             LAWS DESIGNED TO DISARM SLAVES, 
             FREEDMEN, AND AFRICAN-AMERICANS

                    OVERVIEW


Before the Civil War ended, State "Slave Codes" prohibited slaves
from owning guns.  After President Lincoln issued the Emancipation
Proclamation in 1863, and after the Thirteenth Amendment to the
U.S. Constitution abolishing slavery was adopted and the Civil War
ended in 1865, States persisted in prohibiting blacks, now freemen,
from owning guns under laws renamed "Black Codes."  They did so on
the basis that blacks were not citizens, and thus did not have the
same rights, including the right to keep and bear arms protected in
the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, as whites.  This
view was specifically articulated by the U.S. Supreme Court in its
infamous 1857 decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford to uphold slavery.

The United States Congress overrode most portions of the Black
Codes by passing the Civil Rights Act of 1866.  The legislative
histories of both the Civil Rights Act and the Fourteenth
Amendment, as well as The Special Report of the Anti-Slavery
Conference of 1867, are replete with denunciations of those
particular statutes that denied blacks equal access to firearms. 
[Kates, Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second
Amendment, 82 Mich. L. Rev. 204, 256 (1983)]  However, facially
neutral disarming through economic means laws remain in effect.

After the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S.
Constitution in 1878, most States turned to "facially neutral"
business or transaction taxes on handgun purchases.  However, the
intention of these laws was not neutral.  An article in Virginia's
official university law review called for a "prohibitive tax...on
the privilege" of selling handguns as a way of disarming "the son
of Ham", whose "cowardly practice of `toting' guns has been one of
the most fruitful sources of crime....Let a negro board a railroad
train with a quart of mean whiskey and a pistol in his grip and the
chances are that there will be a murder, or at least a row, before
he alights."  [Comment, Carrying Concealed Weapons, 15 Va L. Reg.
391, 391-92 (1909); George Mason University Civil Rights Law
Journal, Vol. 2, No. 1, "Gun Control and Racism," Stefan
Tahmassebi, 1991, p. 75]  Thus, many Southern States imposed high
taxes or banned inexpensive guns so as to price blacks and poor
whites out of the gun market.

In the 1990s, "gun control" laws continue to be enacted so as to
have a racist effect if not intent:  

       * Police-issued license and permit laws, unless drafted
       to require issuance to those not prohibited by law from
       owning guns, are routinely used to prevent lawful gun
       ownership among "unpopular" populations.  

       *  Public housing residents, approximately 3 million
       Americans, are singled out for gun bans.  

       *  "Gun sweeps" by police in "high crime neighborhoods"
       whereby vehicles and "pedestrians who meet a specific
       profile that might indicate they are carrying a weapon"
       are searched are becoming popular, and are being studied
       by the U.S. Department of Justice as "Operation
       Ceasefire."

------------------------------------------------------------

SAMPLE SLAVE CODES, BLACK CODES, ECONOMIC-BASED GUN BANS
USED TO PREVENT THE ARMING OF AFRICAN AMERICANS, 1640-1995


YEAR   JURISDICTION        STATUTE
----   ------------        -------

1640   Virginia            Race-based total gun and self-defense ban.
"Prohibiting negroes, slave and free, from carrying weapons
including clubs." 
(Los Angeles Times, "To Fight Crime, Some Blacks Attack Gun
Control," January 19, 1992)


1640   Virginia            Race-based total gun ban.
"That all such free Mulattoes, Negroes and Indians...shall appear
without arms."  
[7 The Statues at Large; Being a Collection of all the Laws of
Virginia, from the First Session of the Legislature, in the Year
1619, p. 95 (W.W. Henning ed. 1823).] (GMU CR LJ, p. 67)


1712   Virginia            Race-based total gun ban.
"An Act for Preventing Negroes Insurrections." (Henning, p. 481)
(GMU CR LJ, p. 70)


1712   South Carolina      Race-based total gun ban.
"An act for the better ordering and governing of Negroes and
slaves." 
[7 Statutes at Large of South Carolina, p. 353-54 (D.J. McCord ed.
1836-1873).] (GMU CR LJ, p. 70)


1791   United States       2nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution
                           ratified.  
Reads:  "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security
of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,
shall not be infringed."


1792   United States       Blacks excluded from the militia, i.e. law-
                           abiding males thus instilled with the right to
                           own guns.
Uniform Militia Act of 1792 "called for the enrollment of every
free, able-bodied white male citizen between the ages of eighteen
and forty-five" to be in the militia, and specified that every
militia member was to "provide himself with a musket or firelock,
a bayonet, and ammunition."  
[1 Stat. 271 (Georgetown Law Journal, Vol. 80, No. 2, "The Second
Amendment:  Toward an Afro-Americanist Reconsideration," Robert
Cottrol and Raymond Diamond, 1991, p. 331)]


1806   Louisiana           Complete gun and self-defense ban for slaves.
Black Code, ch. 33, Sec. 19, Laws of La. 150, 160 (1806) provided
that a slave was denied the use of firearms and all other offensive
weapons.  
(GLJ, p. 337)


1811   Louisiana           Complete gun ban for slaves.
Act of Apr. 8, 1811, ch. 14, 1811 Laws of La. 50, 53-54, forbade
sale or delivery of firearms to slaves.  (Id.)


1819   South Carolina      Master's permission required for gun
                           possession by slave.
Act of Dec. 18, 1819, 1819 Acts of S.C. 28, 31 prohibited slaves
outside the company of whites or without written permission from
their master from using or carrying firearms unless they were
hunting or guarding the master's plantation.  (Id.)


1825   Florida             Slave and free black homes searched for guns
                           for confiscation.
"An Act to Govern Patrols," 1825 Acts of Fla. 52, 55 - Section 8
provided that white citizen patrols "shall enter into all negro
houses and suspected places, and search for arms and other
offensive or improper weapons, and may lawfully seize and take away
all such arms, weapons, and ammunition...."
Section 9 provided that a slave might carry a firearm under this
statute either by means of the weekly renewable license or if "in
the presence of some white person."  
(Id.)


1828   Florida             Free blacks permitted to carry guns if court
                           approval.
Act of Nov. 17, 1828 Sec. 9, 1828 Fla. Laws 174, 177; Act of Jan.
12, 1828, Sec. 9, 1827 Fla. Laws 97, 100 - Florida went back and
forth on the question of licenses for free blacks; twice in 1828,
Florida enacted provisions providing for free blacks to carry and
use firearms upon obtaining a license from a justice of the peace. 
(Id.)


1831   Florida             Race-based total gun ban.
Act of Jan. 1831, 1831 Fla. Laws 30 - Florida repealed all
provision for firearm licenses for free blacks.  
(Id. p. 337-38)


1831   Delaware            Free blacks permitted to carry guns if court
                           approval.
In the December 1831 legislative session, Delaware required free
blacks desiring to carry firearms to obtain a license from a
justice of the peace.  
[(Herbert Aptheker, Nat Turner's Slave Rebellion, p. 74-75 (1966).]
(GLJ, p. 338)


1831   Maryland            Race-based total gun ban.
In the December 1831 legislative session, Maryland entirely
prohibited free blacks from carrying arms.  
(Aptheker, p. 75)  (GLJ, p. 338)


1831   Virginia            Race-based total gun ban.
In the December 1831 legislative session, Virginia entirely
prohibited free blacks from carrying arms.  
(Aptheker, p. 81)  (GLJ, p. 338)


1833   Florida             Slave and free black homes searched for guns
                           for confiscation.
Act of Feb. 17, 1833, ch. 671, Sec. 15, 17, 1833 Fla. Laws 26, 29
authorized white citizen patrols to seize arms found in the homes
of slaves and free blacks, and provided that blacks without a
proper explanation for the presence of the firearms be summarily
punished, without benefit of a judicial tribunal.  
(Id. p. 338)


1833   Georgia             Race-based total gun ban.
Act of Dec. 23, 1833, Sec. 7, 1833 Ga. Laws 226, 228 declared that
"it shall not be lawful for any free person of colour in this
state, to own, use, or carry fire arms of any description
whatever."  
(Id.)


1840   Florida             Complete gun ban for slaves.
Act of Feb. 25, 1840, no. 20, Sec. 1, 1840 Acts of Fla. 22-23 made
sale or delivery of firearms to slaves forbidden.  
(Id. p. 337)


1840   Texas               Complete gun ban for slaves.
"An Act Concerning Slaves," Sec. 6, 1840 Laws of Tex. 171, 172, ch.
58 of the Texas Acts of 1850 prohibited slaves from using firearms
altogether from 1842-1850.
(Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, Northwestern University,
Vol. 85, No. 3, "Gun Control and Economic Discrimination:  The
Melting-Point Case-In-Point," T. Markus Funk, 1995, p. 797)


1844   North Carolina      Race-based gun ban upheld because free blacks
                           "not citizens."
In State v. Newsom, 27 N.C. 250 (1844), the Supreme Court of North
Carolina upheld a Slave Code law prohibiting free blacks from
carrying firearms on the grounds that they were not citizens.  
(GMU CR LJ, p. 70)  


1845   North Carolina      Complete gun ban for slaves.
Act of Jan. 1, 1845, ch. 87, Sec. 1, 2, 1845 Acts of N.C. 124 made
sale or delivery of firearms to slaves forbidden.  
(GLJ, p. 337)


1847   Florida             Slave and free black homes searched for guns
                           for confiscation.
Act of Jan. 6, 1847, ch. 87 Sec. 11, 1846 Fla. Laws 42, 44 
provided that white citizen patrols might search the homes of
blacks, both free and slave and confiscate arms held therein. (Id.
p. 338)


1848   Georgia             Race-based gun ban upheld because free blacks
                           "not citizens."
In Cooper v. Savannah, 4 Ga. 68, 72 (1848), the Georgia Supreme
Court ruled "free persons of color have never been recognized here
as citizens; they are not entitled to bear arms, vote for members
of the legislature, or to hold any civil office."  
(GMU CR LJ, p. 70)


1852   Mississippi         Race-based complete gun ban. 
Act of Mar. 15, 1852, ch. 206, 1852 Laws of Miss. 328 forbade
ownership of firearms by both free blacks and slaves. 
(JCLC NWU, p. 797) 


1857   United States       High Court upholds slavery since blacks "not
                           citizens."
In Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. (19 How.) 393 (1857), Chief
Justice Taney argued if members of the African race were "citizens"
they would be exempt from the special "police regulations"
applicable to them.  "It would give to persons of the negro
race...full liberty of speech...to hold public meetings upon
political affairs, and to keep and carry arms wherever they went."
(Id. p. 417)  U.S. Supreme Court held that descendants of Africans
who were imported into this country and sold as slaves were not
included nor intended to be included under the word "citizens" in
the Constitution, whether emancipated or not, and remained without
rights or privileges except such as those which the government
might grant them, thereby upholding slavery.  Also held that a
slave did not become free when taken into a free state; that
Congress cannot bar slavery in any territory; and that blacks could
not be citizens.


1860   Georgia             Complete gun ban for slaves.
Act of Dec. 19, 1860, no. 64, Sec. 1, 1860 Acts of Ga. 561 forbade
sale or delivery of firearms to slaves.  
(GLJ, p. 337)


1861   United States       Civil War begins.


1861   Florida             Slave and free black homes searched for guns
                           for confiscation.
Act of Dec. 17, 1861, ch. 1291, Sec. 11, 1861 Fla. Laws 38, 40
provided once again that white citizen patrols might search the
homes of blacks, both free and slave, and confiscate arms held
therein.  
(Id. p. 338)


1863   United States       Emancipation Proclamation 
President Lincoln issued proclamation "freeing all slaves in areas
still in rebellion."  


1865   Mississippi         Blacks require police approval to own guns,
                           unless in military.
Mississippi Statute of 1865 prohibited blacks, not in the military
"and not licensed so to do by the board of police of his or her
county" from keeping or carrying "fire-arms of any kind, or any
ammunition, dirk or bowie knife."  
[reprinted in 1 Documentary History of Reconstruction: Political,
Military, Social, Religious, Educational and Industrial, 1865 to
the Present Time, p. 291, (Walter L. Fleming, ed., 1960.)] (GLJ, p.
344)


1865   Louisiana           Blacks require police and employer approval to
                           own guns, unless in military.
Louisiana Statute of 1865 prohibited blacks, not in the military
service, from "carrying fire-arms, or any kind of weapons...without
the special permission of his employers, approved and indorsed by
the nearest and most convenient chief of patrol." 
(Fleming, p. 280)(GLJ, p. 344)


1865   United States       Civil War ends May 26.


1865   United States       Slavery abolished as of December 18, 1865. 
13th Amendment abolishing slavery was ratified.  Reads:  "Section
1.  Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a
punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly
convicted, shall exist within the United States, or in any place
subject to their jurisdiction.  Section 2.  Congress shall have
power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation."  


1866   Alabama             Race-based total gun ban.
Black Code of Alabama in January 1866 prohibited blacks to own or
carry firearms or other deadly weapons and prohibited "any person
to sell, give, or lend fire-arms or ammunition of any description
whatever" to any black.  
[The Reconstruction Amendments' Debates, p. 209, (Alfred Avins ed.,
1967)] (GLJ, p. 345)


1866   North Carolina      Rights of blacks can be changed by legislature.
North Carolina Black Code, ch. 40, 1866 N.C. Sess. Laws 99 stated
"All persons of color who are now inhabitants of this state shall
be entitled to the same privileges, and are subject to the same
burdens and disabilities, as by the laws of the state were
conferred on, or were attached to, free persons of color, prior to
the ordinance of emancipation, except as the same may be changed by
law."  
(Avins, p. 291.) (GLJ, p. 344)


1866   United States       Civil Rights Act of 1866 enacted.
CRA of 1866 did away with badges of slavery embodied in the "Black
Codes," including those provisions which "prohibit any negro or
mulatto from having fire-arms." [CONG. GLOBE, 39th Congress, 1st
Session, pt. 1, 474 (29 Jan. 1866)]  Senator William Saulsbury (D-
Del) added "In my State for many years...there has existed a
law...which declares that free negroes shall not have the
possession of firearms or ammunition.  This bill proposes to take
away from the States this police power..." and thus voted against
the bill.  CRA of 1866 was a precursor to today's 42 USC Sec.1982,
a portion of which still reads:  "All citizens of the United States
shall have the same right, in every state and territory, as is
enjoyed by white citizens thereof to inherit, purchase, lease,
sell, hold and convey real and personal property."  


1866   United States       Proposed 14th Amendment to U.S. Constitution
                           debated.
Opponents of the 14th Amendment objected to its adoption because
they opposed federal enforcement of the freedoms in the bill of
rights.  Senator Thomas A. Hendricks (D-Indiana) said "if this
amendment be adopted we will then carry the title [of citizenship]
and enjoy its advantages in common with the negroes, the coolies,
and the Indians." [CONG. GLOBE, 39th Congress, 1st Session, pt. 3,
2939 (4 June 1866)].  Senator Reverdy Johnson, counsel for the
slave owner in Dred Scott, opposed the amendment because "it is
quite objectionable to provide that `no State shall make or enforce
any law which shall abridge the privileges and immunities of
citizens of the United States'."  Thus, the 14th Amendment was
viewed as necessary to buttress the Civil Rights Act of 1866,
especially since the act "is pronounced void by the jurists and
courts of the South," e.g. Florida has as "a misdemeanor for
colored men to carry weapons...and the punishment...is whipping..."
[CONG GLOBE, 39th Con., 1st Session, 504, pt. 4, 3210 (16 June
1866)]. 


1866   United States       Klu Klux Klan formed.
Purpose was to terrorize blacks who voted; temporarily disbanded in
1871; reestablished in 1915.  In debating what would become 42 USC
Sec. 1983, today's federal civil rights statute, Representative
Butler explained "This provision seemed to your committee to be
necessary, because they had observed that, before these midnight
marauders [the KKK] made attacks upon peaceful citizens, there were
very many instances in the South where the sheriff of the county
had preceded them and taken away the arms of their victims.  This
was especially noticeable in Union County, where all the negro
population were disarmed by the sheriff only a few months ago under
the order of the judge...; and then, the sheriff having disarmed
the citizens, the five hundred masked men rode at nights and
murdered and otherwise maltreated the ten persons who were in jail
in that county."  
[1464 H.R. REP. No. 37, 41st Cong., 3rd Sess. p. 7-8 (20 Feb.
1871)]


1867   United States       The Special Report of the Anti-Slavery
                           Conference of 1867.
Report noted with particular emphasis that under the Black Codes,
blacks were "forbidden to own or bear firearms, and thus were
rendered defenseless against assaults."  
(Reprinted in H. Hyman, The Radical Republicans and Reconstruction,
p. 219, 1967.) (GMU CR LJ, p. 71) 


1868   United States       14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution
                           adopted, conveying citizenship to blacks.
Reads, in part:  "Section 1.  All persons born or naturalized in
the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are
citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. 
No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the
privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor
shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property,
without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its
jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
"Section 5.  The Congress shall have power to enforce, by
appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article."


1870   Tennessee           First "Saturday Night Special" economic
                           handgun ban passed.
In the first legislative session in which they gained control,
white supremacists passed "An Act to Preserve the Peace and Prevent
Homicide," which banned the sale of all handguns except the
expensive "Army and Navy model handgun" which whites already owned
or could afford to buy, and blacks could not.  
("Gun Control:  White Man's Law," William R. Tonso, Reason,
December 1985)  Upheld in Andrews v. State, 50 Tenn. (3 Heisk.)
165, 172 (1871) (GMU CR LJ, p. 74)
"The cheap revolvers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries were
referred to as `Suicide Specials,' the `Saturday Night Special'
label not becoming widespread until reformers and politicians took
up the gun control cause during the 1960s.  The source of this
recent concern about cheap revolvers, as their new label suggest,
has much in common with the concerns of the gun-law initiators of
the post-Civil War South.  As B. Bruce-Briggs has written in the
Public Interest, `It is difficult to escape the conclusion that the
`Saturday Night Special' is emphasized because it is cheap and
being sold to a particular class of people.  The name is sufficient
evidence -- the reference is to `niggertown Saturday night.'" 
("Gun Control:  White Man's Law," William R. Tonso, Reason,
December 1985) 


1871   United States       Anti-KKK Bill debated in response to race-
                           motivated violence in South.
A report on violence in the South resulted in an anti-KKK bill that
stated "That whoever shall, without due process of law, by
violence, intimidation, or threats, take away or deprive any
citizen of the United States of any arms or weapons he may have in
his house or possession for the defense of his person, family, or
property, shall be deemed guilty of a larceny thereof, and be
punished as provided in this act for a felony."  [1464 H.R. REP.
No. 37, 41st Cong., 3rd Sess. p. 7-8 (20 Feb. 1871)].
Since Congress doesn't have jurisdiction over simple larceny, the
language was removed from the anti-KKK bill, but this section
survives today as 42 USC Sec. 1983:  "That any person who, under
color of any law,...of any State, shall subject, or cause to be
subjected, any person... to the deprivation of any rights,
privileges, or immunities to which...he is entitled under the
Constitution...shall be liable...in any action at law...for
redress...". 


1875   United States       High Court rules has no power to stop KKK
                           members from disarming blacks.
In United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. at 548-59 (1875)  A member
of the KKK, Cruikshank had been charged with violating the rights
of two black men to peaceably assemble and to bear arms.  The U.S.
Supreme Court held that the federal government had no power to
protect citizens against private action (not committed by federal
or state government authorities) that deprived them of their
constitutional rights under the 14th Amendment.  The Court held
that for protection against private criminal action, individuals
are required to look to state governments.
"The doctrine in Cruikshank, that blacks would have to look to
state government for protection against criminal conspiracies gave
the green light to private forces, often with the assistance of
state and local governments, that sought to subjugate the former
slaves and their descendants...
With the protective arm of the federal government withdrawn,
protection of black lives and property was left to largely hostile
state governments."  
(GLJ, p. 348.)


1879   Tennessee           Second "Saturday Night Special" economic
                           handgun ban passed.
Tennessee revamped its economic handgun ban nine years later,
passing "An Act to Prevent the Sale of Pistols," which was upheld
in State v. Burgoyne, 75 Tenn. 173, 174 (1881). 
(GMU CR LJ, p. 74)


1882   Arkansas            Third "Saturday Night Special" economic
                           handgun ban passed.
Arkansas followed Tennessee's lead by enacting a virtually
identical "Saturday Night Special" law banning the sale of any
pistols other than expensive "army or navy" model revolvers, which
most whites had or could afford, thereby disarming blacks.  Statute
was upheld in Dabbs v. State, 39 Ark. 353 (1882) 
(GMU CR LJ, p. 74) 


1893   Alabama             First all-gun economic ban passed. 
Alabama placed "`extremely heavy business and/or transactional
taxes'" on the sale of handguns in an attempt "to put handguns out
of the reach of blacks and poor whites."  
("Gun Control:  White Man's Law," William R. Tonso, Reason,
December 1985) 


1902   South Carolina      First total civilian handgun ban.
The state banned all pistol sales except to sheriffs and their
special deputies, which included the KKK and company strongmen. 
(Kates, "Toward a History of Handgun Prohibition in the United
States" in Restricting Handguns:  The Liberal Skeptics Speak Out,
p. 15, 1979.) (GMU CR LJ, p. 76)


1906   Mississippi         Race-based confiscation through record-
                           keeping.
Mississippi enacted the first registration law for retailers in
1906, requiring them to maintain records of all pistol and pistol
ammunition sales, and to make such records available for inspection
on demand.  
(Kates, p. 14) (GMU CR LJ, p. 75)


1907   Texas               Fourth "Saturday Night Special" economic
                           handgun ban. 
Placed "`extremely heavy business and/or transactional taxes'" on
the sale of handguns in an attempt "to put handguns out of the
reach of blacks and poor whites."  
("Gun Control:  White Man's Law," William R. Tonso, Reason,
December 1985) 


1911   New York            Police choose who can own guns lawfully. 
"Sullivan Law" enacted, requiring police permission, via a permit
issued at their discretion, to own a handgun.  Unpopular minorities
were and are routinely denied permits. 
("Gun Control:  White Man's Law," William R. Tonso, Reason,
December 1985)
"(T)here are only about 3,000 permits in New York City, and 25,000
carry permits.  If you're a street-corner grocer in Manhattan, good
luck getting a gun permit.  But among those who have been able to
wrangle a precious carry permit out of the city's bureaucracy are
Donald Trump, Arthur Ochs Sulzburger, William Buckley, Jr., and
David, John, Lawrence and Winthrop Rockefeller.  Surprise." 
(Terrance Moran, "Racism and the Firearms Firestorm," Legal Times)


1934   United States       Gun Control Act of 1934 (National Firearms
                           Act) passed. 


1941   Florida             Judge admits gun law passed to disarm black
                           laborers.
In concurring opinion narrowly construing a Florida gun control law
passed in 1893, Justice Buford stated the 1893 law "was passed when
there was a great influx of negro laborers in this State....The
same condition existed when the Act was amended in 1901 and the Act
was passed for the purpose of disarming the negro laborers....The
statute was never intended to be applied to the white population
and in practice has never been so applied...".  Watson v. Stone,
148 Fla. 516, 524, 4 So.2d 700, 703 (1941) 
(GMU CR LJ, p. 69)

------------------------------------------------------------

The Following Historical Events Are Included 
as Context for Passage of the Gun Control Act of 1968

1954 - U.S.         Supreme Court held racial segregation of schools
                    violates 14th Amendment. 

1955 - U.S.         Alabama bus segregation ordinance held
                    unconstitutional after boycott and NAACP protest.

1956 - U.S.         Massive resistance to Supreme Court desegregation
                    ruling called for by 101 Southern congressmen.

1957 - U.S.         Congress approved first civil rights law for
                    blacks.
                    Governor ordered National Guard troops to prevent
                    nine blacks from entering all-white high school in
                    Little Rock; President Eisenhower had to send
                    federal military troops to enforce court order that
                    Guardsman be removed.

1960 - U.S.         Sit-ins began February 1 when four black college
                    students in Greensboro, NC, refused to move from a
                    lunch counter after being denied service; by 1961,
                    more than 700,000 students, black and white, had
                    participated in sit-ins.

1962 - U.S.         3,000 troops were required to quell riots after
                    University of Mississippi accepted first black
                    student.

1963 - U.S.         200,000 people participated in March on Washington,
                    at which Dr. Martin Luther King gave his famous "I
                    have a dream" speech.
                    President John F. Kennedy assassinated in November.
                    

1964 - U.S.         Omnibus civil rights bill barring discrimination in
                    voting, jobs, discrimination, etc.; three civil
                    rights workers reported missing in Mississippi,
                    found buried two months later, 21 white men
                    arrested, seven of whom an all-white federal court
                    jury convicted of conspiracy only.

1965 - CA           34 dead in race riot in Watts area of Los Angeles,
                    CA.

1966 - U.S.         First black U.S. senator in 85 years elected
                    (Edward Brook, R-MA)

1967 - U.S.         Race riots in Newark, NJ, kill 26, injure 1,500,
                    with over 1,000 arrested. Race riots in Detroit,
                    MI, killed at least 40, injured 2,000 and left
                    5,000 homeless; was quelled by 4,700 federal
                    paratroopers and 8,000 National Guardsmen.
                    Thurgood Marshall sworn in Oct. 2 as first black
                    justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

1968 - U.S.         Martin Luther King assassinated in April.
                    Robert F. Kennedy assassinated in June.
------------------------------------------------------------

1968   United States       Gun Control Act of 1968 passed.
Avowed anti-gun journalist Robert Sherrill frankly admitted that
the Gun Control Act of 1968 was "passed not to control guns but to
control Blacks."  
[R. Sherrill, The Saturday Night Special, p. 280 (1972).] (GMU CR
LJ, p. 80)
"The Gun Control Act of 1968 was passed not to control guns but to
control blacks, and inasmuch as a majority of Congress did not want
to do the former but were ashamed to show that their goal was the
latter, the result was they did neither.  Indeed, this law, the
first gun-control law passed by Congress in thirty years, was one
of the grand jokes of our time.  First of all, bear in mind that it
was not passed in one piece but was a combination of two laws.  The
original 1968 Act was passed to control handguns after the Rev.
Martin Luther King, Jr., had been assassinated with a _rifle_. 
Then it was repealed and repassed to include the control of _rifles
and shotguns_ after the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy with a
_handgun_.... The moralists of our federal legislature as well as
sentimental editorial writers insist that the Act of 1968 was a
kind of memorial to King and Robert Kennedy.  If so, it was
certainly a weird memorial, as can be seen not merely by  the
handgun/long-gun shellgame, but from the inapplicability of the law
to their deaths."  
(The Saturday Night Special and Other Guns, Robert Sherrill, p.
280, 1972)


1988   Maryland            Fifth "Saturday Night Special" economic
                           handgun ban passes.
Ban on "Saturday Night Specials," i.e. inexpensive handguns,
passes.


1988   Illinois            Poor citizens singled out for gun ban in
                           Illinois.
Starting in late 1988, the Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) and the
Chicago Police Dept. (CPD) enacted and enforced an official policy,
Operation Clean Sweep, which applied to all housing units owned and
operated by the CHA.  The purpose was the confiscation of firearms
and illegal narcotics and consisted of warrantless searches and of
a visitor exclusion policy severely limiting the right of CHA
tenants to associate in their residences with family members and
other guests, tenants had to sign in and out of the building,
producing to the police or CHA officials photo Id.  Relatives,
including children and grandchildren, were not allowed to stay
over, even on holidays.  CHA tenants who objected or attempted to
interfere with these warrantless searches were arrested.
The ACLU filed a lawsuit seeking declaratory and injunctive relief
on behalf of the CHA tenants against the enforcement of Operation
Clean Sweep.  The complaint was filed in the United Sates District
Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division, on
December 16, 1988, as Case No. 88C10566 and is styled as Rose
Summeries, et al. v. Chicago Housing Authority, et al.  A consent
decree was entered on November 30, 1989 in which the CHA and CPD
agreed to abide by certain standards and in which the scope and
purposes of such "emergency housing inspections" were limited. 
(GMU, p. 98)


1990   Virginia            Poor citizens singled out for gun ban in
                           Virginia.
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia upheld a
ban imposed by the Richmond Housing Authority on the possession of
all firearms, whether operable or not, in public housing projects. 
The Richmond Tenants Organization had challenged the ban, arguing
that such requirement had made the city's 14,000 public housing
residents second-class citizens.  
[Richmond Tenants Org. v. Richmond Dev. & Hous. Auth., No. C.A.
3:90CV00576 (E.D.Va. Dec. 3, 1990).]  (GMU, p. 97)


1994   United States       President seeks to single out all poor
                           citizens residing in federal housing for gun
                           ban.
The Clinton Administration introduced H.R. 3838 in 1994 to ban guns
in federal public housing, but the House Banking Committee rejected
it.  Similar legislation was filed in 1994 in the Oregon and
Washington state legislatures.


1995   Maine               Poor citizens singled out for gun ban in
                           Maine.
Portland, ME gun ban in public housing struck down on April 5,
1995.
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