William Jennings Bryan Speech: Imperialism (Flag of an Empire)
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Notification Committee: I shall, at an early day, and in a more formal manner, accept the nomination which you tender, and shall at that time discuss the various questions covered by the Democratic platform. It may not be out of place, however, to submit a few observations at this time upon the general character of the contest before us and ...
Martial Law, a Frame-Up Attempt, Kidnapping, and Murder Result from an Idaho Mining Building Bombing
The Idaho murder trial: Labor unites to defeat a frame-up It began with the bombing of a building. The explosion led to a hunt for terrorists. Men were seized without warrants, transported long distances, and placed in solitary confinement. Those judicial kidnappings were defended by the Supreme Court. But the events did not originate from the mountains of Afghanistan (or anywhere in the Middle East); they ...
Booker T. Washington: Address to the Atlanta Exposition
Booker T. Washington’s 1895 Address to the Atlanta Cotton States and International Exposition is one of the most famous speeches in American history. The goal of the Atlanta Exposition was to showcase the economic progress of the South since the Civil War, to encourage international trade, and to attract investors to the region. Anxious to show there had been progress in race relations as well, the ...
Virulent White Supremacist Benjamin Tillman Elected Governor of South Carolina
On this day in history, the outspoken racist Benjamin Tillman, who advocated violence against African American voters, was elected Governor of South Carolina. Tillman was born on August 11, 1847, in Edgefield, South Carolina on a plantation with 86 slaves. After the Civil War, Tillman himself became a landowner, and by 1876, Tillman was the largest landowner in Edgefield County. According to “‘Pitchfork’ Ben Tillman: The ...
Ida Wells is Forcibly Removed from Her 1st Class Train Seat that she had Purchased Sparking her Rise as an Activist and Journalist
On May 4, 1884, a train conductor with the Memphis and Charleston Railroad ordered Wells to give up her seat in the first-class ladies car and move to the smoking car, which was already crowded with other passengers. The year before, the Supreme Court had ruled against the federal Civil Rights Act of 1875 (which had banned racial discrimination in public accommodations). This verdict supported railroad ...
Susan B. Anthony cast her Vote on Election Day — Illegally
The tactics of the suffragists went beyond petitions and memorials to Congress. Testing another strategy, Susan B. Anthony registered and voted in the 1872 election in Rochester, NY. As planned, she was arrested for "knowingly, wrongfully and unlawfully vot[ing] for a representative to the Congress of the United States," convicted by the State of New York, and fined $100, which she insisted she would never pay ...
The 1871 Chinese massacre in Los Angeles
On Oct. 24, 1871, a mob of 500 men raided Chinatown in Los Angeles, killing at least 20 Chinese Americans and stealing an estimated $1.5 million worth of property. The killings were in response to a shootout that had taken place the same day that killed police Officer Robert Thompson. The shootout caused a commotion, and people began shouting that the Chinese were killing white people, so chaos ...
14th Amendment to the Constitution is Adopted
The Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is one of the most important and most frequently cited amendments in American jurisprudence, and its applicability, as well as its definition, have been shaped by a number of landmark cases. Ratified in 1868, after the conclusion of the Civil War, the Fourteenth Amendment grants citizenship to every individual born or naturalized in the United States and as well ...
The KKK is Founded by Six Confederate Veterans as the Terrorist Arm of the Democratic Party
Democratic Party leaders and media surrogates falsely link the Republican Party to the Ku Klux Klan. In reality, it was Democrats who started the Ku Klux Klan that became the terrorist arm of the Democratic Party. History.com even has it right: In Pulaski, Tennessee, a group of Confederate veterans convenes to form a secret society that they christen the “Ku Klux Klan.” The KKK rapidly grew from ...
The Reconstruction Era Begins (December 8, 1863 – March 31, 1877)
The Reconstruction era was the period in American history which lasted from 1863 to 1877. It was a significant chapter in the history of American civil rights. The term has two applications: the first applies to the complete history of the entire country from 1865 to 1877 following the American Civil War; the second, to the attempted transformation of the 11 former Confederate states from 1863 to 1877, as directed by Congress, and the role ...
