The Power of Twelve

Once is an accident. Twice is a coincidence. Three times or more is a pattern.

There are:

12 inches in a foot
12 months in a year
12 grades in the American school system
12 signs of the zodiac
12 items in a dozen
12 dozen make up one gross
12 pence to a shilling
12 people on a jury
12 channels on early television sets -- 2 through 13
12 districts in the U.S. Federal Reserve bank system
12 tribes of Israel
12 apostles in Christianity, which borrowed the idea from
12 apostles in Mithraism
12 labors of Hercules, imposed as punishment
12 days to the Christmas season, from Yule to Epiphany
12 steps to humility, (St. Benedict, 520 A.D.)
12 steps of pride (St. Bernard of Clairvaux, 1130 A.D.)
12 steps to sobriety (Bill Miller founder of AA, 1937)
12 parts to the Boy Scout Law (Trustworthy, Loyal, etc.)
12 tones in the chromatic musical scale
12 bars in standard blues music
12 animals in the Chinese cycle of years (rat, ox, tiger, etc.)
12 points to a pica, the standard printer's measuring system
12 times 6 picas = 72, the number of points to an inch
12 times 3 = 36, the number of inches in a yard
12 times 2 = 24 hours in a day
12 times 5 = 60 minutes in an hour
12 times 30 = 360 degrees in a circle
12 times 10 = 120 beats per minute, the standard military marching pace
12 times 10 = 120, the optimum systolic blood pressure
12 volts in automobile electrical systems
12 was the base for early mathematics
12 Chairs in the Mel Brooks movie based on a Russian folk tale
12 Monkeys, another movie, by Terry Gilliam
12 Years a Slave, a book and a movie
12 strands in a DNA sequence

   Finally, the atomic weight of carbon, the base of all life forms on earth, is 12.01

   And consider this: 12 states sent delegates to Philadelphia for the Constitutional Convention of 1787, during the 12th year of U.S. independence. (Rhode Island did not attend.)
   Along with the new Constitution, the delegates submitted a package of 12 proposed amendments, the first two of which were not promptly ratified. Proposed Amendments Three through Twelve were approved by the several states by 1791, and became known as the Bill of Rights.
    Proposed Amendment One, dealing with apportionment for the House of Representatives, was never approved, but was superseded when the House itself limited its membership to 435. The Constitution initially specified one representative per 30,000 population, but that soon became unwieldy, leading to the limit of 435.
   Proposed Amendment Two, dealing with salaries for members of Congress, was ratified in 1992, as Amendment 27.

   Taken together, what do they all mean?
   Perhaps nothing; they are just coincidences.

   Or are they?