| Year | Event
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| 1791 | Constitution of third May the first written constitution in Europe, proclaimed by Polish Sejm (Parliament).
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| 1946 | The International Military Tribunal for the Far East begins in Tokyo against 28 Japanese military and government officials accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
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| 1971 | National Public Radio begins programming with All Things Considered, a daily news program. NPR's inaugural program transmission - live coverage of Senate Vietnam hearings - occurred on April 19, 1971.
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| 1971 | Nixon administration (R) arrests nearly 13,000 anti-war demonstrators (Vietnam war) in Washington, D.C.
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| 1979 | Margaret Thatcher, leader of the Conservative Party, became the first female prime minister in the history of England and Europe. [A few more female leaders and wars will be a thing of the past! What? Falkland what?]
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| 1996 | Health Advisory: The CSPI, food police, are at it again. McDonald' Hamburgers are bad for your health. Related material here.
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| 2000 | Executive Order (EO) #13153 {pdf} is issued by Clinton (D), that authorizes the Education Department to reward low performing schools by sending them more money and other resources. EO's are used to bypass the legislative process for creating more laws. You can search for EO's on any subject at the NARA site.
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| 2005 | Today's Example of a Most Interesting Government Purchase: Defense Industry Daily reports that the U.S. Air Force (USAF) recently decided to recompete a $3.3 Billion contract for Avionics for about 670 C-130 Hercules medium transport aircraft which had been originally awarded to Boeing. It seems that service-acquisition chief Darleen Druyun, who went to work for Boeing in January 2003 and also secured jobs for family members in return for influence over military procurement decisions, may have improperly influenced up to eight contracts.
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| 2006 | Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer, a descendant of ethnic Germans who migrated here from Russia in 1909, posthumously pardons 75 men and three women that were convicted of sedition in Montana during World War I. We Americans can get pretty rough on anyone that we judge to be "unpatriotic"; one man was sentenced to 7 to 20 years in prison for calling wartime food regulations a "big joke." See the New York Times, 5/2/06 edition, "Pardons Granted 88 Years After Crimes of Sedition".
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