 1899. Airplanes
were used as ambulances for the first
time duringWorldWar I (191418).
Helicopters first served as ambulances
during the KoreanWar (195053).
#More to explore
Hospital Medicine
Amendment
A change or addition to a law is called
an amendment. The word usually refers
to a change to the constitution of a government.
In the United States there have
been 27 amendments to the Constitution.
The most famous of these are the
first 10. They are known as the Bill of
Rights.
Emergency medical technicians treat a
patient in an ambulance.
BRITANNICA STUDENT ENCYCLOPEDIA Amendment 93
Passing an amendment to the U.S. Constitution
is a two-step process. The first
step is for two thirds of the members of
the Senate and two thirds of the members
of the House of Representatives to
vote for the amendment. The second
step is for the amendment to be ratified,
or approved, by the legislatures of three
quarters of the states.
Every U.S. state has its own constitution,
and almost all of them have been
amended more times than the U.S.
Constitution. The constitution of Alabama
has more than 700 amendments.
In many states voters must approve
amendments.
#More to explore
Bill of Rights Constitution United
States Constitution
American
CivilWar
In the 1860s the northern and southern
parts of the United States fought the
American CivilWar. The war started
after 11 Southern states separated themselves
from the United States and
formed their own government. Their
army fought the forces of the U.S. government.
The CivilWar threatened to
break up the United States. It is also
called theWar Between the States.
Buildup toWar
The North and the South had been
divided for many years over the issue of
slavery. The Southern economy was
based largely on cotton, which was
grown on large farms called plantations.
African slaves did most of the work on
the plantations. The North had small
farms that used paid workers. The
Northern economy also relied more on
manufacturing.
Neither side wanted the others ideas to
spread to new states being created in the
West. Northerners wanted to stop the
spread of slavery. But Southerners
believed that the U.S. government did
not have the right to decide whether or
not slavery should be allowed in a state.
They feared that the governments next
step would be to stop slavery altogether.
Missouri Compromise
In 1819 the U.S. Congress had to decide
whether to allow Missouri to become a
state. Missouri wanted to join as a state
that would allow slavery. Some North-
The only way
to repeal, or
cancel, an
amendment to
the U.S. Constitution
is to
pass another
amendment.
Only one
amendment to
the U.S. Constitution
has
ever been
repealed.
The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution
gave women the right to vote.
94 American Civil War BRITANNICA STUDENT ENCYCLOPEDIA
erners in Congress were not happy with
this. Congress therefore could not agree
about what to do. Finally, Maine asked
to join the country as a free state, or a
state that would not allow slavery. Congress
then agreed to let Missouri join as
a slave state and Maine join as a free
state. This became known as the Missouri
Compromise of 1820. The Compromise
also banned slavery north of
Missouris southern border.
Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Missouri Compromise lasted until
Congress passed the Kansas-Nebraska
Act in 1854. The act created Kansas and
Nebraska as new territories in the area
where slavery was supposed to be forbidden.
Yet the act allowed the people of
the territories to choose whether or not
to allow slavery. In Kansas the act led to
armed conflict. On one side were Southerners
who supported slavery. On the
other side were Northern abolitionists,
who wanted to end slavery.
The Confederacy and the Union
Southerners became more upset when
Abraham Lincoln was elected U.S. president
in 1860. Lincoln belonged to the
Republican Party, which opposed slavery.
Southern states decided to secede
(withdraw) from the United States to
protect their right to keep slaves. South
A map shows where the major battles of the American Civil War took place.
BRITANNICA STUDENT ENCYCLOPEDIA American Civil War 95
Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama,
Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia,
Arkansas, North Carolina, and Tennessee
seceded. They formed a government
called the Confederate States of
America, or the Confederacy. Jefferson
Davis was the Confederate president.
The states that stayed loyal to the
United States were called the Union.
Four statesKentucky, Missouri, Maryland,
and Delawarestayed in the
Union even though they allowed slavery.
They were called border states. In addition,
the western counties of Virginia
refused to join the Confederacy. They
later joined the Union as the state of
West Virginia.
Going into the war the Union had several
advantages over the Confederacy. It
had more people, more industries, and
more railroads. But the Confederacy had
better military leaders.
Events of theWar
Fighting broke out in 1861 and lasted
until 1865. By the end of 1861 two
major battlefronts had developed. One
was in the East, where Virginia, Maryland,
and Pennsylvania suffered most of
the fighting. The other front was in the
West. That front started along the Mississippi
River and then spread.
1861
The American CivilWar began on April
12, 1861, in Charleston, South Carolina.
Confederate troops captured Fort