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Wednesday, November 07, 2007

This Day in History

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[November 07, 2007]  (AP) Today is Wednesday, Nov. 7, the 311th day of 2007. There are 54 days left in the year.

Today's highlight in history:

On Nov. 7, 1917, Russia's Bolshevik Revolution took place as forces led by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin overthrew the provisional government of Alexander Kerensky.

On this date:

In 1874, the Republican Party was symbolized as an elephant in a cartoon drawn by Thomas Nast in Harper's Weekly.

In 1893, the state of Colorado granted its women the right to vote.

In 1916, Republican Jeannette Rankin of Montana became the first woman elected to Congress.

In 1940, in Washington state, the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, nicknamed "Galloping Gertie," collapsed during a windstorm.

In 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt won an unprecedented fourth term in office, defeating Thomas E. Dewey.

In 1962, Richard M. Nixon, having lost California's gubernatorial race, held what he called his "last press conference," telling reporters, "You won't have Nixon to kick around anymore."

In 1967, Carl Stokes was elected the first black mayor of a major city - Cleveland, Ohio.

In 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed a bill establishing the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

In 1972, President Nixon was re-elected in a landslide over Democrat George McGovern.

In 1973, Congress overrode President Nixon's veto of the War Powers Act, which limits a chief executive's power to wage war without congressional approval.

Ten years ago: In a rising war of words, the Clinton administration warned it was considering military options, including a cruise missile strike, if Iraq carried out its threat to shoot down U.N. surveillance planes.

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Five years ago: In his first news conference since the midterm elections, President George W. Bush, charting an agenda for the new Republican Congress, said that homeland security came first and that an economic-recovery plan with new tax cuts would wait until the next year. Dick Gephardt stepped down as House Democratic leader in the wake of his party's election losses.

One year ago: Democrats won control of the House and Senate, riding a wave of anger over the Iraq war and congressional scandals. Keith Ellison, a Democratic state lawmaker from Minnesota, became the first Muslim elected to Congress. Panama won a seat on the U.N. Security Council after Guatemala and Venezuela dropped out to end a deadlock. Dhiren Barot, an al-Qaida operative who had planned to blow up the New York Stock Exchange, the World Bank and landmark London hotels, was sentenced in Britain to life in prison. Pop star Britney Spears filed for divorce from Kevin Federline.

Today's birthdays: Evangelist Billy Graham is 89. Opera singer Dame Joan Sutherland is 81. Actor Barry Newman is 69. Singer Johnny Rivers is 65. Singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell is 64. Singer Nick Gilder is 56. Actor Christopher Knight ("The Brady Bunch") is 50. Actress Julie Pinson is 40. Actor Christopher Daniel Barnes is 35. Actors Jason and Jeremy London are 35. Actress Yunjin Kim ("Lost") is 34.

Thought for today: "All forms of totalitarianism try to avoid the strange, the problematic, the critical, the rational. To do so, they must deny the metropolitan spirit, equalize everything in city and country, and retain a center which is not the center of anything because everything else is swallowed up by it." -- Paul Tillich, American theologian (1886-1965).

[Associated Press]

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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