1.   Bankers argue that loosening the law would bring on lower banking costs and healthier competition in the financial services industry.

2.   A House panel voted Wednesday to loosen anti-trust laws so that competing airlines could coordinate their arrival and departure schedules as a way of ending airport gridlock.

3.   Even opponents of loosening gun laws have dropped their objections, at least for the moment.

4.   Gov. George Pataki signed legislation Monday loosening laws requiring secrecy in child abuse investigations.

5.   Health-conscious Californians rejected one initiative backed by the tobacco industry to loosen anti-smoking laws and another to create a single-payer health-care system.

6.   In recent years, strict federal laws have been loosened to allow banks to do business across state lines and to seek higher revenue from securities underwriting.

7.   Similar questions about Gingrich and his benefactors are likely to arise next year as House Republicans move to loosen the laws and regulations that they believe have stifled entrepreneurs.

8.   The case was so horrible that the sluggish state Legislature loosened confidentiality laws that often protected government error, and Mayor Rudolph Giuliani created a new agency for children.

9.   But with Spain loosening laws that made it difficult and costly to fire employees, the decrease in students may soon translate into teacher layoffs.

10.   More than half of the Swiss support loosening the laws banning marijuana, according to a survey by a drug and alcohol agency.