The state legislature is currently considering legislation that would create a buffer zone.

It's a piece of legislation which is packed away in a little box and left on a shelf.

It does repeal a whole variety of special ordinances. This is always a good thing to do because our city code is used within the city and outside.

The goal with a big piece of social legislation is to have a bipartisan result, so the country will accept it.

By the turn of the twentieth century, every state in the South had laws on the books that disenfranchised blacks and discriminated against them in virtually ever sphere of life, lending sanction to a racial ostracism that extended to schools, churches, housing, jobs, restrooms, hotels, restaurants, hospitals, orphanages, prisons, funeral homes, morgues, and cemeteries. Politicians competed with each other by proposing and passing every more stringent, oppressive, and downright ridiculous legislation (such as laws specifically prohibiting blacks and whites from playing chess together.)

Ultimately it's not serious in any way as proposed legislation, but it's very serious with regard to what the committee's real alternatives are, ... The chairman is actively working to make sure that it's ANWR -- and (the Arctic refuge) alone.