Unix Timestamp: 1133654400
Sunday, December 4. 2005, 12:00:00 AM UTC

2008 Canadian parliamentary dispute: At the request of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Governor General of Canada Michaëlle Jean prorogues the parliament until January 26, 2009, to avoid a confidence motion by a newly-formed coalition of opposition parties. //www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/12/04/harper-jean.html (CBC) //ottawa.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20081204/GG_decision_081204/20081204/?hub=OttawaHome (CTV)

Political crisis in Canada: Governor GeneralMichaëlle Jean grants the request of Prime Minister Stephen Harper to prorogue Parliament until January 26, 2009, averting a motion of no-confidence by the new opposition coalition led by the Leader of the OppositionStéphane Dion, and the New Democratic Party leader Jack Layton, with Bloc Québécois leader Gilles Duceppe as a coalition partner.

Sultan Salahuddin Abdul Aziz Shah ibni Almarhum Sultan Hisamuddin Alam Shah Al-Haj, Sultan of Selangor and 11th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia dies in office.

U.S. military forces land in Somalia.

The National Assembly of Bulgaria elects Dimitar Iliev Popov as Prime Minister of Bulgaria.

Saddam Hussein releases the Western hostages.

President of BangladeshHussain Muhammad Ershad resigns he is replaced by Shahabuddin Ahmed, who becomes interim president.

In Brussels, trade talks break fail because of a dispute between the U.S. and the European Union over farm export subsidies.

President Hossain Mohammad Ershad of Bangladesh is forced to resign following massive protests.

Lech Wałęsa wins the 2nd round of Poland's first presidential election.

Slobodan Milošević becomes President of Serbia.

Prime Minister of JordanZaid ibn Shaker resigns and is replaced by Mudar Badran.

École Polytechnique Massacre (or Montreal Massacre): Marc Lépine, an anti-feminist gunman, murders 14 young women at the École Polytechnique in Montreal.

The Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic becomes the first of the republics of the Soviet Union to abolish the Communist Party's monopoly on power.

Ladislav Adamec resigns as Prime Minister of Czechoslovakia. He is succeeded by Marián Čalfa on December 10.

Egon Krenz resigns as Chairman of the State Council of the German Democratic Republic, and is replaced by Manfred Gerlach, the first non-Communist to hold that post.

Hezbollah militants hijack a Kuwait Airlines plane and kill 4 passengers.

Lt's. Mark Lange and Bobby Goodman of the United States Navy are shot down over Lebanon and captured by the Syrians. Lt Lange died of his injuries.

The People's Republic of China adopts its current constitution.

South Africa grants homeland Ciskei independence (not recognized outside South Africa).

Arthur Scargill becomes President-elect of the National Union of Mineworkers.

The No. 21 Mine explosion in Whitwell, Tennessee kills 13.

The Hastie fire in Kingston upon Hull, England, leads to the deaths of 3 boys and begins the hunt for Bruce George Peter Lee, the UK's most prolific killer.

Dianne Feinstein succeeds the murdered George Moscone as San Francisco, California's first woman mayor (she serves until January 8, 1988).

Black Panther Party members Fred Hton and Mark Clark are shot dead in their sleep during a raid by 14 Chicago police officers.

The second period of Second Vatican Council closes.

"Boynton v. Virginia": The Supreme Court declares that segregation in public transportation is illegal in the United States.

Pierre Lagaillarde, who led the insurrections in 1958 and 1960 in Algeria, fails to appear in court in Paris, France. He had reportedly fled with his four fellow defendants to Spain en route to return to Algeria.

The admission of Mauritania to the United Nations vetoed by the Soviet Union for inscrutable reasons.

The Lewisham train disaster in the UK leaves 92 dead.

December 4 - The Million Dollar Quartet (Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and Johnny Cash) get together at Sun Studios for the first and last time in history.

The first Burger King opens in Miami, Florida, USA.

Great Smog of 1952: A killer fog descends on London (in the process coining the word Smog, for smoke and fog).

The French Interior Minister, Jules S. Moch, takes emergency measures against his country's rioters after six days of violent arguments in the National Assembly.

By a vote of 65–7, the United States Senate approves the entry of the United States into the United Nations.

WWII: Bolivia declares war on Romania and Hungary.

The State of Jefferson is declared in Yreka, California, with judge John Childs as a governor.

WWII: "HMS Nelson" is struck by a mine (laid by ) off the Scottish coast and is laid up for repairs until August 1940.

"The Dandy" comic is first published in Scotland it will still be running .

President Woodrow Wilson departs by ship to the Paris Peace Conference, becoming the first United States President to travel to any foreign country while holding office.

The K.U. or Konservativ Ungdom (Young Conservatives) is founded by Carl F. Herman von Rosen in Denmark.

The Bayswater Railway Station (Victoria, Australia) officially opens.

Notorious New York City politician Boss Tweed escapes from prison and flees to Cuba, then to Spain.

The now-crewless American ship "Mary Celeste" is found (still seaworthy) by the British brig "Dei Gratia".

Battle of Hakodate begins in Japan.

James Clerk Maxwell presents his paper "A Dynamical Theory of the Electromagnetic Field" to the Royal Society in London, treating light as an electromagnetic wave.

American Civil War ndash Sherman's March to the Sea: At Waynesboro, Georgia, forces under Union General Judson Kilpatrick prevent troops led by Confederate General Joseph Wheeler from interfering with Union General Sherman's caign of destroying a wide swath of the South on his march to Savannah, GA (Union forces suffer more than 3 times the casualties as the Confederates, however).

"Syllabus errorum": Pope Pius IX condemns theological liberalism as an error and claims for the supremacy of Roman Catholic Church authority over the civil society. He also condemns rationalism and socialism.

The Mekteb-i Mülkiye School is founded in the Ottoman Empire.

U.S. presidential election, 1844: James K. Polk defeats Henry Clay .

Whig Party holds its first national convention, in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Battle of Antwerp: The last remaining Dutch enforcement, the citadel, is under French attack.

The Chalmers University of Technology is founded in Gothenburg.

India: In the face of fierce opposition, British Lord William Bentinck carries a regulation declaring that all who abet suttee in India are guilty of culpable homicide.

King's College London is founded under the patronage of King George IV and the Prime Minister The Duke of Wellington. It will become the third official university in England.

King\\\\'s College London is founded under the patronage of King George IV and the Prime MinisterThe Duke of Wellington. It will become the third official university in England.

The last of the "Bounty" mutineers dies at Pitcairn Island.

The first issue of "The Observer", the world's first Sunday newspaper, is published.

Robert Burns publishes "Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect".

The town of Martinsborough, North Carolina, itself named for Royal Governor Josiah Martin in 1771, is renamed Greenesville in honor of United States General Nathanael Greene by the North Carolina General Assembly the name Greenesville is later shortened to become Greenville.

An Anglo-Spanish treaty gives Belize to Britain.

The trade with Iceland is opened to all Danish and Norwegian traders.

Francis Light acquires the island of Penang from the Sultan of Kedah on behalf of the British East India Company. It is the first Britishcolony in South-East Asia.

Reykjavík, the capital of Iceland, is founded.

Mission Santa Barbara is founded by Father Fermín Francisco de Lasuén, becoming the 10th mission in the California mission chain.

The first ship leaves Britain for Botany Bay, Australia: 820 out of 1,138 aboard are convicts.

At Fraunces Tavern in New York City, U.S. General George Washington formally bids his officers farewell.

The city of Sevastopol is founded on the Crimean peninsula of the Russian Empire.

United Empire Loyalists flee to Canada from the new United States.

The Treaty of Versailles is signed, ending hostilities between the Franco-Spanish Alliance and England.

Spanish government refuses to grant diplomatic recognition to the USA.

Ireland's last grey wolf is killed.

Loyalists from New York settle Great Abaco in the Bahamas.

Evan William's distillery was founded in Bardstown Kentucky.

The Jacobite Army reaches Derby two days later it begins retreat.

Emperor Yohannes I decrees that Muslims must live separately from Christians throughout Ethiopia.

King Philip's War continues, between the settlers in New England and the indigenous tribes led by Metacomet.

Anton van Leeuwenhoek discovers microorganisms.

Edmond Halley observes the transit of Venus.

Battle of Lund, Sweden. A battle in the Scanian War.

The French East India Company founds its principal Indian base at Pondicherry, on the Coromandel Coast.

King Philip\'s War continues, between the settlers in New England and the indigenous tribes led by Metacomet.

The States of Finland meet in Turku.

The Russo-Turkish War (1676–1681) begins.

The bones of the Princes in the tower were supposedly found

Father Jacques Marquette founds a mission on the shores of Lake Michigan to minister to the Illinois people (the mission would later grow into the city of Chicago).

The Duke of York (later James II) becomes increasingly unpopular in England because of his Catholicism agitation heightens throughout the country with a petition to exclude him from the succession.

The East India Company arranges a trading treaty with the Maratha Empire that has recently been founded by Shivaji Bhonsle in central India.

Middelburg, the Netherlands forbids the building of a synagogue.

An expedition in Sri Lanka led by Phillippe de Oliveira deposes and executes the last Jaffna king Cankili II, putting an end to the Jaffna Kingdom.

A Spanish expedition sails around Tierra del Fuego, mapping the coast and discovering the Diego Ramirez Islands.

Jahangir grants a British mission important commercial concessions at Surat on the west coast of India.

Thirty-eight colonists from Berkeley Parish in England disembark in Virginia and give thanks to God (considered by some to be the first Thanksgiving in the Americas).

The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth reaches the height of its territorial extent.

The Danish–Dutchwhaling settlement of Smeerenburg is founded in Svalbard.

England establishes its first outpost in India.

The Banqueting House of James I of England is destroyed by fire.

The Siege of Osaka begins.

John Napier publishes "Mirifici Logarithmorum Canonis Descriptio", a paper outlining his discovery of logarithms.

The French Estates-General meets for the last time before the era of the French Revolution. In between, France will be governed as an absolute monarchy.

The Rosicrucian Order is instituted in Germany according to Fraternitas Rosae Crucis.

Christianity banned throughout Japan

The Council of Trent (opened December 13, 1545) officially closes. It reaffirms all major Roman Catholic doctrines, and declares the Deuterocanonical books to be canonical, along with the rest of the Bible.

The official Roman Catholic decree Tametsi stipulates that for a marriage to be valid, consent (the essence of marriage) as expressed in the vows has to be given publicly before witnesses, one of whom has to be the parish priest.

Leonardo da Vinci accepts Francis I's invitation to France.

The Italian explorer Rafael Perestrello trades with Chinese merchants at Canton during the Ming Dynasty.

Desiderius Erasmus publishes a new Greek translation of the New Testament.

Treaty of Brussels: Peace is declared between France and the Empire.

King Francis I of France and Pope Leo X sign the Concordat of Bologna.

Gillingham School founded ndash the oldest school in Dorset

Pedro de Solis discovers the Río de la Plata.

Thomas More publishes "Utopia".

The German cities of Lübeck, Wismar, and Rostock enter into a pact to defend against pirates of the Baltic Sea, laying the groundwork for the Hanseatic League.

Kings Louis IX of France and Henry III of England agree to the Treaty of Paris, in which Henry renounces his claims to French-controlled territory on continental Europe (including Normandy) in exchange for Louis withdrawing his support for English rebels.

The famous frescoes of the Boyana Church in Bulgaria are completed (the church and its murals are now a UNESCOWorld Heritage Site).

Nogai Khan leads the second Mongol Golden Horde attack against Lithuania and Poland.

Henry V, Holy Roman Emperor invades Italy.

Beirut and Sidon are captured by the Crusaders.

First Crusade: The Crusaders conquer Sidon.

Construction begins on Fontevraud Abbey in France.

Mawdud of Mosul captures all land belonging to the Crusader County of Edessa east of the Euphrates.

Byzantine EmperorAlexius I Comnenus renews his war with the Seljuk Turks.

Inge the Younger becomes joint king of Sweden with his brother Philip.

The Russian "Primary Chronicle" ends.

Carloman I, King of the Franks, dies, leaving his brother Charlemagne king of the now complete Frankish kingdom.

Gerberga, the widow of Carloman, flees to Desiderius, the king of the Lombards.