February 27

272 – Flavius Valerius Constantinus – Roman Emperor Constantine the Great –  is born in Naissus, Dacia province, now the city of Niš, Serbia.

380 – Under the Edict of Thessalonica, Emperor Theodosius I and his co-emperors, sons Gratian and Valentinian II, declare their wish that all Roman citizens convert to Christianity as defined in the Nicene creed.

1776 – During the Revolutionary War, the Battle of Moore’s Creek Bridge near Wilmington in North Carolina a battalion of the North Carolina Provincial Congress’ Militia breaks up a loyalist militia that the British governor had recruited to join British forces.

1782 – The House of Commons of Great Britain votes against further war in America.

1801 – Pursuant to the District of Columbia Organic Act of 1801, Washington, D.C. is placed under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Congress.

1860 – Abraham Lincoln makes a speech at Cooper Union in the city of New York that is largely regarded as responsible for his election to the Presidency.

1902 – During the Second Boer War, Australian soldiers Harry “Breaker” Morant and Peter Handcock are executed in Pretoria after being convicted of war crimes.

1922 – In the case of Leser v. Garnett, the Supreme Court rules against a challenge to the constitutionality of the 19th amendment.

1933 – Germany’s parliament building in Berlin, the Reichstag, is set on fire.

1939 –  In the case of NLRB v. Fansteel Metallurgical Corp, the Supreme Court rules that the National Labor Relations Board has no authority to force an employer to rehire workers who engage in sit-down strikes.

1943 – The Smith Mine #3 in Bearcreek, Montana, explodes, killing 74 men.

1951 – The 22nd Amendment to the United States Constitution, limiting Presidents to two terms, is ratified.

1973 – The American Indian Movement occupies Wounded Knee in protest of the federal government.

1991 – After Saddam Hussein orders a full retreat, President Bush announces the liberation of Kuwait, however hostilities continue and retreating Iraqi forces are engaged and bombed so extensively by coalition air forces along Highway 80 from Kuwait City to Safwan Iraq, that it comes to be called the Highway of Death.

2004 – Shoko Asahara, the leader of the Japanese doomsday cult Aum Shinrikyo, is sentenced to death for masterminding the 1995 Tokyo subway sarin attack.

2010 – An earthquake measuring 8.8 on the moment magnitude scale that strikes central parts of Chile, killing 500 people, and injuring many more, triggers a tsunami which strikes Hawaii