August 6, 1890: New York State used an ‘electric chair’ to carry out the first execution by electrocution. The condemned was murderer William Kemmler. As it turned out, the process was hardly quick or painless. It took two surges of electricity, one of them lasting more than one minute, to kill Kemmler. The electricity burned Kemmler to death. Despite the gruesome procedure, people still thought electrocution was more humane and efficient than previous methods. With some refinements, it soon became the preferred method of execution in the United States. (see March 20, 1899)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
Emma Goldman
August 6, 1915: Goldman and Ben Reitman were arrested in Portland, OR for distributing literature on birth control. Goldman was released on $500 cash bail and announced that she will try to speak on the subject of birth control on August 7. Reitman remained in jail. (see August 7, 1915)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
FEMINISM & Voting Rights
August 6, 1918: Open-air meeting held in Lafayette Park, Washington, D.C., with approximately 100 suffrage demonstrators protesting Senate inaction on suffrage bill. Forty-eight women arrested and released on bail, including Alice Paul and Lucy Burns. (see Aug 12)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
Nuclear/Chemical News
Hiroshima
August 6, 1945: the US dropped atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. Approximately 90,000 people died by the end of 1945 from the explosion and exposure to the bomb’s radiation. [2016 Atlantic article] (see Aug 9)
ICAN
August 6 – 7, 2015: the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons [ICAN] campaigners organized worldwide events to commemorate the 70th anniversaries of the atomic bombings of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. (Nuclear, see Sept 2; ICAN, see Nov 2)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
Consumer Protection
August 6, 1958: the Food Additives Amendment of 1958 was an amendment to the United States’ Food, Drugs, and Cosmetic Act of 1938. It was a response to concerns about the safety of new food additives. The amendment established an exemption from the “food additive” definition and requirements for substances “generally recognized as safe” by scientific experts in the field, based on long history of use before 1958 or based on scientific studies. New food additives would be subject to testing including by the “Delaney clause”.
The Delaney clause was a provision in the amendment which said that if a substance were found to cause cancer in man or animal, then it could not be used as a food additive. (next CP, see September 8, 1961)
The Cold War
August 6, 1960: in response to a US embargo against Cuba, Fidel Castro nationalized American and foreign-owned property in Cuba. [Castro had become Prime Minister of Cuba on February 16, 1959.] [CubaDebate article] (see Aug 18)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
August 6 Music et al
Pete Best
August 6, 1960: The Silver Beetles went to Mona Best’s Casbah Coffee Club where they saw The Blackjacks playing.
The Blackjacks’ drummer was Mona’s son Pete. Since The Blackjacks were on the point of splitting up, The Beatles suggested that he join them for their first trip to Hamburg. Best was interested in the proposal, and agreed to audition for them (see August 16)
August 6, 1965, The Beatles: UK release of Help! album. (see Aug 13)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
INDEPENDENCE DAY
August 6, 1962: Jamaica independent from United Kingdom. [JIS article] (see ID for expanded list of 1960s independence days)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
BLACK HISTORY & Voting Rights
Voting Rights Act of 1965
August 6, 1965: President Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 guaranteeing African Americans the right to vote. The bill made it illegal to impose restrictions on federal, state and local elections that were designed to deny the vote to blacks., making it easier for Southern blacks to register to vote. Literacy tests, poll taxes, and other such requirements that were used to restrict black voting are made illegal. [DoJ article] (BH, see Aug 11 – 15; VR, see June 25, 2013)
Marine 4-Star General
Gen. Michael E. Langley had his new rank insignia pinned on his uniform by his stepmother, Ola Langley, and his father, Willie C. Langley, a retired Air Force master sergeant, during his promotion ceremony on Saturday.Credit…Kenny Holston for The New York Times
August 6, 2022: Gen. Michael E. Langley, 60, became the first Black Marine to receive a fourth star on his shoulder — a landmark achievement in the corps’ 246-year history. With that star, he became one of only three four-star generals serving in the Marine Corps — the service’s senior leadership. [NYT article] (next BH, see Aug 9)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
Feminism
August 6, 1978: the US Senate joined the House of Representatives in extending the deadline for ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment, originally set for 22 March 1979, to 30 June 1982. (see Oct 31)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
Crime and Punishment
August 6, 1988: Tompkins Square Park Police Riot in New York City: A riot erupted in Tompkins Square Park when police attempted to enforce a newly passed curfew for the park. Bystanders, artists, residents, homeless people and political activists were caught up in the police action which took place during the night and into the early morning. [NYT article] (see June 28, 2004)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
IRAQ War I
August 6, 1990: The UN Security Council orders a global trade embargo against Iraq in response to its invasion of Kuwait. [NYT article] (see Aug 12)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
CLINTON IMPEACHMENT
August 6, 1998: Monica Lewinsky appears before the grand jury to begin her testimony. (see Clinton for expanded story)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
Sexual Abuse of Children
August 6, 2003: CBS News obtained a confidential Vatican document, written in 1962, that lays out a church policy on sexual abuse by priests. The document calls for absolute secrecy when it comes to these cases, warning that anyone who speaks out could be thrown out of the church. The U.S. Conference of Bishops says the document is being taken out of context. [CBS story] (see Aug 8)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
TERRORISM
August 6, 2008: Anthrax attacks: despite having no direct evidence of his involvement, federal prosecutors declared Bruce Ivins to be the sole culprit of the crime, though many question that conclusion. (see May 8, 2009)
August 6 Peace Love Art Activism
Oklahoma City Explosion
August 6, 2010,: Terry Nichols said prison officials in Colorado inserted IVs into his veins and force fed him after hunger strikes this year. Mr. Nichols recently filed a handwritten document in a lawsuit filed against officials at the federal Supermax prison in Florence, Colo., over the lack of whole grains, unpeeled fruit and fewer refined foods in his diet. He said he had gone through three hunger strikes since February. He said prison officials force fed him twice after his weight dropped 25 and 35 pounds to 135 and 125 pounds, respective.
August 5, 1948: Alger Hiss testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, denying that he ever was a member of the Communist Party. [US HoR article] (see August 25, 1948)
August 5, 1957: ABC television network did the first national broadcast of “American Bandstand”. The show was very popular on WFIL-TV in Philadelphia. But the first show was interrupted for half an hour in the middle by The Mickey Mouse Club. Host Dick Clark’s first guest was the Chordettes and the first record danced to on the show was Buddy Holly’s “That’ll Be the Day.” (next Teenage Culture, see February 8 – 21, 1960)
August 5, 1966: Revolver released in UK. According to music critic Richie Unterberger of Allmusic: In many respects, Revolver is one of the very first psychedelic LPs – not only in its numerous shifts in mood and production texture, but in its innovative manipulation of amplification and electronics to produce new sounds on guitars and other instruments. Specific, widely-heralded examples include the backwards riffs of “I’m Only Sleeping”, the sound effects of “Yellow Submarine”, the sitar of “Love You To”, the blurry guitars of “She Said, She Said”, and above all the seagull chanting, buzzing drones, megaphone vocals, free-association philosophizing, and varispeed tape effects of “Tomorrow Never Knows”
John Lennon
August 5, 1966: John Lennon explained/defended/apologized about statement that Beatles are more popular than Jesus, (Beatles, see Aug 12; see Lennon controversy for more)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
Black History
INDEPENDENCE DAY
August 5, 1960: Burkina Faso independent from France. [BBC profile] (see Aug 7)
Nelson Mandela
August 5, 1962: authorities arrested Mandela he after returned to South Africa from a trip abroad. At the time of his arrest, he had been living underground for 17 months. He was convicted of leaving the country illegally and incitement to strike, and sentenced to five years in prison. (SA/A, see Nov 5; NM, see July 11, 1963)
Harlem Riot
August 5, 1964: William Epton, the chairman of the Progressive Labor Movement in Harlem, arrested on charges of advocating criminal anarchy. Part of the evidence was a speech Epton gave on July 18. (see Aug 28 – 30)
MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR
August 5, 1966: King and other marchers from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference were hit with rocks as they marched through white neighborhoods in Chicago, protesting racial discrimination in housing. [Chicago Tribune article] (BH, see Aug 7; MLK, see March 25, 1967)
Eric Clapton
August 5, 1976: Eric Clapton made a drunken declaration of support for former Conservative minister Enoch Powell (known for his anti-immigration Rivers of Blood speech) at a concert in Birmingham. Clapton told the crowd that England had “become overcrowded” and that they should vote for Powell to stop Britain from becoming “a black colony”.
He also told the audience that Britain should “get the foreigners out, get the wogs out, get the coons out”, and then he repeatedly shouted the National Front slogan “Keep Britain White”. [2018 Daily Beast article apology] (see “in September 1976”)
John Crawford III
August 5, 2014: police shot and killed 22-year-old John Crawford III inside a Beavercreek, Ohio, Walmart. Crawford was carrying an air rifle that he had picked up inside the store. Cops were called to investigate a man waving what could be a firearm. Police said Crawford refused to put down the gun and turned toward them in a threatening way. Lawyers representing Crawford’s family say the officers were reckless and negligent.
A grand jury voted not to indict either of the officers involved in the killing. (see Aug 8)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
Nuclear/Chemical News
21.1 megatons
August 5, 1962: Soviet Union above ground nuclear test. 21.1 megatons. (CW, see Aug 17; NN, see Aug 25)
Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty
August 5, 1963: Britain, America and Russia signed a Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty at Moscow to prohibit nuclear weapons tests “or any other nuclear explosion” in the atmosphere, in outer space, and under water. Underground nuclear explosions must not cause “radioactive debris to be present outside the territorial limits” their own country. The nuclear powers thus demonstrated a common goal to “an end to the contamination of man’s environment by radioactive substances.” The treaty was the result of over eight years of negotiations resolving issues of verification and deep-seated differences in attitudes to arms control and security. A total of 108 countries had signed before the LNTB Treaty entered into force 10 Oct 1963. [2009 Wired article] (see June 23, 1965)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
Clarence Earl Gideon
August 5, 1963: Gideon had chosen W. Fred Turner to be his lawyer for his second trial. Turner picked apart the testimony of eyewitness Henry Cook. Turner also got a statement from the cab driver who took Gideon from Bay Harbor, Florida to a bar in Panama City, Florida, stating that Gideon was carrying neither wine, beer nor Coke when he picked him up, even though Cook had testified that he watched Gideon walk from the pool hall to the phone, then wait for a cab. Furthermore, although in the first trial Gideon had not cross-examined the cab driver about his statement that Gideon had told him to keep the taxi ride a secret, Turner’s cross-examination revealed that Gideon had said that to the cab driver previously because “he had trouble with his wife.” The jury acquitted Gideon after one hour of deliberation. (see Gideon for expanded story)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
Vietnam
August 5, 1964: during Operation Pierce Arrow, LTJG Everett Alvarez Jr.’s plane was shot down in the immediate aftermath of the Gulf of Tonkin Incident. Alvarez endured eight years and seven months of brutal captivity by the North Vietnamese at the Hỏa Lò Prison (sarcastically known as the “Hanoi Hilton” by fellow POWs), in which he was repeatedly beaten and tortured. Alvarez was especially esteemed by his fellow prisoners because he was for almost a year the only aviator prisoner of war. He was held prisoner until February 1973. [PBS interview] (see Aug 7)
Da Nang
August 5, 1965: the Viet Cong attacked a petroleum storage facility near Da Nang, destroying 40 percent of the facility and almost 2 million gallons of fuel. (see Aug 12)
POW release
August 5, 1969: North Vietnam released three American prisoners of war to activist Rennie Davis. The servicemen were: Air Force Capt. Wesley L. Rumble, 26, of Oroville, Calif.; Navy seaman Douglas B. Hegdahl, 22, of Clark, S.D.; and Navy Lt (j.g.) Robert Frishman, 28, of Santee, Calif. (Vietnam, see Aug 19; POWs see Sept 2)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
LGBTQ
Lonesome Cowboys raid
August 5, 1969: Atlanta police raided Ansley Mall Mini-Cinema during showing of Andy Warhol’s movie, Lonesome Cowboys. The movie was controversial due to its positive portrayal of homosexuality.
Police handcuffed the theater’s owner and his projectionist and arrested several other theater patrons—gay men, lesbians and drag queens among them—for charges ranging from public indecency to illegal drug possession. The police chief later confirmed that the raid was designed to weed out “known homosexuals.”
Soon after the raid, the Georgia Gay Liberation Front was formed. [Smithsonian article] (see May 1970)
Gene Robinson
August 5, 2003: Gene Robinson, an openly gay man, was elected bishop-designate of New Hampshire by the Episcopal General Convention during its meeting in Minneapolis. This election sparked outrage by conservative Anglican Churches around the world and initiated moves towards a schism within Episcopal Church and conservative, evangelical churches tried to distances themselves from a leadership they felt had descended into heresy. (see Aug 14)
Texas
August 5, 2015: U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia ordered Texas officials to recognize on a state death certificate the surviving spouse in a same-sex marriage whose husband died earlier in the year.
The case came as states such as Texas, which had barred same-sex marriage, grappled with changes brought by the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision in June that made gay marriage legal in the United States.
Texas, where Republican leaders had tried to push back against gay marriage, had balked at recognizing John Stone-Hoskins as the surviving spouse on the death certificate of James Stone-Hoskins, according to court documents. Garcia ordered defendants including Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Republican, and the state’s acting health commissioner to appear in his court next week as he considered whether they should be held in contempt. [Reuters article] (see Aug 10)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
Watergate Scandal
August 5, 1974: the “smoking gun” tape of June 23, 1972, was revealed, in which U.S. President Richard M. Nixon and White House Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman discuss using the CIA to block a Federal Bureau of Investigation inquiry into Watergate. Nixon’s support in Congress collapses. (see Watergate for expanded story)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
US Labor History
August 5, 1981: President Ronald Reagan fired the striking members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO), calling the work stoppage illegal. Reagan’s action and the demise of the union set a new tone for labor-management relations across the country. Employers begin to take tough stands against unions and did not hesitate to replace strikers with replacements. The decline in union membership accelerated. [NPR article] (see Oct 22)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
Feminism
August 5, 1993: signed into law by President Clinton on February 5, 1993, the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) became effective. The Act allows eligible employees to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave in a 12-month period for medical reasons, for the birth or adoption of a child, or for the care of a child, spouse, or parent who has a serious health issue. [US DoL article] (next Feminism see December 10, 1993)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
Hurricane Katrina
August 5, 2011: Katrina shootings and cover-up: Guilty verdicts were handed down for Bowen, Gisevius, Faulcon, Villavaso and Kaufman (see April 4, 2012)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE
August 5, 2014: the American Humanist Association demanded that the Missouri National Guard stop offering Bibles to new recruits at its recruiting station in St. Louis.
The Association, a Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group, also requested the New Testaments volumes displayed in the building be removed.
“Numerous cases have ruled that when the government offers biblical literature, even if done indirectly, it is an unconstitutional endorsement of religion,” Monica Miller, an attorney for the association’s Appignani Humanist Legal Center, wrote in a letter to the General Services Administration and to the Missouri National Guard. The GSA owns the building housing the Guard recruiting station and other military offices. [Washington Times article] (see Sept 18)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
Environmental Issues
Plains All American Pipeline spill
August 5, 2015: more than two months after crude oil from a ruptured pipeline fouled California beaches, Plains All American Pipeline disclosed that the volume of the spill might be far larger than earlier projected. Plains had estimated that the May 19 spill west of Santa Barbara released up to 101,000 gallons. But in documents made public Wednesday, the Texas-based company said alternate calculations found the spill might have been up to 143,000 gallons, or about 40 percent larger. [NYT article search results]
Colorado mine wastewater spill
August 5, 2015: environmental officials in Colorado worked to clean up one million gallons of wastewater containing heavy metals that spilled from an abandoned mine, turning an adjoining river a murky, mustard shade of yellow.
The Environmental Protection Agency caused the spill while it was investigating a leak at the Gold King Mine. The wastewater flowed into Cement Creek, a tributary of the Animas River in southwestern Colorado, and snaked through the river toward New Mexico. E.P.A. officials confirmed the leak contained heavy metals, including lead and arsenic, but said it was too early to know whether there was a health risk to humans or animals. The river was closed for recreational and other uses, but officials said water sources should be safe.
“The orange color is alarming to people, but that is not an indication in any way of a health risk,” said Joan Card, an official with Region 8 of the E.P.A. Testing is ongoing, she said.
Martin Hestmark, an assistant regional administrator with the agency, estimated that the wastewater was flowing at about a few hundred gallons per minute. The E.P.A. diverted the wastewater to treatment ponds it is building. [2016 NPR story] (see Sept 2)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
Voting Rights
August 5, 2015: a federal appeals panel ruled that a strict voter identification law in Texas discriminated against blacks and Hispanics and violated the Voting Rights Act of 1965 — a decision that election experts called an important step toward defining the reach of the landmark law.
The case was one of a few across the country that was being closely watched in legal circles after a 2013 Supreme Court decision that blocked the voting act’s most potent enforcement tool, federal oversight of election laws in numerous states, including Texas, with histories of racial discrimination.
While the federal act still banned laws that suppress minority voting, it had been uncertain exactly what kinds of measures cross the legal line since that Supreme Court ruling.
The Texas ID law was one of the strictest of its kind in the country. It required voters to bring a government-issued photo ID to the polls. Accepted forms of identification included a driver’s license, a United States passport, a concealed-handgun license and an election identification certificate issued by the State Department of Public Safety. [NYT article] (see Aug 11)
Crime and Punishment
August 5, 2020: Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds signed an executive order restoring voting rights to tens of thousands of Iowans with felony convictions ahead of the November election.
Reynolds’ order restored voting rights to felons who have completed their sentence, including probation, parole and special sentences that are associated with sex offenses. Reynolds’ order does not require payment of victim restitution or any other fines or fees as a condition of being able to vote, a point of contention in Florida that has been caught up in court.
The order did not automatically restore voting rights to people convicted of murder, manslaughter, and other felony offenses included in Iowa’s homicide code. Iowans who don’t get their voting rights automatically restored upon completing their sentence can apply to the governor for individual rights restoration. [NPR story] (next C & P, see Sept 11; next VR, see Aug 18)
August 5 Peace Love Art Activism
TERRORISM
Dar Al Farooq mosque
August 5, 2017: an early-morning blast rocked the Dar Al Farooq mosque in Bloomington, MN.
Minnas worshipers had just begun to gather inside for morning prayers.
No injuries were reported. The building sustained damage to its front, and photographs from the scene showed a large shattered window, singed blinds and charring around the outside. [NYT atricle] (T, see Aug 12; Bloomington, see March 13, 2018)
Cesar Sayoc, Jr
August 5, 2019: Cesar A. Sayoc Jr., the fervent supporter of President Trump who rattled the nation when he sent homemade pipe bombs to former President Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and other prominent Democrats, was sentenced to 20 years in prison. [NYT article] (next T, see Sept 4)
August 4, 1862: increasingly discontented over the loss of land, non-payment of annuities, past broken treaties, food shortages and famine following crop failure, representatives of the northern Sissetowan and Wahpeton Dakota bands met at the Upper Sioux Agency in the northwestern part of the reservation and successfully negotiated to obtain food. (see February 8, 1887)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
World War I
August 4, 1914: at midnight, Britain declared war on Germany, marking the official beginning of World War I. (see Nov 29, 1914)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
The Cold War
August 4, 1960: an FBI memo on this day ordered the Bureau’s illegal COINTELPRO program to disrupt organizations advocating independence for Puerto Rico. COINTELPRO, created on March 8, 1956, was a secret program that engaged in a variety of illegal activities against targeted organizations, including wiretaps, burglaries, theft, the forging of documents, and the dissemination of disruptive disinformation.
COINTELPRO was originally directed at the Communist Party and other Marxist groups, but was later expanded to target the Ku Klux Klan, on July 30, 1964, and “New Left” political groups on May 9, 1968. (see Aug 17)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
Black History
Dixon v. Alabama State Board of Education
August 4, 1961: US District court decided that although no rule existed requiring formal charges or a hearing, Alabama State College’s usual practice had been to grant a hearing to students prior to decisions of expulsion. The Court reasoned that any governmental acting to cause injury to an individual must adhere to Constitutional due process requirements. The minimum requirements of due process are to be determined by the circumstances and interests of the parties involved in the action. Actions of the government cannot be arbitrary.
On February 25, 2010, in a ceremony commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the sit-in, Alabama State University (formerly Alabama State College) President William Harris reinstated the nine students, criticized Governor Patterson’s “arbitrary, illegal and intrusive” role in forcing the expulsions, and praised the student protest as “an important moment in civil rights history.” [Justia article] (BH, see Sept 29; SR, see April 6, 1963)
Race Revolt
August 4, 1964: Jersey City revolt ended after the third night of unrest when city officials dispatched 400 police officers to the streets. That same night, black clergy traveled through the city urging an end to the riots using NAACP bullhorns and sound equipment to announce that one of the community’s demands had been met: the city had agreed to re-open two closed local parks.
The Jersey City revolt, one of the first race riots to occur after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, left 46 people injured, 71 homes and businesses damaged, and 52 people arrested. [Black Past article] (RR, see Aug 5)
Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner
August 4, 1964: (Neshoba Country, Miss.) the bodies of the three civil-rights workers—two white, one black [James E. Chaney, 21; Andrew Goodman, 21; and Michael Schwerner, 24] were found in an earthen dam, six weeks into a federal investigation backed by President Johnson. (BH, see Aug 28; see Murders for expanded story)
Medgar Evers assassination
August 4, 1992: Jackson, Mississippi. Judge, L. Breland Hilburn of Hinds County Circuit Court, refused Byron De La Beckwith’s request to let him go free because of deteriorating health and memory. (Evers, see August 24)
Rodney King twice
August 4, 1992: a federal grand jury returned indictments against Sgt. Stacey Koon and officers Laurence Michael Powell, Timothy Wind, and Theodore Briseno on the charge of violating the civil rights of Rodney King. (King, see Feb 25, 1993)
August 4, 1993: U.S. District Judge John Davies sentenced both Sgt. Stacey Koon and Laurence Michael Powell to 30 months in prison for violating King’s civil rights. Powell was found guilty of violating King’s constitutional right to be free from an arrest made with “unreasonable force.” Ranking officer Koon is convicted of permitting the civil rights violation to occur. (BH, see Feb 5, 1994; King, see April 19, 1994)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
Clarence Earl Gideon
August 4, 1961: being too poor to pay for counsel, Gideon was forced to defend himself at his trial after being denied a lawyer by his trial judge, Robert McCrary, Jr.. Gideon was tried and convicted of breaking and entering with intent to commit petty larceny (see Gideon for expanded story)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
Vietnam & Daniel Ellsberg/Pentagon Papers
August 4, 1964: the “second” Gulf of Tonkin incident. It turned out that North Vietnamese “boats” were radar ghosts.”
Daniel Ellsberg started working for the Defense Department as assistant to John McNaughton (assistant secretary of defense and a close advisor to McNamara) The validity of Johnson’s claim…
…was later questioned, and it comes to be considered one of many presidential lies that led to U.S. escalation in Vietnam. (Vietnam, see Aug 5; see DE/PP for expanded story)
LBJ a bit upset
August 4, 1965: President Johnson called CBS president Frank Stanton and asked, “Frank, are you trying to fuck me?” (see Aug 5)
Henry H. Howe
August 4, 1967: the U.S. Court of Military Appeals in Washington upheld the 1965 court-martial of Second Lieutenant Henry H. Howe, who had been sentenced to dismissal from the service and a year at hard labor for participating in an antiwar demonstration. (see Aug 7)
Secret talk
August 4, 1969: American envoy Henry Kissinger held a secret talk with two North Vietnamese negotiators. The North Vietnamese remained immovable. Kissinger reminded them of Nixon’s July 15 warned about a breakthrough before November. (Vietnam, see Aug 30)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
The [bumpy] Road to Bethel
August 4, 1969: Don Ganoung presented the Bethel Medical Center with a check for $10,000; officers of the Peace Service Corps moved into their headquarters on Lake Street. (see Chronology for expanded story)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
Arthur Bremer
August 4, 1972, a jury of six men and six women took just over an hour and a half to reach their guilty verdict. Arthur Bremer was sentenced to 63 years in prison for shooting George Wallace and three other people on May 15, 1972. [2015 Washington Post article] (see Sept 28)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
Jack Kevorkian
August 4, 1993: Thomas Hyde, a 30-year-old Novi, Michigan, man with ALS, is found dead in Kevorkian’s van on Belle Isle, a Detroit park. (see JK for expanded story)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
Dissolution of Yugoslavia
August 4, 1994: Serb-dominated Yugoslavia withdrew its support for Bosnian Serbs, sealing the 300-mile border between Yugoslavia and Serb-held Bosnia. (see July 11 – 22, 1995)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
LGBTQ
Proposition 8
August 4, 2010: Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker ruled that Proposition 8, the 2008 referendum that banned same-sex marriage in California, violates the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause. “Proposition 8 singles out gays and lesbians and legitimates their unequal treatment,” Vaughn wrote in his opinion. “Proposition 8 perpetuates the stereotype that gays and lesbians are incapable of forming long-term loving relationships and that gays and lesbians are not good parents.” [CNN article] (see Sept 21)
Florida gay marriage
August 4, 2014: Florida State Circuit Judge Dale Cohen in Broward County made history, ordering the state of Florida to recognize gay marriages performed in another state. Cohen’s ruling was the third in as many weeks by a Florida judge who ruled that the state’s ban on gay marriage was unconstitutional.
This one was unique, however, because it was the first requiring the state to recognize a gay marriage conducted elsewhere.
The other two – one July 17 by a judge in Monroe County and another July 25 by a Miami-Dade judge – only required local clerks of court to begin issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. (see Sept 3)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
Women’s Health
Alabama/Abortion
August 4, 2014: in a 172-page decision United States District Judge Myron H. Thompson rejected as unconstitutional an Alabama law requiring doctors at abortion clinics to have admitting privileges at local hospitals.
The requirement, adopted by the legislature in 2013, would have forced three of Alabama’s five abortion clinics to close, severely restricting access to abortions while not providing significant medical benefits..
The ruling added to a swirl of contradictory court decisions on the requirement of admitting privileges, especially in the South where abortion opponents had promoted such laws in the name of patient safety. Advocates of abortion rights called the requirement a transparent effort to close clinics.
Major national medical associations had said that requiring admitting privileges were medically unnecessary because in the rare emergency, hospitals would accept patients and specialists would provide treatment. [NYT article] (see Aug 28)
FDA Approves Zurzuvae
August 4, 2023: federal health officials approved the first pill specifically intended to treat severe depression after childbirth, a condition that affects thousands of new mothers in the U.S. each year.
The Food and Drug Administration granted approval of the drug, Zurzuvae, for adults experiencing severe depression related to childbirth or pregnancy. The pill is taken once a day for 14 days.
“Having access to an oral medication will be a beneficial option for many of these women coping with extreme, and sometimes life-threatening, feelings,” said Dr. Tiffany Farchione, FDA’s director of psychiatric drugs, in a statement. [NPR article] (next WH, see Aug 8)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
Sexual Abuse of Children
August 4, 2015: the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Milwaukee said that it would pay $21 million to more than 300 victims of clergy abuse in a settlement that would end a four-year bankruptcy proceeding.
The proposed deal, which would be part of a reorganization plan submitted to a bankruptcy court later this month, was to be reviewed by a judge overseeing the case at a Nov. 9 hearing. Archbishop Jerome Listecki called the settlement a “new Pentecost,” but an attorney for the victims, along with advocates for those abused by clergy, decried the settlement as a paltry amount. [Chicago Tribune article] (March 1, 2016)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE
August 4, 2016: in November 2013, Shannon Morgan, a resident of Leesburg, N.J., applied for a license plate that read “8THIEST.” The DMV denied the application because the plate “may carry connotations offensive to good taste and decency,” according to court papers.
After she received that rejection, Ms. Morgan used the state’s online application form to apply for a plate that said “BAPTIST” and was quickly approved, said Richard B. Katskee, the legal director for Americans United for Separation of Church and State, an advocacy group in Washington that acted as her legal counsel. It sued the commission in April 2014.
Under the terms of the settlement agreement, Ms. Morgan will receive the license plate she requested in 2013 once she reapplied and sent in the usual application fee of $50. The commission also paid her $75,000 in legal fees. (see May 1, 2017)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
Iraq War II
August 4, 2017: a federal appeals court threw out the lengthy sentences for three former Blackwater Worldwide security contractors and ordered a new trial for a fourth man involved in a deadly 2007 shooting in Baghdad.
The shooting injured or killed at least 31 civilians and made Blackwater a symbol of unchecked, freewheeling American power in Iraq.
Firing from heavily armored trucks, the contractors unleashed a torrent of machine gun fire and launched grenades into a crowded traffic circle. An F.B.I. agent one called it the “My Lai massacre of Iraq.”
Three men, Dustin L. Heard, Evan S. Liberty and Paul A. Slough, were convicted in 2014 of voluntary manslaughter and using a machine gun to carry out a violent crime. They were sentenced to 30 years in prison, a mandatory sentence on the machine-gun charge. [Washington Post article] (see October 22, 2014)
A fourth man, Nicholas A. Slatten, a sniper who the government said fired the first shots, was convicted of murder and received a life sentence.
Voting Rights
August 4, 2023: in an emphatic 2-to-1 opinion, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled that Mississippi’s lifetime ban on voting for people convicted of a range of felonies was cruel and unusual punishment that violates the Eighth Amendment and “is at odds with society’s evolving standards of decency.”
The ruling upbraided Mississippi officials for what it called a pointless “denial of the democratic core of American citizenship.”
“Mississippi denies this precious right to a large class of its citizens, automatically, mechanically, and with no thought given to whether it is proportionate as punishment for an amorphous and partial list of crimes,” the judges wrote. [NYT article] (next VR, see Nov 17)
August 4 Peace Love Art Activism
What's so funny about peace, love, art, and activism?
