Great Britain 1/30/1972 Bloody Sunday Also known as the Bogside Massacre. British soldiers shot twenty-six unarmed civilians during a protest march in the Bogside area of Derry, Northern Ireland. Thirteen died and one other died four months later from his wounds.
Great Britain 2/2/1972 British Embassy Burned in Dublin Angry demonstrators burned the British Embassy in Dublin protesting the deaths of thirteen people in Londonderry the previous Sunday, known as Bloody Sunday.
United States 6/29/1972 Supreme Court Strikes Down Death Penalty The US Supreme Court, in Furman v Georgia, ruled by a vote of 5 to 4 that capital punishment, as it was then in effect on the state and federal level, was unconstitutional. It was held that it was a violation of the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution and that the death penalty qualified as "cruel and unusual punishment." It was reinstated in 1976.