On January 30, 1835, Richard Lawrence attempted to shoot President Andrew Jackson, but failed, subdued by a crowd, including several congressmen. That was the first attempt on the life of a sitting U.S. president.
Sadly, January 30, 1948, was the date upon which Indian pacificist leader Mohandes K. Gandhi was shot and killed.
On January 29, 1761, Albert Gallatin was born. Gallatin served as the fourth United States Secretary of the Treasury — a post in which he served longer than any other in American history — advanced the anthropological and linguistic study of native Americans, and became the subject of a biography by Henry Adams. Called the “father of American ethnology,” he has been honored with a 1967 U.S. stamp (pictured) as well as many placenames, including the Gallatin National Forest in Montana.
On January 28, 1912, Belgian economist Gustave de Molinari died. The last major economist of the French Liberal School, heir to Frederic Bastiat, and a prominent advocate of laissez faire, Molinari’s last book, “The Society of To-morrow” (the only one of his many books to be translated into English in his day) envisioned a future of extremely limited government, arguing against the growing tide of socialism and war that was becoming the then-near future.
On January 27, 1945, the Red Army liberated the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp built by the Nazis.
On January 26, 1992, Boris Yeltsin announced that Russia would stop targeting United States cities with nuclear weapons.
On January 24, 1732, French playwright, watchmaker, inventor, musician, diplomat, fugitive, spy, publisher, horticulturalist, arms dealer, satirist, financier, and revolutionary (both French and American) Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais was born. He proved instrumental in securing armaments for the America Revolution, but remains best known for his three “Figaro” plays, Le Barbier de Séville, Le Mariage de Figaro, and La Mère coupable.
On January 22, 1920, American pundit and author Irving Kristol was born.
On January 21, 1950, Alger Hiss was convicted of perjury, with Whittaker Chambers being the main witness in Hiss’s prosecution. Chambers confessed to having been a Soviet spy, and accused Hiss as an accomplice, which Hiss denied to his dying day. Chambers wrote a fascinating memoir about all this in Witness.
Today is economist Tyler Cowen’s birthday. Happy Birthday, Tyler.
On January 20, 1920, the American Civil Liberties Union was founded.
On January 19, 1808, Lysander Spooner was born. Spooner’s achievements in American life, law, and political philosophy, are among the most colorful of the 19th century. He sued to practice law, and won the suit. He set up a postal service that directly competed with the United States Postal Service, delivering mail at a fraction of the cost. He wrote “The Unconstitutionality of Slavery,” and convinced noted Garrisonian abolitionist Frederick Douglass of his argument. (The book became the centerpiece of intellectual ammunition for the Free Soil Party.) Later in life Spooner turned against constiutionalism itself, and penned some of the most radical political works of his day, including “Vices Are Not Crimes” and “The Constitution of No Authority.” Spooner also clearly articulated a “jury nullification” position in his classic treatise “Trial by Jury.”