After more than a year of bitter political debate, President Obama sat down in the White House East Room on March 23 and signed the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act into law with a pen，and then another pen，and another. Obama used 22 pens to sign the $938 billion health care bill.

The practice of using different pens to sign important legislation（法規(guī)）dates at least as far back as Franklin Roosevelt. The reason is fairly simple. The pen used to sign historic legislation itself becomes a historical artifact. The more pens a President uses, the more thank-you gifts he can offer to those who helped create that piece of history. The White House often give pens to supporters of the newly signed legislation. When Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act in 1964, he reportedly used more than 75 pens and gave one of the first ones to Martin Luther King Jr. And in 1996, President Clinton gave the four pens he used to sign the Line-Item Veto bill to those most likely to appreciate the bill's consequence.

    Once they're given away, some pens end up in museums; others are displayed proudly in recipients'(接受者) offices or homes. But they sometimes appear again, like in the 2008 presidential campaign（競(jìng)選活動(dòng)）, when John Macain promised to use the same pen given to him by President Reagan to cut pork from the federal budget.

Not every President goes for the multipen signature, however. President George W. Bush preferred signing bills with only one pen and then offering several unused "gift" pens as souvenirs.

 

1..We can learn from paragraph 1 that the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act        .

A. has been passed easily

B. was put forward one year ago

C. becomes law in the USA

D. is unimportant

2.How are the pens dealt with after being used by President Obama?

A. Supporters of the newly signed legislation are likely to get some of them.

B. Obama will keep them.

C. They will be just set aside

D. They will be sold to the public at a high price.

3.What can we learn about John Macain?

A. He was ever President in the USA.

B. He took part in the 2008 presidential campaign.

C. He never used the pen given by Reagan.

D. He was only concerned about his own business.    

4.What does this passage mainly tell us ?[來(lái)源:學(xué)�？�。網(wǎng)]

A. Obama signed the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

B. It is a practice to use multiple pens to sign important legislation in the USA.

C. Pens are necessary in the signature.

D. All the presidents like the multipen signature.

 

【答案】

 

1.C

2.A

3.B

4.B

【解析】略

 

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