The current administration is once again putting its thumb on the scale of American history, replacing plaques on the old Presidential Home in Philadelphia.1 The plaques, which previously explored George Washington’s slave-ownership at the home, were replaced with more gentle versions that celebrated the home’s history while ignoring the people who actually lived in bondage there.

The State of Memory

On Wednesday, July 15th, an appeals court ruled that the Trump administration could proceed with removing the plaques, arguing that the federal government owns the presidential home where Washington spent much of his time as president.2 3

The removal of these plaques, which memorialized and detailed the lives of nine enslaved people under George Washington, is not only a representation of the current administration’s own political agenda but also part of a movement to disregard Black history in favor of rose-tinted mythology.

Of the nine enslaved people who were mentioned on the National Park Service’s website, three attempted to escape slavery, and two were successful. Describing one of the attempted escapees, Christopher Sheels, the NPS’ website notes: “The teenage personal attendant to George Washington. He helped the president dress and assisted with his personal needs. He attempted to escape to freedom in 1799. Later, he was present at Washington’s deathbed.”4

Nowhere in this description is Sheel’s attempt at escape described in any detail, nor are his motivations addressed. It is worth noting that Sheels was one of the enslaved people under Washington who could read and write, likely prompting fears among the Washingtons that he would use Pennsylvania law to seek his freedom. Indeed, Washington sent Sheels back permanently to Mount Vernon in 1791. 5

I am not the only one who has noticed this omission and disregard. As the historian Kevin Levin notes in his own review of the administration’s new plaques:

Even more troubling is the treatment of Ona Judge. Her panel reads, “The personal maidservant and seamstress for Martha Washington. She ran away from the President’s House and escaped to freedom in 1796. Ona settled in New Hampshire, married a freed black sailor, and had three children before passing away in 1848.”

Let’s be clear. Ona Judge did not run away from a house. She ran away from George Washington. And Washington did not simply let her go.6

The administration’s decision to describe Ona Judge in this way and with such passivity not only betrays a gross disregard for the human reality of slavery but also its historic significance. Enslaved people were and ought to be treated as actors in their own right.

Running From George Washington

Ona Judge was born at Mount Vernon in 1774 and, at the age of 10, began her service to Martha Washington. 7 Once George Washington became president, Judge went with him to the presidential mansion in Philadelphia, and would serve him until 1796, when she made her escape, boarding a ship to New Hampshire. 8 9

Despite portrayals of Washington as ambivalent and even gradually hostile to slavery, Washington never gave up his pursuit of Judge. He put out ads in the Philadelphia Gazette offering a reward of “Ten dollars… to any person who will bring her home, if taken in the city, or on board any vessel in the harbour…”10

In an 1845 interview with the abolitionist newspaper, The Liberator, Judge recounted her reasons for fleeing. Primarily, she wanted to be free, but she was also afraid of being transferred to Elizabeth Park Custis, whose temper and stubbornness were well-known. 11 12

Washington pursued her relentlessly, first sending Burwell Bassett Jr. to persuade her to return to Mount Vernon. Judge refused, telling him, “I am free now and choose to remain so.” Washington then instructed Bassett to seize her and her child by force. Judge was warned and fled to a nearby town. 13 14 15 After Washington died in 1799, Judge lived the rest of her life as a free woman along with her three children, but not because of the Washingtons’ mercy. She took her freedom.

Final Thoughts

The history of the United States is complex, multifaceted, and constantly evolving with more evidence. However, no amount of appeals to complexity or national pride can justify the disregard for the historical context of slavery and the people who were subjected to that horrible institution. As I explained in my piece on Reconstruction, these kinds of attempts to ignore slavery don’t improve the conditions of our country; they only make them more painful.

While it is easy for many politicians to embrace the idea of perpetual improvement and justice, the reality is that equality and justice are not guaranteed. It does not erase the pain and sacrifices of those who gave their lives for a better America, nor does it unify the country. It only creates more wounds to open in the future.

Removing monuments to enslaved people, lynching victims, and advocates for justice is not acceptable. Refusing to talk about racism is not an act of historical preservation; they are a method of historical negligence and erasure. 16

Recognizing the stories of enslaved people and the role founding fathers like George Washington played in their enslavement is not anti-American. Nor should it be partisan or ideological. It is a matter of good historical practice and human dignity, and the current administration is willfully obstructing that critical process.

In January, the National Park Service removed plaques from a Philadelphia monument honoring the nine enslaved people owned by America’s first President, George Washington.1 Acting under President Trump’s Executive Order 14253, “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” the administration targeted the plaques as part of its campaign against what it called a “corrosive ideology.”2 Far from arguing against the facts presented on the exhibit, the administration rejects attempts to reconcile America’s lofty ideals with its racist past. While a federal judge later ordered the plaques restored, the attempt to erase slavery from public memory shows how deeply controversial and challenging evaluating America’s history remains.3

Sadly, this reaction is not new. Nor is it without supporters. Previously, President Donald Trump organized the 1776 Commission, which sought to create a history that is “accurate, honest, unifying, inspiring, and ennobling.”4 It is worth noting that not all history is ennobled or pride-inducing, especially when it comes to slavery. Still, the administration proceeded as it sought to appeal to its base. This reality of historical neglect necessitates reflection because it echoes a larger historical memory: the memory of Reconstruction and America’s first attempt to establish a multi-racial democracy and the subsequent destruction of those efforts.

Reconstruction: A New Birth of Freedom and Remembering the Fight

The memory of Reconstruction and the Civil War that preceded it has been the subject of intense debate and controversy. Not only because of the question of whether it could have succeeded— historian H.W. Brands argues that it was doomed—but also because the story of reconstruction was initially and deliberately misrepresented through the Lost Cause.5 As I explained in my 2021 piece for the UIS Observer, “Confederates like former General Jubal Early, Edward Pollard, and ex-Confederacy president Jefferson Davis did everything in their power to promote the idea that the Confederacy was a martyr to a noble cause.” 6

Southern white supremacists downplayed the role of slavery and, through their operations, helped turn the public against Reconstruction. This effort would eventually push African Americans from positions of power in the South and allow Southern white supremacists to write the legacy of Reconstruction.

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It would be a mistake, however, to ignore the role of African Americans as participants in the fight for racial equality. As Eric Foner rightly notes, African Americans were not passive participants in their development or march to greater liberty. Though later undermined in much of their fight, African Americans continued to work to “establish as much independence as possible in their working lives, consolidate their families and communities, and stake a claim to equal citizenship.”7

Throughout the Civil War and in its eventual end, calls for racial equality and the right to vote became central to a post-war America. In February of 1865, Reverend Henry Highland Garnet was the first African American to deliver a speech before Congress. In his speech, Garnet emphasized that “all unjust and heavy burdens” needed to be removed from the backs of every man in America. He further demanded that Black soldiers, many of whom had given their lives in the fight against slavery, should “enjoy the well-earned privilege of voting…” for their representatives and leaders. To Garnet, this was not a request for special privileges, but a call for justice.8

African Americans, through consistent advocacy, not only pushed for greater rights but also sought to maintain political power in the Republican Party. Through their votes, African Americans brought about Republican majorities in the South, including the election of nearly 2,000 Black representatives to state and federal legislatures.9 10 These efforts and the adoption of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments helped challenge the idea that America was a white man’s country and his country alone.

Violence and Reprisal

Fearing the end of racial hierarchy and the loss of free labor that came with slavery, white Southerners, especially former enslavers, feared and attempted to quash it through terroristic violence. In May of 1866, white mobs in Memphis, Tennessee, began burning buildings and attacking and killing black residents over an argument that broke out with Black soldiers and white police officers. The violence and the subsequent Southern press’s attempt to blame the Black soldiers appalled Northern journalists. One Republican newspaper, the Independent, described the violence in vivid detail, saying “The freedman at Memphis… have been hunted in the streets, women and children shot in cold blood, their homes burnt over their heads and at least one woman burnt alive, their churches and schools burnt to the ground…”11

By 1868, the Ku Klux Klan had formed and began attacking Black voters and Northern Republicans in the hopes of achieving its white supremacist agenda. Though they would subsequently be put down under federal legislation, other organizations continued their attacks.12

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Southern legislatures, seeking to wrestle control away from Black voters and the Republican Party, instituted “Black Codes,” which ensured that former enslaved people were tied to white employers.13 Black children could be “apprenticed” to a white person at the direction of a court, and that white person had the power to inflict “such moderate corporeal chastisement as a father or guardian is allowed to inflict on his or her child or ward at common law…”14 Through legal and illegal means, White Supremacists in the South drove African Americans from the ballot box and would eventually institute Jim Crow.

Reconstruction Ends

Though Reconstruction was an impressive and powerful display of strength and a remarkable effort to ensure racial equality, it would end by the late 1870s as the previously pro-Reconstruction Republican Party gradually abandoned the project. In his 1877 inaugural address, incoming Republican President Rutherford B. Hayes promised to advocate for what he saw as the “truest interests of the white” and “colored people” to create a stronger nation. Hayes made little mention of the violence or voter suppression efforts by Southern white supremacists and instead stated his high hopes for a newly established, united country.15 Union troops were withdrawn, and with their departure, the mechanism for enforcing racial equality disappeared, and the rise of Jim Crow was secure.

This was not an accident, as an agreement was hatched between the Southern Democrats and Hayes’ Republican allies to secure the presidency. In a private meeting with a New Orleans editor carrying messages from Louisiana Democrats, Hayes remarked that he believed “the intelligence of any country ought to govern it,” suggesting his support for Southern home rule.16 With home rule came the end of Reconstruction.

Final Thoughts

While it is easy for many politicians to embrace the idea of perpetual improvement and justice, the reality is that equality and justice are not guaranteed. It does not erase the pain and sacrifices of those who gave their lives for a better America, nor does it unify the country. It only creates more wounds to open in the future.

Removing monuments to enslaved people, lynching victims, and advocates for justice is not acceptable. Refusing to talk about racism is not an act of historical preservation; they are a method of historical negligence and erasure. If we are to be a more perfect union, then the study of history, in its own context, must remain free to criticize the past and evaluate it in its own terms, irrespective of appeals to national pride, ethnonationalism, or partisanship. The people who fought and died for a better tomorrow deserve better; we deserve better.

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Hello everyone,

I hope you are doing well. It is my great pleasure to announce that I am starting a new publication here on Substack! While much of my work on The Progressive American Report will continue, I also want to branch out into history. As some of you may know, I studied political science and history at Loras College, and I thoroughly enjoyed working for the Center for Dubuque History as one of their archival interns.

It is that experience that has motivated me to start The Democracy Archive!

What is the Democracy Archive?

Democracy has never been a finished project. It is a consistent struggle for justice, rights, and dignity—a fight that rages on even now. From the fight against slavery to the feminist movement, the American democratic project has gone through numerous changes and challenges that merit intense, detailed examination. Those examinations don't simply explain the past, but also help us evaluate today's problems in context.

That’s where The Democracy Archive comes in. This new history newsletter will explore the ways democracy has been built, challenged, and remembered, not just through leaders and institutions, but through the lives and voices of everyday people.

Each issue will take readers into the archives of struggle and memory. Together, we’ll revisit stories such as:

• How Ella Baker and the young activists of SNCC embodied the grassroots organizing tradition.

• The legacies of trauma and resilience in communities shaped by immigration, oppression, and identity.

• The battles over memory and monuments, from the Lost Cause to today’s culture wars.

• The high stakes of elections, political conflict, and violence.

Some stories will feel familiar, others less so. All of them will ask the same questions: How is democracy made? Who gets remembered, and who is forgotten? And what can the past teach us about the present?

I want this space to be both scholarly and accessible — a place where careful historical work meets public storytelling. History is not just an academic exercise; it is a civic one. Understanding the lessons, struggles, and memories of the past is essential to the democratic future we are trying to build.

The Democracy Archive will launch soon. In the weeks ahead, you’ll see the first essays on stories of resistance, resilience, and remembrance, but also examples of political conflict and controversy.

If that content interests you, please subscribe today and join me in building this community of readers. Please share it with your friends and family!

My first piece will be on the Election of 1860 and the consequences of division in American politics.

I look forward to hearing from you all. If you have any stories you would like me to cover, please don't hesitate to comment below! Thank you for your time and support!

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