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Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus to a white passenger. Martin Luther King Jr. kicked off his civil rights career leading protesters in a boycott of the bus system, resulting in a Supreme Court decision that bus segregation was unconstitutional. -
In 1957, Little Rock’s Central High School became a crucial battleground in the struggle for civil rights. The nation sat transfixed as nine African-American students entered the previously all-white school under federal troop escort. -
Alaska became the 49th state to enter the Union on Jan 3, 1959. Later that year, Hawaii would become the 50th state on August 21. Both states were signed into statehood by President Dwight D. Eisenhower..Alaska was the first of the two to enter statehood because Congress convinced Eisenhower that its natural oil reserves would be beneficial to the American economy.
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The Trade Expansion Act of 1962 provided the President of the United States of America with new authority to cut (or impose) international trade tariffs.
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John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, was assassinated on Friday, November 22, 1963, at 12:30 p.m. CST in Dallas, Texas, while riding in a presidential motorcade through Dealey Plaza. -
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a landmark piece of federal legislation in the United States that prohibits racial discrimination in voting. -
The 1968 United States presidential election was the 46th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 5, 1968. The Republican nominee, former vice president Richard Nixon, defeated the Democratic nominee, incumbent vice president Hubert Humphrey. -
Martin Luther King Jr., an African American clergyman and civil rights leader, was fatally shot at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4. -
The Vietnam War was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia.