Dec. 20 history: La. Purchase

Dec. 20 history

In 1803, The Louisiana Purchase was completed as ownership of the territory was formally transferred from France to the United States. The deal involved total payments of $27,267,622. Louisiana Purchase, Summary, Facts, Significance, Treaty, 1803 (americanhistorycentral.com) 

In 1836, President Andrew Jackson presents Congress with a treaty he negotiated with the Ioway, Sacs, Sioux, Fox, Otoe and Omaha tribes of the Missouri territory. The treaty, which removed those tribes from their ancestral homelands to make way for white settlement, epitomized racist 19th century presidential policies toward Native Americans. The agreement was just one of nearly 400 treaties—nearly always unequal—that were concluded between various tribes and the U.S. government between 1788 and 1883.

In 1860, South Carolina became the first state to secede from the Union as all 169 delegates to a special convention in Charleston voted in favor of separation.

In 1864, Confederate forces evacuated Savannah, Georgia, as Union Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman nearly completed his “March to the Sea.” 

In 1957, while spending the Christmas holidays at Graceland, his newly purchased Tennessee mansion, rock-and-roll star Elvis Presley receives his draft notice for the United States Army. 

In 1963, the Berlin Wall was opened for the first time to West Berliners, who were allowed one-day visits to relatives in the Eastern sector for the holidays.

In 1989, the United States launched Operation Just Cause, sending troops into Panama to topple the government of Gen. Manuel Noriega.

In 1999, the Vermont Supreme Court ruled that gay couples were entitled to the same benefits and protections as wedded heterosexual couples.

In 2001, the U.N. Security Council authorized a multinational force for Afghanistan.

In 2002, Trent Lott of Mississippi resigned as Senate Republican leader two weeks after igniting a political firestorm with racially charged remarks.

In 2005, a federal judge ruled that “intelligent design” could not be mentioned in biology classes in a Pennsylvania public school district, delivering a stinging attack on the Dover Area School Board.

In 2016, President Barack Obama designated the bulk of U.S.-owned waters in the Arctic Ocean and certain areas in the Atlantic Ocean as indefinitely off limits to future oil and gas leasing.