March
This Month in Black History

March 1827
Freedom’s Journal, the first black-owned and operated newspaper in the United States was established.

March 1857
The Supreme Court ruled on Dred Scott v. Sanford. The court ruled that slaves were not citizens of the United States, had no rights to sue in federal courts and said blacks could not be citizens. The ruling in the case is one of the most controversial decisions the court has ever made.

March 1865
The Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands was established to help former slaves and poor whites in the South after the Civil War.

March 1883
Jan Matzeliger patented his shoe-lasting machine.

March 1965
Hundreds of people marched from Selma, Alabama to Montgomery, the state capital, for voting rights for African Americans.

March 1988
Toni Morrison was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for her novel “Beloved.”