January

1 -- 1892: The Ellis Island Immigrant Station in New York opened.
1 -- 1863: President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring that slaves in rebel states were free.
1 -- 1808: A law prohibiting the importation of slaves into the United States went into effect.
1 -- 1797: Albany became the capital of New York state, replacing New York City.
2 -- 1974: President Richard Nixon signed legislation requiring states to limit highway speeds to 55 mph.
2 -- 1903: President Theodore Roosevelt closes a post office in Indianola, Mississippi, for refusing to hire as African-American postmistress.
2 -- 1788: Georgia became the fourth state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
3 -- 1961: The United States severed diplomatic relations with Cuba.
3 -- 1959: Alaska is admitted into the Union as the 49th and largest state.
3 -- 1947: Congressional proceedings were televised for the first time as viewers in Washington, Philadelphia and New York City saw some of the opening ceremonies of the 80th Congress.
4 -- 2007: Nancy Pelosi is elected Speaker of the House, by a vote of 233-202.
4 -- 1974: President Nixon refuses to hand over tapes subpoenaed by the Watergate Committee.
4 -- 1896: Utah was admitted to the Union as the 45th state.
4 -- 1790: President George Washington delivers the first State of the Union address.
5 -- 1933: Calvin Coolidge died, he was the 30th president of the United States of America.
5 -- 1925: Nellie T. Ross succeeded her late husband as governor of Wyoming, becoming the first female governor in U.S. history.
6 -- 1919: Theodore Roosevelt died, he was the 26th president of the United States of America.
6 -- 1912: New Mexico became the 47th state.
7 -- 1959: The United States recognized Fidel Castro's new government in Cuba.
7 -- 1800: Millard Fillmore was born, he was the thirteenth president of the United States of America.
7 -- 1789: The first U.S. presidential election was held. Americans voted for electors who, a month later, chose George Washington to be the nation's first president.
8 -- 1964: President Lyndon B. Johnson declared a war on poverty.
8 -- 1918: Mississippi becomes 1st state to ratify 18th amendment (prohibition).
8 -- 1815: U.S. forces led by Gen. Andrew Jackson defeated the British in the Battle of New Orleans, the closing engagement of the War of 1812.
9 -- 1913: Richard M. Nixon was born, he was the 37th president of the United States of America.
9 -- 1861: Mississippi seceded from the Union.
9 -- 1788: Connecticut became the fifth state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
10 -- 1861: Florida becomes 3rd state to secede from US
10 -- 1776: Thomas Paine published the pamphlet "Common Sense."
11 -- 1861: Alabama seceded from the Union.
11 -- 1805: The Michigan Territory was created by an act of Congress.
12 -- 1948: The Supreme Court ruled that state law schools could not discriminate against applicants on the basis of race.
12 -- 1932: Hattie W. Caraway became the first woman elected to the U.S. Senate, after serving out the remainder of the term of her late husband, Thaddeus.
12 -- 1915: The U.S. House of Representatives rejected a proposal to give women the right to vote.
13 -- 1988: The Supreme Court rules (5-3) public school officials have broad powers to censor school newspapers, plays and other expressive activities
13 -- 1966: Robert C. Weaver was named Secretary of Housing and Urban Development by President Lyndon B. Johnson; Weaver became the first black Cabinet member.
13 -- 1794: President George Washington approves a measure adding two stars and two stripes to the American flag, following the admission of Kentucky and Vermont to the union. (The number of stripes was later reduced to the original 13.)
14 -- 1994: President Bill Clinton and Russian President Boris Yeltsin signed accords in Moscow to stop aiming missiles at any nation and to dismantle the nuclear arsenal of Ukraine.
14 -- 1963: George C. Wallace was sworn in as governor of Alabama with a pledge of "segregation forever."
14 -- 1639: Connecticut's first constitution, the Fundamental Orders, was adopted.
15 -- 1870: The Democratic Party was first represented as a donkey in a in Harper's Weekly cartoon.
15 -- 1777: The people of New Connecticut declared their independence. (The tiny republic later became the state of Vermont.)
16 -- 2007: Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., launched his successful bid for the White House.
16 -- 1920: Prohibition began as the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution took effect.
17 -- 1893: Rutherford B. Hayes died, he was the nineteenth president of the United States of America.
17 -- 1706: Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston.
18 -- 1862: John Tyler died, he was the tenth president of the United States of America.
19 -- 1979: Former Attorney General John N. Mitchell was released on parole after serving 19 months at a federal prison in Alabama.
19 -- 1955: A presidential news conference was filmed for television for the first time, with the permission of President Dwight D. Eisenhower.
19 -- 1861: Georgia seceded from the Union.
19 -- 1807: Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee was born in Westmoreland County, Va.
20 -- 2009: Barack Obama is sworn in as the first U.S black president.
20 -- 1986: The United States observed the first federal holiday in honor of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.
20 -- 1981: Iran released 52 Americans held hostage for 444 days, minutes after the presidency had passed from Jimmy Carter to Ronald Reagan.
20 -- 1945: President Franklin D. Roosevelt was sworn into office for an unprecedented fourth term.
21 -- 1861: Five Southerners resigned from the U.S. Senate, including Jefferson Davis of Mississippi, the future president of the Confederacy.
22 -- 1997: The Senate confirmed Madeleine Albright as the nation's first female secretary of state.
22 -- 1973: Lyndon B. Johnson died, he was the 36th president of the United States of America.
22 -- 1973: The Supreme Court handed down its Roe vs. Wade decision, which legalized abortion.
23 -- 1845: Congress decided all national elections would be held on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November.
24 -- 1964: The 24th Amendment to U.S. Constitution goes into effect and states voting rights could not be denied due to failure to pay taxes.
25 -- 1999: The Supreme Court ruled, 5-4, that the 2000 census could not use statistical sampling to enhance its accuracy.
25 -- 1961: President John F. Kennedy held the first presidential news conference carried live on radio and television.
26 -- 1870: Virginia rejoined the Union.
26 -- 1861: Louisiana seceded from the Union.
26 -- 1837: Michigan became the 26th state.
26 -- 1784: Benjamin Franklin expressed unhappiness over the choice of the eagle as the symbol of America, and stated his own preference: the turkey.
27 -- 1981: President Ronald Reagan greeted the 52 former American hostages just released by Iran at the White House.
28 -- 1973: A cease-fire officially went into effect in the Vietnam War.
28 -- 1915: The Coast Guard was created by an act of Congress.
28 -- 1909: The United States withdrew its forces from Cuba as Jose Miguel Gomez became president.
29 -- 2002: In his first State of the Union address, President George W. Bush warned of "an axis of evil" consisting of North Korea, Iran and Iraq.
29 -- 1861: Kansas became the 34th state of the Union.
29 -- 1843: William McKinley was born, he was the 25th president of the United States of America.
30 -- 1882: Franklin D. Roosevelt was born, he was the 32nd president of the United States of America.
31 -- 1865: Gen. Robert E. Lee was named general-in-chief of all the Confederate armies.

February

1 -- 1861: Texas voted to secede from the Union
2 -- 1653: New Amsterdam (New York City) was incorporated.
3 -- 1924: Woodrow Wilson died, he was the 28th president of the United States of America.
3 -- 1913: The 16th Amendment to the Constitution, providing for a federal income tax, was ratified.
3 -- 1809: The territory of Illinois was created.
3 -- 1690: The first paper money in America was issued by the colony of Massachusetts.
4 -- 1861: Delegates from six southern states met in Montgomery, Ala., to form the Confederate States of America.
4 -- 1789: Electors chose George Washington to be the first president of the United States
4 -- 1783: Britain declared a formal cessation of hostilities with its former colonies, the United States of America
5 -- 1897: The Indiana House of Representatives passed, 67-0, a measure redefining the method for determining the area of a circle, which would have effectively altered the value of pi. (The bill died in the Indiana Senate.)
6 -- 1911: Ronald Reagan was born, he was the 40th president of the United States of America.
6 -- 1788: Massachusetts became the sixth state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
6 -- 1778: The United States won official recognition from France with the signing of a Treaty of Alliance in Paris.
7 -- 1983: Elizabeth H. Dole was sworn in as the first female secretary of transportation by the first woman to sit on the Supreme Court, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.
7 -- 1943: The government announced the start of shoe rationing, limiting consumers to buying three pairs per person for the remainder of the year.
8 -- 1978: Senate deliberations were broadcast on radio for the first time.
8 -- 1837: The Senate selected the vice president of the United States, choosing Richard Mentor Johnson after no candidate received a majority of electoral votes.
9 -- 1861: Jefferson Davis was elected the provisional president of the Confederate States of America.
9 -- 1825: The House of Representatives elected John Quincy Adams president after no candidate had received a majority of electoral votes.
9 -- 1773: William Henry Harrison was born, he was the ninth president of the United States of America.
10 -- 1967: The 25th Amendment to the Constitution, dealing with presidential disability and succession, was ratified as Minnesota and Nevada adopted it.
11 -- 1945: President Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet leader Josef Stalin signed the Yalta Agreement during World War II.
11 -- 1812: Massachusetts Gov. Elbridge Gerry signed a redistricting law favoring his party, giving rise to the term "gerrymandering."
12 -- 1999: The Senate voted to acquit President Bill Clinton of perjury and obstruction of justice; Clinton told Americans he was "profoundly sorry" for what he'd said and done in the Monica Lewinsky affair.
12 -- 1809: Abraham Lincoln was born, he was the sixteenth president of the United States of America.
13 -- 2004: President George W. Bush, trying to calm a political storm, ordered the release of his Vietnam-era military records to counter Democrats' suggestions that he'd shirked his duty in the Texas Air National Guard.
14 -- 1920: The League of Women Voters was founded in Chicago
14 -- 1912: Arizona became the 48th state of the Union.
14 -- 1859: Oregon became the 33rd state of the Union.
15 -- 1933: President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt escaped an assassination attempt in Miami that claimed the life of Chicago Mayor Anton J. Cermak.
15 -- 1879: President Rutherford B. Hayes signed a bill allowing female attorneys to argue cases before the Supreme Court.
15 -- 1820: Susan B. Anthony, the co-founder of the National Woman Suffrage Association, was born.
16 -- 1862: During the Civil War, some 14,000 Confederate soldiers surrendered at Fort Donelson, Tenn. (Union Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's victory earned him the nickname "Unconditional Surrender Grant.")
17 -- 1972: President Richard M. Nixon departed on his historic trip to China.
17 -- 1964: The Supreme Court ruled in Westberry v. Sanders that congressional districts within each state had to be roughly equal in population.
17 -- 1801: The House of Representatives broke an electoral tie between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr, choosing Jefferson to be president.
18 -- 1861: Jefferson Davis was sworn in as president of the Confederate States of America in Montgomery, Alabama
19 -- 1881: Kansas became the first state to prohibit all alcoholic beverages.
19 -- 1803: Congress voted to accept Ohio's borders and constitution.
20 -- 1839: Congress prohibited dueling in the District of Columbia.
20 -- 1809: The Supreme Court ruled that the power of the federal government is greater than that of any individual state.
20 -- 1792: President George Washington signed an act creating the U.S. Post Office.
21 -- 1885: The Washington Monument was dedicated.
21 -- 1848: Former President John Quincy Adams suffered a stroke on the floor of the House of Representatives in Washington, D.C. He died two days later.
22 -- 1935: It became illegal for airplanes to fly over the White House.
22 -- 1924: President Calvin Coolidge delivered the first radio broadcast from the White House as he addressed the country over 42 stations.
22 -- 1865: Tennessee adopted a new constitution abolishing slavery.
22 -- 1819: Spain ceded Florida to the United States.
22 -- 1732: George Washington was born, first president of the United States of America.
23 -- 1927: President Calvin Coolidge signed a bill creating the Federal Radio Commission, forerunner of the Federal Communications Commission.
23 -- 1870: Mississippi was readmitted to the Union.
23 -- 1848: John Quincy Adams died, he was the sixth president of the United States of America. He was the son of John Adams, the second president.
23 -- 1836: The siege of the Alamo began in San Antonio, Texas.
24 -- 1868: The House of Representatives impeached President Andrew Johnson following his attempted dismissal of Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton; Johnson was later acquitted by the Senate.
24 -- 1863: Arizona was organized as a territory.
24 -- 1803: The Supreme Court in Marbury v. Madison ruled itself the final interpreter of constitutional issues.
25 -- 1919: Oregon became the first state to tax gasoline, at one cent per gallon.
25 -- 1913: The 16th Amendment to the Constitution, giving Congress the power to levy and collect income taxes, was declared in effect by Secretary of State Philander Chase Knox.
26 -- 1987: The Tower Commission issued its report on the Iran-Contra affair, rebuking President Ronald Reagan for failing to control his national security staff.
26 -- 1919: Congress established Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona.
27 -- 1951: The 22nd Amendment to the Constitution, limiting a president to two terms of office, was ratified.
27 -- 1801: The District of Columbia was placed under the jurisdiction of Congress.
28 -- 1974: The United States and Egypt re-established diplomatic relations after a seven-year break.
28 -- 1861: The Territory of Colorado was organized.

March

1 -- 1961: President John F. Kennedy established the Peace Corps.
1 -- 1872: President Ulysses S. Grant signed an act creating Yellowstone National Park.
1 -- 1867: Nebraska became the 37th state.
1 -- 1809: The Illinois Territory came into existence.
1 -- 1790: President George Washington signed a measure authorizing the first U.S. Census.
1 -- 1781: The Continental Congress declared the Articles of Confederation to be in force, following ratification by Maryland.
2 -- 1917: Puerto Ricans were granted U.S. citizenship.
2 -- 1836: The Republic of Texas formally declared its independence from Mexico.
2 -- 1807: Congress outlawed the importing of slaves to the United States
3 -- 1931: President Herbert Hoover signed a measure making "The Star-Spangled Banner" the national anthem of the United States.
3 -- 1849: The U.S. Department of the Interior was established.
3 -- 1845: Florida became the 27th state.
4 -- 1917: Republican Jeanette Rankin of Montana took her seat as the first woman elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.
4 -- 1791: Vermont became the 14th state.
4 -- 1789: The Constitution of the United States went into effect as the first Federal Congress met in New York.
5 -- 1868: The Senate was organized into a court of impeachment to decide charges against President Andrew Johnson.
5 -- 1770: The Boston Massacre took place as British soldiers, taunted by a crowd of colonists, opened fire, killing five people.
6 -- 1933: A nationwide bank holiday declared by President Franklin D. Roosevelt went into effect.
6 -- 1857: In its Dred Scott decision, the Supreme Court held that Scott, a slave, could not sue for his freedom in a federal court.
7 -- 1994: The Supreme Court, in Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc., ruled that a parody that pokes fun at an original work can be considered "fair use" that doesn't require permission from the copyright holder.
7 -- 1801: Massachusetts enacts the first state voter registration law.
8 -- 1948: The Supreme Court, in McCollum v. Board of Education, struck down voluntary religious education classes in Champaign, Ill., public schools, saying the program violated separation of church and state.
8 -- 1930: William H. Taft died, he was the 27th president of the United States of America.
8 -- 1913: Internal Revenue Service begins to levy and collect income taxes
8 -- 1874: Millard Fillmore died, he was the thirteenth president of the United States of America.
9 -- 1964: The Supreme Court, in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, ruled that public officials who charged they'd been libeled by news reports could not recover damages unless they proved actual malice on the part of the news organization.
10 -- 1864: Ulysses S. Grant became commander of the Union armies during the Civil War.
10 -- 1785: Thomas Jefferson was appointed America's minister to France, succeeding Benjamin Franklin.
11 -- 1993: Janet Reno was unanimously confirmed by the Senate to be the nation's first female attorney general.
12 -- 2002: Homeland security chief Tom Ridge unveiled a color-coded system for terror warnings.
12 -- 1993: Janet Reno was sworn in as the nation's first female attorney general.
12 -- 1664: New Jersey became a British colony as King Charles II granted land in North America to his brother James, the Duke of York.
13 -- 1901: Benjamin Harrison died, he was the 23rd president of the United States of America.
13 -- 1868: The impeachment trial of President Andrew Johnson began in the United States Senate.
14 -- 1923: President Warren G. Harding became the first chief executive to file an income tax return.
14 -- 1900: Congress ratified the Gold Standard Act.
15 -- 1913: President Woodrow Wilson met with reporters for the first presidential news conference.
15 -- 1820: Maine became the 23rd state.
15 -- 1767: Andrew Jackson was born, he was the seventh president of the United States of America.
16 -- 1882: The U.S. Senate ratified a treaty establishing the Red Cross.
16 -- 1802: President Thomas Jefferson signed a measure authorizing the establishment of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y.
16 -- 1751: James Madison was born, he was the fourth president of the United States of America.
17 -- 1776: British forces evacuated Boston during the Revolutionary War.
18 -- 1959: President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Hawaii statehood bill. (Hawaii became a state on Aug. 21, 1959.)
18 -- 1837: Grover Cleveland was born, he was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States of America.
18 -- 1766: Britain repealed the Stamp Act of 1765.
19 -- 2003: President George W. Bush ordered the start of the war against Iraq.
19 -- 1979: The U.S. House of Representatives began televising its day-to-day business.
19 -- 1918: Congress approved daylight saving time.
19 -- 1917: In Wilson v. New, the Supreme Court upheld the eight hour work day for railroad workers.
20 -- 2004: Hundreds of thousands of people worldwide rallied against the U.S. led war in Iraq on the first anniversary of the start of the conflict.
21 -- 1972: The Supreme Court, in Dunn v. Blumstein, ruled that states may not require at least a year's residency for voting eligibility.
21 -- 1965: More than 3,000 civil rights demonstrators led by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. began their march from Selma to Montgomery, Ala.
22 -- 1882: Congress outlawed polygamy.
22 -- 1765: Britain enacted the Stamp Act of 1765 to raise money from the American colonies. (The Act was repealed the following year.)
23 -- 2010: President Barack Obama signs a sweeping health care reform bill into law.
23 -- 1981: The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that states could require, with some exceptions, parental notification when teenage girls seek abortions.
23 -- 1775: Patrick Henry called for America's independence from Britain, telling the Virginia Provincial Convention, "Give me liberty, or give me death!"
24 -- 2008: President George W. Bush pledged to ensure "an outcome that will merit the sacrifice" of those who have died in Iraq, as the U.S. death toll in the five year war hit 4,000.
24 -- 1934: President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed a bill granting future independence to the Philippines.
25 -- 2004: Congress passed a law making it a separate offense to harm a fetus during a violent federal crime.
25 -- 1634: Maryland was founded by English colonists sent by the second Lord Baltimore.
26 -- 1982: Groundbreaking ceremonies took place in Washington, D.C., for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.
27 -- 1794: President George Washington and Congress authorized creation of the U.S. Navy.
28 -- 1969: Dwight D. Eisenhower died, he was the 34th president of the United States of America.
28 -- 1898: the Supreme Court, in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, ruled that a child born in the United States to Chinese immigrants was a U.S. citizen.
28 -- 1834: the U.S. Senate voted to censure President Andrew Jackson for the removal of federal deposits from the Bank of the United States.
29 -- 1973: The last United States troops left South Vietnam, ending America's direct military involvement in the Vietnam War.
29 -- 1790: John Tyler is born, he was the tenth president of the United States of America.
29 -- 1638: Swedish colonists settled in present-day Delaware.
30 -- 1981: President Ronald Reagan was shot and seriously injured outside a Washington hotel by John W. Hinckley Jr. Also wounded were White House press secretary James Brady, Secret Service agent Timothy McCarthy and District of Columbia police officer Thomas Delahanty.
30 -- 1870: The 15th Amendment to the Constitution, giving all citizens the right to vote regardless of race, was declared in effect by Secretary of State Hamilton Fish.
30 -- 1870: Texas was readmitted to the Union.
30 -- 1867: U.S. Secretary of State William H. Seward reached agreement with Russia to purchase the territory of Alaska for $7.2 million, a deal ridiculed as "Seward's Folly."
30 -- 1822: Florida became a United States territory.
31 -- 1968: at the conclusion of a nationally broadcast address, President Lyndon B. Johnson shocked his listeners by announcing he would not seek another term of office.
31 -- 1917: The United States took possession of the Virgin Islands from Denmark.

April

1 -- 1970: President Richard M. Nixon signed a measure banning cigarette advertising on radio and television, to take effect after Jan. 1, 1971.
1 -- 1789: The U.S. House of Representatives held its first full meeting in New York City; Frederick Muhlenberg of Pennsylvania was elected the first speaker.
2 -- 1792: Congress passed the Coinage Act, which authorized establishment of the U.S. Mint.
3 -- 1948: President Harry S. Truman signed into law the Marshall Plan, designed to help European allies rebuild after World War II and resist Communism.
3 -- 1776: George Washington received an honorary doctor of laws degree from Harvard College.
4 -- 1968: Civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., 39, was shot to death in Memphis, Tenn.
4 -- 1850: The city of Los Angeles was incorporated.
4 -- 1841: William Henry Harrison died, he was the ninth president of the United States of America.
4 -- 1818: Congress decided the United States flag would consist of 13 red and white stripes and 20 stars, with a new star to be added for every new state of the Union.
5 -- 1792: George Washington cast the first presidential veto, rejecting a congressional measure for apportioning representatives among the states.
5 -- 1621: the Mayflower sailed from Plymouth Colony in present day Massachusetts on a month long return trip to England.
6 -- 1789: The first U.S. Congress begins regular sessions at Federal Hall in New York City
7 -- 1862: Union forces led by Gen. Ulysses S. Grant defeated the Confederates at the Battle of Shiloh in Tennessee.
8 -- 1952: President Harry S. Truman seized the steel industry to avert a nationwide strike. (The U.S. Supreme Court later ruled that Truman had overstepped his authority.)
8 -- 1913: The 17th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified, providing for direct popular election of United States senators (as opposed to appointment by state legislatures).
9 -- 1996: President Bill Clinton signed a line-item veto bill into law.
9 -- 1865: Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered his army to Union Gen. Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House in Virginia.
9 -- 1833: The nation's first tax-supported public library was founded in Peterborough, N.H.
10 -- 1790: President George Washington signed into law the first United States Patent Act.
11 -- 1951: President Harry S. Truman relieved Gen. Douglas MacArthur of his commands in the Far East.
11 -- 1945: U.S. soldiers liberate Nazi concentration camp "Buchenwald."
12 -- 1999: U.S. District Judge Susan Webber Wright found President Bill Clinton in contempt of court for giving "intentionally false" testimony in a lawsuit filed by Paula Jones about his relationship with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky.
12 -- 1945: Franklin D. Roosevelt died, he was the 32nd president of the United States of America.
12 -- 1861: The Civil War began as Confederate forces fired on Fort Sumter in South Carolina.
13 -- 1943: President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the Jefferson Memorial.
13 -- 1743: Thomas Jefferson was born, the third president of the United States of America.
14 -- 1865: President Lincoln was shot and mortally wounded by John Wilkes Booth while attending the comedy "Our American Cousin" at Ford's Theater in Washington, D.C. He died the next day.
14 -- 1775: The first American society for the abolition of slavery was organized by Benjamin Franklin and Benjamin Rush.
15 -- 1865: Abraham Lincoln died, the day after he was shot by John Wilkes Booth at Ford's Theatre. Lincoln was the sixteenth president of the United States of America.
15 -- 1865: Andrew Johnson became the 17th president of the United States after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.
16 -- 1992: The House ethics committee listed 303 current and former lawmakers who had overdrawn their House bank accounts.
16 -- 1862: President Abraham Lincoln signed a bill ending slavery in the District of Columbia.
17 -- 1961: CIA-trained Cuban exiles launched the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in a failed attempt to overthrow the government of Fidel Castro.
17 -- 1790: American statesman Benjamin Franklin died in Philadelphia at age 84.
18 -- 1978: the Senate approved the Panama Canal Treaty, providing for the complete turnover of control of the waterway to Panama on the last day of 1999.
18 -- 1775: Paul Revere began his famous ride from Charlestown to Lexington, Mass., warning American colonists that the British were coming.
19 -- 1939: Connecticut became the last of the original 13 colonies to ratify the Bill of Rights, 147 years after it took effect.
19 -- 1933: The United States went off the gold standard.
19 -- 1775: The American Revolutionary War began with the battles of Lexington and Concord.
20 -- 1971: The U.S. Supreme Court, in Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, unanimously upheld the use of busing to achieve racial desegregation in schools.
20 -- 1836: Congress voted to establish the Wisconsin Territory.
21 -- 1789: John Adams was sworn in as the first vice president of the United States.
22 -- 1994: Richard M. Nixon, the 37th president of the United States, died at a New York hospital four days after suffering a stroke; he was 81.
22 -- 1889: The Oklahoma Land Rush began at noon as thousands of homesteaders staked claims.
22 -- 1864: Congress authorized the use of the phrase "In God We Trust" on coins.
23 -- 2004: President George W. Bush eased Reagan-era sanctions against Libya in return for Moammar Gadhafi's giving up weapons of mass destruction.
23 -- 1969: Sirhan Sirhan was sentenced to death for assassinating New York Senator Robert F. Kennedy. (The sentence was later reduced to life in prison.)
23 -- 1791: James Buchanan was born, he was the fifteenth president of the United States of America.
23 -- 1789: President-elect George Washington moved into the first executive mansion, the Franklin House, in New York.
24 -- 1980: The United States launched an unsuccessful attempt to free the American hostages in Iran, a mission that resulted in the deaths of eight U.S. servicemen.
24 -- 1900: Congress approved a bill establishing the Library of Congress.
24 -- 1898: Spain declared war on the United States after rejecting America's ultimatum to withdraw from Cuba.
25 -- 2004: Hundreds of thousands of abortion-rights supporters marched in Washington, D.C. to protest Bush administration policies.
25 -- 1945: Delegates from some 50 countries met in San Francisco to organize the United Nations.
25 -- 1898: The United States formally declared war on Spain.
26 -- 2000: Vermont Gov. Howard Dean signed the nation's first bill allowing same-sex couples to form civil unions.
26 -- 1865: John Wilkes Booth, the assassin of President Lincoln, was surrounded by federal troops near Bowling Green, Va., and killed.
26 -- 1607: English colonists went ashore at present-day Cape Henry, Va., on an expedition to establish the first permanent English settlement in the Western Hemisphere. They later settled at Jamestown.
27 -- 1978: Convicted Watergate defendant John D. Ehrlichman was released from an Arizona prison after serving 18 months.
27 -- 1973: Acting FBI Director L. Patrick Gray resigned after it was revealed that he had handed over bureau files on the Watergate burglary to the Nixon White House.
27 -- 1822: Ulysses S. Grant is born, he was the eighteenth president of the United States of America.
28 -- 1788: Maryland became the seventh state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
28 -- 1758: James Monroe was born. He was the fifth president of the United States of America.
29 -- 1945: During World War II American soldiers liberated the Dachau concentration camp.
29 -- 1861: Maryland's House of Delegates voted against seceding from the Union.
30 -- 1973: President Nixon announced the resignations of top aides H.R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman, along with Attorney General Richard G. Kleindienst and White House counsel John Dean.
30 -- 1970: President Nixon announced the U.S. was sending troops into Cambodia, an action that sparked widespread protest.
30 -- 1812: Louisiana became the 18th state of the Union.
30 -- 1803: The United States purchased the Louisiana Territory from France for 60 million francs, the equivalent of about $15 million.
30 -- 1789: George Washington took office in New York as the first president of the United States.

May

1 -- 1960: The Soviet Union shot down an American U-2 reconnaissance plane near Sverdlovsk and captured its pilot, Francis Gary Powers.
2 -- 1972: After serving 48 years as head of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover died in Washington at age 77.
2 -- 1957: Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, the controversial Republican senator from Wisconsin, died at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland.
2 -- 1890: The Oklahoma Territory was organized.
2 -- 1863: Confederate Gen. Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson was accidentally wounded by his own men at Chancellorsville, Va.; he died eight days later.
2 -- 1670: The Hudson Bay Company was chartered by England's King Charles II.
3 -- 1988: The White House acknowledged that first lady Nancy Reagan had used astrological advice to help schedule President Ronald Reagan's activities.
3 -- 1921: West Virginia imposed the first state sales tax.
3 -- 1802: Washington, D.C., was incorporated as a city.
4 -- 1970: Ohio National Guardsmen opened fire on anti-war protesters at Kent State University, killing four students and wounding nine others.
4 -- 1904: the United States took over construction of the Panama Canal.
4 -- 1626: Dutch explorer Peter Minuit landed on present day Manhattan Island.
5 -- 1925: Schoolteacher John T. Scopes was charged in Tennessee with violating a state law that prohibited teaching the theory of evolution. (Scopes was found guilty, but his conviction was later set aside.)
5 -- 1818: Political philosopher Karl Marx was born in Prussia.
6 -- 1861: Arkansas seceded from the Union.
7 -- 1992: A 203 year-old proposed constitutional amendment barring Congress from giving itself a midterm pay raise was ratified when Michigan became the 38th state to approve it.
7 -- 1945: Germany signed an unconditional surrender at Allied headquarters in Rheims, France, to take effect the following day, ending the European conflict of World War II.
7 -- 1789: The first inaugural ball was held in New York in honor of President George Washington and his wife, Martha.
8 -- 1958: Vice President Richard Nixon was shoved, stoned, booed and spat upon by anti-American protesters in Lima, Peru.
8 -- 1884: Harry S. Truman was born, he was the 33rd president of the United States of America.
9 -- 1974: The House Judiciary Committee opened public hearings on whether to recommend the impeachment of President Nixon.
9 -- 1913: The 17th amendment to the Constitution, providing for the popular election of U.S. senators, was ratified.
9 -- 1754: A cartoon in Benjamin Franklin's Pennsylvania Gazette showed a snake cut into sections, each part representing an American colony; the caption read, "JOIN, or DIE."
10 -- 1924: J. Edgar Hoover became director of the FBI, a job he held until his death in 1972.
10 -- 1865: Union forces captured Confederate President Jefferson Davis in Irwinville, Ga.
10 -- 1818: American patriot Paul Revere died in Boston.
11 -- 1858: Minnesota became the 32nd state of the Union.
11 -- 1647: Peter Stuyvesant arrived in New Amsterdam (New York City) to become governor.
12 -- 2002: Jimmy Carter became the first present or former U.S. president to visit Cuba since Fidel Castro seized power in 1959.
13 -- 1607: English colonists arrived by ship at the site of what became the Jamestown settlement in Virginia (the colonists went ashore the next day).
14 -- 2008: The Interior Department declared the polar bear a threatened species because of the loss of Arctic sea ice.
14 -- 2001: The Supreme Court ruled that there is no exception in federal law for people to use marijuana to ease their pain from cancer, AIDS or other illnesses.
14 -- 1787: Delegates began to arrive in Philadelphia for a convention to draw up the U.S. Constitution.
15 -- 2006: The United States removed Libya from its list of terrorist states and said it would restore normal diplomatic relations.
15 -- 1972: Alabama Gov. George Wallace was shot while campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination in Laurel, Md., and left permanently paralyzed below the waist.
15 -- 1911: The U.S. Supreme Court ordered the breakup of Standard Oil Co., ruling it was a monopoly in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act.
16 -- 1868: The Senate failed by one vote to convict President Andrew Johnson as it took its first ballot on the 11 articles of impeachment against him
16 -- 1866: Congress authorized minting of the first 5-cent piece.
17 -- 1996: President Bill Clinton signed a measure requiring neighborhood notification when sex offenders move in. Megan's Law was named for 7 year old Megan Kanka, who was raped and killed in 1994.
17 -- 1973: The Senate began its televised hearings into the Watergate scandal.
17 -- 1954: The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously struck down racially segregated public schools in its Brown v. Board of Education decision.
18 -- 1896: The U.S. Supreme Court, in Plessy v. Ferguson, endorsed "separate but equal" racial segregation, a concept the court renounced 58 years later with Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka.
19 -- 1994: Former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis died in New York at age 64.
19 -- 1993: The White House set off a political storm by firing the entire staff of its travel office.
19 -- 1992: The 27th Amendment to the Constitution, which prohibits Congress from giving itself pay raises until the next congressional term, went into effect
19 -- 1992: Vice President Dan Quayle criticized the CBS sitcom "Murphy Brown" because the title character chose to have a child out of wedlock, sparking national outrage as millions of single parent families were insulted.
19 -- 1921: Congress passed, and President Warren G. Harding signed, the Emergency Quota Act, which established national quotas for immigrants.
20 -- 1995: President Bill Clinton announced that the two block stretch of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House would be permanently closed to traffic as a security measure.
20 -- 1902: The United States ended a three year military presence in Cuba as the Republic of Cuba was established under its first elected president, Tomas Estrada Palma.
20 -- 1861: North Carolina voted to secede from the Union.
21 -- 1832: The first Democratic National Convention got under way, held in Baltimore.
22 -- 1947: the Truman Doctrine was enacted as Congress appropriated military and economic aid for Greece and Turkey.
23 -- 1788: South Carolina became the eighth state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
24 -- 2001: Democrats gained control of the U.S. Senate for the first time since 1994 when Sen. James Jeffords of Vermont abandoned the Republican Party and declared himself an independent.
24 -- 1999: The Supreme Court ruled that police violate people's privacy rights when they bring TV camera crews or other journalists into homes during arrests or searches.
25 -- 1961: President John F. Kennedy, addressing Congress, called on the nation to work toward putting a man on the moon by the end of the decade.
25 -- 1787: The Constitutional Convention began meeting in Philadelphia after enough delegates had shown up for a quorum.
26 -- 1972: President Richard M. Nixon and Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in Moscow. (The U.S. withdrew from the treaty in 2002)
26 -- 1938: The House Un-American Activities Committee was established by Congress.
26 -- 1868: The impeachment trial of President Andrew Johnson ended with his acquittal on the remaining charges.
27 -- 1935: The Supreme Court struck down the National Industrial Recovery Act.
28 -- 1996: President Bill Clinton's former business partners in the Whitewater land deal, James and Susan McDougal and Arkansas Gov. Jim Guy Tucker, were convicted of fraud.
28 -- 1984: President Ronald Reagan led a state funeral at Arlington National Cemetery for an unidentified American soldier killed in the Vietnam War.
29 -- 1917: John F. Kennedy was born, he was the 35th president of the United States of America.
29 -- 1848: Wisconsin became the 30th state of the union.
29 -- 1790: Rhode Island became the 13th original colony to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
30 -- 1922: The Lincoln Memorial was dedicated in Washington in a ceremony attended by President Warren G. Harding, Chief Justice William Howard Taft and lawyer Robert Todd Lincoln, the son of President Abraham Lincoln and his wife, Mary Todd.
30 -- 1854: The territories of Nebraska and Kansas were established.
31 -- 1994: The United States announced it was no longer aiming long range nuclear missiles at targets in the former Soviet Union.
31 -- 1913: The 17th Amendment to the Constitution, providing for the popular election of U.S. senators, was declared in effect.

June

1 -- 1868: James Buchanan died, he was the fifteenth president of the United States of America.
1 -- 1796: Tennessee became the 16th state.
1 -- 1792: Kentucky became the 15th state of the union.
2 -- 1986: For the first time, the public could watch the proceedings of the U.S. Senate on television.
2 -- 1924: Congress passed a measure that was then signed by President Calvin Coolidge granting American citizenship to all U.S. born American Indians.
3 -- 1808: Jefferson Davis - the first and only president of the Confederate States of America - was born in Christian County, Kentucky
4 -- 1985: The Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling striking down an Alabama law providing for a daily minute of silence in public schools.
4 -- 1919: Congress approved the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guaranteeing citizens the right to vote regardless of their gender, and sent it to the states for ratification.
5 -- 2004: Ronald Reagan died, he was the 40th president of the United States of America.
5 -- 1968: Sirhan Sirhan shoots Bobby Kennedy, who dies the next day.
5 -- 1933: The United States went off the gold standard.
5 -- 1794: Congress passed the Neutrality Act, prohibiting Americans from enlisting in the service of a foreign power.
6 -- 2005: The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that people who smoke marijuana because their doctors recommend it to ease pain can be prosecuted for violating federal drug laws.
6 -- 2001: Democrats assumed control of the U.S. Senate when Sen. James Jeffords of Vermont left the Republican Party to become an independent.
6 -- 1968: Bobby Kennedy dies, one day after being shot by Sirhan Sirhan at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.
7 -- 2006: The U.S. Senate rejected a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.
8 -- 1982: In the first speech by an American president to a joint session of the British Parliament, President Ronald Reagan predicted that Marxism-Leninism would wind up "on the ash heap of history."
8 -- 1861: Tennessee seceded from the Union.
8 -- 1845: Andrew Jackson died, he was the seventh president of the United States of America.
9 -- 1954: During the Senate-Army Hearings, Army special counsel Joseph N. Welch berated Sen. Joseph R. McCarthy, asking: "Have you no sense of decency, sir?"
10 -- 1801: The North African state of Tripoli declared war on the United States in a dispute over safe passage of merchant vessels through the Mediterranean.
11 -- 1992: The Supreme Court ruled that people who commit hate crimes may be sentenced to extra punishment.
11 -- 1990: The Supreme Court struck down a federal law prohibiting desecration of the American flag.
11 -- 1776: The Continental Congress formed a committee to draft a Declaration of Independence calling for freedom from Britain.
12 -- 1987: President Ronald Reagan, during a visit to a divided Berlin, publicly challenged Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev to "tear down this wall."
12 -- 1967: The Supreme Court, in Loving v. Virginia, struck down state laws prohibiting interracial marriages.
12 -- 1924: George H. W. Bush was born, he was the 41st president of the United States of America.
12 -- 1838: The Iowa Territory was organized.
12 -- 1776: Virginia's colonial legislature became the first to adopt a Bill of Rights.
13 -- 1967: President Lyndon B. Johnson nominated Solicitor-General Thurgood Marshall to become the first black justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.
13 -- 1966: The Supreme Court issued its landmark Miranda v. Arizona decision, ruling that criminal suspects had to be informed of their constitutional right to consult with an attorney and to remain silent before being questioned by police.
13 -- 1888: Congress created the Department of Labor.
14 -- 1954: The words "under God" were added to the Pledge of Allegiance.
14 -- 1943: The Supreme Court, in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, ruled that children in public schools could not be forced to salute the U.S. flag.
14 -- 1777: The Continental Congress in Philadelphia adopted the Stars and Stripes as the national flag.
14 -- 1775: The Continental Army, forerunner of the U.S. Army, was created.
15 -- 1992: Bill Clinton, with the help of the AllSong Baptist Sing-A-Long Church and Pony show, belted out an amazing rendition of when the Saints come marching in. Right after the Secret Service came marching in and belted the prez out of the church.
15 -- 1864: Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton signed an order establishing a military burial ground, which became Arlington National Cemetery.
15 -- 1849: James K. Polk died, he was the eleventh president of the United States of America.
15 -- 1836: Arkansas became the 25th state.
15 -- 1775: The Second Continental Congress voted unanimously to appoint George Washington head of the Continental Army.
16 -- 1858: As he accepted the Illinois Republican Party's nomination for U.S. Senate, Abraham Lincoln said the slavery issue had to be resolved, declaring, "A house divided against itself cannot stand."
17 -- 1972: President Richard Nixon's downfall began with the arrest of five burglars inside Democratic national headquarters in Washington's Watergate complex.
17 -- 1963: The Supreme Court struck down rules requiring the recitation of the Lord's Prayer or the reading of Biblical verses in public schools.
17 -- 1856: The Republican Party opened its first convention, in Philadelphia.
17 -- 1775: The Battle of Bunker Hill took place near Boston during the Revolutionary War.
18 -- 1979: President Jimmy Carter and Soviet President Leonid I. Brezhnev signed the SALT II strategic arms limitation treaty in Vienna.
18 -- 1873: Suffragist Susan B. Anthony was found guilty by a judge in Canandaigua, N.Y., of breaking the law by casting a vote in the 1872 presidential election. (The judge fined Anthony $100, but she never paid the penalty.)
18 -- 1812: The United States declared war against Britain.
19 -- 1964: The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was approved by the Senate, 73-27, after surviving a filibuster lasting 83 days.
19 -- 1953: Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, 37, convicted of conspiring to pass U.S. atomic secrets to the Soviet Union, were executed at Sing Sing Prison in Ossining, N.Y.
19 -- 1934: The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) was created.
19 -- 1862: Slavery was outlawed in U.S. territories.
20 -- 1963: The United States and Soviet Union signed an agreement to set up a hot line communication link between the two superpowers.
20 -- 1863: West Virginia became the 35th state.
20 -- 1782: Congress approved the Great Seal of the United States.
21 -- 1989: A divided Supreme Court ruled that burning the American flag as a form of political protest is protected by the First Amendment.
21 -- 1982: A jury in Washington, D.C., found John Hinckley Jr. innocent by reason of insanity in the shootings of President Ronald Reagan and three others.
21 -- 1788: The U.S. Constitution went into effect as New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify it.
22 -- 1970: President Richard Nixon signed a measure lowering the voting age to 18.
22 -- 1944: President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the GI Bill of Rights, authorizing a broad package of benefits for World War II veterans.
22 -- 1870: The U.S. Department of Justice was created.
22 -- 1868: Arkansas was re-admitted to the Union.
23 -- 1972: President Richard M. Nixon and White House chief of staff H.R. Haldeman discussed a plan to use the CIA to obstruct the FBI's Watergate investigation. (Revelation of the tape recording of this conversation sparked Nixon's resignation in 1974.)
23 -- 1947: the Senate joined the House in overriding President Harry S. Truman's veto of the Taft-Hartley Act, designed to limit the power of organized labor.
24 -- 1908: Grover Cleveland died, he was the 22nd and 24th president of the United States of America.
25 -- 1962: The U.S. Supreme Court, in Engel v. Vitale, ruled that recital of a state-sponsored prayer in New York State public schools was unconstitutional.
25 -- 1950: North Korean troops invade South Korea, marking the beginning of the Korean War
25 -- 1938: The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 was enacted
25 -- 1876: U.S. Army Lt. Col. George Custer and more than 200 troops die in the Battle of Little Big Horn
25 -- 1788: Virginia becomes the 10th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution
26 -- 1998: The Supreme Court issued a landmark sexual harassment ruling, putting employers on notice that they can be held responsible for supervisors' misconduct even if they knew nothing about it.
26 -- 1950: President Truman authorized the Air Force and Navy to enter the Korean conflict, one day after North Korea invaded South Korea.
27 -- 1977: The U.S. Supreme Court, in Bates v. State Bar of Arizona, struck down state laws and bar association rules that prohibited lawyers from advertising their fees for routine services
27 -- 1930: Ross Perot is born in Texarkana, TX. A successful business career earned him billions of dollars. He became a famous political and historical figure when he ran for president in the 1992 elections. Perot ran as an independent, using his wealth to fund his campaign. Opposing him was Bill Clinton on the Democratic ticket and then Republican president George H. W. Bush, running for his second term. Perot's inclusion in the race for the presidency influenced how voters split their votes. In the end Bush did not gain and second term and Bill Clinton became the 42nd U.S. President
28 -- 1973: White House Counsel John W. Dean began testifying before the Senate Watergate Committee
28 -- 1836: James Madison died, he was the fourth president of the United States of America.
29 -- 1776: The Virginia state constitution was adopted, and Patrick Henry was made governor.
30 -- 1958: The U.S. Senate passed the Alaska statehood bill by a vote of 64-20
30 -- 1906: President Theodore Roosevelt signed the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act.

July

1 -- 1991: President Bush nominated federal appeals court judge Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court. He was confirmed but not before a sexual harassment scandal, fueled by Anita Hill, who had worked for Thomas, turned the confirmation process into a long, drawn-out, heated media circus.
1 -- 1987: President Reagan nominated federal appeals court judge Robert H. Bork to the Supreme Court, setting off a turbulent confirmation process that ended with the Senate rejecting Bork's nomination. His extremist views and concern that he would sway the court to roll back certain civil rights were the basis of the rejection.
1 -- 1968: The United States, Great Britain, the Soviet Union and nearly 60 other nations signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
1 -- 1863: The Civil War Battle of Gettysburg, resulting in a Union victory, began in Pennsylvania.
2 -- 1908: Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall was born in Baltimore.
2 -- 1881: President Garfield was shot by Charles J. Guiteau at the Washington railroad station; Garfield died the following September. (Guiteau was hanged in June 1882.)
2 -- 1776: The Continental Congress passed a resolution saying that "these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States."
3 -- 1890: Idaho became the 43rd state of the Union
3 -- 1863: The three-day Civil War Battle of Gettysburg, Pa., ended in a major victory for the North as Confederate troops retreated.
3 -- 1775: General George Washington took command of the Continental Army at Cambridge, Mass.
4 -- 1966: President Johnson signed the Freedom of Information Act into law.
4 -- 1872: Calvin Coolidge was born, he was the 30th president of the United States of America.
4 -- 1831: James Monroe died, he was the fifth president of the United States.
4 -- 1826: John Adams, the second U.S. president and Thomas Jefferson, the third U.S. president both died.
4 -- 1776: The Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence , thereby establishing the United States of America.
5 -- 1935: President Roosevelt signed the National Labor Relations Act, which provided for a National Labor Relations Board, and authorized labor to organize for the purpose of collective bargaining.
6 -- 1946: George W. Bush was born, he is the 43rd president of the United States of America.
6 -- 1945: President Truman signed an executive order establishing the Medal of Freedom.
6 -- 1777: British forces captured Fort Ticonderoga in upstate New York. Although the Declaration of Independence was signed over a year earlier, the Revolutionary War was still being fought.
7 -- 1981: President Reagan announced he was nominating Arizona Judge Sandra Day O'Connor to become the first female justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.
7 -- 1958: President Eisenhower signed the Alaska Statehood Act. Alaska became a state the following year.
7 -- 1898: The United States annexed Hawaii.
7 -- 1865: Four people whom conspired with John Wilkes Booth to assassinate President Lincoln were hanged in Washington, D.C.
8 -- 1908: Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller was born. He served three terms as governor of New York (1959-1973) and then as vice president of the United States under Gerald Ford.
9 -- 1850: Zachary Taylor died, he was the twelfth president of the United States of America.
10 -- 1890: Wyoming became the 44th state.
10 -- 1850: Vice President Millard Fillmore assumed the presidency, taking the oath of office following the death of President Zachary Taylor.
11 -- 1804: Vice President Aaron Burr mortally wounded former Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton during a pistol duel in Weehawken, N.J.
11 -- 1767: John Quincy Adams was born, he was the sixth president of the United States of America. He was the son of John Adams, the second president.
12 -- 1984: Democratic presidential candidate Walter F. Mondale announced he'd chosen U.S. Rep. Geraldine A. Ferraro of New York to be his running mate. Ferraro was the first woman to run for vice president on a major-party ticket.
12 -- 1977: President Carter defended Supreme Court decisions limiting government payments for poor women's abortions, saying, "There are many things in life that are not fair."
12 -- 1862: Congress authorized the Medal of Honor.
13 -- 1960: John F. Kennedy won the Democratic presidential nomination at his party's convention in Los Angeles.
14 -- 1913: Gerald Ford was born, he was the 38th president of the United States of America.
14 -- 1798: Congress passed the Sedition Act, making it a federal crime to publish false, scandalous or malicious writing about the United States government.
15 -- 1971: President Richard Nixon announced he would visit the People's Republic of China. This was a key turning point in normalizing relations with the world's most populated country, and at the time fully under Communist rule.
15 -- 1964: Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona was nominated for president by the Republican National Convention in San Francisco.
15 -- 1870: Georgia became the last Confederate state readmitted to the Union.
16 -- 1790: The District of Columbia was established as the seat of the United States government.
17 -- 1821: Spain ceded Florida to the United States.
18 -- 1969: Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., drove off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island near Martha's Vineyard; passenger Mary Jo Kopechne died.
18 -- 1947: President Truman signed the Presidential Succession Act, which placed the speaker of the House and the Senate president pro tempore next in the line of succession after the vice president.
18 -- 1940: The Democratic National Convention in Chicago nominated President Roosevelt for an unprecedented third term in office.
19 -- 1993: President Clinton announced a policy allowing homosexuals to serve in the military under a compromise dubbed "don't ask, don't tell, don't pursue."
20 -- 1944: Franklin D. Roosevelt was the first and only president nominated for a fourth term in office.
21 -- 1949: The U.S. Senate ratified the North Atlantic Treaty.
21 -- 1930: President Hoover signed an executive order establishing the Veterans Administration.
22 -- 1998: President Clinton signed a bill designed to mold the Internal Revenue Service into a friendlier, fairer tax collector
22 -- 1975: The House of Representatives and the Senate joined together in a vote to restore the American citizenship of Confederate General Robert E. Lee
23 -- 2007: In a first of its kind, eight Democratic Presidential contenders had a debate in which the questions were delivered via the Internet, through a video sharing site called YouTube
23 -- 1877: Ulysses S. Grant died, he was the eighteenth president of the United States of America.
24 -- 2003: The House and Senate intelligence committees issued their final report on the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, citing countless blunders, oversights and miscalculations that prevented authorities from stopping the attackers.
24 -- 1974: The Supreme Court unanimously ruled that President Nixon had to turn over subpoenaed White House tape recordings to the Watergate special prosecutor.
24 -- 1866: Tennessee became the first state to be readmitted to the Union after the Civil War.
24 -- 1862: Martin Van Buren died, he was the eighth president of the United States of America.
25 -- 1952: Puerto Rico became a self-governing commonwealth of the United States.
25 -- 1868: Congress passed an act creating the Wyoming Territory.
25 -- 1866: Ulysses S. Grant was named General of the Army of the United States, the first officer to hold the rank.
26 -- 1947: President Truman signed the National Security Act.
26 -- 1788: New York became the 11th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
26 -- 1775: Benjamin Franklin became Postmaster-General.
28 -- 1945: The U.S. Senate ratified the United Nations Charter by a vote of 89-2.
29 -- 1958: President Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act, which created NASA.
30 -- 2003: In his State of the Union address, President Bush took personal responsibility for using disputed intelligence in planning the war on Iraq.
30 -- 1965: President Johnson signed into law the Medicare bill, which went into effect the following year.
30 -- 1942: President Roosevelt signed a bill creating a women's auxiliary agency in the Navy known as "Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service" — WAVES for short.
30 -- 1619: The first representative assembly in America convened in Jamestown, Va.
31 -- 1991: President Bush and Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev signed the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty in Moscow.
31 -- 1948: President Truman helped dedicate New York International Airport (later John F. Kennedy International Airport) at Idlewild Field.
31 -- 1875: Andrew Johnson died, he was the seventeenth president of the United States of America.

August

1 -- 1988: Conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh began broadcasting his nationally syndicated radio program.
1 -- 1876: Colorado was admitted as the 38th state
2 -- 1943: During World War II, Navy boat PT-109, commanded by Lt. John F. Kennedy, sank after being rammed by the Japanese destroyer Amagiri off the Solomon Islands.
2 -- 1939: Albert Einstein signed a letter to President Roosevelt urging creation of an atomic weapons research program.
2 -- 1923: Warren Harding died, he was the 29th president of the United States of America.
2 -- 1790: The first United States census began; the final total was 3,929,214.
2 -- 1776: Members of the Continental Congress began signing the Declaration of Independence.
3 -- 1923: Calvin Coolidge was sworn in as the 30th president of the United States, following the death of Warren G. Harding.
3 -- 1807: Former Vice President Aaron Burr went on trial before a federal court in Richmond, Va., charged with treason. (He was acquitted less than a month later.)
4 -- 1977: President Carter signed a measure establishing the Department of Energy.
5 -- 1963: The United States, Britain and the Soviet Union signed a treaty in Moscow banning nuclear tests in the atmosphere, in space and underwater.
5 -- 1933: President Franklin D. Roosevelt established the National Labor Board, later replaced with the National Labor Relations Board.
6 -- 1965: President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act.
6 -- 1945: The United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, resulting in an estimated 140,000 deaths in the first use of a nuclear weapon in warfare.
7 -- 1789: The U.S. War Department was established by Congress
7 -- 1782: George Washington created the Order of the Purple Heart, a decoration to recognize merit in enlisted men and non-commissioned officers.
8 -- 1974: President Nixon announced he would resign following damaging revelations in the Watergate scandal.
8 -- 1945: President Truman signed the United Nations Charter.
9 -- 1988: President Reagan nominated Lauro Cavazos to be secretary of education; Cavazos became the first Hispanic to serve in the Cabinet.
9 -- 1974: President Nixon's resignation took effect. Vice President Gerald R. Ford became the nation's 38th chief executive.
10 -- 1993: Ruth Bader Ginsburg was sworn in as the second female justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.
10 -- 1988: President Reagan signed a measure providing $20,000 payments to Japanese-Americans who'd been interned by the government during World War II.
10 -- 1874: Herbert Hoover was born, he was the 31st president of the United States of America.
10 -- 1846: President Polk signed a measure establishing the Smithsonian Institution, named after English scientist James Smithson, whose bequest of half a million dollars had made it possible.
10 -- 1821: Missouri became the 24th state.
11 -- 1993: President Clinton named Army Gen. John Shalikashvili to be the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, succeeding the retiring General Colin Powell.
11 -- 1949: President Truman nominated Gen. Omar N. Bradley to become the first chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
13 -- 2007: Karl Rove, President Bush's political strategist, announced his resignation.
13 -- 1846: The American flag was raised for the first time in Los Angeles.
14 -- 2003: The chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, Roy Moore, said he would not remove a Ten Commandments monument from the state judicial building, defying a federal court order to remove the granite monument.
14 -- 1945: President Truman announced that Japan had surrendered unconditionally, ending World War II.
14 -- 1935: President Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act into law.
14 -- 1848: The Oregon Territory was created.
15 -- 1971: President Nixon announced a 90-day freeze on wages, prices and rents.
16 -- 1777: American forces won the Revolutionary War Battle of Bennington.
18 -- 1920: The 19th Amendment to the Constitution, which guarantees the right of all American women to vote, was ratified as Tennessee became the 36th state to approve it.
18 -- 1894: Congress established the Bureau of Immigration.
19 -- 1946: William Clinton was born, he was the 42nd president of the United States of America.
20 -- 1833: Benjamin Harrison was born, he was the 23rd president of the United States of America.
21 -- 1959: Hawaii became the 50th state when President Eisenhower signed an executive order, five months after he'd signed the Hawaiian statehood bill.
22 -- 2003: Alabama's chief justice, Roy Moore, was suspended for his refusal to obey a federal court order to remove his Ten Commandments monument from the rotunda of his courthouse.
24 -- 1954: President Eisenhower signed the Communist Control Act, outlawing the Communist Party in the United States.
24 -- 1814: During the War of 1812, British forces invaded Washington, setting fire to the Capitol (which was still under construction) and the White House, as well as other public buildings.
25 -- 1958: President Eisenhower signed a measure providing pensions for former U.S. presidents and their widows.
25 -- 1916: The National Park Service was established within the Department of the Interior.
26 -- 1968: The Democratic National Convention opened in Chicago. Thousands demonstrated against the Vietnam War. Riots broke out and the police fought back. The violence was televised around the world, prompting the famous chant "the whole world is watching."
26 -- 1920: The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, guaranteeing American women the right to vote, was certified in effect by Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby.
27 -- 2007: Attorney General Alberto Gonzales announced his resignation after a controversy over the firings of nine U.S. attorneys
27 -- 1908: Lyndon B. Johnson was born, he was the 36th president of the United States of America.
28 -- 1963: 200,000 people participated in a peaceful civil rights rally in Washington, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech in front of the Lincoln Memorial.
30 -- 1967: The Senate confirmed the appointment of Thurgood Marshall as the first black justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.

September

1 -- 1951: The United States, Australia and New Zealand signed the ANZUS treaty, a mutual defense pact.
1 -- 1939: World War II began when Nazi Germany invaded Poland.
1 -- 1807: Former Vice President Aaron Burr was found not guilty of treason.
2 -- 1945: Japan formally surrendered in ceremonies aboard the USS Missouri, ending World War II.
2 -- 1789: The United States Treasury Department was established.
3 -- 1783: The Treaty of Paris between the United States and Great Britain officially ended the Revolutionary War.
4 -- 1951: President Truman addressed the nation from the Japanese peace treaty conference in San Francisco in the first live, coast-to-coast television broadcast.
5 -- 1975: President Ford escaped an attempt on his life by Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, a disciple of Charles Manson
5 -- 1836: Sam Houston was elected president of the Republic of Texas.
5 -- 1774: The first Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia.
6 -- 1901: President William McKinley was shot and mortally wounded by anarchist Leon Czolgosz at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, N.Y. McKinley died eight days later; he was succeeded by Vice President Theodore Roosevelt.
7 -- 1977: Convicted Watergate conspirator G. Gordon Liddy was released after serving more than four years in prison.
8 -- 1974: President Ford granted an unconditional pardon to former President Nixon.
9 -- 1850: California became the 31st state of the union.
9 -- 1776: The second Continental Congress made the term "United States" official, replacing "United Colonies."
10 -- 1608: John Smith was elected president of the Jamestown colony council in Virginia.
11 -- 1789: Alexander Hamilton was appointed the first U.S. Secretary of the Treasury.
12 -- 1958: The U.S. Supreme Court, in Cooper v. Aaron, unanimously ruled that Arkansas officials who were resisting public school desegregation orders could not disregard the high court's rulings.
13 -- 1803: Commodore John Barry, considered by many the father of the American Navy, died in Philadelphia.
13 -- 1788: The Congress of the Confederation authorized the first national election, and declared New York City the temporary national capital.
14 -- 1901: William McKinley died, eight days after being shot in Buffalo, NY. McKinley was the 25th president of the United States of America.
14 -- 1814: Francis Scott Key wrote "The Star-Spangled Banner" after witnessing how Fort McHenry in Maryland had endured British bombardment during the War of 1812.
15 -- 1857: William H. Taft is born, he was the 27th president of the United States of America.
15 -- 1789: The U.S. Department of Foreign Affairs was renamed the Department of State.
16 -- 1940: President Roosevelt signed into law the Selective Training and Service Act, which set up the first peacetime military draft in U.S. history
17 -- 1787: The Constitution of the United States was completed and signed by a majority of delegates attending the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia.
18 -- 1793: President Washington laid the cornerstone of the U.S. Capitol.
19 -- 1881: James A. Garfield died, he was the 20th president of the United States of America.
19 -- 1777: In the Revolutionary War, American soldiers won the first Battle of Saratoga.
20 -- 1881: Chester A. Arthur was sworn in as the 21st president of the United States, succeeding the assassinated James A. Garfield.
21 -- 2001: Congress approved $15 billion to help an airline industry reeling from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
21 -- 1998: President Bill Clinton's videotaped grand jury testimony was publicly broadcast. In it Clinton sparred with prosecutors about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky, at one point answering a question by saying, "It depends on what the meaning of 'is' is."
22 -- 1862: President Lincoln issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, declaring all slaves in rebel states should be free as of Jan. 1, 1863.
22 -- 1789: Congress authorized the office of Postmaster-General.
23 -- 1780: British spy John Andre was captured along with papers revealing Benedict Arnold's plot to surrender West Point to the British.
23 -- 1779: During the Revolutionary War, the American warship Bon Homme Richard, commanded by John Paul Jones, defeated the HMS Serapis in battle.
24 -- 1789: Congress passed a Judiciary Act which provided for an Attorney General and a Supreme Court.
25 -- 1981: Sandra Day O'Connor was sworn in as the first female justice on the Supreme Court.
25 -- 1789: The first United States Congress adopted 12 amendments to the Constitution and sent them to the states for ratification. (Ten of the amendments became the Bill of Rights.)
26 -- 1986: William H. Rehnquist was sworn in as the 16th chief justice of the United States, while Antonin Scalia joined the Supreme Court as its 103rd member.
26 -- 1789: Thomas Jefferson was appointed America's first secretary of state.
27 -- 1964: The government publicly released the report of the Warren Commission, which found that Lee Harvey Oswald had acted alone in assassinating President Kennedy.
27 -- 1928: The United States said it was recognizing the Nationalist Chinese government.
28 -- 1787: Congress voted to send the Constitution to state legislatures for their approval.
29 -- 2005: John Roberts was sworn in as the nation's 17th chief justice after winning Senate confirmation.
29 -- 1789: The U.S. War Department established a regular army with a strength of several hundred men.
30 -- 1788: The Pennsylvania Legislature elected the first two members of the U.S. Senate - William Maclay of Harrisburg and Robert Morris of Philadelphia.
30 -- 1777: The Continental Congress — forced to flee in the face of advancing British forces — moved to York, Pa.

October

1 -- 1924: Jimmy Carter was born, he was the 39th president of the United States of America.
2 -- 1967: Thurgood Marshall was sworn in as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
2 -- 1919: President Woodrow Wilson suffered a stroke that left him partially paralyzed.
3 -- 1863: President Lincoln declared the last Thursday in November as Thanksgiving Day.
4 -- 1822: Rutherford B. Hayes was born, he was the nineteenth president of the United States of America.
5 -- 1953: Earl Warren was sworn in as the 14th chief justice of the United States
5 -- 1947: In the first televised White House address, President Truman asked Americans to refrain from eating meat on Tuesdays and poultry on Thursdays to help stockpile grain for starving people in Europe.
5 -- 1829: Chester A. Arthur was born, he was the 21st president of the United States of America.
6 -- 1976: In a debate with Democratic candidate Jimmy Carter, President Gerald R. Ford asserted there was "no Soviet domination of eastern Europe." Ford later conceded that he had misspoken.
7 -- 1963: President John F. Kennedy signed the documents of ratification for a nuclear test ban treaty with Britain and the Soviet Union.
7 -- 1765: The Stamp Act Congress convened in New York to draw up colonial grievances against England.
8 -- 1869: Franklin Pierce died, he was the fourteenth president of the United States of America.
9 -- 1888: The Washington Monument was opened to the public.
10 -- 2002: The House voted 296-133 to give President George W. Bush broad authority to use military force against Iraq. (The Senate followed suit the next day.)
10 -- 1973: Vice President Spiro T. Agnew, accused of accepting bribes, pleaded no contest to one count of federal income tax evasion and resigned from office.
11 -- 2002: Former President Jimmy Carter won the Nobel Peace Prize.
11 -- 1890: Daughters of the American Revolution was founded.
12 -- 1973: Nixon nominates Gerald Ford to replace Spiro Agnew as Vice President.
13 -- 1792: The cornerstone of the executive mansion, later known as the White House, was laid during a ceremony in the District of Columbia.
13 -- 1775: The United States Navy originated when the Continental Congress ordered the construction of a naval fleet.
14 -- 1960: The idea of a Peace Corps was first suggested by Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kennedy to an audience of students at the University of Michigan.
14 -- 1912: Theodore Roosevelt, campaigning for the presidency, was shot in the chest in Milwaukee. Despite the wound, he went ahead with a scheduled speech.
14 -- 1890: Dwight D. Eisenhower was born, he was the 34th president of the United States of America.
15 -- 1991: The Senate narrowly confirmed the nomination of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court, 52-48.
15 -- 1966: President Lyndon Johnson signed a bill creating the Department of Transportation.
16 -- 1973: Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho, who negotiated a cease-fire in the Vietnam War, were named winners of the Nobel Peace Prize; Tho declined the award.
16 -- 1962: The Cuban missile crisis began as President Kennedy was informed that reconnaissance photographs had revealed the presence of missile bases in Cuba.
17 -- 1777: British forces under Gen. John Burgoyne surrendered to American troops in Saratoga, N.Y., in a turning point of the Revolutionary War.
18 -- 1898: The American flag was raised in Puerto Rico shortly before Spain formally relinquished control of the island to the U.S.
18 -- 1867: The United States took formal possession of Alaska from Russia.
18 -- 1767: The boundary between Maryland and Pennsylvania, the Mason-Dixon line, was agreed upon.
19 -- 1951: President Harry S. Truman signed an act formally ending the state of war with Germany.
20 -- 1964: Herbert Hoover died, he was the 31st president of the United States of America.
20 -- 1947: The House Un-American Activities Committee opened hearings into alleged Communist influence and infiltration within the American motion picture industry.
20 -- 1803: The U.S. Senate ratified the Louisiana Purchase.
21 -- 1971: President Richard M. Nixon nominated Lewis F. Powell and William H. Rehnquist to the U.S. Supreme Court.
21 -- 1967: Tens of thousands of Vietnam War protesters marched in Washington, D.C.
22 -- 1962: President John F. Kennedy announced an air and naval blockade of Cuba, following the discovery of Soviet missile bases on the island.
22 -- 1863: Sam Houston was inaugurated as the first constitutionally elected president of the Republic of Texas.
23 -- 1987: The U.S. Senate rejected the Supreme Court nomination of Robert H. Bork, 58-42.
23 -- 1973: President Nixon agreed to turn over White House tape recordings subpoenaed by the Watergate special prosecutor to Judge John J. Sirica.
24 -- 1962: The U.S. blockade of Cuba during the missile crisis began under a proclamation signed by President John F. Kennedy.
24 -- 1945: The United Nations charter took effect.
25 -- 1962: U.S. ambassador Adlai E. Stevenson presented photographic evidence of Soviet built missile bases in Cuba to the U.N. Security Council.
26 -- 2001: President Bush signed the USA Patriot Act, giving authorities unprecedented ability to search, seize, detain or eavesdrop in their pursuit of possible terrorists.
26 -- 1774: The First Continental Congress adjourned in Philadelphia.
27 -- 1858: Theodore Roosevelt was born, he was the 26th president of the United States of America.
27 -- 1787: The first of the Federalist Papers, a series of essays calling for ratification of the U.S. Constitution, was published in a New York newspaper.
28 -- 1919: Congress enacted the Volstead Act, which provided for enforcement of Prohibition, over President Wilson's veto.
28 -- 1886: The Statue of Liberty, a gift from the people of France, was dedicated in New York Harbor by President Cleveland.
29 -- 1966: The National Organization for Women was founded.
29 -- 1682: The founder of Pennsylvania, William Penn, landed at what is now Chester, PA
30 -- 1735: John Adams was born, the second president of the United States of America.
31 -- 2005: President George W. Bush nominated Judge Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court.

November

1 -- 1950: Two Puerto Rican nationalists tried to force their way into Blair House in Washington to assassinate President Harry S. Truman. One of the assailants was killed.
1 -- 1765: The Stamp Act went into effect, prompting stiff resistance from American colonists.
2 -- 1983: President Reagan signed a bill establishing a federal holiday on the third Monday of January in honor of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.
2 -- 1976: Former Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter became the first candidate from the Deep South since the Civil War to be elected president
2 -- 1948: President Truman surprised the nation by winning a narrow upset over Republican challenger Thomas E. Dewey.
2 -- 1865: Warren Harding was born, he was the 29th president of the United States of America.
2 -- 1795: James K. Polk was born, he was the eleventh president of the United States of America.
3 -- 2005: Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, pleaded not guilty to a five count felony indictment in the CIA leak case. Libby was convicted and sentenced to 30 months in prison. President George W. Bush commuted his sentence.
3 -- 1998: Former pro wrestler Jesse Ventura was elected governor of Minnesota.
4 -- 2008: Barack Obama was the first ever African-American to be elected president.
4 -- 1991: Ronald Reagan opened his presidential library in Simi Valley, Calif., with a dedication attended by President Bush and former Presidents Carter, Ford and Nixon — the first-ever gathering of five past and present U.S. chief executives.
4 -- 1924: Nellie T. Ross of Wyoming was elected the nation's first woman governor.
5 -- 1940: President Franklin Delano Roosevelt won an unprecedented third term in office as he defeated Republican challenger Wendell L. Willkie.
5 -- 1872: Susan B. Anthony defied the law by attempting to vote for President Grant. (She was convicted by a judge and fined $100, but never paid the fine.)
6 -- 1956: President Dwight D. Eisenhower won re-election, defeating Democrat Adlai E. Stevenson.
6 -- 1934: Nebraska voters approved a constitutional amendment which dissolved their two chamber legislature in favor of a nonpartisan, single legislative body (or "unicameral"), which was implemented in 1937.
6 -- 1861: Confederate President Jefferson Davis was elected to a six-year term of office.
7 -- 2000: Republican George W. Bush was elected president over incumbent Democratic Vice President Al Gore, though Gore won the popular vote. The winner was not known for more than a month because of a dispute over the results in Florida.
7 -- 2000: Hillary Rodham Clinton was elected to the U.S. Senate from New York, becoming the first first lady to win public office.
7 -- 1944: President Roosevelt won an unprecedented fourth term in office, defeating Thomas E. Dewey.
7 -- 1916: Republican Jeannette Rankin of Montana became the first woman elected to Congress.
7 -- 1893: The state of Colorado granted women there the right to vote.
7 -- 1874: The Republican Party was symbolized as an elephant in a cartoon drawn by Thomas Nast in Harper's Weekly.
8 -- 1933: President Roosevelt created the Civil Works Administration, designed to create jobs for more than four million unemployed.
9 -- 2004: Attorney General John Ashcroft and Commerce Secretary Don Evans resigned; they were the first members of the Cabinet to leave as President George W. Bush headed from re-election into his second term.
10 -- 1982: The newly finished Vietnam Veterans Memorial was opened to its first visitors in Washington, D.C.
10 -- 1775: The U.S. Marines were organized under authority of the Continental Congress.
11 -- 1983: President Reagan became the first U.S. chief executive to address the Diet, Japan's national legislature.
11 -- 1921: The remains of an unidentified American service member were interred in the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery in a ceremony presided over by President Harding.
12 -- 1999: President Bill Clinton signed a sweeping measure knocking down Depression-era barriers, allowing banks, investment firms and insurance companies to sell each other's products.
12 -- 1998: Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley filed a $433 million dollar lawsuit against the firearms industry, declaring that it had created a public nuisance by flooding the streets with weapons deliberately marketed to criminals. (the Illinois Supreme Court dismissed the lawsuit in 2004.)
13 -- 2003: Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore, who had refused to remove a granite Ten Commandments monument from the state courthouse, was thrown off the bench by a judicial ethics panel for having "placed himself above the law."
13 -- 1998: President Bill Clinton agreed to pay Paula Jones $850,000, ending the four-year legal battle over her sexual harassment lawsuit that spurred impeachment proceedings against him. Clinton did not admit guilt.
13 -- 1956: The Supreme Court struck down laws calling for racial segregation on public buses.
13 -- 1942: The minimum draft age was lowered from 21 to 18.
13 -- 1789: Benjamin Franklin wrote in a letter to a friend, "In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes."
14 -- 1995: The U.S. government instituted a partial shutdown, closing national parks and museums while government offices operated with skeleton crews.
14 -- 1881: Charles J. Guiteau went on trial for assassinating President Garfield. (Guiteau was convicted and hanged the following year.)
15 -- 1939: President Franklin D. Roosevelt laid the cornerstone of the Jefferson Memorial in Washington, D.C.
15 -- 1777: The Continental Congress approved the Articles of Confederation, precursor to the U.S. Constitution.
16 -- 1907: Oklahoma became the 46th state of the union.
17 -- 2003: Actor Arnold Schwarzenegger was sworn in as governor of California.
17 -- 2000: The Florida Supreme Court froze the state's presidential tally, forbidding Secretary of State Katherine Harris to certify vote count results in the race between Republican George Bush and Democrat Al Gore.
17 -- 1800: Congress held its first session in Washington, D.C., in the partially completed Capitol building.
18 -- 1886: Chester A. Arthur died, he was the 21st president of the United States of America.
19 -- 1863: President Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address as he dedicated a national cemetery at the site of the Civil War battlefield in Pennsylvania.
19 -- 1831: James A. Garfield was born, he was the 20th president of the United States of America.
20 -- 1925: Robert F. Kennedy was born in Brookline, Mass.
20 -- 1789: New Jersey became the first state to ratify the Bill of Rights.
21 -- 1922: Rebecca L. Felton of Georgia was sworn in as the first woman to serve in the U.S. Senate.
21 -- 1789: North Carolina became the 12th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
22 -- 1963: President John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, was shot to death while riding in a motorcade in Dallas, TX. Texas Gov. John B. Connally, in the same limousine, was seriously wounded. Suspected gunman Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was sworn in as the 36th president of the United States.
23 -- 1804: Franklin Pierce was born, he was the fourteenth president of the United States of America.
24 -- 1963: Jack Ruby shot and mortally wounded Lee Harvey Oswald, the accused assassin of President Kennedy.
24 -- 1871: The National Rifle Association was incorporated.
24 -- 1784: Zachary Taylor was born, he was the twelfth president of the United States of America.
25 -- 2002: President George W. Bush signed legislation creating the Department of Homeland Security and appointed Tom Ridge to be its head.
26 -- 2000: Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris certified Republican George W. Bush the winner over Democrat Al Gore in the state's presidential balloting by 537 votes.
26 -- 1973: President Nixon's personal secretary, Rose Mary Woods, told a federal court that she'd accidentally caused part of the 18 1/2-minute gap in a key Watergate tape.
26 -- 1942: President Roosevelt ordered nationwide gasoline rationing, beginning December 1.
27 -- 2003: President Bush flew to Iraq under extraordinary secrecy and security to spend Thanksgiving with U.S. troops and thank them for "defending the American people from danger."
27 -- 1998: Answering 81 questions put to him three weeks earlier, President Clinton wrote the House Judiciary Committee that his testimony in the Monica Lewinsky affair was "not false and misleading."
27 -- 1973: The Senate voted 92-3 to confirm Gerald R. Ford as vice president, succeeding Spiro T. Agnew, who'd resigned.
28 -- 2000: George W. Bush's lawyers asked the U.S. Supreme Court to bring "legal finality" to the presidential election by ending any further ballot recounts; Al Gore's team countered that the nation's highest court should not interfere in Florida's recount dispute.
28 -- 1995: President Bill Clinton signed a bill that ended the federal 55 mph speed limit.
29 -- 1967: Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara announced he was leaving the Johnson administration to become president of the World Bank.
29 -- 1963: President Johnson named a commission headed by Earl Warren to investigate the assassination of President Kennedy.
30 -- 1782: The United States and Britain signed preliminary peace articles in Paris, ending the Revolutionary War.

December

1 -- 1969: The U.S. government held its first draft lottery since World War II.
1 -- 1824: The presidential election was turned over to the House of Representatives when a deadlock developed between John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson, William Crawford and Henry Clay. No candidate had received a majority in the Electoral College(Adams was the eventual winner).
2 -- 1954: The Senate voted to condemn Sen. Joseph R. McCarthy, R Wis., for "conduct that tends to bring the Senate into dishonor and disrepute."
2 -- 1823: President James Monroe outlined his doctrine opposing European expansion in the Western Hemisphere.
3 -- 1828: Andrew Jackson was elected president of the United States by the Electoral College.
3 -- 1818: Illinois was admitted to the union as the 21st state.
4 -- 1945: the Senate approved U.S. participation in the United Nations.
4 -- 1942: President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered the dismantling of the Works Progress Administration, which had been created to provide jobs during the Depression.
5 -- 2002: Senate Republican leader Trent Lott praised Strom Thurmond's pro-segregation 1948 presidential campaign. The ensuing uproar led to Lott's resignation from the Senate leadership.
5 -- 1996: Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan questioned whether the stock market was overvalued, saying in a speech in Washington, "How do we know when irrational exuberance has unduly inflated asset values?"
5 -- 1994: Republicans chose Newt Gingrich to be the first GOP speaker of the House in four decades.
5 -- 1933: Prohibition came to an end as Utah became the 36th state to ratify the 21st Amendment to the Constitution, repealing the 18th Amendment.
5 -- 1848: President James K. Polk triggered the Gold Rush of 1849 by confirming that gold had been discovered in California.
5 -- 1782: Martin Van Buren was born, he was the eighth president of the United States of America.
6 -- 1973: House minority leader Gerald R. Ford was sworn in as vice president, succeeding Spiro T. Agnew.
6 -- 1947: Everglades National Park in Florida was dedicated by President Harry S. Truman.
6 -- 1790: Congress moved to Philadelphia from New York.
7 -- 1941: The home base of the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii was attacked by Japanese forces.
7 -- 1808: Electors chose James Madison to be the fourth president of the United States.
7 -- 1796: Electors chose John Adams to be the second president of the United States.
7 -- 1787: Delaware became the first state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
8 -- 1993: President Bill Clinton signed into U.S. law the North American Free Trade Agreement, which went into effect at the start of 1994.
8 -- 1987: President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev signed a treaty at the White House calling for destruction of intermediate-range nuclear missiles.
8 -- 1941: The United States entered World War II as Congress declared war against Japan, a day after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
8 -- 1776: During the Revolutionary War, George Washington's retreating army crossed the Delaware River from New Jersey into Pennsylvania.
9 -- 2000: The U.S. Supreme Court ordered a temporary halt in the Florida presidential vote count.
9 -- 1998: Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee drew up four proposed articles of impeachment against President Bill Clinton, all stemming from his sexual relationship with Monica Lewinsky and long campaign to cover it up.
9 -- 1975: President Gerald R. Ford signed a $2.3 billion seasonal loan authorization to prevent New York City from having to default.
10 -- 2007: Former Vice President Al Gore accepted the Nobel Peace Prize with a call for humanity to rise up against a looming climate crisis and stop waging war on the environment.
10 -- 2002: Former President Jimmy Carter accepted the Nobel Peace Prize for his diplomacy in the Middle East in the 1970s.
10 -- 1906: President Theodore Roosevelt became the first American to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, for helping mediate an end to the Russo-Japanese War.
10 -- 1817: Mississippi was admitted to the union as the 20th state.
11 -- 1998: The House Judiciary Committee approved three articles of impeachment against President Bill Clinton.
11 -- 1941: Germany and Italy declared war on the United States; the U.S. responded in kind.
11 -- 1816: Indiana became the 19th state.
12 -- 2000: A divided U.S. Supreme Court halted the presidential recount in Florida, effectively making Republican George W. Bush the winner.
12 -- 1998: The House Judiciary Committee approved a fourth and final article of impeachment against President Bill Clinton and submitted the case to the full House.
12 -- 1787: Pennsylvania became the second state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
12 -- 1745: John Jay, the first chief justice of the Supreme Court, was born in New York City.
13 -- 2000: Republican George W. Bush claimed the presidency 36 days after Election Day.
13 -- 1918: President Woodrow Wilson arrived in France, becoming the first chief executive to visit Europe while in office.
14 -- 1819: Alabama joined the Union as the 22nd state.
14 -- 1799: George Washington died, he was the first president of the United States of America.
15 -- 1938: Groundbreaking ceremonies for the Jefferson Memorial took place in Washington, D.C.
15 -- 1791: The Bill of Rights went into effect following ratification by Virginia.
16 -- 1950: President Harry S. Truman proclaimed a national state of emergency in order to fight "world conquest by Communist imperialism."
16 -- 1773: The Boston Tea Party took place as American colonists boarded a British ship and dumped more than 300 chests of tea overboard to protest tea taxes.
17 -- 2004: President George W. Bush signed into law the largest overhaul of U.S. intelligence-gathering in 50 years.
17 -- 1992: President George H.W. Bush, Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari signed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in separate ceremonies.
17 -- 1777: France recognized American independence.
18 -- 1865: The 13th Amendment to the Constitution, abolishing slavery, was declared in effect by Secretary of State William H. Seward.
18 -- 1787: New Jersey became the third state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
19 -- 1998: President Bill Clinton was impeached by the Republican controlled House for perjury and obstruction of justice (he was later acquitted by the Senate).
19 -- 1777: Gen. George Washington led his army of about 11,000 men to Valley Forge, Pa., to camp for the winter.
19 -- 1732: Benjamin Franklin began publishing "Poor Richard's Almanac."
20 -- 1978: Former White House Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman was released from prison after serving 18 months for his role in the Watergate cover-up.
20 -- 1860: South Carolina became the first state to secede from the Union.
20 -- 1803: The Louisiana Purchase was completed as ownership of the territory was formally transferred from France to the United States during ceremonies in New Orleans.
21 -- 1620: Pilgrims aboard the Mayflower went ashore for the first time at present-day Plymouth, Mass.
22 -- 1864: During the Civil War, Union Gen. William T. Sherman wrote a message to President Abraham Lincoln which said in part: "I beg to present you as a Christmas-gift the city of Savannah."
23 -- 1788: Maryland passed an act to cede an area "not exceeding ten miles square" for the seat of the national government; about two-thirds of the area became the District of Columbia.
23 -- 1783: George Washington resigned as commander in chief of the Continental Army and retired to his home at Mount Vernon, Va.
24 -- 1943: President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower supreme commander of Allied forces during World War II.
24 -- 1851: Fire devastated the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., destroying about 35,000 volumes.
24 -- 1814: The War of 1812 officially ended as the United States and Britain signed the Treaty of Ghent in Belgium.
25 -- 1776: Gen. George Washington and his troops crossed the Delaware River for a surprise attack against Hessian forces at Trenton, N.J.
26 -- 2006: Gerald Ford died, he was the 38th president of the United States of America.
26 -- 1972: Harry S. Truman died, he was the 33rd president of the United States of America.
27 -- 1945: The World Bank was created with an agreement signed by 28 nations.
28 -- 1945: Congress officially recognized the "Pledge of Allegiance."
28 -- 1856: Woodrow Wilson was born, he was the 28th president of the United States of America.
28 -- 1846: Iowa became the 29th state to be admitted to the Union.
28 -- 1832: John C. Calhoun became the first vice president of the United States to resign, stepping down over differences with President Andrew Jackson.
29 -- 1845: Texas was admitted to the union as the 28th state.
29 -- 1808: Andrew Johnson was born, he was the seventeenth president of the United States of America.
30 -- 1853: The United States and Mexico signed a treaty under which the U.S. agreed to buy some 45,000 square miles of land from Mexico for $10 million in a deal known as the Gadsden Purchase. (The area is located in present-day southern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico.)
31 -- 1965: California becomes the largest state in population.
31 -- 1862: President Abraham Lincoln signed an act admitting West Virginia to the Union.
31 -- 1776: Rhode Island establishes wage and price controls to curb inflation: Limit is 70 cents a day for carpenters, 42 cents for tailors