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A Dutch ship brings 20 African indentured servants to the English colony of Jamestown, Virginia.
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On Septeember 20 1664, Maryland passed the first antiamalgamation law. This was intended to prevent English women from marrying African men. Interracial marriage was a fairly common practice during the colonial era among white indentured servants and black slaves-as well as in more aristocratic circles.
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One of the earliest slave revolts takes place in Stono, South Carolina, near Charleston. A score of whites and more than twice as many blacks slaves are killed as the armed slaves try to flee to Florida. For more information, visit Africans in America, Pt. 1, The Terrible Transformation.
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Congress passes the first Fugitive Slave Act, which makes it a crime to harbor an escaped slave.
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In 1845 publishes Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Written by Himself, one of the enduring classics of American literature.
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Angered by the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act, Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes the first of 41 installments of Uncle Tom’s Cabin in an abolitionist weekly, June 5, 1851. She intends her novel about slaves Uncle Tom, who is sold and resold, and Eliza, who flees to save her child, to “awaken sympathy” for those suffering under a “cruel and unjust” system. In book form the following year, Cabin sells 300,000 copies and is credited with shaping perceptions leading to the Civil War.
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Passed by Congress on January 31, 1865, and ratified on December 6, 1865, the 13th amendment abolished slavery in the United States. Source : Our Documents . gov : 100 Milestone Documents of American History
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In 1868, the same year the state rejected the 15th Amendment giving blacks the right to vote, Dawson Pompey became the first African American to hold elective office in Michigan when Covert residents chose him to oversee local road projects. Source : Zlati Meyer, "Rural west Michigan Covert Township Integrated Quietly in the 1860s", Detroit Free Press, September 5, 2011.
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African American physician Daniel Hale Williams performs the world's first successful open-heart surgery. For another article about Dr. Daniel Hale Williams, see Frank Daniels III, "Doctor performed successful open-heart surgery", The Tennessean, January 17, 2013.
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Louisiana passes limits the right to vote to anyone whose fathers and grandfathers were qualified on January 1, 1867. No African Americans had the right to vote at that time. Other southern states follow suit. For more information visit "grandfather clause" in BlackPast.org
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The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, usually abbreviated as NAACP, formed in 1909. Its mission is "to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to eliminate racial hatred and racial discrimination". Its name, retained in accordance with tradition, is one of the last surviving uses of the term colored people.
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The Montgomery Bus Boycott was a civil rights protest during which African Americans refused to ride city buses in Montgomery, Alabama, to protest segregated seating. The boycott took place from December 5, 1955, to December 20, 1956, and is regarded as the first large-scale U.S. demonstration against segregation. Source:https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/montgomery-bus-boycott
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August 29, 1957, the Senate gave final congressional approval to a Civil Rights Act after South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond (then a Democrat) ended a filibuster that had lasted 24 hours.
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The Historic Selma to Montgomery marchers started on March 7, 1965. More than 600 hundred marchers led by the SNCC and SCLC gathered in Selma to march in solidarity. Coupled with the original aim of the protest, marchers also wanted to call attention to the denial of their voting rights. With the 1964 Civil Rights Act passing, King and other leaders hoped the gathering would speed along the opportunity for fairness.
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Barack Obama was the first African-American to be elected as a president of the United States.
