Common Sense with Paul Jacob

On Jan. 23, 1737, John Hancock, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, president of the Second Continental Congress, the first and third Governor of Massachusetts and, most importantly, a major financier of the revolutionary cause, was born in Braintree, Massachusetts.

On Jan. 23, 1943, Montgomery’s 8th Army captured Tripoli, Libya, from the German-Italian Panzer Army. On the same day, Australian and American forces defeated the Japanese army in Papua. This turning point in the Pacific War marked the beginning of the end of Japanese aggression.

On Jan. 23, 1964, the 24th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, prohibiting the use of poll taxes in federal elections, was ratified. At the time of passage, five states still imposed a poll tax: Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Texas, and Virginia. The amendment made the poll tax unconstitutional at the federal level, however, not until the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections in 1966, were poll taxes for state elections officially declared unconstitutional.

On Jan. 22, 1944, Operation Shingle, an Allied amphibious landing against Axis forces in the area of Anzio and Nettuno, Italy, began. The resultant combat during this part of World War II’s Italian Campaign became known as the Battle of Anzio.

On Jan. 22, 1980, Andrei Sakharov, the Soviet physicist who helped build the Soviet Union’s hydrogen bomb, was arrested in Moscow after criticizing the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan. He was subsequently stripped of his scientific honors and banished to the remote city of Gorky. Sakharov’s exile to Gorky ended in 1986, when Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev allowed his return to Moscow. In 1969, an essay Sakharov wrote attacking the arms race and Soviet political repression had been smuggled out of the USSR and published in The New York Times. In 1975, he became the first Soviet to win the Nobel Peace Prize.

On Jan. 21, 1928, Gene Sharp, one of the world’s leading experts on non-violent change, was born. Sharp’s extensive writings, including his 1973 book “The Politics of Nonviolent Action,” have influenced anti-government resistance movements around the world. During the Korean War, he was jailed for nine months after protesting the conscription of soldiers. Sharp is currently Professor Emeritus of political science at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth.

On Jan. 21, 1950, Eric Arthur Blair, better known by his pen name George Orwell, died – just a year after his dystopian novel “Nineteen Eighty-Four” was published. The English author and journalist was known for his awareness of social injustice, intense opposition to totalitarianism, and a passion for clarity in language. His two books, “Animal Farm” and “1984,” together sold more copies than any two books by any other twentieth-century author.

On Jan. 20, 1265, the first English parliament conducted its first meeting held by Simon de Montfort in the Palace of Westminster.

On Jan. 20, 1801, John Marshall was appointed by President John Adams to be the Chief Justice of the United States, serving in the position longer than anyone else in the country’s history, during all or part of the terms of six presidents – John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson.

On Jan. 20, 1885, L.A. Thompson patented the roller coaster.

On Jan. 20, 1920, the American Civil Liberties Union was founded.