December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

Technological and Cultural Milestones

The Wright Brothers

December 17, 1903: Orville and Wilbur Wright made the first successful man-powered airplane flight, near Kitty Hawk, N.C.(see October 27, 1904)

Color TV

December 17, 1953: the FCC approved color specifications from the National Television System Committee (NTSC) for a color system compatible with existing black and white sets. By the end of 1953, 44.7% of American households have a TV set. By the end of 1954, 55.7% of households will. (see Dec 30)

Superstation

December 17, 1976: WTCG-TV, Atlanta, GA, changed its call letters to WTBS, and uplinked via satellite. The station became the first commercial TV station to cover the entire U.S. (see June 5, 1977)

Simpsons

December 17, 1989:  the first full episode of “The Simpsons,” a Christmas special titled “Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire,” premiered on Fox. The episode chronicled the less-than-perfect family’s financial woes and captured viewers with a satirical cynicism that would define the following decade of television.(next CM, see February 14, 1990)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

Anarchism in the US

December 17, 1910: Emma Goldman published her first book, Anarchism and Other Essays. (PDF of book) (see Emma Goldman for her larger story)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

Nuclear and Chemical Weapons

Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann

December 17, 1938: German chemists Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann discovered nuclear fission by splitting the nuclei of uranium into lighter elements while performing experiments in Berlin.(see August 2, 1939)

Intercontinental missile

December 17, 1957: the US successfully test-fired the Atlas intercontinental ballistic missile for the first time. (see Dec 18)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

Immigration History

Magnuson Act

December 17, 1943: the Magnuson Act repealed the Chinese Exclusion Act (May 6, 1882). The exclusion act was arguably the most restrictive immigration law ever passed in the US. It barred from immigration all Chinese laborers. Although it permitted the entry of some non-laborers, who were required to obtain certification from the Chinese government, few were able to quality. Repeal of the Exclusion Act at this time was spurred by the fact that China was an important ally of the U.S. against Japan in World War II. (see June 27, 1952)

Arizona drivers license

December 17, 2014: the Supreme Court let stand a ruling requiring Arizona to issue driver’s licenses to young immigrants spared from deportation by President Obama.

The court’s brief, unsigned order gave no reasons, but it nonetheless represented the justices’ first encounter with the Obama administration’s recent efforts to provide relief to immigrants who are in the United States unlawfully. Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr. dissented, also without giving reasons. [NYT article] (see February 15, 2015)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

Japanese Internment Camps

December 17, 1944: Major General Henry C. Pratt issued Public Proclamation No. 21, declaring that, effective January 2, 1945, Japanese American “evacuees” from the West Coast could return to their homes. (see November 21, 1945 re the final closing.) (see JI for expanded chronology)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

BLACK HISTORY

Montgomery Bus Boycott

December 17, 1955: Martin Luther King, Jr met with white representatives in an unsuccessful attempt to resolve the bus dispute. The boycott, initially launched as a one-day statement of protest, had been going on for nearly two weeks at this point. ( see Montgomery for expanded chronology)

Coerced confessions

December 17, 1977: the district attorney dropped the murder and robbery charges against the five Black men forced to confess under threat of death, saying that without the confessions there was not much of a case. Two of the defendants had spent one year in jail, and the other three had been incarcerated for almost two years.  No one was ever convicted of  Gordon Howell’s murder (see January 22, 1976). (see Dec 30)

Arthur McDuffie

December 17, 1979: Arthur McDuffie, a 33-year-old African American insurance sales representative, was riding a motorcycle when he was signaled to pull over by Metro-Dade Police Department (MDPD) officers in Miami, Florida. Mr. McDuffie did not comply, beginning an eight-mile chase through Miami. After he was apprehended, MDPD officers beat him into a coma. There is no evidence that he physically resisted arrest, and officers later ran over Mr. McDuffie’s motorcycle to make it appear as if he had been in an accident. Mr. McDuffie died four days later.

After an autopsy confirmed witness reports that he had been beaten to death, five MDPD officers were charged with manslaughter and evidence tampering. The jury found them not guilty on all counts.(BH & McDuffie, see May 18, 1980)

Medgar Evers

December 17, 1990: Byron De La Beckwith, 70 years old, twice tried but never convicted in the shooting death of the civil rights leader Medgar Evers in 1963, was arrested as a fugitive from Mississippi. Officials said a grand jury in Hinds County heard testimony the previous week in the slaying of Medgar Evers, who was field secretary for the Mississippi branch of the NAACP . Hinds County District Attorney Ed Peters, said he had no comment on the arrest and would not say whether Mr. Beckwith had been indicted in connection with the reopened investigation into Mr. Evers’ killing. (see Dec 19)

George J. Stinney Jr

December 17, 2014: Calling it a “great and fundamental injustice,” South Carolina Circuit Judge Carmen T. Mullen vacated the 1944 murder conviction of 14-year-old George J. Stinney Jr., the youngest person executed in the United States in the last century.

Mullen did not rule that the conviction of Mr. Stinney for the murder of two white girls in the town of Alcolu was wrong on the merits. She did find, however, that the prosecution had failed in numerous ways to safeguard the constitutional rights of Mr. Stinney, who was black, from the time he was taken into custody until his death by electrocution.

The all-white jury could not be considered a jury of the teenager’s peers, Judge Mullen ruled, and his court-appointed attorney did “little to nothing” to defend him. His confession was most likely coerced and unreliable, she added, “due to the power differential between his position as a 14-year-old black male apprehended and questioned by white, uniformed law enforcement in a small, segregated mill town in South Carolina.” (see GJS, Jr for expanded chronology)

Russian voter interference

December 17, 2018: according to a report produced for the Senate Intelligence Committee. the Russian influence campaign on social media in the 2016 election made an extraordinary effort to target African-Americans, used an array of tactics to try to suppress turnout among Democratic voters and unleashed a blizzard of activity on Instagram that rivaled or exceeded its posts on Facebook

New Knowledge, a cybersecurity company based in Austin, Tex., along with researchers at Columbia University and Canfield Research LLC  produced the report. [NYT article]

Colin Kaepernick/Ben & Jerry’s

December 17, 2020: Vermont ice cream maker Ben & Jerry’s honored Colin Kaepernick with a new flavor blending his civil rights activism and non-dairy, vegan appetite.

“Change the Whirled” — a mix of caramel sunflower butter, fudge chips, graham crackers and chocolate cookies — would raise money for Kaepernick’s “courageous work to confront systemic oppression and to stop police violence against Black and Brown people,” the company said in a statement. [VTDigger story] (next BH, see ; see CK for expanded Kaepernick story)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

December 17 Music et al

Beatles

December 17, 1961: Brian Epstein contacted a local wedding photographer, Albert Marrion, to see if he could take some professional pictures of the group for the first time. (see January 1, 1962)

Alan Freed

December 17, 1962: Alan Freed pleaded guilty in Criminal Court to accepting a $2,000 bribe from the Cosnat Distributing Company and a $700 bribe from the Superior Record Sales Co, Inc. Jundge John Murtagh imposed a $300 fine and a six-month suspended jail sentence.  (see June 8, 1963)

DJ Carroll James

December 17, 1963: radio DJ Carroll James at Washington. D.C. station WWDC, played a U.K. copy of  “I Want to Hold Your Hand” on the radio after a 15-year-old girl from Silver Spring, MD wrote to him requesting Beatles music after seeing the CBS-news segment.  James Carroll became the first disc jockey to broadcast a Beatles record on American radio. He had obtained the record from his stewardess girlfriend, who brought the single back from the UK. Due to listener demand, the song was played daily, every hour. (see Dec 18 – 19)

Beatles Third Christmas Record

December 17, 1965, The Beatles: “The Beatles Third Christmas Record” released. (see January 8, 1966)

Winchester Cathedral

December 17 – 30, 1966: “Winchester Cathedral” by The New Vaudeville Band #1 on the Billboard Hot 100.

Christmas Time Is Here Again

December 17, 1967: Beatles sent Christmas Time Is Here Again to fan club members.  (see Busy Beatles for more) (next Beatles, see Dec 26)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

Environmental Issues

Clean air bill

December 17, 1963: President Johnson signed into law a “clean air” bill designed to channel $95 million in federal funds into a four-year program to fight air pollution. The legislation authorized the Department of Health, Education and Welfare to conduct research into the problem of air pollution, which some experts say is becoming a national menace.

It also would permit federal aid to states and communities which are fighting air pollution.

In signing the measure, Johnson said it would combat a “serious and growing” hazard. He said an estimated 6,000 U.S. communities need the type of assistance provide by the bill. States will retain the primary responsibility for controlling and reducing pollution except in those cases where pollution from one source — such as a concentration of factories — affects more than one state.

In such cases federal authorities may seek relief in court if a voluntary solution is unsuccessful.

The federal aid program involves grants on a matching basis on a matching basis of one state dollar for every two federal dollars put up. Regional grants are based on matching of three-quarters federal, one-quarter state. (see September 3, 1964)

Fracking

December 17, 2014: NY Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s administration announced that it would ban hydraulic fracturing in New York State because of concerns over health risks, ending years of debate over the method of extracting natural gas. [NYT article] (see January 6, 2015)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

Feminism

December 17, 1970: Jo Carol LaFleur told the principal of a Cleveland, Ohio, junior high school, where she was teaching, that she was pregnant. According to school policy, teachers were banned from the classroom after the fourth month of pregnancy — and could not return until the semester after the child was three months old. On January 21, 1974, in Cleveland Board of Education v. LaFleur the US Supreme Court found that overly restrictive maternity leave regulations in public schools violated the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment and the Fourteenth Amendment. This decision struck down mandatory maternity leave rules. (F, see January 15, 1971; Jo Carol LaFleur, see January 21, 1974)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

Lynette Alice Fromme

December 17, 1975: a federal jury in Sacramento, California, sentenced Lynette Alice Fromme, also known as “Squeaky” Fromme, to life in prison for her attempted assassination of President Gerald R. Ford. (see Lynette Squeaky Fromme) (see August 16, 2009)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

Irish Troubles

December 17, 1983:  a Provisional IRA car bomb killed 6 Christmas shoppers and injured 90 outside Harrods in London. (see  Troubles for expanded chronology)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

see AIDS & Ryan White for full story

Diagnosis

December 17, 1984: during a partial-lung removal procedure, Ryan White was diagnosed with AIDS. (next AIDS, see March 2, 1985)

Ruling appealed

December 17, 1985: the school board voted 7–0 to appeal Indiana Department of Education ruling. (see RW for expanded chronology)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

The Cold War

Dissolution of the USSR

December 17, 1989: Timișoara Riot in Romania. Demonstrations in the city of Timișoara were triggered by the government-sponsored attempt to evict László Tőkés, an ethnic Hungarian pastor, accused by the government of inciting ethnic hatred. Members of his ethnic Hungarian congregation surrounded his apartment in a show of support. Romanian students spontaneously joined the demonstration which had became a more general anti-government demonstration. Regular military forces, police and Security fired on demonstrators killing and injuring men, women and children. (see USSR for expanded chronology)

United States/Cuba

December 17, 2014: American officials announced that the US would restore full diplomatic relations with Cuba and open an embassy in Havana for the first time in more than a half-century after the release of an American contractor held in prison for five years.

In a deal negotiated during 18 months of secret talks hosted largely by Canada and encouraged by Pope Francis, who hosted a final meeting at the Vatican, President Obama and President Raúl Castro of Cuba agreed in a telephone call to put aside decades of hostility to find a new relationship. [NYT article] (see January 12, 2015)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

Jack Kevorkian

December 17, 1993: Kevorkian ended fast and left jail after Oakland County Circuit Court Judge reduced bond to $100 in exchange for his vow not to assist in any more suicides until state courts resolved the legality of his practice. (see JK for expanded chronology)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

see CLINTON IMPEACHMENT for expanded chronology

Monica Lewinsky subpoenaed

December 17, 1997: Monica Lewinsky subpoenaed by lawyers for Paula Jones, who was suing the president on sexual harassment charges.

Impeachment debate

December 17, 1998: Republicans rescheduled the impeachment debate for December 18 over Democratic objections. Republican Speaker-elect Bob Livingston is forced to admit his own marital indiscretions, but says unlike President Clinton, they were not with a staff member and he was never asked to testify under oath about them

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

ADA

December 17, 1999: The Ticket to Work and Work Incentives Improvements Act of 1999 (TWWIIA) expanded the availability of Medicare and Medicaid so that certain disabled beneficiaries who return to work will not lose their medical benefits. (see May 29, 2001)

STAND YOUR GROUND

December 17, 2014: on this date Markus Kaarma, 30, of Missoula, Montana, who had shot and killed Diren Dede, a German exchange student caught trespassing in his garage, was convicted of deliberate homicide in a case that attracted attention as a test of “stand your ground” laws that governed the use of deadly force to defend life and property.

Kaarma had shot  Dede on April 27, 2014 after being alerted to an intruder by motion sensors. Witnesses testified Kaarma fired four shotgun blasts at Dede, who was unarmed.(see February 12, 2015)

December 17 Peace Love Art Activism

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

BILL OF RIGHTS

December 16, 1689, : the English “Bill of Rights” went into effect. (see October 19, 1765)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

BLACK HISTORY

Short family murdered

December 16, 1945: in Fontana, California, the home of the Short family erupted in flames, killing Mrs Helen Short and her two children, Barry, 9, and Carol Ann, 7. Mr O’day H. Short survived the explosion The Shorts were the first and only black family living in the neighborhood.

Initially organized as a collection of chicken farms and citrus groves in the early twentieth century, by the early 1940s the small San Bernardino County town of Fontana was transformed into an industrial center with the opening of a wartime steel mill. As the community population grew in numbers and diversity, strict segregation lines emerged: black families moving out of the overcrowded Los Angeles area were relegated to living in the rocky plains of “North Fontana,” and working in the dirtiest departments of the mill. Ku Klux Klan activity also surged throughout Southern California during this time period, with white supremacists poised to terrorize black and Chicano veterans of WWII returning with militant ideas of racial equality.

This was reality in fall 1945, when O’day H. Short – a Mississippi native and Los Angeles civil rights activist – purchased a tract of land “in town” with intentions of moving his family to Fontana’s white section. As the Shorts built their modest home and prepared to live in it full time, local forces of all kinds tried to stop them. In early December 1945, “vigilantes” visited Mr. Short and ordered him to move or risk harm to his family; he refused and reported the threats to the FBI and local sheriff. Sheriff’s deputies did not offer protection and instead reiterated the warning that Short should leave before his family was harmed. Shortly after, members of the Fontana Chamber of Commerce visited the home, encouraging Mr. Short to move to the North Fontana area, and offering to buy his home. He refused.

Just days later, an explosion “of unusual intensity” destroyed the home, killing Mr. Short’s wife and children. He survived for two weeks, shielded from the knowledge of the other deaths, but died in January 1946 after the local D.A. bluntly informed him of his family’s fate during an investigative interview.

Local officials initially concluded that the fire was an accident, caused by Mr. Short’s own lighting of an outdoor lamp. After surviving family members, the black press, and the Los Angeles NAACP protested, a formal inquest was held, at which an independent arson investigator obtained by the NAACP testified that the fire had clearly been intentionally set. Despite this testimony, and evidence of the harassment the Short family had endured in the weeks leading to the fire, local officials again concluded it an accident and closed the case. No criminal investigation was ever opened, no arrests or prosecutions were made, and residential segregation persisted in Fontana for over 25 more years.

Women’s Political Council

In 1946, The Women’s Political Council formed as a civic organization for African-American professional women in Montgomery, Alabama. It was inspired by the Atlanta Neighborhood Union. Many of its middle-class women were active in education; most of WPC’s members were educators at Alabama State College or Montgomery’s public schools. About forty women attended the first organizational meeting. Mary Fair Burks, who was head of Alabama State’s English department, was the group’s first president. (Black History, see Feb 12; Feminism, see July 9, 1947)

Albany Movement

December 16, 1961: New York Times: The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., 264 other Negroes and one white youth were arrested today as they marched on City Hall for a prayer demonstration. All were jailed. There was no violence, despite the tension aroused by week-long racial controversy and the breakdown of negotiations between white and Negro leaders aimed at restoring this city of 56,000 persons to normal. (see Albany Movement for the long sad story)

Medgar Evers assassination

December 16, 1992: a divided Mississippi Supreme Court refused to block the trial of Byron De La Beckwith, paving the way for him to be tried for the third time for the 1963 murder of the civil rights leader Medgar Evers. The court voted 4 to 3 to deny Mr. Beckwith’s claim that the case should be dismissed without going to trial. (see Dec 23)

SOUTH AFRICA/APARTHEID

December 16, 1961: Nelson Mandela and other A.N.C. leaders form a military wing called Umkhonto we Sizwe, or Spear of the Nation. Mr. Mandela becomes the first commander in chief of the guerrilla army. He will train to fight, work to obtain weapons for the group, and come to be known as the Black Pimpernel, but he will never see combat. (see August 5, 1962)

Amadou Diallo

December 16, 1999: a NY appellate court ordered a change of venue to Albany, stating that pretrial publicity had made a fair trial in New York City impossible. (see February 25, 2000)

Colin Powell

December 16, 2000: President-elect George W. Bush selected Colin Powell to become the first African-American secretary of state.(see January 21, 2001)

Tulsa “Good Friday” Shootings

December 16, 2013: On April 6, 2012 Jacob England and Alvin Watts had gone on a shooting spree that left three people dead and terrorized Tulsa’s black community. On this date, the two men were each sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. The men were sentenced after pleading guilty to three first-degree murder charges and two shooting with intent to kill charges. England, 19, and Watts, 33, were also sentenced to one year in the county jail for the misdemeanor charge of malicious intimidation, the state of Oklahoma’s equivalent of a hate crime offense.

On December 16, 2013, Jacob England and Alvin Watts, the two suspects in Tulsa’s so-called “Good Friday” murders, were each sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. The men were sentenced after pleading guilty to three first-degree murder charges and two shooting with intent to kill charges. England, 19, and Watts, 33, were also sentenced to one year in the county jail for the misdemeanor charge of malicious intimidation, the state of Oklahoma’s equivalent of a hate crime offense.

BLACK & SHOT

December 16, 2015: Chicago police Officer Jason Van Dyke was indicted on first-degree murder charges in the shooting of Laquan McDonald. (B & S, see Dec 27; McDonald, see Jan 22)

Emmett Till

December 16, 2016:  President Obama signed the Emmett Till Civil Rights Crimes Reauthorization Act of 2016. The Act allowed the Department of Justice and the FBI to reopen unsolved civil rights crimes.committed before 1980. The legislation is an expansion of a previous bill of a similar name signed into law in 2008. (BH, see January 10, 2017; ET, see January 23, 2017)

Trayvon Martin Shooting

December 16, 2017: George Zimmerman took a verbal shot at rapper JAY-Z threatening to “beat” the rapper and feed him to “an alligator” over Jay-Z’s role in a Trayvon Martin documentary.

Zimmerman, said he has a score to settle with JAY-Z over the way a camera crew treated the Zimmerman family.  Zimmerman complained that a production team made unannounced visits to the homes of his parents and an uncle in Florida and said JAY-Z and executive producer Michael Gesparro indirectly “harassed” his family.

“I know how to handle people who f–k with me,” Zimmerman added “I have since February 2012.”

Negro Leagues Recognized

December 16, 2020: Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred declared that seven Negro leagues that operated between 1920 and 1948 would be recognized as official major leagues, with their records and statistics counted in baseball’s record books.

“All of us who love baseball have long known that the Negro Leagues produced many of our game’s best players, innovations and triumphs against a backdrop of injustice,” Manfred said in a statement. “We are now grateful to count the players of the Negro Leagues where they belong: as Major Leaguers within the official historical record.” [NYT article] (next BH, see Dec 17)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

 Cold War

Korea

December 16, 1950: President Harry S. Truman proclaimed a national state of emergency during the Korean War in response to Chinese intervention.

Survival Under Atomic Attack

In 1951, the US Government released a film, “Survival Under Atomic Attack” (NN, see Jan 27; Red Scare, see March 29, 1951)

LSD & the US Government

In 1951: the CIA became aware of and began experimenting with LSD. (next Red Scare, see March 29)

LSD &  Al Hubbard

In 1951: Al Hubbard first tried LSD. Hubbard was an early proponent for the drug during the 1950s. He is reputed to have been the “Johnny Appleseed of LSD” and the first person to emphasize LSD’s potential as a visionary or transcendental drug. Hubbard may have introduced more than 6,000 people to LSD, including scientists, politicians, intelligence officials, diplomats, and church figures. Hubbard, then forty-nine years old, eagerly sought out others familiar with hallucinogenic drugs, including Aldous Huxley, the eminent British novelist who for years had been preoccupied with the specter of drug-induced thought control.

“Most people are walking in their sleep,” Hubbard said. “Turn them around, start them in the opposite direction and they wouldn’t even know the difference. [but]  give them a good dose of LSD and let them see themselves for what they are.”

LSD & Charles Savage

In 1952: Charles Savage published the first study on the use of LSD to treat depression.

LSD & Dr. Humphry Osmond

In 1953: Dr. Humphry Osmond began treating alcoholics with LSD.

First LSD conferences

In 1955: first conferences focusing on LSD and mescaline took place in Atlantic City and Princeton, N.J.

LSD & Aldous Huxley

In 1955: with Al Hubbard’s assistance, novelist Aldous Huxley first took LSD. (see March 14, 1957)

LSD/relating to Nature

December 16, 2019: the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published an article in which they said, “We found a strong relationship between the amount of lifetime use of psychedelics and nature relatedness, as well as increases in nature relatedness from before to after psychedelic use.”  (next LSD, see November 3, 2020)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

LGBTQ

Overt Homosexuality

December 16, 1963: the NY State Liquor Authority announced the revocation of the liquor licenses of two NYC bars. In a NY Times article, NYC Police Commissioner said, “Homosexuality is another one of the many problems confronting law enforcement…the underlying factors in homosexuality are not criminal but rather medical and sociological.” In the same NYT article, a Dr Irvin Bieber stated, “Public acceptance, [of homosexuality] if based on the concept of homosexuality as an illness, could be useful. If, by a magic wand, one could eliminate overnight all the manifestations of hostility I think there would be a gradual, important reduction in the incidence of homosexuality.”  (see May 19, 1964)

Rev Frank Schaefer

December 16, 2013: Rev. Frank Schaefer, a United Methodist minister who was suspended for officiating at his son’s gay marriage, said he would not voluntarily surrender his religious credentials even though he cannot uphold his church’s doctrines on issues relating to same-sex marriage.

Schaefer was convicted of violating church doctrine by performing a same-sex marriage when he officiated at his son’s nuptials in 2007 in Massachusetts. On Nov. 19, he was suspended for 30 days and asked to agree to abide by church doctrine, as outlined in the Methodist Book of Discipline, or to surrender his ministerial credentials. (see Dec 19)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

Vietnam & STUDENT ACTIVISM

December 16, 1965: in Des Moines, Iowa  John F. Tinker (15), John’s younger sister Mary Beth Tinker (13), and their friend Christopher Eckhardt (16) decided to wear black armbands to their schools (high school for John and Christopher, junior high for Mary Beth) in protest of the Vietnam War and supporting the Robert Kennedy’s proposed extension of the Viet Cong’s proposed Christmas Eve truce.  Two days earlier, the principals of the Des Moines schools adopted a policy that banned the wearing of armbands to school. Any student violating the policy would be suspended and allowed to return to school only after agreeing to comply with the policy. Mary Beth Tinker and Christopher Eckhardt chose to violate this policy, and the next day John Tinker also did so. Both were suspended from school until after January 1, 1966, when their protest had been scheduled to end. (for more, see Tinker v Des Moines ; Student Activism, see February 27, 1969; Tinker, see February 24, 1969; Vietnam, see Dec 18)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

December 16 Music et al

The Beatles

December 16, 1966: release of Beatles Fourth Christmas Record — Pantomime: Everywhere It’s Christmas to fan club members. (next Beatles, see Dec 18)

John & Yoko

December 16, 1969: John Lennon and Yoko Ono put up eleven billboards in major cities worldwide with the slogan: War Is Over! (Lennon, see Dec 19; Vietnam see February 18, 1970)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

INDEPENDENCE DAY

December 16, 1971, Bangladesh war of independence ends in victory. (NYT article)

December 16, 1991: Kazakhstan declared its independence from the Soviet Union. (USSR, see Dec 24; ID, see March 1, 1992)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

Sara Jane Moore

December 16, 1975,  a federal court accepted Sara Jane Moore’s plea of guilty of attempting to assassinate President Ford. (see Sarah Jane for more)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

TERRORISM

December 16, 1989: a powerful explosion killed Federal Judge Robert Vance after he opened a mail bomb in his house near Birmingham, Alabama. His wife, Helen, was seriously injured.

The federal government charged Walter Leroy Moody, Jr., with the murders of Judge Vance and of Robert E. Robinson, a black civil-rights attorney in Savannah, Georgia, who had been killed in a separate explosion at his office on December 18. Moody was also charged with mailing bombs that were defused at the Eleventh Circuit’s headquarters in Atlanta and at the Jacksonville office of the NAACP.

Moody was sentenced to seven federal life terms. (see Dec 18)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

IRAQ

Weapon discovery

December 16, 1995: Iraqi scuba divers, under the direction of the United Nations Special Commission, dredge the Tigris near Baghdad. The divers find over 200 prohibited Russian-made missile instruments and components. (see August 31, 1996)

U.S. and British forces attack Iraq v Clinton Impeachment

December 16, 1998: in a coordinated strike, U.S. and British forces attack Iraq in retaliation for its failure to cooperate with U.N. weapons inspectors. Because of the military action, House Republican leaders delay a planned impeachment debate and vote set to begin Thursday, December 17. (see Clinton Impeachment: Iraq, see October 2, 2002)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

Sexual Abuse of Children

December 16, 2006:  the Archdiocese of Los Angeles agreed to pay $60m to settle to 45 cases of alleged sexual abuse by priests. (see January 4, 2007)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

STAND YOUR GROUND LAW

December 16, 2012: Tampa, FL. Michael Jock was waiting in line at a Little Caesars when another customer, Randall White, complained about the slow service. The men exchanged words, which turned into a shoving match. Jock pulled out a revolver and fired it at White, striking him in the torso. The two struggled and White was shot a second time. Jock claimed the action was justified under Florida’s “stand your ground” law.

However, according to the Tampa Bay Times, police determined that the incident “did not reach a level where deadly force was required.” The officers charged Jock with aggravated battery with a weapon and shooting within a building. He was later released on $20,000 bail. (see January 3, 2013)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

Stop and Frisk Policy

December 16, 2013: the Civilian Complaint Review Board went after officer Roman Goris after an alleged wrongful stop and frisk in 2011. The NYPD disciplinary trial of marked the first time the NYPD’s independent watchdog prosecuted an officer for a stop and frisk violation itself. (see Dec 19)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

Cannabis

December 16, 2014:  drug Policy Alliance lobbyist Bill Piper told the Los Angeles Times “the war on medical marijuana is over” after President Obama signed the $1.1 trillion “Cromnibus” bill  with a small provision tucked away inside that prohibited the federal government from interfering with states that legalized it. (see Dec 18 or see CCC for expanded chronology)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism

Women’s Health

December 16, 2021:  the federal government permanently lifted a major restriction on access to abortion pills. It allowed patients to receive the medication by mail instead of requiring them to obtain the pills in person from specially certified health providers.

The Food and Drug Administration’s action meant that medication abortion, an increasingly common method authorized in the United States for pregnancies up to 10 weeks’ gestation, would become more available to women who found it difficult to travel to an abortion provider or prefer to terminate a pregnancy in their homes. It allowed patients to have a telemedicine appointment with a provider who could prescribe abortion pills and send them to the patient by mail.  [NYT article] (next WH, see March 25, 2022)

December 16 Peace Love Art Activism