Liz Tracey

Alexander Hamilton’s anonymous essay challenged the voting citizens of New York to hold fast to the truth when deciding to ratify (or not) the US Constitution.

Noah Webster’s American Dictionary of the English Language declared Americans free from the tyranny of British institutions and their vocabularies.

The 1954 Supreme Court decision, based on the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, declared that “separate but equal” has no place in education.

Signed February 2, 1848, the treaty compelled Mexico to cede 55 percent of its territory, bringing more than 525,000 square miles under US sovereignty.

The Treaty of Ghent ended the War of 1812, an oft overlooked conflict that continues to shape the politics and culture(s) of North America.

Proposition 6, better known as the Briggs Initiative, was the first attempt to restrict the rights of lesbian and gay Americans by popular referendum.

President Ford’s unconditional pardon of Richard Nixon created political controversy. It also tarnished Ford’s own reputation with the American public.

Five months before his assassination in 1978, Harvey Milk called on the president of the United States to defend the rights of gay and lesbian Americans.

The Black feminist collective's 1977 statement has been a bedrock document for academics, organizers and theorists for 45 years.