1970 Archives - PopHistory.org

Native American group occupies Mount Rushmore to protest broken Treaty of Fort Laramie

Around dusk on the evening on August 29, 1970, a group of 23 Native American activists climbs to the top of Mount Rushmore. Renaming the landmark Crazy Horse Mountain, in honor of the Lakota leader who famously resisted white Americans’ incursions into the area, the protesters are there to reclaim land they believe to be rightfully theirs under the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie, which guaranteed Indigenous people the right to all of Western South Dakota. The occupation will last for two months, beginning a new chapter in Native American activism.

Signed at Fort Laramie in the Wyoming Territory, the 1868 treaty was meant to end hostilities between the United States and the Lakota people, Yanktonai Dakota and Arapaho Nation. Although it was designed to assimilate Native Americans into white American culture—U.S. courts, not tribal ones, were given jurisdiction over the reservation, and the treaty attempted to incentivize Native Americans to give up their traditional way of life in favor of farming—the Treaty of Fort Laramie allocated the Black Hills and adjacent lands west of the Missouri River, roughly half of what is now South Dakota, to Indigenous peoples. In a sadly predictable turn of events, the United States broke the treaty within a decade. After George Armstrong Custer’s expedition found gold in the Black Hills region in 1874, white prospectors and settlers rushed into the region, leading to the Great Sioux War of 1876 and American occupation of most of the land promised to the Lakota.

Nearly a century later, the political and social fervor of the 1960s led to the birth of United Native Americans, an activist group founded in San Francisco in 1968 with the mission of fighting for the rights and welfare of Indigenous peoples. It was members of this group that climbed 3,000 feet to the top of Mount Rushmore on August 29, 1970. The site, a memorial to four American presidents that symbolized the advance of white “civilization” into lands considered sacred by the Natives who had lived there before, was an obvious target for the activists. Lehman Brightman, a UNA member and professor at the University of California, Berkeley, chartered a bus for him and his students after hearing of the protest and became a spokesperson for the protesters there. “The federal government said this land would belong to us as long as the grass grows and the water flows and the sun shines,” he told one reporter. “Then they turned around and took this land from us.”

With supporters running supplies up the mountain, protesters continued the occupation until winter weather forced them to withdraw in November. Throughout that time, the monument remained open to tourists, although the occupiers draped a flag reading “Sioux Indian Power” from the mountaintop and greeted visitors with protest chants. Native Americans from around the country also visited during this period, which Brightman said he hoped would be a “spark” for further native activism. Indeed, protesters took to the mountain again the following June in a brief action that led to 12 arrests. The activism of the 1970s received new attention in the 2010s, when protests against the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline took place at the Standing Rock Reservation, a remnant of the original Great Sioux Reservation established in 1868.

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Thousands of Mexican-American antiwar activists march in Chicano Moratorium

Year: 1970

Month Day: August 29

On August 29, 1970, more than 20,000 Mexican-Americans march through East Los Angeles to protest the Vietnam War. The Chicano Moratorium, as this massive protest was known, was peaceful until the Los Angeles Police entered Laguna Park, sparking violence and rioting that led to three deaths. The Chicano Moratorium is now remembered both as the tragic end of one stage of Chicano activism and as a moment that galvanized and inspired a new generation of activists.

The march was planned as an entirely peaceful demonstration in support of peace and in protest of the Vietnam War, which claimed Latino lives at a disproportionately high rate. As demonstrators assembled in the park, the owner of a nearby liquor store called the police on some Chicano customers in the fear that they might begin shoplifting. When the LAPD responded, it assumed the protest had led to looting, and before long the police were storming the park with tear gas. Three people died and hundreds were arrested as riots spread throughout East LA.

Among the dead was Ruben Salazar, a Los Angeles Times journalist often referred to as the voice of the local Chicano community; he was hit on the head with an LAPD tear gas canister. Salazar’s death, in particular, sparked outrage, and many believe that the police or the FBI, whose agents were present for the march, used the chaos as cover for the assassination of a prominent voice of dissent.

Many viewed the violence and Salazar’s death as a loss of innocence for the Chicano movement. For many, however, it was the beginning of a lifetime of activism and a moment that would forever encapsulate the community’s struggle for racial equality. Many prominent Chicano artists, activists and politicians were present at the rally. The former Laguna Park is now called Ruben F. Salazar Park.

READ MORE: Vietnam War Protests

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President Nixon meets with anti-war protestors at the Lincoln Memorial

Year: 1970

Month Day: May 09

In the early hours of May 9, 1970, a frazzled President Richard Nixon embarks upon what his Chief of Staff will describe as “the weirdest day so far” of his presidency. Preoccupied with the recent Kent State shootings and the unrest that has spread to college campuses across the country, Nixon makes an impromptu and bizarre visit to a group of anti-war protesters at the Lincoln Memorial.

On the Friday after the Kent State massacre, in which Ohio National Guard killed four students and wounded nine during an anti-war protest, Nixon was unable to sleep. Around 4 in the morning, after spending several hours making phone calls, he roused his personal valet, Manolo Sanchez, and asked him if he had ever seen the Lincoln Memorial at night. Knowing he would encounter a crowd of student protesters that had camped out on the National Mall, Nixon set off with Sanchez, his physician and a Secret Service team.

Nixon’s account of the event differs greatly from that of the protesters, although both confirm it was a strange moment. Nixon described the students he met there as “overawed” and portrayed the conversation as a civil one. He told the protesters that he understood their hatred of the war, saying, “I know probably most of you think I’m an SOB. But I want you to know that I understand just how you feel.” Trying to start a friendly conversation, he asked where they went to school, and when some replied that they had come from Syracuse the president responded by talking about the school’s football team. “Here we had come from a university that’s completely uptight, on strike,” one student recalled, “and when we told him where we were from, he talked about the football team.” Nixon opined on the benefits of travel, particularly to Prague, Warsaw and Asia, but his audience struggled to follow along. “As far as sentence structure,” one of them later told a reporter, “there was none.”

The conversation lasted over an hour and both sides at least managed to explain their views on the war, although neither convinced the other. Nixon did not sleep that night, instead insisting he take Sanchez to see the floor of the House of Representatives before eating breakfast at the Mayflower Hotel. A diary entry written later that day by H.R. Haldeman, Nixon’s Chief of Staff, corroborates the students’ version of events: “I am concerned about his condition … he has had very little sleep for a long time and his judgment, temper and mood suffer badly as a result.”

READ MORE: Vietnam War Protests

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Environmental Protection Agency opens

On December 2, 1970, a new federal agency opens its doors. Created in response to the dawning realization that human activity can have major effects on the planet, the Environmental Protection Agency heralded a new age of government action on behalf of the environment.

Concerns about pollution and other environmental issues began creeping into the American consciousness in the 1950s and 60s. The 1962 publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring was a watershed moment for American environmental awareness, as were a major oil spill that affected California beaches and the burning of Ohio’s heavily-polluted Cuyahoga River in 1969. That same year, Congress passed the National Environmental Policy Act, which mandated that government agencies compile environmental statistics and produce environmental impact statements before proceeding with projects that could affect the environment. Given the number of offices across the executive branch that were now tasked with enforcing environmental regulations, President Richard Nixon decided in July of 1970 to create a single agency to deal with environmental issues, and the EPA was born.

The EPA was flooded with resumes from environmentalists excited by the idea that the government would finally act on their concerns. It opened with 5,8000 employees and a budget of $1.4 billion, led by former Justice Department lawyer William Ruckelshaus. Conscious of the importance of establishing the new administration’s authority, Ruckelshaus acted aggressively to enforce the Clean Water Act, secure a ban on the pesticide DDT, and prosecute the corporations responsible for polluting the Cuyahoga. Thanks to his efforts, the EPA has maintained its role as a strong enforcer, and the position of EPA Administrator is considered cabinet-level despite the EPA not technically being a cabinet agency. Like all federal agencies, however, it is only as powerful as the executive allows—after years of relatively aggressive action on climate change, the EPA deleted almost all references to the global climate crisis from its website after President Donald Trump took office.

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“Tears Of A Clown” gives Smokey Robinson & The Miracles their first #1 pop hit

Updated:: Dec 10, 2019
Original:: Apr 1, 2010

Year: 1970

Month Day: December 12

While Motown Records founder Berry Gordy surely deserves credit for establishing the creative philosophy and business strategy that turned his Detroit-based company into a hit-making machine in the 1960s, the inner workings of that machine during the company’s early years depended almost as much on the talents of a young man named William Robinson, Jr., better known to the world as “Smokey.” Even if he’d never sung on a single Motown record, Smokey Robinson would still be regarded as one of the label’s most important figures purely on the basis of his production and songwriting work for acts like Mary Wells, Marvin Gaye and The Temptations. But Smokey Robinson did sing, of course, in his trademark falsetto, on some of Motown’s most beloved records: “Shop Around” (1960); “You Really Got A Hold On Me” (1962); “I Second That Emotion” (1967), to name only a few. After more than a decade of hits like these that never quite made it to the top of the charts, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles finally earned their first #1 hit when “Tears Of A Clown” topped the Billboard Hot 100 on December 12, 1970.

Like many of his other songs, “Tears Of A Clown” told a story to which any current or former lovelorn teenager could relate. Mining much the same emotional territory as he did in the song many consider to be his masterpiece, “The Tracks Of My Tears” (1965), Robinson showcased his ability in “Tears Of A Clown” to tell such a story using a catchy melody and clever wordplay—”Don’t let my glad expression/Give you the wrong impression“—without ever lapsing into corniness. It was that ability that led Bob Dylan to refer to Smokey Robinson as America’s “greatest living poet.”

Smokey Robinson’s association with Berry Gordy began even before Motown Records was founded, and it continued long after he stopped scoring hits of his own. Robinson’s “Shop Around” was the company’s first big hit (it was a Billboard #2 hit for The Miracles in 1960), and his “My Guy” (1964) and “My Girl” (1965) were #1 hits for Mary Wells and The Temptations, respectively. In 1967, Smokey Robinson became the vice president of Motown Records Corporation, a position he held for the next two decades until the company was sold to MCA in 1988.

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John Lennon writes and records “Instant Karma” in a single day

Year: 1970

Month Day: January 27

“I wrote it for breakfast, recorded it for lunch and we’re putting it out for dinner.” That’s the way John Lennon told the story of “Instant Karma,” one of his most memorable songs as a solo artist and the third Lennon single to appear before the official breakup of the Beatles. The only exaggeration in John’s description was the part about dinner: “Instant Karma” wasn’t actually released to the public until 13 days after it was written and recorded over the course of a single Tuesday, on January 27, 1970. By any measure, it was one of the fastest pop songs ever to come to market.

“Instant Karma” came during a tumultuous time for John Lennon personally and for the band he was in the midst of leaving behind. The Beatles had spent the better part of 1969 trying to decide whether or not they were still a band, abandoning recording sessions that had just begun and canceling plans for their first live performances in more than three years. The material for both of the band’s last two albums—Abbey Road and Let it Be—was recorded that year, but Let it Be sat unreleased and without an agreed-upon producer. Lennon, meanwhile, was moving in a new direction. “Give Peace a Chance,” recorded during the famous June 1969 “bed-in,” had already come out under the name “The Plastic Ono Band,” as had “Cold Turkey,” his wrenching account of kicking heroin that same year. By January 1970, John had walked away from the Beatles, and the Plastic Ono Band was the only musical entity he considered himself part of.

The January 27 session came about spontaneously. Lennon wrote the song that morning and, as he said, “I knew I had a hit record.” What got the record finished that same day and gave it its incredible sound, however, was the unexpected appearance of Phil Spector that evening in the EMI studios. After several run-throughs under Spector’s direction, John said, “Suddenly we went in the room and heard what he’d done to it…it was fantastic. It sounded like there was [sic] fifty people playing.” John’s happiness with the results would lead directly to Spector’s taking over the dormant Let it Be project—a development that ended up driving a further wedge between Lennon and McCartney prior to the official breakup of the Beatles.

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Japanese author Yukio Mishima dies by suicide

Year: 1970

Month Day: November 25

World-renowned Japanese writer Yukio Mishima dies by suicide after failing to win public support for his often extreme political beliefs.

Born in 1925, Mishima was obsessed with what he saw as the spiritual barrenness of modern life. He preferred prewar Japan, with its austere patriotism and traditional values, to the materialistic, westernized nation that arose after 1945. In this spirit, he founded the “Shield Society,” a controversial private army made up of about 100 students that was to defend the emperor in the event of a leftist uprising.

On November 25, Mishima delivered to his publisher the last installment of The Sea of Fertility, his four-volume epic on Japanese life in the 20th century that is regarded as his greatest work. He then went with several followers to a military building in Tokyo and seized control of a general’s office. There, from a balcony, he gave a brief speech to about 1,000 assembled servicemen, in which he urged them to overthrow Japan’s constitution, which forbids Japanese rearmament. The soldiers were unsympathetic, and Mishima committed seppuku, or ritual suicide, by disemboweling himself with his sword.

Though his extreme beliefs did not gain him much of a following, many mourned the loss of such a gifted author.

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National Guard kills four students in Kent State shootings

On May 4, 1970, in Kent, Ohio, 28 National Guardsmen fire their weapons at a group of anti-war demonstrators on the Kent State University campus, killing four students, wounding eight, and permanently paralyzing another. The tragedy was a watershed moment for a nation divided by the conflict in Vietnam, and further galvanized the anti-war movement.

Two days earlier, on May 2, National Guard troops were called to Kent to suppress students rioting in protest of the Vietnam War and the U.S. invasion of Cambodia. The next day, scattered protests were dispersed by tear gas, and on May 4 class resumed at Kent State University. By noon that day, despite a ban on rallies, some 2,000 people had assembled on the campus. National Guard troops arrived and ordered the crowd to disperse, fired tear gas, and advanced against the students with bayonets fixed on their rifles. Some of the protesters, refusing to yield, responded by throwing rocks and verbally taunting the troops.

Minutes later, without firing a warning shot, the Guardsmen discharged more than 60 rounds toward a group of demonstrators in a nearby parking lot, killing four and wounding nine. The closest casualty was 20 yards away, and the farthest was almost 250 yards away. After a period of disbelief, shock, and attempts at first aid, angry students gathered on a nearby slope and were again ordered to move by the Guardsmen. Faculty members were able to convince the group to disperse, and further bloodshed was prevented.

The shootings led to protests on college campuses across the country. Photographs of the massacre became enduring images of the anti-war movement. In 1974, at the end of a criminal investigation, a federal court dropped all charges levied against eight Ohio National Guardsmen for their role in the Kent State students’ deaths.

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Japan launches its first satellite

Year: 1970

Month Day: February 11

From the Kagoshima Space Center on the east coast of Japan’s Ohsumi Peninsula, Ohsumi, Japan’s first satellite, is successfully launched into an orbit around Earth. The achievement made Japan the world’s fourth space power, after the Soviet Union in 1957, the United States in 1958, and France in 1965.

Two months after Japan’s launching of Ohsumi, China became the world’s fifth space power when it successfully launched Mao 1 into space. The satellite, named after Mao Zedong, the leader of communist China, orbited Earth broadcasting the Chinese patriotic song The East Is Red once a minute.

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Qaddafi becomes premier of Libya

Year: 1970

Month Day: January 15

Muammar al-Qaddafi, the young Libyan army captain who deposed King Idris in September 1969, is proclaimed premier of Libya by the so-called General People’s Congress.

Born in a tent in the Libyan desert, Qaddafi was the son of a Bedouin farmer. He attended university and the Libyan military academy and steadily rose in the ranks of the Libyan army. An ardent Arab nationalist, he plotted with a group of fellow officers to overthrow the Libyan monarchy, which they accomplished on September 1, 1969.

Blending Islamic orthodoxy, revolutionary socialism, and Arab nationalism, Qaddafi established a fervently anti-Western dictatorship. In 1970, he removed U.S. and British military bases and expelled Italian and Jewish Libyans. In 1973, he nationalized foreign-owned oil fields. He reinstated traditional Islamic laws, such as prohibition of alcoholic beverages and gambling, but liberated women and launched social programs that improved the standard of living in Libya. As part of his stated ambition to unite the Arab world, he sought closer relations with his Arab neighbors, especially Egypt. However, when Egypt and then other Arab nations began a peace process with Israel, Libya was increasingly isolated.

Qaddafi’s government financed a wide variety of terrorist groups worldwide, from Palestinian guerrillas and Philippine Muslim rebels to the Irish Republican Army. During the 1980s, the West blamed him for numerous terrorist attacks in Europe, and in April 1986 U.S. war planes bombed Tripoli in retaliation for a bombing of a West German dance hall. Qaddafi was reportedly injured and his infant daughter killed in the U.S. attack.

In the late 1990s, Qaddafi sought to lead Libya out of its long international isolation by turning over to the West two suspects wanted for the 1988 explosion of an airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland. In response, Europe lifted sanctions against Libya. After years of rejection in the Arab world, Qaddafi also sought to forge stronger relations with non-Islamic African nations such as South Africa, remodeling himself as an elder African statesman.

Qaddafi surprised many around the world when he became one of the first Muslim heads of state to denounce al-Qaida after the attacks of September 11, 2001. The next year, he offered a public apology for the Lockerbie bombing, later agreeing to pay nearly $3 billion in compensation to the victims’ families. In 2003, he gained favor with the administration of George W. Bush when he announced the existence of a program to build weapons of mass destruction in Libya and that he would allow an international agency to inspect and dismantle them. Though some in the U.S. government pointed to this as a direct and positive consequence of the ongoing war in Iraq, others pointed out that Qaddafi had essentially been making the same offer since 1999, but had been ignored. In 2004, U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair visited Libya, one of the first western heads of state to do so in recent memory; he praised Libya during the visit as a strong ally in the international war on terror.

In February 2011, as unrest spread through much of the Arab world, massive political protests against the Qaddafi regime sparked a civil war between revolutionaries and loyalists. In March, an international coalition began conducting airstrikes against Qaddafi strongholds under the auspices of a U.N. Security Council resolution. On October 20, Libya’s interim government announced that Qaddafi had died after being captured near his hometown of Sirte.

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