xx Chronology into a sack, thrown into a river, and drowns. The servant is flogged. There are no written details to determine why there is a difference in punishment. The widow petitioned for bankruptcy three years later. 1668 New Jersey enacts its own sodomy law that proscribes the death penalty ex- cept for those under the age of 14. 1673 to 1677 On his voyage down the Mississippi River, Father Jacques Marquette recounts that some Indians assume the garb of women, which they wear throughout their lives. Many other travelers to the American frontier make similar observations. 1676 Duke of York creates a set of laws used in colonial Pennsylvania and Dela- ware. The law includes a provision proscribing death for males over the age of 14 engaging in sodomy. The law is later modified in 1682 setting the maxi- mum penalty at six-months in jail. This is the only sodomy law in colonial times not to specify death to all those convicted of sodomy. This lenient posi- tion ended when the Quakers lost control of the colony. 1700 Pennsylvania modifies its sodomy statutes to specify that blacks charged with buggery will also be punished by death. The preamble for the code states, “some difficulties have arisen” concerning blacks charged with crimes, indi- cating there are problems applying the law concerning free blacks or black slaves. Furthermore, the law establishes flogging every three months during the first year of imprisonment and, if the prisoner is married, he is to be cas- trated and his wife is allowed to divorce. 1704 Public discontent with the New Jersey legislature leads to the state pardoning everyone except those whose crime is 1 of 11 categories. Since sodomy is not 1 of the 11 categories, all sodomy convictions are overturned. 1712 South Carolina enacts a sodomy statute requiring a death sentence and for- feiture of property. The statute applied to males only who engaged in “the detestable and abominable vice of buggery.” 1715 North Carolina adopts the common law of England thus making sodomy a capital offense and applies only to males. 1719 Delaware, an area that was subsequently under Swish, Dutch, and finally En- glish control, enacts “An Act for the advancement of Justice, and more certain administration thereof” that clarified that sodomy is punishable under English common law and proscribes death for conviction. 1777 In anticipation of success of the American Revolution, Thomas Jefferson works with a committee to craft a new criminal code. Jefferson and other liberals argue to lift the death penalty for sodomy and, instead, advocate for the lesser penalty of castration for men and to bore a hole through the nose of women. Jefferson’s ideas are rejected and the death penalty is retained. 1778 Baron Frederich von Steuben is the first soldier known to be dismissed from the U.S. military for engaging in homosexuality. Steuben was recognized as one of Europe’s greatest military minds and was engaged by the U.S. military
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