On April 20, 1871, President Ulysses Grant signed the law, also known as the Civil Rights Act of 1871. Part of the law is known today as Section 1983 of the United States Code and is the basis for federal civil rights lawsuits across the country.

Through the Ku Klux Klan Act, Congress opened the doors of federal courts to sue state officers and even private actors for civil rights violations. Section 1983 includes suits for violations of civil rights by police officers, public educators and officials, or prison guards and wardens. Another part of the act is included in Section 1985 of the code.

The Ku Klux Klan Act’s passage followed racial violence and terrorism in South Carolina. It was the third of a series of “Enforcement Acts” meant to protect African American citizens against this widespread extralegal violence. The first two acts, passed in May 1870 and February 1871, aimed to allow the federal government to enforce the 15th Amendment and African American voting rights in the south.  

During the debates over the act, the bill’s supporters repeatedly described the of terror imposed by the Klan upon black citizens and their white sympathizers in the southern states. These violent acts went unpunished, legislators asserted, because Klan members and sympathizers were powerful enough that law enforcement would not arrest them, juries refused to convict, and judges would not hold fair trials.

Republicans in Congress argued that states refusing to protect African Americans by ignoring the violence of the Klan violated their14th amendment right to “equal protection.”

The origins of the Ku Klux Klan Act and Section 1983 go back to the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which was modeled on the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. Prior to Reconstruction, the one area in which Congress and the federal government could guarantee, by private lawsuits, constitutional rights was related to fugitive slaves.

Thus, when Ohio Representative Samuel Shellabarger introduced the Civil Rights Act of 1871 on March 28, 1871, he had modeled the text on Section 2 of the Civil Rights Act of 1866. Section 2 of the 1866 act forbade certain acts by any person “under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom” and created a right to sue in federal court for violations of civil rights done under the color of state law. As a source of power, Shellabarger specifically pointed to Section 5 of the 14th Amendment, which gave Congress power to enforce the rights granted in the amendment’s text.

Democrats, joined by moderate and conservative Republicans, questioned the law’s constitutionality because of what they considered the radicalness of reaching private acts of individuals, not merely when the government itself acted.

Some Republicans were among the critics, including Illinois Senator Lyman Trumbull, author of the Civil Rights Act of 1866. Trumbull said the Ku Klux Klan Act would allow Congress to enact a general criminal code.

Other conservative Republicans, like James Garfield and James Farnsworth, believed the act was unconstitutional because Congress’s power under Section Five of the 14th Amendment was limited to remedying state acts and enforcing the laws against the states.

As an immediate result of the act, hundreds of men were indicted in North Carolina, while United States Attorney G. Wiley Wells secured around 700 indictments in Mississippi. Most prominently, in the 1871 and 1872 South Carolina trials, the military provisions of the act were used to make hundreds of arrests and force up to 2,000 Klansmen to flee the state. As Professor Eric Foner puts it, the “legal offensive” of 1871 ultimately broke the Klan and “produced a dramatic decline in violence throughout the South.” Breaking the Klan, however, would not be the end of the fight to protect constitutional rights against extralegal violence and the actions of state actors.

The act has been amended many times since 1871 until it became part of the United States code as Section 1983 (to allow for civil rights suits against government officials) and Section 1985 (which allows the government to charge private actors with conspiracy to interfere with another person’s civil rights). The Supreme Court’s “state action” requirement in the 1883 Civil Rights Cases limited the power of the Civil Rights Act of 1871 until a series of Supreme Court cases in the 1950s suggested the justices were, in the words of historian Michael Klarman, “no longer willing to permit state-action doctrine to obstruct the pursuit of racial equality.”

In 1961, Monroe v. Pape opened up civil rights lawsuits under Section 1983 to apply to anyone whose constitutional rights were violated by state and local government officials and local governments. In the case, which arose out of a lawsuit against the city of Chicago for violations of civil rights by police officers, the Court would not hold the city liable but found any individuals acting “under color of law” could be sued under Section 1983. Limitations remain on the ability to sue cities for the actions of local officials, but Section 1983 continues to be the foundational means for citizens to sue state officers for civil rights violations.

Recently, the Ku Klux Klan act and Section 1985 have been cited in a lawsuit brought against former President Donald Trump and others in relation to the January 6, 2021 riot at the capitol in Washington. The act is also part of an active lawsuit against white supremacists involved in violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017.

Nicholas Mosvick is a Senior Fellow for Constitutional Content at the National Constitution Center.

Additional Resources:

Eric Foner, The Second Founding: How the Civil War and Reconstruction Remade the Constitution (2020)

Michael Klarman, From Jim Crow to Civil Rights: The Supreme Court and Struggle for Racial Equality (2004)

Kurt Lash, The Fourteenth Amendment and the Privileges and Immunities of American Citizenship (2015)

Gerard Magliocca, America’s Founding Son: John Bingham and the Invention of the Fourteenth Amendment (2016)

To set the scene: The Battles of Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts were the official start of hostilities between colonists who objected to British rule and British soldiers sent to restore order in the Colonies.

Not all colonists favored the Revolution, and by some estimates, about 20 percent were Loyalists, while another 25 percent were mostly neutral.

But parts of New England were a hotbed of Patriot activity. British troops were garrisoned in Boston and their commander, General Thomas Gage, sent a force from Boston to seize military supplies stored by the Patriots in nearby Concord.

The rebel forces knew of the plans, were well-organized and armed. The British troops confronted one small group in Lexington, and for some reason, a shot rang out. The British opened fire upon the Patriots and then started a bayonet attack, killing eight local militia members.

The British ran into much stiffer resistance approaching Concord. Another shot rang out, and the British quickly found themselves outnumbered and outflanked by a combined force of Patriot minutemen and militia.

The British regulars then made a difficult retreat to Boston, which was greatly aided by the arrival of reinforcements led by Lord Percy. Today, we estimate that 49 Patriots and 73 British troops died in the fighting.

So let’s start with a few famous reports and quotes related to the first battle of the war.

1. Did Paul Revere say, “The British are coming”?

That seems highly unlikely for several reasons. Revere was on a secret mission to warn the Patriots about the advance of British forces, and at the time, the colonists were British. His more likely response was, “The regulars are coming out.”

2. Did Revere ride by himself at midnight to warn the Patriots?

There were multiple riders as part of the intelligence effort set up by the Patriots. Two other men, William Dawes, and Samuel Prescott rode with Revere. Revere never reached Concord as part of the ride. He was detained by the British after leaving Lexington. It was Prescott who rode from Lexington to Concord.

3. Who shot the shot heard 'round the world?

In Ralph Waldo Emerson’s “Concord Hymn,” the “embattled farmers” fired “the shot heard 'round the world” at the British regulars in Concord. More likely, the shots were fired at Lexington, where the British fired on the Patriot militia, who also may have taken a few shots in the confusion.

One eyewitness to the skirmish was Paul Revere, who had been detained but not arrested by the British. He couldn’t tell who fired the first shot, in his account. Both sides later accused the other of firing first.

4. Were the colonists just a bunch of farmers fighting against the British?

In reality, the Patriots at Lexington and Concord were well organized and well supplied. Many were veterans of the French and Indian campaigns, and they better understood the battle tactics in the area than the British. After withdrawing back to Boston, Lord Percy said, “They have amongst them those who know very well what they are about, having been employed as rangers among the Indians.”

5. Did the Patriots engage the British from a distance using rifles?

The Colonists primarily used muskets and not rifles, and they had to get fairly close to the enemy in small-group formations to be effective.

An article on the American Rifleman website makes a convincing argument that the Patriots were better shots than the British, but only 2 percent of their shots were on target.

Much of the fighting in the British retreat was in hand-to-hand combat, and the British were able to use bayonets. The Patriots used circling tactics to constantly harass the British while building up their troop strength. In the end, about 15,000 Patriot militia and Minutemen surrounded Boston as they trailed the British retreat.

Franklin had been ill for some time, and his last major public appearance was at the Constitutional Convention in 1787. He knew his time was short in April 1790 and worked to make sure that the proper obituary was written in advance.

The Pennsylvania Gazette announced his passing. Another contemporary newspaper, the Federal Gazette, summed up public opinions about the Founding Father in its brief obituary.

“Died on Saturday night, in the 85th year of his age, the illustrious BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. The world has been so long in possession of such extraordinary proofs of the singular abilities and virtues of this  FRIEND OF MANKIND that it is impossible for a newspaper to increase his fame, or to convey his name to a part of the civilized globe where it is not already known and admired.”

Reportedly, Franklin’s last words were, “A dying man can do nothing easily.” Newspapers in Boston said that Franklin had been ill for several weeks, and they made sure readers knew that Franklin was born there.

His passing was duly noted in Europe. Franklin’s reputation as a scientist, inventor, author, and statesman extended there for decades, where the French considered Franklin a true Renaissance man.

The French National Assembly went into mourning. “He was able to restrain thunderbolts and tyrants,” said Count Mirabeau.

Franklin’s funeral was on April 21, 1790, and at least 20,000 people attended it. By current estimates, the population of the city of Philadelphia in 1790 was 28,000.

His coffin was carried by the most powerful men in the state of Pennsylvania and escorted to Christ Church by a crowd of citizens that included a contingent of printers and members of the American Philosophical Society, which Franklin founded. Absent from the event was President George Washington and members of Congress, who were in New York City.

Thomas Jefferson had returned from France in 1790 and visited with Franklin in Philadelphia about one month before his death. In his eulogy for Franklin, Jefferson told the story about his response to people in France who asked if he was really in that country to replace Franklin.

“I generally answered ‘no one can replace him, Sir; I am only his successor,’” Jefferson said. He said that there was "more respect and veneration attached to the character of Doctor Franklin in France than to that of any other person in the same country."

James Madison also recalled Franklin with respect: “I had opportunities of enjoying much of his conversation, which was always a feast to me. I never passed half an hour in his company without hearing some observation or anecdote worth remembering.”

Franklin had written his epitaph in 1728, which reappeared after his passing.

“The Body of B. Franklin, Printer; like the Cover of an old Book, Its Contents torn out, And stript of its Lettering and Gilding, Lies here, Food for Worms. But the Work shall not be wholly lost; For it will, as he believ'd, appear once more, In a new & more perfect Edition, Corrected and amended By the Author.”

Nationally, newspapers covered the funeral of the most famous of all Americans.

And in France, it was assumed that Congress and the president would join the French government in mourning Franklin.

Count Mirabeau stated, “The Congress has ordained throughout the United States a mourning of one month for the death of Franklin, and at this moment America is paying this tribute of veneration and gratitude to one of the fathers of her Constitution."

That wasn’t true.

Madison asked his colleagues in the House of Representatives to wear symbols of mourning for one month, and they agreed.

The Senate declined. The chamber was influenced by John Adams, who disliked Franklin, as did Richard Henry Lee. The Senate also ignored tributes about Franklin sent by France. Franklin, in his lifetime, had been critical of a government that had two houses of the legislature, and his grandson, Benjamin Franklin Bache, was a newspaper publisher openly critical of the Federalists who controlled the Senate.

Jefferson lost an argument with President George Washington for the executive branch to wear mourning symbols. Washington feared the act would set a precedent for all Founding Fathers and that it was too similar to how royalty was honored in Europe.

The first official eulogy for Franklin in the United States didn’t happen until 1791.

How to Stop the Minority-Rule Doom Loop

By Adam Jentleson, Author, Kill Switch: The Rise of the Modern Senate

Adam Jentleson details how certain features of the Senate, the Electoral College, and other institutions dramatically benefit Republicans and impede majority rule, and argues that fundamental reform, including abolishing or substantially changing the filibuster, is necessary for progress.

Booth’s full plot included killing Lincoln, Vice President Andrew Johnson, and Secretary of State William Seward. General Ulysses Grant was another possible target. But only two attacks took place on April 14, 1865, with Seward surviving an assassination attempt and Lincoln dying from Booth's single gunshot.

According to the rules of presidential succession in 1865, only Vice President Johnson, and not Seward or Grant, was in line to replace Lincoln if he died. If Johnson had died, an acting President would be appointed until a special election could be held to elect a new President (and not a Vice President).

The acting President would have been the president pro tempore of the Senate, Lafayette Sabine Foster of Connecticut.

The Presidential Succession Act of 1792 controlled how the President was replaced if he died in office, quit, or was unable to perform his duties.

The act was changed in 1886 and 1947 to deal with different scenarios. The 20th Amendment addressed what happens if a president-elect can’t take office, and the 25th Amendment cleared up the succession of a new Vice President and what happens when a president is temporarily unable to perform his or her duties.

Back in 1865, Booth had convinced George Atzerodt, an acquaintance, to kill Johnson by setting a trap at the Kirkwood House hotel where the vice president lived. However, Atzerodt lost his nerve and didn’t attempt to kill the Vice President, even though he had a rented room above Johnson’s and a loaded gun was found in the room.

If Atzerodt or another assailant had succeeded, Senator Foster would have been acting President until March 4, 1866. And if Foster weren’t available, Speaker of the House Schuyler Colfax would have been next, and last, in line to succeed Lincoln and Johnson.

A special election would have taken place in November 1865, with the Electoral College convening in December 1865, and the presidential inauguration being held on March 4, 1866.

The person charged with the official notification of the states to start the special election process was the secretary of state. Luckily, William Seward survived an attack by assassin Lewis Powell.

If Seward had died,  that power may have devolved on the assistant secretary of state, who could perform the duties as an acting secretary of state until a new President named a replacement who was confirmed by the Senate.

The assistant secretary of state on April 15, 1865, was Frederick W. Seward, the son of William Seward. Frederick Seward was also seriously injured defending his father during Powell’s assassination attempt. (He would recover after Powell pistol-whipped him.)

From what we know about Lafayette Sabine Foster, he was a conservative Republican who was named as the president pro tempore of the Senate about a month before Lincoln’s death. Foster only remained in the Senate for another two years, failing in a re-election attempt. He was later a judge in his home state until his death in 1880.

According to his obituary, Foster was “a prominent figure in congressional life, as a clear and forcible debater upon great public questions, and as an unsurpassed presiding officer in the Senate, that he was most widely known and will be best remembered.”

Foster also was cited for being above the politics that led to his Senate defeat in 1866.

“He was no seeker after popularity, certainly he never descended to any truckling arts to secure it, and probably to some extent he lost favor by the high tone of both his character and bearing, and by the selectness of his friendships,” the obituary said.

A New York Times article from 1875 sheds some more light on Foster’s loss of his Senate seat. The Republicans picked another nominee at a caucus in 1866, and Foster signaled his agreement to run as a rival candidate supported by Connecticut’s Democrats. Foster dropped out at the last moment to accept a judge's position in the state.

The Times article said Foster remained bitter about losing his Senate seat.

“He does not appear to be have ever recovered from the disappointment of his defeat in 1866,” the article stated.

And what would have happened in the special presidential election of November 1865? The Republican Party was already split between its Radical and Moderate wings.

General Grant may have run for president as a compromise candidate, but other prominent Republicans included Seward, Colfax, Thaddeus Stevens, and Benjamin Wade.

The Democrats were also divided and had been badly beaten in the 1864 presidential campaign. Former New York Governor Horatio Seymour, the eventual 1868 nominee, was a key player in the party, as was George H. Pendleton, the 1864 vice presidential nominee. General Winfield Scott Hancock had presidential ambitions in later years, and he had personally supervised the executions in the Lincoln assassination case.

The former Confederate states wouldn’t have been involved since they weren’t readmitted to the union.

Benjamin Wade replaced Foster as Senate president pro tempore in 1867 and nearly became acting President in 1868 when President Johnson avoided removal from office by one vote in a Senate trial.

Scott Bomboy is the editor-in-chief of the National Constitution Center

Why wasn’t General Ulysses S. Grant in the theater box with Lincoln, as scheduled? Where was the President’s bodyguard? How many people were targeted in the plot? And how did all the assassins escape, at least temporarily?

Many of the questions were eventually answered, but some still linger today. And some people have doubts about one of the alleged plotters and her involvement in Lincoln’s murder.

1. Where was General Grant?

He wanted to be in New Jersey! Grant was advertised to be at the event, according to the New York Times, but he declined the invitation so he could travel with his wife to New Jersey to visit relatives.

Link: Read the account in The New York Times

2. Lincoln almost didn’t go to Ford’s Theater

In that first report of the assassination from the Times, the newspaper said Lincoln was reluctant to go to the play. However, since General Grant canceled, he felt obliged to attend, even though his wife didn’t feel well. Lincoln tried to get House Speaker Schuyler Colfax to go with him, but Colfax declined.

“He went with apparent reluctance and urged Mr. Colfax to go with him, but that gentleman had made other engagements,” the Times reported.

3. If Colfax had been in the booth with Lincoln, two persons in line to succeed Lincoln would have been in danger.

Vice President Andrew Johnson was also an assassination target, but his assailant lost his nerve and didn’t attack. Colfax was third in line to succeed Lincoln, after Johnson, and Senate Pro Tempore Lafayette Sabine Foster. Secretary of State William Seward wasn’t in the line of succession in 1865.

4.  Why wasn’t Vice President Johnson attacked?

John Wilkes Booth had convinced George Atzerodt, an acquaintance, to kill Johnson by setting a trap at the Kirkwood House hotel where the Vice President lived. However, Atzerodt lost his nerve and didn’t attempt to kill Johnson, even though he had a rented room above Johnson’s, and a loaded gun was found in the room.

5. How did Secretary of State Seward survive despite having his throat stabbed two or three times?

Assassin Lewis Powell gained entry to Seward’s home, where the secretary was bedridden after a carriage accident. Frederick W. Seward, his son, was seriously injured defending his father during Powell’s assassination attempt.  The secretary was wounded, but the metal surgical collar he was wearing protected him.

6. Where was Lincoln’s bodyguard?

The Smithsonian Magazine did a story on this a few years ago. John Parker, the bodyguard, initially left his position to watch the play, and then he went to the saloon next door for intermission. It was the same saloon where Booth was drinking. No one knows where Parker was during the assassination, but he wasn’t at his position at the door to the booth.

7. Where was the Secret Service?

It didn’t exist yet. The Secret Service was originally created in July 1865 to combat counterfeiters and its job of protecting the president became full-time after President William McKinley's assassination in 1901.

8. How did Booth stay in hiding for so long?

Booth was able to escape Ford’s Theater alive, and he was on the run for 12 days, accompanied by another conspirator, David Herold. The pair went to the Surratt Tavern in Maryland, gathered supplies, went to see Dr. Mudd to have Booth’s broken leg set, and then headed through forest lands and swamps to Virginia. They were also aided by a former Confederate spy operative and by other Confederate sympathizers. Military forces were hot on their trail, and they found a person who directed them to a Virginia farm. At the Garrett Farm, Booth was fatally wounded, and Herold surrendered.

9. The original plan was to kidnap Lincoln, not kill him

Booth met with his conspirators in March 1865 and came up with a plan to kidnap Lincoln as he returned from a play at the Campbell Hospital on March 17.  But Lincoln changed his plans at the last minute and went to a military ceremony.  Booth then thought about kidnapping Lincoln after he left an event at Ford’s Theater. But the actor changed his mind after Lee's surrender.

10.  Was Mary Surratt part of the conspiracy?

That’s a topic still being debated today. Surratt was a Southern sympathizer who had owned land with her late husband in Maryland. She also owned a home in Washington that was also used as a boarding house, and she was friends with Booth. She also rented a tavern she owned in Maryland to an innkeeper.

Surratt was with Booth on the day of the assassination, and she allegedly had told the innkeeper to get a pair of guns ready that night for visitors. The innkeeper’s testimony doomed Surratt to the gallows. What was controversial was the decision to hang Surratt – a decision personally approved by President Andrew Johnson.

On August 22, 1781, a jury in Great Barrington, Massachusetts found that an African American woman named Elizabeth Freeman should be freed and was not the legal property of Colonel John Ashley. By winning, Freeman, also known as “Mum Bett,” became the first African American woman to successfully file a lawsuit for her freedom in the state of Massachusetts.

The case, Brom and Bett v. Ashley, was argued in court on August 21, 1781. The jury only took one day to reach its verdict. However, it took Mum Bett at least 30 years to be able to fight for her freedom in court that day.

Mum Bett—who, after gaining freedom, changed her legal name to Elizabeth Freeman—became a slave in the household of Colonel Ashley and his wife, a wealthy and prominent western Massachusetts family, sometime in the 1740s. It is reported that Mrs. Ashley was not kind to her slaves. Once, in a particularly brutal moment, Mrs. Ashley went to strike another slave (possibly the sister or daughter of Mum Bett) with a hot shovel, and Mum Bett blocked the blow, leaving her with a scar. While in the Ashley home, Mum Bett left her scar exposed as evidence of her abuse.

Colonel Ashley served as a judge of the Berkshire Court of Common Pleas. In January 1773, Ashley moderated the local committee that wrote the Sheffield Declaration. Also known as the Sheffield Resolve, the Declaration was a petition against British tyranny, as well as a manifesto for individual rights of American colonists. In particular, it declared that “mankind in a state of nature are equal, free, and independent of each other, and have a right to the undisturbed enjoyment of their lives, their liberty and property.” Notably, this language was to be found again in the Declaration of Independence of 1776 and in the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780.

At some point, Mum Bett overheard Colonel Ashley and his dinner guests “talking over the Bill of Rights… that all people were born free and equal.” Mum Bett recognized that the principles of liberty and equality the men discussed could also apply to her. From that moment, she resolved to gain her freedom.

To help her in her pursuit of freedom, Mum Bett sought out the aid of Theodore Sedgewick, a lawyer in the neighboring town of Stockbridge, who supported the anti-slavery cause. Sedgewick later described Mum Bett bringing her case to him on the grounds of the newly ratified Massachusetts Constitution.

Mum Bett was joined in her freedom suit by another enslaved man, Brom, who was also the property of Colonel Ashley. Sedgewick brought the case to the Berkshire Court of Common Pleas in May 1781.

Prior to 1780, there had been about 30 freedom suits brought forward in which slaves sought freedom from their masters on legal technicalities, such as a mother's slave status (if unclear). In the case of Mum Bett and Brom, however, Sedgewick took the case to court on constitutional grounds, arguing that due to the Massachusetts Constitution’s language on equality, slavery was outlawed in the state and Mum Bett and Brom were not Ashley's legitimate property. The case was widely considered to be a “test case,” as lawyers on both sides of the issue were keen to see how a court would interpret the new Massachusetts Constitution in light of Sedgewick’s request for the freedom of Mum Bett and Brom from slavery.

Sedgewick obtained a writ of replevin from the court, an action for the recovery of property. The writ ordered Colonel Ashley to release Mum Bett and Brom because they were not his legitimate property. The Colonel refused to do so.

By August 1781, Colonel Ashley still refused to release Mum Bett and Brom from his ownership. Their case was advanced to the County Court of Common Pleas of Great Barrington, where Sedgewick argued before the court that the Massachusetts Constitution outlawed slavery. On August 22, 1781, the jury agreed, declaring Mum Bett and Brom to be free people. The court granted them 30 shillings each.

As a free woman, Mum Bett changed her name to Elizabeth Freeman. Despite repeated requests to return to work for Colonel Ashley, Elizabeth became a paid domestic worker in the home of Theodore Sedgewick. She also became widely known in the area for her skills as a healer, midwife, and nurse. Elizabeth eventually bought her own house, where she lived alongside her children. She died on December 28, 1829 and was buried in the Sedgewick family plot. Her gravestone includes the words: "She was born a slave and remained a slave for nearly thirty years. She could neither read nor write, yet in her own sphere she had no superior or equal."

Elizabeth’s successful case for her own freedom was the first won by an African American woman in the state of Massachusetts. The case also launched the beginning of three freedom suits, known collectively as the Quock Walker case. Though historians debate the extent of the role that this trio of cases played in the cause of ending slavery, they represented a significant step towards it—a step ultimately resulting in the declaration by Supreme Court Chief Justice William Cushing that the institution of slavery was incompatible with the principles of liberty and legal equality articulated in the new Massachusetts Constitution.

Slavery was outlawed in the state of Massachusetts in 1783.

Sources:

https://www.massmoments.org/moment-details/jury-decides-in-favor-of-elizabeth-mum-bett-freeman.html

https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/elizabeth-freeman

https://www.elizabethfreemancenter.org/who-we-are/elizabeth-freeman/

https://www.mass.gov/guides/massachusetts-constitution-and-the-abolition-of-slavery#:~:text=In%201780%2C%20when%20the%20Massachusetts,judicial%20review%20to%20abolish%20slavery.

Alexandra “Mac” Taylor is a Content Fellow for the National Constitution Center.

He was born on April 13, 1743, in Virginia and died on July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

Jefferson is best known for his role in writing the Declaration of Independence, his foreign service, his two terms as president, and his omnipresent face on the modern nickel.

The well-rounded Jefferson was also a Renaissance man who was intellectually curious about many things.

Here are 10 interesting facts about Jefferson’s pursuit of knowledge:

1. Thomas Jefferson really liked books. The third President, after his retirement, sold his library of 6,500 volumes to the Library of Congress after it was ransacked by the British. Jefferson needed the cash to pay off debts, but he started buying more books. "I cannot live without books," he told John Adams.

2.  Jefferson, the economist. Jefferson was deeply engaged in economic theory, which he learned to love during his time in France. He was a friend and translator to leading European theorists; he believed in the free market policies, and he opposed bank notes as currency.

3. Jefferson, the architect. He designed the rotunda for the University of Virginia, his own home at Monticello, and the Virginia State Capitol in Richmond. Monticello has some good resources about what he called the “hobby of my old age,” though architecture was a lifetime pursuit for Jefferson. Monticello and the University of Virginia are on the World Heritage List.

4. Jefferson, the food lover. On his return from France, Jefferson brought his love of that nation’s cuisine back with him. James Hemings went to France as Jefferson's slave, and the pair agreed that if Hemings learned how to make French cuisine, he would be freed on his return to America.

5. Jefferson, the wine snob.  Yes, Jefferson brought his love of French wine back to America, too. He had two vineyards at Monticello. Acknowledged as a great wine expert of early America, he sought to promote wine as an alternative to whiskey and cider.

6. Jefferson the agriculturalist. He believed in the United States as an agrarian society, in part, because it would make the nation independent from other nations. Jefferson practiced what he taught: He was one of the first American farmers to employ crop rotation and redesigned the plow to make it more efficient.

7. Jefferson, the paleontologist. He was also obsessed with fossils and was involved in a great debate about the mammoth that became a political cause. Jefferson raised the profile of paleontology as president, and he has a mammoth named after him.

8. Jefferson, the astronomer. Jefferson loved stargazing almost as much as he liked books. He made sure astronomy was taught at the University of Virginia, and he designed what may have been the first observatory in the United States.

9. Jefferson, the writer. He was a prolific writer during his lifetime, with his authorship of the Declaration of Independence and the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom included in his epitaph (instead of his two terms as president). The Thomas Jefferson Papers at the Library of Congress includes about 27,000 documents, including his extensive correspondence with key historical figures.

10. Jefferson, the musician. He took violin lessons as a child and played the violin as he courted his future wife, Martha Skelton. Jefferson spent considerable time studying the violin as an instrument, but by 1778 he complained about music being played in the New World as being in a “state of deplorable barbarism."

The landmark case in question is Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District from 1969. Mary Beth Tinker, John Tinker, and Christopher Eckhardt, public school students in Des Moines, Iowa, wore black armbands to school to protest the Vietnam War and were suspended. The students sued the school arguing that through the school’s disciplinary action their rights of free speech were being violated.  

Writing for a 7-2 majority, Justice Abe Fortas ruled on behalf of the students and famously said public school students don’t “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.” However, the court also gave school administrators broad powers to prevent conduct that “materially disrupts classwork or involves substantial disorder or invasion of the rights of others.”

Since Tinker, a series of decisions further defined the ability of public-school officials to limit student speech in order to avoid such disruptions. In Bethel School District v. Fraser (1986), the court by a 7-2 majority said a public high school student couldn’t use sexually explicit language at an assembly, while in Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier (1988) the court by a 5-3 majority said public high school officials could censor a student newspaper if needed. And in Morse v. Frederick (2007), a divided Supreme Court said school officials could restrict student free speech if it was seen reasonably as promoting illegal drug use, with Chief Justice John Roberts writing for a 5-4 majority.

Those decisions dealt with actions taken by students physically on campus or within a school, or at a school-related event. Since 2007, public school leaders have faced a new challenge: student speech expressed on social media outside of school. There have been challenges in federal district court, including cases in recent years involving bomb threats made on social media by a student and a student expelled for operating a racist Instagram account that targeted other students and school personnel. In most cases, the school administrators prevailed.

However, the case in front of the court now, Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L., which will be heard in late April 2021, involves several facets of other lower court cases and it could define how public-school administrators monitor and discipline students who are not at school.

A public-school student, named “B.L.” in the lawsuit brought by her parents, was a member of the Mahanoy Area High School’s junior varsity cheerleading team. After B.L. did not make the varsity cheer squad as a sophomore, she and a friend were at a convenience store on a Saturday. B.L. and her friend posted an image on Snapchat with their middle fingers extended and a caption using obscenities about the cheerleading program and the high school. A second post expressed disappointment about not making the varsity team.

About 250 people were in B.L.’s Snapchat group, and news of the posts, along with a screenshot, made their way to the cheerleading team’s coaches. Citing team and school rules, the coaches removed B.L. from the cheerleading team for the season. B.L. and her parents appealed to school administrators, who agreed with the coaches.

B.L.’s parents sued on her behalf and the case was heard by the Third Circuit Court of Appeals after a lower court ruled in favor of the student. The Third Circuit majority said a critical question was the location where B.L. made her obscenity-laden “Snap” on Snapchat. It cited a recent Supreme Court decision, Packingham v. North Carolina (2017) and two Third Circuit decisions supporting the argument that B.L.’s messages—called “Snaps”—were “off-campus speech.” In a 2-1 decision, Judge Cheryl Ann Krause, joined by Judge Stephanos Bibas, wrote that “that Tinker does not apply to off-campus speech—that is, speech that is outside school-owned, -operated, or -supervised channels and that is not reasonably interpreted as bearing the school’s imprimatur.”

Judge Thomas Ambro agreed with the overall judgment but dissented from the majority’s opinion about Tinker excluding off-campus speech. “There are no facts before us to draw a clear and administrable line for this new rule that Tinker does not apply to off-campus speech,” Ambro wrote. “The case before us is straightforward—B.L.’s Snap is not close to the line of student speech that schools may regulate” under Tinker and its related cases. Ambro believed B.L.’s acts did not cause “substantial disruptions,” and the coaches testified in court they didn’t expect the actions “would substantially disrupt any activities in the future.”

In Mahanoy Area’s appeal to the Supreme Court, its attorneys presented one question to the justices to decide: Whether Tinker applies to student speech that occurs off campus. Its petition noted that lower federal courts were divided on the question and it was important for the justices to decide if schools could regulate any off-campus speech under Tinker. Mahanoy Area also has argued that the Third Circuit majority’s decision was wrong. “Both the First Amendment and schools’ pedagogical missions focus on people, not property. What matters is whether the speech involves the school community, not whether a student is three feet on or off campus,” it said in a subsequent brief.

The American Civil Liberties Union, representing B.L., has asked the court to uphold the Third Circuit ruling on the grounds stated by Judge Ambro, and has argued that expanding Tinker beyond the schoolhouse gates could “seriously undermine” students’ First Amendment rights; but if the court chose that route, there would need to be narrow rules for schools to follow.

The justices will hear arguments on April 28, 2021. The decision will be closely watched because the court may need to address Tinker, the role of social media as a platform for student free speech, and the bounds of free speech in general online.

Scott Bomboy is the editor in chief of the National Constitution Center.

The President had gone to Warm Springs, Georgia, on doctor’s advice on March 29, 1945, to recover from what was believed to be exhaustion.  Around 1:15 p.m., Roosevelt collapsed in a chair as he sat for a portrait painting as he complained of a terrific headache. Within two hours, he was pronounced dead at the age of 63.

Audio: Radio announcements of FDR's death

Truman, in particular, had little contact with Roosevelt since becoming FDR’s third Vice President in January 1945. Nine months earlier, the former Senator from Missouri had been a compromise choice among Democratic leaders to replace Roosevelt’s second Vice President, Henry Wallace.

In the run-up to the July 1944 convention in Chicago, James Byrnes, William O. Douglas, and Truman were considered for a Vice Presidential slot that Wallace wouldn’t surrender without a floor vote.  Party leaders knew the pick was crucial because of Roosevelt’s apparent declining health. Truman was acceptable as a choice for pro-union and conservative Democrats.

However, Truman was reluctant to accept until Roosevelt insisted. Truman was approved on the second ballot, but only after considerable efforts were made convincing Wallace supporters to switch candidates.

Truman had spent his time as Vice President in his constitutional role of presiding over the Senate, and on that day, he was having drinks with his friend, Sam Rayburn, after the Senate had finished its business. A call came from the White House to go immediately to its Pennsylvania Avenue entrance. Truman was met by Eleanor Roosevelt and told the President had died. When Truman asked what he could do for Mrs. Roosevelt, she replied, “Is there anything we can do for you? You are the one in trouble now.”

Within minutes, the White House press agency sent out an official bulletin at 5:47 p.m., that President Roosevelt had died two hours earlier from a cerebral stroke. Chief Justice Harlan Stone was then called to the White House to issue Truman’s presidential oath of office in the Cabinet Room in front of Bess Truman, Rayburn, and several Cabinet members.

Within 15 minutes of the press office’s death notification, all major American radio networks had issued bulletins, and they stopped their regular programming. News reports were mixed with solemn music, and interviews with shocked citizens.

At 7 p.m., Truman convened his first Cabinet meeting, which was a short session. But after the meeting, War Secretary Henry Stimson pulled President Truman aside to tell him about a secret project about a “new explosive of almost unbelievable destructive power.” Two weeks later, Truman would be fully briefed on the Manhattan Project and the United States atomic program.

One hour later, the White House issued a brief statement from President Truman. "The world may be sure that we will prosecute this war on both fronts, east and west, with all the vigor we possess, to a successful conclusion," Truman said. The White House also said that a conference in San Francisco to organize the United Nations would go on as scheduled.

In his diary that night, Truman noted that he had not been included in any of the previous President’s planning during the war. “I was not familiar with any of these things, and it was something to think about, but I decided the best thing to do was to go home and get as much rest as possible and face the music,” he wrote.

Eleanor Roosevelt had flown down on a military plane to Fort Benning in Georgia, to work on the funeral arrangements for the late President Roosevelt. She arrived at Warm Springs at 11:30 p.m., and spent the night making plans with other Roosevelt family members.

In a late edition, the New York Times noted the gravity and importance of the day’s events. “The impact of the news of the President's death on the capital was tremendous. Although rumor and a marked change in Mr. Roosevelt's appearance and manner had brought anxiety to many regarding his health, and there had been increasing speculation as to the effects his death would have on the national and world situation, the fact stunned the Government and the citizens of the capital,” it reported.

“The constitutional transition to the Presidency of Mr. Truman was accomplished without a visible sign of anxiety or fear on the part of any of those responsible for waging war and negotiating peace under the Chief Executive.”