[Pinochets men accused of Letelier murder in 1978. Dick Cheneys
hypocrisy in 2000. Reagans racist dog-whistle in 1980. Dixiecrats
defend the poll tax in 1948. Chicago Freedom Movement in 1966. Birth
of a hero in 1848. Toxic-waste emergency in 1978.]
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THIS WEEK IN PEOPLE’S HISTORY, AUGUST 1 – 7  
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_ Pinochet's men accused of Letelier murder in 1978. Dick Cheney's
hypocrisy in 2000. Reagan's racist dog-whistle in 1980. Dixiecrats
defend the poll tax in 1948. Chicago Freedom Movement in 1966. Birth
of a hero in 1848. Toxic-waste emergency in 1978. _

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_AUGUST 1, 1978 (45 YEARS AGO)._ The former head of Chile's National
Directorate of Intelligence and two of his deputies are indicted by a
federal grand jury in Washington, D.C., for the 1976 murder of Orlando
Letelier and Ronni Moffit. Letelier, who had been Chile's Foreign
Minister during the presidency of Salvador Allende, was killed by the
Pinochet regime because it considered him to be their enemy. Living in
exile, Letelier had played a major role in organizing opposition to
Pinochet; just a week before Letelier and Moffit were killed by a bomb
hidden in Letelier's car, Chile had revoked Letelier's Chilean
citizenship. Pinochet would not allow the extradition of the three
indicted Chileans, but two of them were eventually convicted in Chile
in 1993 and sentenced to prison.
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_AUGUST 2, 2000._ In the midst of the presidential campaigning by
George W. Bush and Al Gore, the Center for Public Integrity releases a
detailed, eye-opening report, "Cheney Led Halliburton to Feast at
Federal Trough" concerning Bush's running mate Dick Cheney. The report
lays bare the hypocritical way that Cheney, who had spent a lifetime
attacking "Big Government" for "wasteful inefficiency," had just spent
five years as CEO and Chairman of Halliburton Company, making sure
that Hallibuton racked up huge profits selling goods and services to
the federal government for at least $2.3 billion, proving that one
person's waste and inefficiency are another person's profits.
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_AUGUST 3, 1980._ Two weeks after being nominated for the presidency,
Republican candidate Ronald Reagan delivers his first post-convention
speech, choosing language and a location that makes crystal clear his
intention to win the votes of "George Wallace-inclined voters." He
speaks to a nearly all-white crowd near Philadelphia, Miss., at the
Neshoba County Fair, located within walking distance of the location
of the infamous 1964 murders of three civil rights workers by the Ku
Klux Klan. In his speech Reagan doesn't refer to the murders or the
Klan, but he does say "I believe in states’ rights. … And I
believe that we’ve distorted the balance of our government today by
giving powers that were never intended in the Constitution to that
federal establishment. …" Visit the Zinn Education Project site at
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much more.

_AUGUST 4, 1948 (75 YEARS AGO)._ Southern Democrats in the U.S. Senate
use the filibuster to kill a bill that would have banned the
requirement to pay a poll tax in order to vote in a federal election.
At the time, poll taxes are one of the main hurdles for Black voters
in seven southern states -- Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, South
Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia --  and they will remain so
until 1964, when poll taxes in federal elections are outlawed by the
24th Amendment. Two years later the Supreme Court rules that demanding
money for the right to vote in _any_ election is unconstitutional.
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_AUGUST 5, 1966. _Even though it is illegal in 1966 for Chicago
landlords and real-estate brokers to discriminate on the basis of
race, almost all of the city's residential areas are very close to
being entirely white or entirely Black. A coalition of civil rights
organizations called the Chicago Freedom Movement is determined to
change that by pressuring the city's racist politial leadership to
enforce the laws and by pressuring the residents of lily-white
neighborhoods to accept the result. Mayor Richard Daley denounces the
movement, insisting the city is already doing everything possible;
thousands of white Chicagoans take the Mayor's side; the police
department is amazingly ineffective when asked to protect legal,
non-violent, civil rights demonstrations. Tensions explode when a
thousand  Chicago Freedom Movement activists rally is the lily-white
Marquette Park neighborhood and are confronted by a 4-thousand-person
mob shouting "White Power!" The police make no attempt to prevent to
the mob from bombarding the demonstrators with rocks, bottles and
cherry bombs. Martin Luther King Jr. falls to his knees when a rock
hits him on the head, but he gets to his feet. When the Chicago
Freedom Movement demonstrators, many of them bloodied, retreat to the
protection of a church, King says, "I had expected some hostility, but
not of this enormity. I have never in my life seen such hate. Not in
Mississippi or Alabama."
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_AUGUST 6, 1848 (175 YEARS AGO)._ Susan Ann Baker is born on a
plantation on Georgia's Atlantic Coast, about 20 miles southwest of
Savannah. Her mother is an enslaved person, so under the law Sister
Baker is enslaved from the moment of her birth.  Even though  it is
against the law in Georgia to teach an enslaved person to read, she
learns to read and write.
    When she is 13 years old, Union forces attack a major
Confederate fort on the coast near where she lives. One of her uncles
leads his family, including Sister Baker, through the fighting and
across the Union lines, where they present themselves to the soldiers
as self-emancipated refugees. 
    Before long a Union officer asks Sister Baker if she can read
and write, and makes a note of her reply. Days later the same officer
asks Sister Baker if she would organize a makeshift school for the
numerous formerly enslaved children who have taken shelter with the
Union troops. Suddenly, without any formal training as a teacher, she
becomes a teenage schoolmistress.
    Sister Baker has a long and extraordinary life, including
becoming an Army nurse. She is married twice (and is better known by
her married name, Susie King Taylor). After the Civil War she spends
years working as an educator for the newly liberated citizens of
Georgia. Before she dies at age 64, she publishes a memoir,
 _Reminiscences of My Life in Camp with the 33d United States Colored
Troops, Late 1st S.C. Volunteers._ For much more about Susie King
Taylor's heroic life, visit
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_AUGUST 7, 1978 (45 YEARS AGO)._ President Jimmy Carter declares that
a toxic waste dump in a residential neighborhood near Buffalo, N.Y.,
is causing a health emergency and directs the federal government to
protect the affected residents and remediate the hazard.  The
clean-up of the waste dump, which is known as Love Canal, is the first
time that federal emergency funds are used for anything other than a
natural disaster.  It took 21 years to clean the site up at a cost of
about $400 million. [link removed]

* U.S. history
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* Orlando Letelier
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* Dick Cheney
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* Ronald Reagan
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* poll tax
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* integration
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* slavery
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* toxic waste
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