Freedom Calendar 12/06/08 - 12/13/08

December 6, 1865, Republican Party’s 13th Amendment, banning slavery, is ratified. December 7, 1928, Republican Octaviano Larrazolo of New Mexico becomes first Hispanic to serve in U.S. Senate.

December 8, 1953, Eisenhower administration Asst. Attorney General Lee Rankin argues for plaintiffs in Brown v. Board of Education; 1924 Democratic presidential candidate John W. Davis argues in favor of “separate but equal”.

December 9, 1872, Republican Pinckney Pinchback (R-LA) becomes nation’s first African-American governor.

December 10, 1869, Republican Gov. John Campbell of Wyoming Territory signs first-in-nation law granting women right to vote and to hold public office.

December 11, 1895, African-American Republican and former U.S. Rep. Thomas Miller (R-SC) denounces new state constitution written to disenfranchise African-Americans.

December 12, 2003, President George W. Bush nominates African-American Alphonso Jackson as U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

December 13, 2001, “No Child Left Behind” Act to improve public education for all children passes House; signed into law by President George W. Bush.

Tags: President Bush and Freedom Calendar or Booker T. Washington and Republicans or African-Americans and Brown v. Board of Education or Ronald Reagan and Michael Steele or Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass or 40 acres and a mule or Martin Luther King and Voting Rights Act of 1965 or Dred Scott