Shirley Chisholm becomes first Black woman to be elected to Congress, representing Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, NYC, 1968

Spingarn Medal awarded Damon J. Keith “in tribute to his steadfast defense of constitutional principles as revealed in a series of memorable decisions he handed down as a United States District Court judge.”

Hulan Jack was elected first Black Borough President of Manhattan, NYC, 1953

Carol Moseley Braun is the 1st African American woman to be elected to the US Senate

Spingarn Medal presented to Paul Robeson “for his outstanding achievement in the theater, on the concert stage, and in the general field of racial welfare.”

Harold Ford elected congressman from TN, 1974

Democrats suppressed Black vote by fraud and violence and carried Mississippi election. “The Mississippi Plan” staged riots, political assassinations, massacres and social and economic intimidation was used later to overthrow Reconstruction governments in South Carolina and Louisiana.

President Ronald Reagan signs law designating the third Monday in January Martin Luther King Jr Day, 1983

Barack Obama is elected to the U.S. Senate from Illinois. He becomes the second African American elected to the Senate from that state, and only the fifth black U.S. senator in history

First issue of the Crisis published by editor W.E.B. Du Bois.