1863: Harper's Weekly featured a cartoon about the Civil War, celebrating the end of the General Benjamin Butler's command of New Orleans occupation forces; the cartoon shows President Lincoln welcoming him back to Washington. Butler coined the term "contraband" to designate escaped slaves who crossed Union lines to freedom. Harper's Cartoon

1961: In his farewell address, President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned against the rise of "the military-industrial complex." He also called for "people of all faiths, all races, all nations ... [to] come to live together in a peace guaranteed by the binding force of mutual respect and love."

1984: The U.S. Supreme Court ruled, 5-4, that the private use of home video cassette recorders to tape TV programs did not violate federal copyright laws.

1998: President Bill Clinton became the first U.S. president to testify as a defendant in a criminal or civil suit when he answered questions from lawyers for Paula Jones, who had accused the president of sexual harassment.

2004: Three U.S. soldiers were killed north of Baghdad, pushing the U.S. death toll in the Iraq conflict to 500.

Births

Benjamin Franklin b. 17 Jan 1706 (Boston); d. 1790 printer, writer, scientist, statesman; known for Poor Richard's Almanac, helped establish the first U.S. lending library; helped negotiate a peace treaty with Great Britain, signed in Paris in 1783. Read more from the LOC.

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