On March 27, 1866, President Andrew Johnson vetoed a civil rights bill that would later become the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, conferring full US citizenship on all slaves. Read President Johnson’s veto letter, transmitted to the US Senate.
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On March 26, 1975, the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on their Destruction went into force. Today, 162 countries have signed the Convention, pledging never “to develop, produce, stockpile or otherwise acquire or retain” biological weapons. Some signatory nations, however, have reserved the [...]
US Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor was born in El Paso, Texas on March 26, 1930.
A British bill abolishing the slave trade became law on March 25, 1807. Learn more about slavery and the slave trade in Britain.
On March 25, 1931, nine black teenagers were arrested in Paint Rock, Alabama for allegedly raping two white women. Twelve days later, the young men were put on trial in the nearby town of Scottsboro. After numerous the proceedings culminated in two landmark decisions by the US Supreme Court, Powell v. Alabama and Norris v. [...]
On March 24, 1661, William Ledda, executed in Boston, became the last Quaker in the American colonies to be put to death for his religious beliefs. Learn more about the persecution of the Quakers in colonial Massachusetts.
On March 24, 1980, Archbishop Óscar Romero was assassinated while celebrating Mass in San Salvador, El Salvador by a right-wing death squad. Romero had become unpopular with conservative elements in the country when he began speaking out against government repression of the nation’s poor and of his fellow priests. Read a biography of Archbishop Óscar [...]
On March 23, 1918, 101 leaders of the Industrial Workers of the World union (“The Wobblies”) were put on trial in Chicago for conspiracy to obstruct America’s participation in World War I. Learn more about the Wobblies from the Constitutional Rights Foundation.
On March 23, 1956, the Islamic Republic of Pakistan became the world’s first Islamic republic. Unfortunately, democracy in Pakistan collapsed quickly after General Ayub Khan lead a successful coup d’etat. Since that time, Pakistan has vacillated between military and civilian government. Pakistan was governed by the 1956 Constitution of Pakistan, until it was superseded by [...]
On March 22, 1765, the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act, a revenue-raising measure under which all pamphlets, almanacs, newspapers, bonds, notes, leases, insurance policies, and legal papers had thenceforward to be issued on stamped paper that could only be purchased from the king’s officers. American colonists objected to the Act, saying that Parliament did [...]
