Rebuilding Sierra Leone

The University of South Carolina School of Law recently hosted a very interesting conference entitled “Rebuilding Sierra Leone: Changing Institutions and Culture” (logo at right). Organized by Professor Joel Samuels, this April 1 conference was one of the first interdisciplinary academic conferences in the United States to focus solely on the unique challenges of redeveloping Sierra Leone after its decade-long armed conflict in the 1990s.
The goal of the conference was to highlight salient issues that have hindered Sierra Leone’s post-war rebuilding, and to begin discussion among academics working in different disciplines on future collaborations on Sierra Leone-specific projects.
The conference was divided into four panels:
► “Sierra Leone in Context”
► “Paths to Rebuilding Sierra Leone”
► “The Special Court for Sierra Leone”
► “The Problem of Child Soldiers”
Some highlights included a talk by Professor Erika George (University of Utah) (left) that began with the observation that erosion or failure of the education system is one of the first indicators of a failing or failed state. She linked this idea to the state of education in Sierra Leone prior to and after the conflict, noting some post-conflict improvements but also some very worrying gaps that still remain.
Another thought-provoking speaker was Professor Jennifer Moore (University of New Mexico) (right), who argued that post-conflict Sierra Leone needs not only courtroom (retributive) justice, it also needs to focus on social justice (material well-being), and historical justice (addressing peace in community life. She highlighted the work of two nongovernmental organizations within Sierra Leone – the Centre for Development and Peace Education and Fambul Tok – in contributing to the two latter forms of justice.
Yours truly, Valerie Oosterveld, had the honour of presenting a paper on the jurisprudence of the Special Court for Sierra Leone with respect to gender-based crimes against humanity and war crimes. I traced positive and less-than-positive legal reasoning with respect to gender-based acts in the trial judgments in what are usually referred to as the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council and the Civil Defence Forces cases. I contrasted these cases with the Revolutionary United Front case, arguing that the RUF case represents a step forward in efforts to contextualize rape, sexual mutilation and other forms of sexual violence directed against women, girls, men and boys, as well as gender-based crimes such as forced marriage. My presentation represented a continuation of arguments outlined in a recently-published article - “The Gender Jurisprudence of the Special Court for Sierra Leone: Progress in the Revolutionary United Front Judgments” (2011) 44(1) Cornell International Law Journal 49-74.
The conference participants also heard interesting presentations by: Prof. Christopher DeCorse (Syracuse University), Herb Frazier (author), Kevin Lowther (author), Joseph Opala (Bunce Island Conservation Project), Ambassador June Carter Perry (former US Ambassador to Sierra Leone), Lt. Col. Mark Daubney (British Embassy), Ambassador David Scheffer (Northwestern University), James Hodes (Cochran Law Firm), Anthony Triolo (International Center for Transitional Justice), Professor Daniel Hoffman (University of Washington), Professor Mark Drumbl (Washington & Lee University) and Professor Noah Novogrodsky (University of Wyoming).
There was discussion among the conference participants about publishing an edited volume focused on possibilities and challenges facing Sierra Leone in its rebuilding efforts: I will keep IntLawGrrl readers informed about this potentially exciting development!

On March 18

On this day in ...
... 1890, Kate Kennedy (left), a pioneer Californian, died in Oakland. (photo credit) Born in Gaskinstown, County Meath, Ireland in 1827, she'd arrived in San Francisco in 1856. Largely self-educated, she worked for 3 decades as a public-schools teacher and principal, becoming, in the words of the San Francisco Chronicle, "a distinguished educator ... of national repute." The Board of Education nonetheless demoted her; she objected, eventually winning $5,000 in back pay. She was a suffragist, labor activist, and "ardent feminist" who fought successfully for equal-pay-for-equal-work legislation.

(Prior March 18 posts are here, here, here, and here.)

'Nuff said

(Taking context-optional note of thought-provoking quotes)

She is making plans to move to Colorado, where she could afford to keep teaching by living with her parents.

-- New York Times article referring to Erin Parker, a Wisconsin high school teacher. Total "'Nuff said" about the current state of public education.

Go On! International Women's Day

(Go On! is an occasional item on symposia and other events of interest)

Today's the beginning of Women's History Month. No better way to launch it than with an announcement of a "Celebration of International Women’s Day: Ensuring Women’s Equal Access to Education, Training, Technology, and Work," to be held from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. on March 8 at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York, 899 Tenth Avenue, Room 630T, New York City. Cosponsors include the college's Center for International Human Rights, Women's Center, and M.A. Program in International Crime and Justice.

Scheduled panelists:

► Professor John Mathiason, Professor of International Relations at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse University, and Former Deputy-Director of the U.N. Division on the Advancement of Women

► Heather McKay, Director, Innovative Training and Workforce Development Research and Programs, Center for Women & Work, Rutgers University

► Ejim Dike, Director, Human Rights Project, Urban Justice Center

Serving as discussant will be Dr. Dorota Gierycz, Visiting Scholar at the Center for International Human Rights, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and the first Head of the UN Gender Analysis Section. Moderating will be Rebecca Landy, Assistant Director of the Center for International Human Rights, John Jay College of Criminal Justice (to whom thanks are due for this notice). For information and to RSVP, e-mail Rebecca at rlandy@jjay.cuny.edu.

Minorities in Viet Nam

(It’s IntLawGrrls’ great pleasure to welcome back alumna Gay McDougall, who contributes this guest post)

This month I conducted a 10-day official visit to Viet Nam. My objectives for this, my 10th such country visit, were to hold consultations on minority issues and to examine the human rights situation of Viet Nam’s numerous minority groups. These goals conform with my mandate as the Independent Expert on Minorities for the United Nations: to promote implementation of the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities, and to identify challenges, as well as successful practices, in regard to minority issues.

I would first like to thank the Government of Viet Nam for extending an invitation to me and for the high level of importance that it attached to my visit, apparent in the assistance and access provided to me, at both national and provincial levels. My preliminary comments, excerpted in this post, will be followed by a report containing my full findings and recommendations to the U.N. Human Rights Council next March.

I began my visit in Hanoi before travelling to regions of significant minority populations, including the provinces of Dien Bien in the Northern Highlands, Tra Vinh in the Mekong Delta region, and Gia Lai and Kon Tum provinces in the Central Highlands. (map credit) I met with senior Government officials, representatives of non-governmental organizations, community members, academics, and others working in the field of minority issues, social inclusion and promotion of equality and non-discrimination.

Overview

Viet Nam is a country of great diversity. The majority population consists of those who identify themselves as part of the “Kinh” ethnic group. There are 53 other ethnic groups as well, with unique religious, linguistic and cultural characteristics, and identities. Viet Nam recognizes its minority populations as important constituent parts of its nation, and it understands many of the challenges that it faces to ensure that the rights of minorities are respected, protected and promoted in every sphere of life. The establishment of dedicated Governmental bodies with responsibilities for minorities, including the Committee on Ethnic Minority Affairs, is a positive practice that is replicated on provincial and district levels.
Viet Nam has witnessed a remarkable period of economic growth, progress towards the United Nations' Millennium Development Goals, and highly positive results in respect to poverty alleviation and economic development in general. The Government readily acknowledges that despite these achievements, most minority groups remain the poorest of Viet Nam’s poor.

The acknowledgment of the economic and social gaps that exist between the minority communities and the majority population is an important step towards putting in place the measures required to close those gaps.

Government programs over the past several years have established important initiatives to close those gaps through infrastructure projects, social protection programs and developments in the fields of health and education. The government should be commended for these programs and for the improvements that the programs have made in the lives of minorities.

I understand the challenges facing the government in achieving the rights of non-Kinh ethnic communities, particularly those in the most geographically remote areas. I welcome the government’s affirmation of its commitment to tackling those challenges as a matter of high priority. It is critical that:

► The Government ensures that its economic growth is achieved without negatively impacting on the lives of minorities or deepening their poverty; and

► Minorities share fully in the benefits of growth and prosperity, while maintaining their distinct cultures and identities.

Education

Access to quality and appropriate education is a gateway to development and poverty eradication for minorities. It is equally essential for the preservation and promotion of minority cultures, languages and identities. Education helps minorities to take control of their lives and to fulfill their potential as equal stakeholders in the development of the State. (photo credit)

Viet Nam has made significant progress in the provision of school structures to most Communes, in the option of boarding schools for students from remote villages, and in access to secondary schools for minority children. Nonetheless, I am concerned that minorities are achieving poor results in education relative to Kinh students.

One of the problems that has been identified is that minorities lack adequate opportunities to be taught in their own minority languages from the earliest years of education. They struggle with being taught only in Vietnamese.

With the ultimate goal of fluency in Vietnamese, bilingual education helps minority children to make better early progress in education and provides a strong and culturally appropriate foundation for their future schooling. I look forward to the results of a pilot programme of Mother-Tongue-based bilingual education currently being implemented by the Ministry of Education and Training and UNICEF, including in Gia Lai and Tra Vinh, 2 provinces I visited. Studies done worldwide endorse this approach. It is not sufficient that the Mother-Tongue language is taught as a subject. In preschool, and the first 3 years, it should be the language of instruction, which then transitions to be Vietnamese.

Enjoyment of rights
As in many countries with such diversity, numerous challenges exist to ensuring that members of minority groups can fully realize all their economic, social, cultural, civil and political rights and live in conditions of equality. The rights of minorities include:

► Freedom to practice their religions without restriction;

► Freedom of association and expression;

► Right of peaceful assembly;

► Equal right to own and use land; and

► Right to participate fully and effectively in decisionmaking regarding issues that affect them, including economic development projects and resettlement issues.

(photo credit) Concerns relating to these rights have been raised with me in the context of my visit; in turn, I have raised these issues directly with the Government of Viet Nam at national and provincial levels. I will study closely the information that I have gathered and the responses of the Government before commenting on these issues in my final report.

Conclusion
I believe that my visit marks an important step by the Government of Viet Nam to engage with the human rights bodies and mechanisms of the U.N. system. I welcome the Government’s undertaking to extend further invitations to other U.N. human rights experts in the months ahead, and I hope that these will include invitations to a wide range of mandate holders, including those with mandates in the area of civil and political rights.

In honor of Maître Alice Roullet-Piccard & Dr. Dorothea May Moore

(Today's IntLawGrrls guest blogger, Claire Moore Dickerson, has chosen to dedicate her contribution to 2 foremothers)

I am delighted to participate in this project, and would like to dedicate my contribution to two formidable professional women whom I knew well and continue to admire fiercely.

Maître Alice Roullet-Piccard (right), born in 1890, received her degree in law from the Faculty of Law of the University of Geneva in 1912, and in 1914 was among the first woman admitted to the bar in Geneva. She opened a law office with her husband, a former classmate at university. From that perch she practiced law until her death in 1972, frequently representing wards of the state and the indigent. She also raised three children.

She became an institution within the Geneva bar. Walking in her wake through the city was a slow process: as she proceeded through the streets, stately, under full sail, she would be greeted by colleagues and clients. To her granddaughter, Maître Roullet-Piccard seemed in total command and absolutely fearless.

Dr. Dorothea May Moore (below right) was my pediatrician (and my first cousin). Tall and spare, her gray hair was swept up in a 1930s style, and her voice was slightly gravely but very elegant. Her gray eyes framed by steel-rimmed glasses, she offered her small patients an unfailingly bemused gaze, inviting and intimidating at once.

Born in 1894, she graduated from college in 1915 and medical school in 1922. She had her own practice, engaged in research, and taught at Harvard Medical School for over 30 years, where she was the first woman instructor in pediatrics. She continued to work under her maiden name even after her marriage in 1941, and, having started in medicine before the advent of antibiotics, persisted in her chosen her profession long after many of her age cohort had retired. She died just 15 years ago, at the age of 101.

Even as a girl, I understood both that the paths chosen by Maître Roullet-Piccard and Dr. Moore had been hard, and that their example made my own path smoother.

On May 25

On this day in ...
... 1875 (135 years ago today), Gracie Annie Lockhart became the 1st woman in the British Empire to earn a university degree. Lockhart (left), then 20 years old, was graduated with a bachelor's degree from Mount Allison University, Sackville, New Brunswick, which in 1854 had opened the 1st and only college for women in Canada. She'd go on to be a schoolteacher and the wife of a Methodist minister. Her milestone contribution? Her

academic achievement as a student provided clear evidence of the justice of women's claim to full rights in the field of higher education.

(Prior May 25 posts are here, here, and here.)

On April 20

On this day in ...
.... 1971, in Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the position of the Nixon Administration and unanimously held that the Constitution permits busing of schoolchildren as a means to eliminate the vestiges of de jure segregation. (credit for photo of "the first African American to attend an integrated school in Charlotte") In an aspect of the judgment that appeared more important to The New York Times' reporter than the holding applicable to the North Carolina school district at bar, Chief Justice Warren E. Burger's decision for the Court

excluded 'de facto' segregation of the North from today's ruling by declaring, 'We do not reach in this case the question whether a showing that school segregation is a consequence of other types of state action, with out any discriminatory action by the school authorities, is a constitutional violation requiring remedial action by a school desegregation decree.'

Relying the Swann precedent in their dissents in the 2007 Seattle Schools case were Justices Stephen Breyer and John Paul Stevens, the latter of whom celebrates his 90th birthday today.

(Prior April 20 posts are here, here, and here)

'Nuff said

(Taking context-optional note of thought-provoking quotes)

[W]omen now outnumber men applying to and graduating from college -- so much so that it appears some colleges are giving male applicants an admissions boost. As a result, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights is examining whether colleges are engaging in widespread discrimination against women in an effort to balance their male and female populations.

-- Los Angeles Times editorial on "Colleges' gender gap," which includes details on developments at institutions of higher education throughout the United States. Theories on the "why" behind the male deficit abound; the editorial concludes:

There may be no one reason -- or solution. But figuring out ways to help boys achieve in school is a better response to the gender gap than making it easier for them to get into college later.

On December 11

On this day in ...

... 1849 (160 years ago today), Ellen Key (right) was born in Sweden. An advocate of child-center education, women's suffrage, and feminism, she began writing in her 30s. Her "advanced ideas on sex, love and marriage, and moral conduct had wide influence." Works available in English --on the availability of which The New York Times reported as early as 1913 -- include War, Peace, and the Future: A Consideration of Nationalism and Internationalism, and of the Relation of Women to War (1916). (credit for portrait of Key by Hannah Hirsch-Pauli) Among Key's many notable quotes, here's one exemplifying her views on teaching; another, her views on war:

Education can give you a skill, but a liberal education can give you dignity.

Everything, everything in war is barbaric.... But the worst barbarity of war is that it forces men collectively to commit acts against which individually they would revolt with their whole being.

(Prior December 11 posts are here and here.)

On November 5

On this day in ...
... 1834 (175 years ago today), a daughter, Anna Harriette, was born into a family of high military rank, the Crawfords, in Wales. Or so she claimed years later in the memoir published under the name she took after marriage -- Anna Leonowens -- and titled The English Governess at the Siamese Court (1870). Recent research, however, indicates that Leonowens (right) was born 3 years earlier, in India, to a father who was a lowly sergeant, surnamed not Crawford but Edwards, and to an Anglo-Indian mother. (photo credit) By her deception, it is written, Leonowens

protected not only herself but her children, who would have greater opportunities if their mixed-race heritage remained unknown.

Some facts are not in question: that she married in India in 1849, that in her 30s she was widowed, and that as a result she accepted an offer to become the governess for the "39 wives concubines and 82 children" of Mongkut, King of Siam, in present-day Thailand. Her adventure is perhaps best known through film adaptations such as the 1956 musical The King and I.

(Prior November 5 posts are here and here.)

On October 12

On this day in ...
... 1906, the San Francisco Board of Education ordered that Japanese children be be taught in racially segregated public schools, and so touched off "a diplomatic crisis between Japan and the United States." President Theodore Roosevelt sent native Californian Victor Metcalf, the Secretary of Commerce and Labor, to urge school officials to rescind the order. Metcalf is depicted in the cartoon at right, begging a white schoolchild,

'For heaven's sake do not embarrass the Administration!'

while a Japanese mother and son look on. (credit) In a December speech to Congress, Roosevelt denounced the schools' order as a "'wicked absurdity,' asked Congress to grant citizenship to those Japanese immigrants who wanted it, and vowed to protect the rights of all Japanese residents in the United States." His request was not popular. A 1907 "Gentlemen's Agreement" was entered, by which the united States informally agreed not to restrict Japanese immigration or schooling and Japan agreed not to permit further migration from Japan to the United States.


(Prior October 12 posts are here and here.)

On September 28

On this day in ...

... 2009 (today), is marked, at least among some in the United States, Ask a Stupid Question Day. It's said that this holiday dates to the 1980s:

[T]here was a movement by teachers to try to get kids to ask more questions in the classroom. Kids sometimes hold back, fearing their question is stupid, and asking it will result in ridicule.

This day, then, is dedicated to remind students, and all of us, early in the school year, that there are no stupid questions. Or perhaps better said:

[N]o question is too stupid to ask.

It is the search for answers that results in learning.


(Prior September 28 posts are here and here.)

'No one would ever boo Obama'

On Tuesday, my 11-year-old son joined children across the country in what ought to become annual back-to-school tradition: He watched intently as the President of this United States extolled the virtues of hard work and diligent study as means to the fulfillment that comes with education.

"Obama was pretty good," my son said.

"Did anyone boo when he told you to do your homework?" I asked in jest.

My son's quick reply:

"No one would ever boo Obama."

A day later, some adults proved less in control of themselves than the average American middle-schooler.

President Barack Obama took his promise to reform health care to Congress last night (right). His speech was serious stuff -- dead serious, as anyone caught in the crucible of the U.S. health system well knows (prior post).

Congress responded with an absence of decorum that rivaled the most raucous Westminster backbenchers.

Just 2 examples out of many detailed in this Washington Post article by Dana Milbank:

► "You lie!" U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) blurted in response to Obama's assertion that his plan would not cover illegal immigrants. He spat the words so loudly that they were fully audible in TV rooms everywhere.

► "Rep. Al Green (D-Tex.), also on the GOP side of the aisle, felt the need to pound his fist in the air and make what looked, awkwardly, like a fascist salute."

This from officials who owe a debt of trust to the public that elected them and pays their salaries. More of the same, on health and education, from others who've sought to skewer rational debate these long summer months. The nonsense underscores a point made first by Justice Holmes and repeated on this blog 2 weeks ago: Even the most basic of human rights are not won without a fight.

This one's a knock-down drag-out.

'Nuff said

(Taking context-optional note of thought-provoking quotes)

[T]he Court ... simply applies T.L.O. to declare unconstitutional a strip search of a 13-year-old honors student that was based on a groundless suspicion that she might behiding medicine in her underwear. This is, in essence, a case in which clearly established law meets clearly outrageous conduct. I have long believed that "‘[i]t does not require a constitutional scholar to conclude that a nude search of a 13-year-old child is an invasion of constitutional rights of some magnitude.’"

-- U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens (above left), concurring in part and dissenting in part yesterday in Safford United School District #1 v. Redding (quoting his own 1985 concurrence/dissent in the case of New Jersey v. T.L.O.).

In the opinion Stevens, joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (right), contended that their colleagues should have upheld a lower court's decision to let go forward the damages suit filed by the girl, an Arizona middle school student when searched in 2003. They failed to persuade the rest of the Court, however. Although 6 Justices agreed that the search violated the 4th Amendment, they ruled that this was not "clearly established" in 2003, so that school officials were immune from suit. (SCOTUSblog's Lyle Denniston explains that a prospective matter this ruling does expand student privacy somewhat.) The 9th Justice, Clarence Thomas, filed a concurrence/dissent inverse to that of Stevens and Ginsburg: Thomas agreed officials were immune, but disagreed that strip searching the teenager violated the Constitution.

The work of the U.N. minority issues expert

(My thanks to IntLawGrrls for this opportunity to contribute this guest post on my current work on behalf of the United Nations)

► This week I sent a letter, along with my colleagues who work on torture and arbitrary detention, to China. We challenged the Chinese government either to explain how its detention of two ethnic Uighurs complies with international law or to release the two urgently. China acknowledges having upwards of 40 different ethnic and religious minorities, in addition to the Tibetans, who face varying levels of oppression and repression.

► Next week I leave for a mission to Kazakhstan.

► Last year this time I was in Guyana, investigating the multi-layered relationships between the Indo-Guyanese (persons of East Indian descent), who currently control the government, and the Afro-Guyanese, who are almost the same percentage of the population but feel persecuted and grossly disadvantaged.

► In France, I saw a country that tourists never see. The lives of the “visible minorities” of France, persons who immigrate from North Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean to the shoddy, ghetto suburbs outside Paris, can’t been seen from the Eiffel Tower. They face discrimination at all levels. They are suspected and feared because of their religion. And even those who are second-generation citizens are never, ever considered “French.”

Since 2005, I have done this work in my capacity as U.N. Independent Expert on Minority Issues. I was appointed to the position by the High Commissioner for Human Rights with the consent of all governments that were members of the U.N. Human Rights Council (née Commission on Human Rights). There are over 40 individuals like myself, from all regions of the world, who are chosen to carry out this critical function for the chief human rights mechanism of the United Nations. Each has a mandate to focus on a specific human right. My mandate is to focus on the rights of minority populations. They are defined as groups that are distinct by ethnicity (race), religion or language and who have an inferior power relationship to other groups in the society. The relative numbers aren’t as meaningful as the subservient power status. So that:

► In South Africa during apartheid, my mandate would have been the protection of the African population, rather than the Afrikaners.

► In Brazil, I focus on the Afro-Brazilians even though the government now admits that they may be 55% or more of the population.

The international legal prescription against racial discrimination is at the core of my mandate, along with the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to Ethnic, Religious or Linguistic Minorities.

Furthermore, the U.N. resolution authorizing my work requires that I take “a gender perspective” in everything that I do. Each year I visit a number of countries where I am received at the level of a Cabinet Member or Minister of State. That gives me an unparalleled opportunity to engage the top officials in countries about their policies regarding minorities. And, of course, I am able to meet with minority communities, with academics who study these issues, and with civil societies more broadly. I present my findings, evaluations and detailed recommendations to the 47 governments that sit on the U.N. Human Rights Council. I also do thematic reports on issues that concern minorities across all regions of the world, like minorities and poverty or minorities and the right to education.

Of course, my mandate also includes minorities in the United States. Indeed, U.S. civil rights laws and my personal experiences as a minority in the United States have enriched my capacity to grapple with the complexities of discrimination as they present themselves in other cultures and countries. When I take on issues here in the United States, however, that home-grown expertise is rarely acknowledged.

An example: The U.N. Special Rapporteur on Housing and I intervened a while back when the City of New Orleans revealed a post-Hurricane Katrina plan to tear down much of the its remaining public housing. Our assessment was that to do that would violate the right to adequate housing that is guaranteed without discrimination by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The local response? New Orleans' daily newspaper, the Times-Picayune, accused me of being a meddling outsider “idiot from the U.N.”

On June 19

On this day in ...
… 1961, Kuwait declared independence from the United Kingdom. Back in 1899, Britain had concluded a protectorate agreement with the ruler of Kuwait (flag at left). In it the ruler promised not to conclude treaties with other powers, to admit no foreign agents, and to cede no part of his territory without British consent. According to the independence agreement concluded on this day in 1961, relations between the 2 countries should continue to be governed by a spirit of close friendship, and, when appropriate, the 2 governments would consult on matters of concern to them both.

… 1939 (70 years ago today), Grace Abbott (below right), American social reformer, teacher, and writer, died in Chicago, Illinois. Concerned about the low pay and long hours required of children working in factories, Abbott became a leader in the fight for federal children's rights legislation. As associate of Jane Addams, Nobel Peace Prizewinner and IntLawGrrls transnational foremother, Abbott served as head of the Children's Bureau in the Department of Labor from 1921 to 1934. She was the official representative of the United States on the League of Nations' advisory committees on traffic in women and on child welfare from 1922 to 1934. Upon her resignation, President Franklin D. Roosevelt described her career as one of

inestimable value to the children, the mothers, and fathers of the country, as well as to the Federal and State governments.

From 1934 until her death, Abbott continued working for social welfare as a professor at the University of Chicago and as chair of international labor conferences and state committees dealing with child labor. (photo credit)

(Prior June 19 posts are here and here.)

On June 18

On this day in ...
… 1900, Empress Dowager Longyu of China (right) ordered all foreigners killed, including foreign diplomats and their families. (image credit) A niece of the Empress Dowager Cixi, on whom we've also posted, she had the title of Empress bestowed on her in 1889. When Cixi and her adoptive son, the emperor, died of ill health, and a new emperor was named in 1908, Longyu became Empress Dowager. Her military command was issued amid the Boxer Uprising, which the imperial government at 1st tried to suppress but later came to support, eventually committing the regular Chinese army to join the Boxers in their fight against foreign troops. A 55-day siege would ensue, ending when international forces took Peking and subdued the rebellion, thus weakening imperial rule in China.
… 1909 (100 years ago today), Nannie Helen Burroughs (left), African American educator, orator, religious leader, and businesswoman, founded the National Training School for Women and Girls in Washington, D.C. (photo credit) The school combined vocational education and traditional Christian values, training students in domestic science, business, sewing, printing, barbering, and shoe repair. Additionally, the curriculum emphasized to all students the importance of being proud black women by teaching African-American history and culture. Burroughs, who'd been born in 1879, died in 1961; thereafter the school was renamed the Nannie Helen Burroughs School and converted to an elementary school. The school was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1991.

(Prior June 18 posts are here and here.)

May 16

On this day in ...
... 1804 (205 years ago today), Elizabeth Palmer Peabody (right) was born in Massachusetts, to a father who was a doctor and a mother who ran a school at the family home. (photo credit) Eventually Elizabeth became her mother's assistant. (It is telling that despite the influence of her mother, on her death 89 years later, her New York Times obituary mentioned only her father.) She opened many schools from 1820 on. In 1860, a year after learning of the work of "German educator Friedrich Froebel, who had worked with very young children and formulated an approach based on organized play, the use of the hands and the senses, and involvement with nature," she "established the first formally organized American kindergarten." She would spend much of the rest of her life advocating, "with missionary zeal," early childhood education. This, however, was but 1 of her causes: Peabody was a "[t]eacher and educational reformer," an "abolitionist, opponent of European autocratic despotism, friend of political refugees," and an "advocate of Native American rights and education, of woman's suffrage, and of world peace."
... 1997, President Mobutu Sese Seko went into exile, bringing to an end 3 decades of dictatorial rule in Zaire, and leaving the capital of the country, known today as the Democratic Republic of Congo, to rebels who were by then within 5 miles of the capital, Kinshasa. Mobutu (right) would die in Morocco less than 1/2 a year later, felled by prostate cancer at age 66.

(Prior May 16 posts are here and here.)

On February 19

On this day in ...
... 1881, to give effect to an amendment to the state constitution the previous year, legislators made Kansas the 1st state in the Union to outlaw alcoholic beverages. Among those at the forefront of this Kansas temperance movement was the hatchet-wielding activist Carrie Nation (left).
... 1897, in Stoney Creek, Ontario, a 40-year-old woman whose infant son had died after drinking impure milk, Adelaide Hunter Hoodless (below right), founded the Federation of Women's Institutes of Canada -- motto, "For Home and Country" -- for which a primary goal was the pasteurization of milk. A onetime student at the Ladies College not far from the farm where she grew up, Hoodless wrote a textbook entitled Public School Domestic Science. She also would help found the National Council of Women, the Victorian Order of Nurses, and the YWCA in Canada. She died in 1910.

(Prior February 19 posts here and here.)