July 3. 1832: Opium exempted from federal tariff duty. 1969: Rent strike and occupation, Nichelino section of Turin, Italy; first coordination with ongoing factory struggles.

July 4. 1776: Spurred by unfair taxation issues, the US Declaration of Independence from England begins first successful anti-imperialist revolution in world history. Within 30 years, the US would begin its 200-year legacy of opposing similar revolutions in other countries.

July 5. 1948: War-ravaged Britain adopts National Health Service Act, which includes medical, unemployment, motherhood, widow, orphan, old age, and death benefits.

July 6. 1699: Captain William Kidd, a New York businessman turned pirate, captured in Boston and deported back to Vermont. 1993: Women For A Nuclear Test Ban climb over wall, Buckingham Palace, London.

July 7. 1863: First military draft by US (exemptions cost $100). 1979: 2,000 Indian activists and anti-nuclear demonstrators march through the Black Hills (South Dakota) to protest the development of uranium mines in sacred lands.

July 8. 1932: Depression low point of Dow Jones Industrial Average: 41.22. 1973: French government declares an illegal "exclusion zone" in international waters around nuclear test site, Mururoa Atoll, South Pacific.

July 9. 1951: Dashiel Hammett sentenced to six months imprisonment for refusing to cooperate with anti-communist inquiry.

July 10. 1875: Mary McLeod Bethune, black educator and activist, born. 1927: Kevin O'Higgins, Irish Free State Vice President, assassinated.

July 11. 1917: In order to break up a copper mine strike, several thousand vigilantes round up 1,186 IWW members in Bisbee, AZ; they are "deported" into the Sonoran desert. Patriotism and support for the war effort were cited as reasons for the action. 1985: US votes to impose sanctions against South Africa in protest of its apartheid policy.

July 12. 1810: Members of shoemakers' union face trial in New York City for striking to win wage increases. 1933: Congress passes first minimum wage law ($0.33 per hour).

July 13. 1863: Three days of massive anti-draft protests in New York City. Modern history's bloodiest riot began when a mob of 50,000 Civil War draft protesters burned buildings (including an orphan asylum), stores, and draft offices, attacked police, and some protesters clubbed, lynched, and shot large numbers of blacks, who they blamed for the government's position. Rioters were protesting the provision allowing cash payment in place of service. 1,200 died.

July 14. 1789: Storming of the Bastille heralds the French Revolution. Begun by Parisian crowds seeking arms and the liberation of political prisoners. 1979: Anti-Somocista popular revolution in Nicaragua successful; no apologies to US government, CIA and other avid supporters of the dictator.

July 15. 1097: Capture of Jerusalem (first Crusade) 10,000 massacred, the traditional Christian way. 1955: 52 Nobel laureates, led by Albert Einstein, call on all states to renounce force as an act of policy. Mainau, West Germany.

July 16. 1439: Kissing banned in England, in an attempt to stop the spread of pestilence and disease. The prohibitions fail as people only paid them lip service. 1862: Birth of Ida B. Wells, journalist, activist and anti-lynching organizer. Holly Springs, Miss.