January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

US Labor History

President Andrew Jackson

January 29, 1834: Andrew Jackson became the first president to use federal troops to quell labor unrest. the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal construction teams consisted primarily of Irish, German, Dutch and black workers who, with primitive tools, were forced to work long hours for low wages in dangerous conditions. Fed up, the workers rioted on January 29, but were quickly put down by federal troops. The move set precedent for future labor-management relations. When labor uprisings increased toward and into the turn of the century, business leaders were confident in the knowledge that they could turn to local, state or federal government leaders to head off labor unrest. (see Feb 20)

President Barak Obama

January 29, 2009: President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act, which allowed victims of pay discrimination to file a complaint with the government against their employer within 180 days of their last paycheck. Previously, victims (most often women) were only allowed 180 days from the date of the first unfair paycheck.  (White House archive article) (see Feb 24)

Trump guts DoD unions

January 29, 2020:  Yahoo News reported that President Trump had officially granted the Department of Defense the legal authority to abolish the collective bargaining rights of its civilian labor  unions  representing some 750,000 workers.

Such authority would provide “maximum flexibility,” Trump wrote in a memo in the Federal Register,.  Trump invoked “national security” to justify granting the Defense Department an exemption from the law giving all federal workers the right to unionize.

“When new missions emerge or existing ones evolve, the Department of Defense requires maximum flexibility to respond to threats to carry out its mission of protecting the American people,” Trump wrote in the memo. “Where collective bargaining is incompatible with these organizations’ missions, the Department of Defense should not be forced to sacrifice its national security mission.” (next LH, see January 4, 2021)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

BLACK HISTORY

January 29, 1877: Shortly before President Ulysses S Grant left office, an Electoral Commission was created to settle the disputed 1876 presidential election between Republican Rutherford B. Hayes and Democrat Samuel J. Tilden. Democrats agreed to give Hayes the presidency on the understanding that the federal government would remove its troops from the former Confederate states.

This compromise — or as some historians have it, betrayal — marked the end of Reconstruction.

“The phase that began in 1877 was inaugurated by … the abandonment of the Negro as a ward of the nation,” historian C. Vann Woodward wrote in his 1955 book, “The Strange Career of Jim Crow.” (next BH, see Apr 24)

Pace v. Alabama

January 29, 1883:  the US Supreme Court affirmed in Pace v. Alabama, that Alabama’s anti-miscegenation statute was constitutional.

The plaintiff, Tony Pace, an African-American man, and Mary Cox, a white woman, were residents of the state of Alabama, who had been arrested in 1881 because their sexual relationship violated the state’s anti-miscegenation statute. They were charged with living together “in a state of adultery or fornication” and both sentenced to two years imprisonment in the state penitentiary in 1882.

They could not marry each other under Alabama law. Interracial marital sex was deemed a felony, whereas extramarital sex (“adultery or fornication”) was only a misdemeanor. Because of the criminalization of interracial relationships, they were penalized more severely for their extramarital relationship than if they had been both whites or both black. The Alabama code stated:

“If any white person and any negro, or the descendant of any negro to the third generation, inclusive, through one ancestor of each generation was a white person, intermarry or live in adultery or fornication with each other, each of them must, on conviction, be imprisoned in the penitentiary or sentenced to hard labor for the county for not less than two nor more than seven years.” (see Oct 15)

Montgomery Bus Boycott

January 29, 1956: Martin Luther King, Jr fined for driving thirty miles an hour in a twenty-five mile zone. (see MBB for expanded chronology) (next BH, see Feb 2)

George Whitmore, Jr

January 29, 1965: Kings County DA Aaron E. Koota met with five representatives of the Brooklyn N.A.A.C.P. who demand that he dismiss the indictment against Whitmore for the Minnie Edmonds murder. Koota refused and told the press that Whitmore’s “guilt or innocence of this crime should be determined by a jury based on all the evidence in the case.” (see Whitmore for expanded story)

137 shots

January 29, 2013: Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson, Safety Director Martin Flask, and Chief Michael McGrath reported that at least 63 Cleveland Police cars were involved in the pursuit or played some role in the chase that ended with police firing 137 shots and killing Timothy Russell and  Malissa Williams.  (see 137 for expanded coverage)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

Native Americans

Mixed Bloods

With the Nelson Act of 1905, the United States federal government had taken control over the education of the Alaska territory’s Native children and appointed the Alaskan territorial government to oversee the education of “white children and children of mixed blood who lead a civilized life.” Soon after, four children of “mixed blood” petitioned the Alaska Federal District Court for a writ of mandamus requiring the Sitka School District to admit the students to the locally controlled schools established by the Nelson Act. The schools in Sitka served white children and had refused to allow the “mixed blood” pupils to enroll.

On January 29, 1908, the District Court issued its ruling. Reasoning that Congress understood that “where mixed bloods live among and associate with the uncivilized, they become subject to and influenced by their environment as naturally as water seeks its level,” the Court held that Congress only intended the Nelson Act to mandate the enrollment of “mixed bloods” who: “Had for themselves, or, in cases where they were minors living with parents or guardians, the parents or guardians had, put off the rude customs, modes of life, and associations, and taken up their abode and life free from an environment which retarded their development in lines of progressive living, systematic labor, individual ownership and accumulation of property, intellectual activity, and well–defined and respected domestic and social relations.”

In contrast, the Court reasoned, children in families “which preferred the other life, without its attendant responsibilities and obligations to society at large, was provided a system of education under the control of the Secretary of the Interior, more appropriate to their undeveloped mental condition, and through which they could, in view of their surroundings, be better instructed.”

Applying this new rule to the case at hand, the Court went on to analyze pictures of the parents, their clothing, residence, place of worship, associates, and occupation to determine whether the families, in fact, led civilized lives. The Court concluded that the children and their families were not civilized and not entitled to admission to the Sitka schools, and that they were required to instead attend the federally-run, assimilation-focused schools for Native children.  (see April 6, 1917)

Chief Wahoo

January 29, 2018: the Cleveland Indians baseball organization announced that it would stop using the Chief Wahoo logo on their uniforms beginning in 2019, according to Major League Baseball, which said the popular symbol was no longer appropriate for use on the field.

The cartoonish caricature of a Native American that has assumed several forms over the years, first appeared on the Indians’ uniforms in 1948.

Phillip Yenyo, the executive director of the American Indian Movement of Ohio, cheered the decision as, “another step in the right direction,” but lamented that it was being put off for a year.” (see Feb 23)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

ADA

The Seeing Eye

January 29, 1929: The Seeing Eye was incorporated in Nashville, TN. Its purpose was to train dogs to guide the blind.

League for the Physically Handicapped

In 1935: to protest the fact that their requests for employment with the Works Progress Administration (WPA) had been stamped ‘PH’ (physically handicapped), 300 members of the League for the Physically Handicapped staged a nine-day sit in at the Home Relief Bureau of New York City. Eventually, they help secure several thousand jobs nationwide. The League of the Physically Handicapped is accepted as the first organization of people with disabilities by people with disabilities. (see August 14, 1935)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

Environmental Issues

Olga Owens Huckins

January 29, 1958: the Boston Herald printed a letter from Olga Owens Huckins attacking the pesticide DDT as dangerous. She also wrote to her friend Rachel Carson, which prompted Carson to write ‘Silent Spring.’   (see August 29, 1962)

Ozone

January 29, 1978: Sweden became the first country to outlaw aerosol sprays. The ban was enacted to address the harmful effects of aerosol on the Earth’s ozone layer.  (NYT article) (see December 11, 1980)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

January 29 Music et al

Bob Dylan

January 29, 1961: Dylan visited Woody Guthrie (see Dylan for more) (next Dylan, see Apr 11)

We Can Work It Out

January 29 – February 4, 1966: ”We Can Work It Out” by the Beatles #1 on the Billboard Hot 100.

Sound City Acid Test

January 29, 1966 : Acid Test at Sound City Studios in San Francisco. (see February)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

Nuclear News

January 29, 1964: Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb opened. The movie’s popularity was evidence of changing attitudes toward atomic weapons and the concept of nuclear deterrence. (see May 24)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

Vietnam

More $

January 29, 1968: President Johnson asked for $26.3 billion to continue the war in Vietnam and announced an increase in taxes. Johnson had been given a glowing report on progress in the war from Gen. William Westmoreland. Westmoreland stated in a speech before the National Press Club that, “We have reached an important point when the end begins to come into view. I am absolutely certain that, whereas in 1965 the enemy was winning, today he is certainly losing. The enemy’s hopes are bankrupt.”  (see Jan 30)

Weather Underground

January 29, 1975: the Weather Underground bombed the U.S. State Department main office in Washington, D.C.  (Vietnam, see “March 1 and following”; WU, see December 3, 1980)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

Symbionese Liberation Army

January 29, 1979: Twenty-two months into her seven-year term, President Carter commuted the sentence of Patty Hearst. (see June 16, 1999)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

CLINTON IMPEACHMENT

January 29, 1998: the judge in the Paula Jones lawsuit ruled that Monica Lewinsky was “not essential to the core issues” of the Jones case, and ordered that all evidence related to Lewinsky be excluded from the Jones proceedings. (see Clinton for expanded story)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

Women’s Health

Eric Rudolph

January 29, 1998: Eric Rudolph bombed an abortion clinic in Birmingham, Alabama killing a Birmingham police officer and part-time clinic security guard Robert Sanderson, and critically injuring nurse Emily Lyons. (see May 31, 2003)

Dr George Tiller

On May 31, 2009, Scott Roeder had assassinated women’s health care provider Dr George Tiller.  On January 29, 2010 a jury returned a verdict of guilty for Roeder on charges of one count first-degree murder and two counts of aggravated assault after less than 40 minutes of deliberation. (NYT article) (WH & Terrorism, see April 1)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

Free Speech

January 29, 2010: Culpeper County Public Schools in Virginia decided on this date to discontinue using the newest edition of the diary of Anne Frank, officially The Diary of a Young Girl: The Definitive Edition. The 50th anniversary edition contains sections not in previous editions and, according to the school district, some parents objected to her candid discussion of her emerging sexuality.

The Diary of Anne Frank, as it is generally known, is widely regarded as a classic of modern literature. It is the diary of a young Jewish girl who, along with her family, was hidden from the Nazis in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Her diary covers the period from June 1942 to August 1944. The family was exposed in 1944, and Anne and her sister eventually died of disease at the Bergen Belsen extermination camp. Her father Otto Frank survived and arranged for the publication of Anne’s diary.

Over the years, a number of  schools and libraries has banned or challenged  the book. In 1983, the Alabama State Textbook Committee argued that the book should be rejected for classroom use because it is “a real downer.  (see March 2, 2011)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

Immigration History

January 29, 2017: Reince Priebus, the White House chief of staff, appeared to reverse a key part of President Trump’s immigration order saying that people from the affected countries who hold green cards would not be prevented from returning to the United States. Priebus also said that border agents had “discretionary authority” to detain and question suspicious travelers from certain countries. That statement seemed to add to the uncertainty over how the executive order will be interpreted and enforced in the days ahead.

Part of the president’s order gave preferential treatment to Christians who tried to enter the United States from majority-Muslim countries. In a Twitter post, Mr. Trump deplored the killings of Christians in the Middle East without noting the killings of Muslims, who have been killed in vastly greater numbers in Iraq, Syria and elsewhere. (NYT video) (see Jan 30)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

Trump Impeachment

January 29, 2020:  the NYT reported that the White House and Senate Republicans had worked aggressively to discount damaging revelations from John R. Bolton and line up the votes to block new witnesses from testifying in President Trump’s impeachment trial, in a push to bring the proceeding to a swift close.

As the Senate opened a two-day, 16-hour period of questioning from senators, Mr. Trump laced into Mr. Bolton, his former national security adviser, whose unpublished manuscript contains an account that contradicts his impeachment defense. The president described Mr. Bolton on Twitter as a warmonger who had “begged” for his job, was fired, and then wrote “a nasty & untrue book.” (next TI, see Jan 30 or see Trump for expanded chronology)

January 29 Peace Love Art Activism

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

BLACK HISTORY

Adam Crosswhite

January 27, 1847: more than 100 citizens of Marshall, Michigan, helped Adam Crosswhite and his family, who had escaped slavery, to flee to Canada rather than be captured by bounty hunters. Crosswhite and his family had fled a Kentucky plantation after he learned his four children were going to be sold. When a deputy sheriff arrived, he wound up arresting the bounty hunters, rather than the Crosswhite family, which made it safely to Canada. Later, the family returned to Marshall. Crosswhite’s escape played a part in the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. (see Feb 16)

see Montgomery Bus Boycott for expanded story

January 27, 1956: ML King received a threatening phone call. (next BH, see Feb 2)

Medgar W. Evers assassination

January 27, 1964: The State prosecution accepted a full slate of white men to sit as a jury in the case of Byron De La Beckwith, accused of the rifle slaying of Medgar W. Evers on June 12, 1963.  (BH, see Jan 31; ME, see Feb 5)

see George Whitmore, Jr for expanded story

January 27, 1965: The New York Times quotes an unnamed assistant to NY County DA Frank Hogan as saying, “I am positive that the police prepared the confession for George Whitmore, Jr., just as his lawyer charged a few days ago. I am also sure that the police were the ones who gave Whitmore all the details of the killings that he recited to our office.”

Robert Lacey, Black and shot

January 27, 1967:Jefferson County, Alabama sheriff deputies went to the home of Robert Lacey, a black father of six, because Mr. Lacey had failed to take the family dog to the veterinarian after it bit a neighborhood child. The health department had instructed the family to take the dog in for a rabies test, but the family did not own a car and had no means of transporting the animal.

The deputies knocked at the door as Mr. Lacey was getting out of the shower, and when he answered the door they told him to get dressed and go with them. Mr. Lacey asked why and told the deputies to just take the dog. The deputies said they weren’t interested in the dog and told him to get dressed. As Mr. Lacey was doing so, a gun he kept in his dresser fell to the floor. In response, the deputies pushed Mr. Lacey against the wall and attempted to handcuff him. Mr. Lacey offered to walk to the car with them, but one of the deputies said, “Boy, you gonna leave here with handcuffs on, dead or alive.”

Mr. Lacey was a large man; as the deputies attempted to wrestle him down, one of them fell to the ground and the other then shot Mr. Lacey in the leg. The deputies later claimed Mr. Lacey lunged at them before the second shot, but Mr. Lacey’s family insisted Mr. Lacey fell to the ground before the deputy shot him again, “between the eyes.” Neighbors who ran to the house after the shooting were instructed by police to move the body before the coroner arrived.

Lacey’s death marked the second black man killed by Jefferson County law enforcement within nine days, and would be one of ten total law enforcement killings of black men in the Birmingham, Alabama, area within a 14 month period spanning from 1966 to 1967. (see Feb 6)

Eldon Avenue Axle Plant Revolutionary Union Movement

January 27, 1969: a group of Detroit African-American auto workers known as the Eldon Avenue Axle Plant Revolutionary Union Movement led a wildcat strike against racism and bad working conditions. They were critical of both automakers and the UAW, condemning the seniority system and grievance procedures as racist.  (LH, see Dec 31; BH, see Mar 10)

Irene Morgan

On July 16, 1944 Irene Morgan, 27, recovering from a miscarriage, and traveling by bus from Virginia to Baltimore for a doctor’s appointment, refused to relinquish her seat [as well as another black woman] to a white couple.

The driver, angered by Morgan’s refusal, drove the bus to the Middlesex County town of Saluda and stopped outside the jail. A sheriff’s deputy came aboard and told Morgan that he had a warrant for her arrest. She continued to refuse and had to be physically subdued. She was jailed for resisting arrest and violating Virginia’s segregation law.

On June 3, 1946, in Morgan v. Commonwealth of Virginia, the U.S Supreme Court (6 – 1 decision) found in favor of Irene Morgan, calling segregated seating on interstate buses an “impermissible burden on interstate commerce.”

On January 27, 2001: President Bill Clinton presented the Presidential Citizens Medal to Irene Morgan. (2007 NYT obit) (see Feb 21)

Emmett Till

January 27, 2017: in a Vanity Fair magazine article, Duke University professor Timothy B. Tyson reported that Carolyn Bryant Donham (the woman who accused Till of inappropriate behavior) told him that the story she and others told about Emmett Till were false. Tyson wrote that Donham said of her long-ago allegations—that Emmett grabbed her and was menacing and sexually crude toward her–“that part is not true.” (next BH, see Feb 11; see ET for expanded chronology)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

Technological Milestones

Incandescent lamp

January 27, 1880:  Thomas Edison received a patent for his electric incandescent lamp.  (see March 23, 1883)

Wireway

January 27, 1948: Wire Recording Corporation of America announced the first magnetic tape recorder. The ‘Wireway’ machine with a built-in oscillator sold for $149.50. (see June 21)

iPad

January 27, 2010:  Apple CEO Steve Jobs unveiled the iPad tablet computer during a presentation in San Francisco. (Video via YouTube)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

Nuclear and Chemical Weapons/News

Frenchman Flat

January 27, 1951:  the era of US atomic testing in the Nevada desert began as an Air Force plane dropped a one-kiloton bomb on Frenchman Flat. (video via YouTube) (see Mar 6)

Space treaty

January 27, 1967:  President Johnson and counterparts in London and Moscow signed the “Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space.” Signatories agree, among other points, that outer space will remain demilitarized (including nuclear weapons), no territorial claims on earth orbit or any planetary bodies will be made and that astronauts or cosmonauts who find themselves landing off course will be returned to their home countries. (see Feb 14)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

January 27 Music et al

John Coltrane

January 27, 1960: John Coltrane released “Giant Steps” album, considered a classic jazz album and one that saxophonists still measure themselves by today. The Penguin Guide.

Lindsay Planer wrote in AllMusic, “History will undoubtedly enshrine this disc as a watershed the likes of which may never truly be appreciated. “

Peppermint Twist

January 27 – Feb 16 – “Peppermint Twist” by Joey Dee & the Starlighters #1 Billboard Hot 100.

Instant Karma

January 27, 1970: John Lennon wrote and recorded “Instant Karma” In his words, “I wrote it for breakfast, recorded it for lunch and we’re putting it out for dinner.” It became the third Lennon single to appear before the official breakup of the Beatles. The only exaggeration in John’s description was the part about dinner: wasn’t actually released to the public until Feb 6. (see Instant Karma for more) (next Beatles, see Mar 8)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

Vietnam

Policy failing

January 27, 1965: President Johnson received a memorandum stating that the current Vietnam policy was clearly not working. The Viet Cong were on the move and on the rise and supplied by North Vietnam. The South Vietnam government was unstable as well. (see Feb 7)

Anti-Vietnam War ads

January 27, 1968: the subways and elevated trains in Chicago began allowing anti-Vietnam War ads on this day. The Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) had refused to carry the ads for two years. The Illinois ACLU sued on behalf of the Chicago Women for Peace and the North Shore Women for Peace, chapters of the Women Strike for Peace organizations. The federal judge dismissed the suit when the CTA capitulated and agreed to carry the ads. The ad, addressed to President Lyndon Johnson, read: “War is Not Peace. Tyranny is Not Freedom. Hate is Not Love. End the War in Vietnam.” (see Jan 29)

Paris Peace Accords

January 27, 1973: representatives of the United States, North Vietnam, and South Vietnam signed the Paris Peace Accords, ending the Vietnam War. The United States’s chief negotiator, Dr. Henry Kissinger, was awarded the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize for his role in concluding the treaty and ending hostilities. (see Jan 28)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

Space Race

January 27, 1967: a fire during routine testing of the Apollo spacecraft (scheduled to be the first manned mission of the Apollo manned lunar landing program, with a target launch date of February 21, 1967) killed three astronauts — Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chafee — in their capsule.

Immediately after the fire, NASA convened the Apollo 204 Accident Review Board to determine the cause of the fire. Although the ignition source was never conclusively identified, the astronauts’ deaths were attributed to a wide range of lethal design and construction flaws in the early Apollo Command Module. The manned phase of the project was delayed for 20 months while these problems were corrected. (Washington Post 50th anniversary article) (see Apr 20)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

Watergate Scandal

January 27, 1975: in the wake of the Watergate scandal and the attendant abuses of power by the Nixon administration, and also recent revelations of illegal CIA spying on Americans [in The New York Times on December 22, 1974], the Senate created the Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with respect to the Intelligence Agencies. Known as the Church Committee after its chair, Senator Frank Church (D–Idaho), the committee held public hearings about abuses by the intelligence agencies, and eventually published 14 reports on violations of the rights of American citizens by the intelligence agencies. The vote to create the committee was 82–4, indicating the depth of disgust over alleged abuses by the FBI and the CIA in the Senate.

The Church Committee reports are still an extremely valuable resource on the history of violations of American rights in the twentieth century. The Church Committee was paralleled by the Pike Committee, created by the House of Representatives on February 19, 1975. Following the revelations about the CIA by the Times, President Gerald Ford tried to head off Congressional investigations by creating the Rockefeller Commission to investigate the CIA on January 4, 1975, but that effort failed when Congress created the two committees.

The Church Committee hearings created sensation after sensation, with revelations of CIA assassination plots, and more. The Church Committee reports are still an invaluable source of information about the abuses of the CIA, the FBI, and other federal agencies. The reports also document the involvement of presidents, both Republican and Democratic, in approving many if not most of the abuses by the intelligence agencies. (see Watergate for its expanded story)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

LGBTQ

January 27, 1977: the Vatican reaffirmed the Roman Catholic Church’s ban on female priests. (see Mar 26)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

FREE SPEECH

January 27, 1978: the Illinois Supreme Court reversed the Illinois Appellate Court and the Circuit Court of Cook County’s grant of Injunctive Relief in favor of the Village of Skokie and against the Nazi group headed by Frank Collin. The Nazis were free to March in Skokie pending resolution of the federal lawsuit filed by the ACLU on behalf of the Nazis. (see Feb 23)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

Jack Kevorkian

January 27, 1994: Michigan Judge Jessica R. Cooper of Oakland County Circuit Court dismissed charges against Jack Kevorkian in two deaths, becoming the fifth lower court judge in Michigan to rule that assisted suicide was a constitutional right. (see JK for expanded chronology)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

CLINTON IMPEACHMENT

Paula Jones

January 27, 1998: Paula Jones’ attorney, John Whitehead, answered Starr’s subpoena with several documents, possibly including Clinton’s deposition in the Jones suit. Clinton personal secretary, Betty Currie testified before the grand jury. First lady Hillary Rodham Clinton says in a broadcast interview that a “vast right-wing conspiracy” was behind the charges against her husband. A Portland, Ore., man, Andy Bleiler, alleged he had a five-year affair with Lewinsky, and his lawyer promises to turn over documents and items to Starr’s investigators. Clinton delivers his State of the Union address, making no mention of the scandal.

Senate votes

January 27, 1999: in twin 56-44 votes, the Senate refused to dismiss the charges against President Clinton and agreed to seek depositions from Monica Lewinsky, Vernon Jordan and Sidney Blumenthal. (see Clinton for expanded story)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

Immigration History

Matthew Nestor convicted

January 27, 2011: a federal jury convicted Matthew Nestor, a former Pennsylvania police officer, of the most serious charge against him in what prosecutors said was a cover-up of the beating death of a Luis Ramirez, a Mexican immigrant. The jury delivered a less severe verdict against a second officer and acquitted a third.

The former officers, Matthew Nestor, Jason Hayes and William Moyer, were accused of helping a group of white teenage football players cover up their parts in the death of Luis Ramírez, an illegal Mexican immigrant who was fatally beaten in July 2008 in Shenandoah, Pa.

Nestor, the former Shenandoah police chief, was found guilty of falsifying records, a charge that could bring up to 20 years in prison, but he was acquitted of conspiracy. Moyer, a former Shenandoah lieutenant, was convicted of lying to the F.B.I., but acquitted of all other counts, including obstruction of justice, and he faces up to five years in prison. Hayes, a former patrolman, was acquitted of all charges. (see Ramirez for expanded chronology)

Refugees denied entry

January 27, 2017: President Trump suspended entry of all refugees to the US for 120 days, barred Syrian refugees indefinitely, and blocked entry into the United States for 90 days for citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.

The Department of Homeland Security said that the order also barred green card holders from those countries from re-entering the United States. (BBC piece) (see Jan 28)

More difficult

January 27, 2020:  CNN reported that the Supreme Court in a 5-4 vote  cleared the way for the Trump administration to make it more difficult for low-income immigrants seeking to come to or trying to remain legally in the United States.

The so-called public charge rule, unveiled in August, impacted people who rely on public assistance, including most forms of Medicaid, food stamps and housing vouchers.

Advocates and several states immediately opposed the rule, arguing that the changes would penalize immigrants who rely on temporary assistance from the government and impose costs on the states. (next IH, see Jan 31)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

Women’s Health

January 27, 2017: U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks blocked Texas from requiring that fetal remains to be buried or cremated, saying the rule placed burdens on access to abortion that “substantially outweigh the benefits.”

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton vowed to appeal, setting up another high-stakes battle over Texas’ attempts to regulate abortion providers — seven months after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned two Texas regulations that would have left nine abortion clinics operating in the state.

After hearing two days of testimony early this month, Sparks issued a preliminary injunction that indefinitely prohibited Texas from enforcing the rule, which would have required health facilities to ensure that fetal tissue was buried or cremated — with the ashes buried or appropriately scattered — whether from an abortion or miscarriage.

The rule did not apply to miscarriages at home or to early-term, drug-induced abortions that typically take place at home.

Sparks said the new standards were vague, inviting interpretations that would allow state health officials “to exercise arbitrary, and potentially discriminatory, enforcement on an issue connected to abortion and therefore sensitive and hotly contested.” (see Feb 18)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

Trump Impeachment

January 27, 2020: on the second day of President Trump’s lawyers presenting arguments against his impeachment, they told senators that no evidence existed tying the president’s decision to withhold security aid from Ukraine to his insistence on the investigations. They say the investigations were requested out of a concern for corruption in Ukraine.

Yet a new account by the President’s former national security adviser John R. Bolton weakened that defense when he wrote for a forthcoming book that Trump had conditioned military aid for Ukraine on that country’s willingness to furnish information on his political rivals. [NYT article] (next TI, see Jan 28 or see Trump for expanded chronology)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

Environmental Issues

January 27, 2021: President Biden signed a series of executive orders that aim to “confront the existential threat of climate change” across the federal government while emphasizing job creation and tackling racial inequity.

“In my view, we’ve already waited too long to deal with this climate crisis. We can’t wait any longer,” said Mr. Biden, speaking at the White House. “We see it with our own eyes. We feel it. We know it in our bones. And it’s time to act.”

The executive orders also set broad new foreign policy goals, including specifying that climate change, for the first time, will be a core part of all foreign policy and national security decisions.

Biden’s international climate envoy, John Kerry, said that the United States would host an international climate change summit on Earth Day, April 22. “The convening of this summit is essential to ensuring that 2021 is going to be the year that really makes up for the lost time of the last four years,” said Mr. Kerry. [NYT article] (next EI, see Feb 8)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

TERRORISM

January 27, 2021: a “National Terrorism Advisory System Bulletin” issued by the Department of Homeland Security [DHS] warned that the deadly rampage of the Capitol on January 6 may not have been an isolated episode,that the United States faced a growing threat from “violent domestic extremists” emboldened by the attack.

The department’s terrorism alert did not name specific groups that might be behind any future attacks, but it made clear that their motivation would include anger over “the presidential transition, as well as other perceived grievances fueled by false narratives,” a clear reference to the accusations made by President Donald J. Trump and echoed by right-wing groups that the 2020 election was stolen.

“D.H.S. is concerned these same drivers to violence will remain through early 2021,” the department said.  [NYT article] (next T, see Mar 16)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism

Cannabis

January 27, 2021:  a study published in the British Medical Association journal’s BMJ concluded that increasing access to marijuana dispensaries was associated “…with reduced opioid related death rates, particularly deaths associated with synthetic opioids such as fentanyl,”

It was a finding that held “…for both medical and recreational dispensaries” the study said.

Researchers looked at opioid mortality and cannabis dispensary prevalence in 23 U.S.states from 2014 to 2018 and found that, overall, counties where the number of legal marijuana shops increased from one to two experienced a 17 percent reduction in opioid-related fatalities.

Increasing the dispensary count from two to three was linked to an additional 8.5 percent decrease in opioid deaths.

Further, the study found that this trend “appeared particularly strong for deaths associated with synthetic opioids other than methadone, with an estimated 21 percent reduction in mortality rates associated with an increase from one to two dispensaries.”  [Marijuana Moment article] (next Cannabis, see  Feb 22 or, see CCC for expanded chronology)

January 27 Peace Love Art Activism