Today in History

1624		Class-based legislation is passed in the colony of Virginia, exempting the upper class from punishment by whipping.
1766		Antonio de Ulloa, the first Spanish governor of Louisiana, arrives in New Orleans.
1793		Austrian troops crush the French and recapture Liege.
1821		James Monroe becomes the first president to be inaugurated on March 5, only because the 4th was a Sunday.
1905		Russians begin to retreat from Mukden in Manchuria, China.
1912		The Italians become the first to use dirigibles for military purposes, using them for reconnaissance flights behind Turkish lines west of Tripoli.
1918		The Soviets move the capital of Russia from Petrograd to Moscow.
1928		Hitler's National Socialists win the majority vote in Bavaria.
1933		Newly inaugurated President Franklin D. Roosevelt halts the trading of gold and declares a bank holiday.
1933		Hitler and Nationalist allies win the Reichstag majority. It will be the last free election in Germany until after World War II.
1943		In desperation due to war losses, fifteen and sixteen year olds are called up for military service in the German army.
1946		In Fulton, Missouri, Winston Churchill tells a crowd that "an iron curtain has descended on the Continent [of Europe]."
1956		The U.S. Supreme Court affirms the ban on segregation in public schools in Brown vs. Board of Education.
1969		Gustav Heinemann is elected West German President.
1976		Britain gives up on the Ulster talks and decides to retain rule in Northern Ireland indefinitely.
1984		The U.S. Supreme Court rules that cities have the right to display the Nativity scene as part of their Christmas display.