Blacks held a mass meeting in Philadelphia to protest the action of the Pennsylvania Reform Convention of 1837 which denied them the right to vote.

William J. Jefferson, first congressman elected from Louisiana since Charles Edmund Nash left office in 1876, born

First training camp for colored officers is established by the U.S. Army in Des Moines, Iowa

On March 14, 2012, Thomas Lubanga was convicted of using child soldiers during the ethnic conflict in the Ituri region. A former militia leader, Lubanga had been on trial for three-years and may receive life imprisonment. The use of child soldiers occurred in 2002 and 2003. The ruling made by the International Criminal Court was significant. It established the use of child soldiers as an international crime.

Quincy Delight Jones, Jr., or simply known as Quincy Jones, is a distinguished American musician. Very few Jazz enthusiasts are recognized as the biggest names in the music industry, and Jones being one of them, is unquestionably one of the brightest and trendiest legends the world has seen. While primarily mastering the demanding instrument of the trumpet in his earlier years, Jones widened his instrumental capabilities by learning the French horn, drums, piano and synthesizer. Alongside the well-nourished sounds of these instruments, Jones also preferred taking on the challenging role of a vocalist in a number of his compositions. In a career that has spanned well over 6 decades, the Chicago-born maestro has distinguished himself as one of the most prominent and successful musicians, conductors, producers, arrangers, composers and actors in modern day entertainment.

Born on March 14, 1933, in Chicago, Illinois, the 81 year old Hall of Famer has had a long and memorable 6-decade journey in the American music industry. Some of the artists Jones has had the privilege to work with include big names such as Miles Davis, Frank Sinatra, Michael Jackson, Peggy Lee, Ray Charles, Paul Simon, and Aretha Franklin, among several others. While his family moved around for work-related affairs in his early years, Jones gathered enough experience to perform with local musicians that shared a similar passion Jazz. From an early age, Jones displayed a tremendous ability for arrangements of difficult compositions, and after receiving a scholarship at Seattle University, had furnished his skills as a trumpeter to play alongside Lionel Hampton’s orchestra in 1953. However, the beginning of his career was marked by average success, and at times, financial instability. After a number of European tours as a trumpeter, Jones had lost most of his savings while prospects for earning decent wages were in the distant horizon. It was only in the mid-1960s, when encouraged by director Sidney Lumet, Jones produced his first ever film score,

Kirby Puckett was a professional baseball player for the Minnesota Twins of the Major Baseball League. He was born on March 14, 1960 in Chicago, Illinois and raised in a public housing project in Chicago. He attended and graduated from Calumet High School, where he played baseball. Due to his short stature, a mere 5 feet and 8 inches, Puckett received no scholarships from universities, much to his disappointment. He therefore decided to work as an assembly line worker at Ford Motor Company. He then went back to school and attended Bradley University, and a year later, transferred to Triton College. In 1982, he was selected by the Minnesota Twins in the first Major League Baseball draft that year. He first played for a few minor leagues such as the Appalachian League and the California League, where he showed great prowess. In 1984, 21 games into the season, he was brought into the major leagues.

He made his major league debut on May 8 against the California Angels. His average during the first year was .296, ranking fourth in the American League in singles. The next year, his average was .288 hits, which made him fourth in the league in hits, third in triples, second in plate appearances, and first in at bats. In 1986, he was selected to his first All-Star game, and also earned his first Golden Glove Award. He began to make a name for himself as more than just a hitter, and began to improve his statistics for total runs scored, bases, at bats and assists.

The Minnesota Twins reached the post-season in 1987, which was the first time they had done so since 1970. Puckett helped his team to win the 1987 World Series title, which was only the fifth time that they had done so in the history of the franchise. Statistically, Puckett’s best season was 1988, where he hit an average of .356, scored 24 home runs, and 121 Runs Batted In. He finished third in the Most Valuable Player voting, same as the year before that. However, the Twins’ performance deteriorated, as did Puckett’s, and the team slipped into last place in

Joseph P. Bradley , (born March 14, 1813, Berne, N.Y., U.S.—died Jan. 22, 1892, Washington, D.C.), associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1870. Bradley was appointed to fill a vacancy on the Electoral Commission of 1877, and his vote elected Rutherford B. Hayes president of the United States. As a justice he emphasized the power of the federal government to regulate commerce. His decisions reflecting this view, rendered during the period of rapid industrialization that followed the American Civil War, were significant in assuring a national market for manufactured goods. His refusal to allow constitutional protection for the civil rights of blacks assisted in the defeat of Reconstruction in the South.

A farm boy with a thirst for learning, Bradley managed to find a way to attend Rutgers College. He thereafter passed the New Jersey bar. He grew to be both a reflective master of the law and an active participant in large undertakings; the Camden & Amboy Railroad was his most important client. In 1870 Bradley was appointed to the Supreme Court by President Ulysses S. Grant and was assigned, as a traveling circuit justice, to the Fifth (Southern) Circuit. His first major civil-rights case was United States v. Cruikshank, which he heard initially in federal circuit court in 1874. It concerned an armed attack by whites who killed 60 blacks at a political rally in Louisiana. Bradley ruled that such rights as the citizen’s right to vote, to assemble peaceably, and to bear arms and the rights to due process and equal protection were not protected by the federal government but by the states. When the case reached the Supreme Court, the majority held the same view.

In 1883 Bradley and the court majority declared unconstitutional two sections of the Civil Rights Act of 1875, which had forbidden discrimination on the ground of colour in inns, public conveyances, and places of amusement. Bradley held that the act was beyond the power of Congress because the Fourteenth Amendment barred discriminatory actions only

Quincy Jones, Music Impresario, Born March 14, 1933 in Chicago’s South Side.

He first fell in love with music when he was in elementary school. He settled on the trumpet after trying nearly all the instruments in his school band.

At the age of 18 he won a scholarship to Berkley College of Music in Boston.

In his prosperous career he wrote charts for musicians such as Ray Charles and Duke Ellington, composed 33 film scores for major motion pictures and also wrote theme music for television.

He is the most nominated Grammy artist with a total of 76 nominations and 26 awards. He also received an Emmy award, 7 Oscar nominations and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts an Sciences Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.

Throughout his career his ongoing concern was to foster appreciation of African-American music and culture.

Dates: October 6, 1917 - March 14, 1977

Also known as: Fannie Lou Townsend Hamer

Fannie Lou Hamer, born in Mississippi, was working in the fields when she was six, and was only educated through the sixth grade.