On March 15, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson addressed a
joint session of Congress to urge the passage of legislation
guaranteeing voting rights for all.

Using the phrase “we shall overcome,” borrowed from African
American leaders struggling for equal rights, Johnson declares
that “every American citizen must have an equal right to vote.”

Johnson reminds the nation that the Fifteenth Amendment, which
was passed after the Civil War, gave all citizens the right to vote
regardless of race or color.

President Johnson (right) meeting with civil rights leaders.

President Lyndon Johnson signing the 1965
Civil Rights Bill, also known as The Voting
Rights Act.

On March 4, 1933, at the height of the Great Depression, Franklin
Delano Roosevelt was inaugurated as the 32nd president of the
United States. In his famous inaugural address, delivered outside
the east wing of the U.S. Capitol, Roosevelt outlined his “New
Deal”—an expansion of the federal government as an instrument
of employment opportunity and welfare—and told Americans that
“the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Although it was a
rainy day in Washington, and gusts of rain blew over Roosevelt
as he spoke, he delivered a speech that radiated optimism a
nd competence, and a broad majority of Americans united
behind  their new president and his radical economic proposals
to lead the nation out of the Great Depression.

President Herbert Hoover signed a congressional act making “The
Star-Spangled Banner” the official national anthem of the United
States.

Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964)

Francis Scott Key (August 1, 1779 – January 11, 1843)

SANDY KOZEL

The movie King Kong opened in New York City on March 2, 1933,
to rave reviews, and has since been ranked by Rotten Tomatoes 
as the greatest horror film of all time and the fifty-sixth greatest
film of all time. In 1991, it was deemed "culturally, historically
and aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and
selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.

Robert William Armstrong (November 20, 1890 – April 20, 1973)
Vina Fay Wray (September 15, 1907 – August 8, 2004)

President John F. Kennedy addresses the first group of
Peace Corps volunteers headed for Ghana and Tanzania.

On March 1, 1961, President John F. Kennedy issued Executive
Order #10924, establishing the Peace Corps as a new agency
within the Department of State. The same day, he sent a message
to Congress asking for permanent funding for the agency, which
would send trained American men and women to foreign nations
to assist in development efforts. The Peace Corps captured the imagination of the U.S. public, and during the week after its
creation thousands of letters poured into Washington from
young Americans hoping to volunteer.