Jimmy Carter, former Democratic governor of Georgia and recipient of the Nobel Prize for Peace in 2002, was elected 39th president of the United States this day in 1976, narrowly defeating Republican Gerald R. Ford.
| 2002: | | In Norwegian-brokered peace negotiations held in Thailand, the government of Sri Lanka and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam agreed to set up a panel to discuss ways to share power. |
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| 1983: | | U.S. President Ronald Reagan signed a bill designating the third Monday in January a national holiday in memory of Martin Luther King, Jr. |
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| 1963: | | South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem was killed in a coup. |
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| 1950: | | British playwright George Bernard Shaw died at age 94. |
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| 1949: | | The Netherlands and the Republic of Indonesia signed the Hague Agreement, an attempt to end conflict over Indonesia's proclaimed independence. |
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| 1930: | | Tafari Makonnen was crowned emperor of Ethiopia, taking the name Haile Selassie. |
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| 1917: | | The British issued the Balfour Declaration, a statement of support for “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.” |
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| 1889: | | North Dakota was admitted to the union as the 39th U.S. state and South Dakota as the 40th. |
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| 1755: | | | Marie-Antoinette, the queen consort of King Louis XVI of France (1774–93), was born. |
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