February 24

February 24 is the 55th day of the year, and the American record for it runs from 1803 to 2022 — a span of 219 years. The entry that anchors it: In Marbury v. Madison, 1803.

The antebellum decades brought the date closer to the country’s central argument. In 1803, in Marbury v. Madison, the Supreme Court declared an act of Congress unconstitutional for the first time, forming the basis of judicial review in the United States. Then, in 1863, Arizona is organized as a United States territory.

Reconstruction and the years that followed added their own entries. In 1868, Andrew Johnson became the first U.S. president to be impeached.

The early twentieth century brought industry, air travel and war to the date. In 1917, World War I — the U.S. ambassador Walter Hines Page to the United Kingdom is given the Zimmermann Telegram, in which Germany pledges to ensure the return of New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona to Mexico if Mexico declares war on the United States. A year later, in 1918, Estonian Declaration of Independence. Then, in 1943, World War II — the Battle of Kasserine Pass, the first major engagement between American and Axis forces in Africa, ended with the Allied forces suffering heavy losses.

After 1945 the date reflects a country operating at global scale. In 1983, a special commission of the United States Congress condemns the Japanese American internment during World War II.

The most recent entries fall within living memory. In 2022, Russo-Ukrainian War — Days after recognising Donetsk and Luhansk as independent states, Russian president Vladimir Putin orders the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The date is also a birthday. Among the Americans born on February 24: John McKinly (1721), Irish-American physician and politician, 1st Governor of Delaware; Martin W. Bates (1786), American lawyer and politician; Winslow Homer (1836), American painter and illustrator; Zara DuPont (1869), American suffragist; and Honus Wagner (1874), American baseball player, coach, and manager.

February 24 is also a date of endings. Among the Americans who died on it: Robert Fulton (1815), American engineer; Joseph Jenkins Roberts (1876), American-Liberian politician, 1st President of Liberia; Joshua Chamberlain (1914), American general and politician, 32nd Governor of Maine; and Robert La Follette Jr. (1953), American politician, senator of Wisconsin.

What holds these 8 entries together is nothing more than the calendar, and nothing less. 219 years separate the earliest from the latest, and each was once simply the present day.