July 1st is the 183rd day of the year…midpoint…there are 183 days left.
July 1 is also:
Creative Ice Cream Flavors Day
International Joke Day (not “Tell a Joke Day” which is on August 16th)
National Gingersnap Day
Dominion Day, now called Canada Day, a national holiday commemorating the Confederation of the provinces of Canada into the Dominion of Canada under the terms of the British North America Act of 1867. Sir John A. Macdonald was sworn in as the first Prime Minister of Canada.
July 1, 1766 – Jean-François Lefebvre de la Barre was a young French nobleman. He became famous for having been tortured and beheaded before his body was burnt on a pyre along with a copy of Voltaire’s “Philosophical Dictionary” nailed to his torso for his crime of not saluting a Roman Catholic religious procession in Abbeville, France.
July 1, 1862, Internal Revenue Law imposed first federal taxes on inheritance, tobacco and on incomes over $600 (progressive rate)
Polygamy
Congress outlawed polygamy by passing the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act in 1862. Lincoln gave Brigham Young tacit permission to ignore the Morrill Act in exchange for not becoming involved with the Civil War. General Patrick Edward Connor, commanding officer of the federal forces garrisoned at Fort Douglas, Utah beginning in 1862, was explicitly instructed not to confront the Mormons over this or any other issue.
The Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act was amended in 1882 by the Edmunds Act, a United States federal statute, signed into law on March 23, 1882 by president Chester A. Arthur, declaring polygamy a felony. The Edmunds Act also prohibited “bigamous” or “unlawful cohabitation” (a misdemeanor), thus removing the need to prove that actual marriages had occurred. It was passed in a wave of Victorian-era reaction to the perceived immorality of polygamy, or at least polygyny (one man, more than one wife), which was often compared to slavery. The act not only reinforced the 1862 Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act but also revoked polygamists’ right to vote, made them ineligible for jury service, and prohibited them from holding political office.
The Edmunds–Tucker Act was passed in response to the dispute between the United States Congress and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) regarding polygamy. The act disincorporated both the LDS Church and the Perpetual Emigration Fund on the grounds that they fostered polygamy. It dissolved the corporation of the church and directed the confiscation by the federal government of all church properties valued over a limit of $50,000. The act was repealed in 1978.
The LDS Church banned the practice of polygamy in 1904.
Weights and Measures
The U.S. National Bureau of Standards became effective in 1901. It had been established under an Act of Congress (31 Stat. 1449) approved 3 Mar 1901 that expanded the functions of the Office of Standard Weights and Measures, previously part of the Coast and Geodetic Survey. Its duties included the custody of the standards; comparison of standards; construction of standards; testing and calibration of standard measuring apparatus; and determination of physical constants and the properties of materials which are of great importance to scientific or manufacturing interests. The Bureau became the National Institute of Standards and Technology (N.I.S.T) in 1988.
SOS was adopted as the international distress signal on July 1, 1908.
ZIP codes (Zoning Improvement Plan) were introduced for United States mail in 1963.