On March 11, 1702, The Daily Courant, England’s first national daily newspaper, was published for the first time. It was a one-sheet, concentrated on foreign news, sans commentary. The reverse side sported advertising. It was produced by Elizabeth Mallet (1672–1706), a printer and bookseller who lived, and published the paper, next to the Kings Arms tavern at Fleet Bridge in London.
March 9 marks the 1763 birthday of British pamphleteer and activist William Cobbett. Cobbett was known for his lifelong opposition to authority, and his later-in-life “radicalism,” which included his opposition to Britain’s protectionist Corn Laws as well as his support for Catholic Emancipation. Cobbett died in 1835.
In 1776 on this date, Scottish philosopher Adam Smith published An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, which became the first widely accepted landmark work in the field of economics. It was not the first general treatise on the subject, however; that designation almost certainly belongs to banker Richard Cantillon’s Essai sur la Nature du Commerce en Général, cited by Smith in his more famous book. It is also worth noting that Étienne Bonnot de Condillac’s systematic treatise, Le Commerce et le Gouvernement, also saw publication in 1776.
On March 9, 1862, the USS Monitor and CSS Virginia fought to a draw in the Battle of Hampton Roads, the first battle between two ironclad warships. The Virginia was built on the remains of the USS Merrimack, and the battle is often referred to as between “the Monitor and the Merrimack.”
On March 8, 1775, “African Slavery In America,” often described as the first known essay advocating the abolition of slavery in America, was published anonymously in the Pennsylvania Journal and the Weekly Advertiser. Thomas Paine (pictured) is believed to be the essay’s author.
The first anti-slavery society was formed in Philadelphia weeks after publication, and Paine was a founding member.
Exactly 120 years earlier, a court in Northampton County of the Virginia Colony ruled that John Casor, then working as an indentured servant to Robert Palmer, must be returned to Anthony Johnson as Johnson’s “lawful” slave for life. Johnson himself was one of the original indentured servants brought to Jamestown, had completed his indenture to become a “free Negro,” and became the first African landowner in the colony. The case marked the first person of African descent to be legally recognized as a lifelong slave in England’s North American colonies. In summary: the first official chattel slave in English-speaking North America was of African descent was owned by a man also of African descent.
Think I’m making it up?
No. It’s true. Some people get distracted and treat their grass as if it were gravel and let their car edge onto it.
Why’dja do it Sandy, huh? Why?
On the hand, it’s her property, so who cares?
What difference does it make?
Well, mucho . . . if you’re Lantana, Florida, which fined Sandy $101,750 for imperfect parking, $47,000 because of storm-inflicted fence damage, $16,000 for cracks in her driveway.
The good news is that Institute for Justice is litigating on behalf of Sandy Martinez and other homeowners being hit with plainly unjust fines for trivial
IJ argues that the state and local governments at fault are violating the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against excessive fines. And the Institute and its clients are winning. The U.S. Supreme Court has just ruled, in Timbs v. Indiana, that this Eight Amendment ban applies to cities and states as well as to the federal government.
Many locales, perhaps including Lantana, Florida, may still try to get away with the grift despite this definitive ruling. But sooner or later, some judge will throw out the blatantly excessive fines and point to the recent Supreme Court decision.
Help is on the way, Sandy.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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On February 20, 1991, in the Albanian capital Tirana, a gigantic statue of Albania’s long-time leader, Enver Hoxha, was brought down by mobs of angry protesters.
On January 31, 1849, the Corn Laws were abolished in the United Kingdom, one of the most impressive and far-reaching anti-protectionist moves of all time. “Corn” stood for all grains, including wheat, oats, barley, etc.; the free-trade agitation by John Bright and Richard Cobden was one of the main impetuses for the reform.
On Jan. 31, 1865, the United States Congress proposed the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, submitting it to the states for ratification. The Amendment’s main section reads: “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”
On Jan. 31, 1990, the first McDonald’s fast food restaurant opened in the Soviet Union. In 2022 they were all closed in protest of the Ukraine war.