400 Years of African Slavery in America

[Ken]

Seems war/killing and rebellion and greed should be pretty high on the list for that period at the national level.
Slavery and genocide were simply a continuation of colonialism, not something particular to the birth of this nation. Had this nation never become independent, it still would have been killing Indians and enslaving people.

I think those two are specifically called out because they were necessary, in the sense that the nation would not be without them.

Yes. We all live on stolen Indian land. And, as the 1619 project points out, the legacy of slavery and segregation/white supremacy permeates every part of our cultural and physical landscape as well, from our cities and freeway systems to the electoral college to land ownership patterns across the country.

Every country has histories of war and rebellion. But our twin histories of slavery and Indian genocide are especially American, or have a uniquely American flavor with how they happened here.

[HondurasKeiser]

I followed your link to Stephen's essay and found it rather pedantic and far from a "withering critique" The first half of his essay is a picayune argument about the dates 1619 vs 1776 and how much the authors "dissed" 1776. He wastes half the essay on an argument that basically has no relevance to the overall theme. The second half of his essay is basically an argument that whites don't get enough credit for their role in abolition and civil rights. Essentially arguing that 1619 should have been written from more of a white perspective, like pretty much every other history of the country ever written. What actually makes the series interesting and worth reading is the fact that it was not. There are endless other histories of the country gathering dust on library shelves.

Quibble with dates and the extent to which whites are given credit for social change in this country. But none of that changes the basic fact that this country was born with two original sins: (1) Slavery and (2) the genocide of the native peoples. And both sins are explicitly tied to white supremacy and Christianity. In the south and east, slavery is the more evident sin and gaping wound. Here in the west, the Indian genocides and removals are the more recent and still festering wound.

I've only read some parts of the 1619 project and found it to be an interesting and thought-provoking work. But it's just one of many different historical takes on this country and I'm not really sure what all the fuss is about. One can write a history of the US focused on women's history, or Indian history, or immigrant history, or religious history, or economic history, or Hispanic history, or military history. And hundreds of works have been written with all those different slants. Of course this is an African-American centric history. That's the whole point.

This is simultaneously a good country and a bad country. And has been for the entirely of it's existence. That is the fundamental paradox of America and American life.

You call it pedantic, I call it an effective rebuttal to the inane, myopic and ahistorical claim made by the progenitors of the 1619 Project, that 1619 was the true founding of the country and that everything we’ve ever done as a country has been to protect slavery and instantiate anti-black racism.

[barnhart]

You call it pedantic, I call it an effective rebuttal to the inane, myopic and ahistorical claim made by the progenitors of the 1619 Project, that 1619 was the true founding of the country and that everything we’ve ever done as a country has been to protect slavery and instantiate anti-black racism.

You're right, that thesis does sound like an overreach, but the only places I have seen that advanced is in the critiques of displeased social conservatives.

I just read the as much as I could of the Times editorial response that I am allowed without an account. I would summarize their restatement of the thesis as the claim that 1619 was the first date at which the crucial elements for the American project were brought together in one place, euro-colonialism, african enslavement and white supremacy. From that point on the idealism was continually counterbalanced by an unwillingness of application.

I don't see much controversy in that. One reason I find a project like this valuable is the broadening of the narrative. For example, the Oregon trail has more cultural recognition than the great migration even though it is twice as distant historically and involved a tiny fraction of the people caught up in the great migration. Yet I had never heard of it until the Wilkerson book. I think the 1619 project is an attempt to bring more stories into the narrative of America.

I also notice that the detractors do not generally contest the factual content but rather the motives of the project.

[Robert]

Yes. We all live on stolen Indian land. And, as the 1619 project points out, the legacy of slavery and segregation/white supremacy permeates every part of our cultural and physical landscape as well, from our cities and freeway systems to the electoral college to land ownership patterns across the country.

Every country has histories of war and rebellion. But our twin histories of slavery and Indian genocide are especially American, or have a uniquely American flavor with how they happened here.

Yet, without colonization, the "Indian" or better term native Americans would never have been brought Christianity. They would have lived without the hope of salvation.

Not all who came over caused genocide. That is painting a really wide brush. The governments caused it more then the individuals. Many groups came over and lived very peacefully. The native Americans did not consider ownership of the land. They migrated with the herds mostly and did not set down strong roots as settlers did. Many could easily work around the early settlers. It was more the move of governments that wanted to control the areas. Some of that came out of the culture of the settlers, but not all. Many were escaping tyrannical governments and wanted little to do with big governments.

The north also did not stay with slavery. Early Mennonites wrote a letter to the Quakers speaking against ownership of others. It took 50 years, but the Quakers finally addressed it and it became part of their doctrine and culture. Slavery was more a southern culture and it was not practiced in the northern states. The northern states should not have to pay or do anything towards any reparations. Most western states were not even in existence. Only a handful of southern states did it. The nation paying just does not sound right when it was just a small part that did it.

While being wrong, slavery was/is part of the world culture. It still is in some areas of the world. Some claim there is more enslaved now then during any time in history. I think it is much more important to address the current slavery then going back and opining about what was done 400 years ago.

[Ken]

Yes. We all live on stolen Indian land. And, as the 1619 project points out, the legacy of slavery and segregation/white supremacy permeates every part of our cultural and physical landscape as well, from our cities and freeway systems to the electoral college to land ownership patterns across the country.

Every country has histories of war and rebellion. But our twin histories of slavery and Indian genocide are especially American, or have a uniquely American flavor with how they happened here.

Yet, without colonization, the "Indian" or better term native Americans would never have been brought Christianity. They would have lived without the hope of salvation.

Not all who came over caused genocide. That is painting a really wide brush. The governments caused it more then the individuals. Many groups came over and lived very peacefully. The native Americans did not consider ownership of the land. They migrated with the herds mostly and did not set down strong roots as settlers did. Many could easily work around the early settlers. It was more the move of governments that wanted to control the areas. Some of that came out of the culture of the settlers, but not all. Many were escaping tyrannical governments and wanted little to do with big governments.

The north also did not stay with slavery. Early Mennonites wrote a letter to the Quakers speaking against ownership of others. It took 50 years, but the Quakers finally addressed it and it became part of their doctrine and culture. Slavery was more a southern culture and it was not practiced in the northern states. The northern states should not have to pay or do anything towards any reparations. Most western states were not even in existence. Only a handful of southern states did it. The nation paying just does not sound right when it was just a small part that did it.

While being wrong, slavery was/is part of the world culture. It still is in some areas of the world. Some claim there is more enslaved now then during any time in history. I think it is much more important to address the current slavery then going back and opining about what was done 400 years ago.

You sure go to some mental gymnastics to refute my simple claim that slavery and Indian genocide were the two biggest collective "original sins" of this country. Collective sins that were inextricably linked to the growth and development of the nation. Nowhere do I claim that every American was a slave owner or profited from slavery or later white supremacy. Nor do I claim that every American in the 19th Century personally made war on Indians. But we live in a nation that was created, in part, through those two sins.

You live in a state where this happened: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_massacre

But go ahead and tell us how there is no historical legacy of slavery and white supremacy in Oklahoma because it wasn't yet a state in 1860.

And frankly, I'm astonished that you would think that Americas long and brutal history of colonization, betrayal, persecution, and genocide was necessary to bring Christianity to native Americans. But I guess that sort of thinking was once common:

Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius. (Kill them all; let God sort them out.)

--Arnaud Amaury ,leader of the Albigensian Crusade ordering the slaughter of 20,000 civilians at the massacre at Béziers in 1209.

[GaryK]

You live in a state where this happened: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_massacre

But go ahead and tell us how there is no historical legacy of slavery and white supremacy in Oklahoma because it wasn't yet a state in 1860.

Unless Robert has moved very recently, I'm pretty sure he lives in Indiana.

[Ken]

You live in a state where this happened: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_massacre

But go ahead and tell us how there is no historical legacy of slavery and white supremacy in Oklahoma because it wasn't yet a state in 1860.

Unless Robert has moved very recently, I'm pretty sure he lives in Indiana.

My mistake then. Who here lives in Oklahoma?

[GaryK]

You live in a state where this happened: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_massacre

But go ahead and tell us how there is no historical legacy of slavery and white supremacy in Oklahoma because it wasn't yet a state in 1860.

Unless Robert has moved very recently, I'm pretty sure he lives in Indiana.

My mistake then. Who here lives in Oklahoma?

Maybe DrWojo.

[barnhart]

Robert, I might be wrong, but I haven't seen anything related to the NYT 1619 project that suggest anyone pay or be paid. What I have seen so far is asking for acknowledgment, simply to be included in the national story.

[Neto]

Unless Robert has moved very recently, I'm pretty sure he lives in Indiana.

My mistake then. Who here lives in Oklahoma?

Maybe DrWojo.

I don't live in Oklahoma anymore, but grew up just north of Tulsa. (The riots were in North Tulsa, the Negro Business District. And just so I don't have a bunch of PC police jumping down my back, that was the proper name for that section of Tulsa during that era.) Obviously, however, I wasn't born until much later. I wish I would have asked my grandpa about it, because he was around 28 years old and was working in Tulsa, unless he was out in Virginia (WWI non-combatant military service) then.
The first I recall hearing about it was 50 years later (1971), when there were lots of articles in the local newspaper about it. It was honest reporting, too - admitting not only to what had happened in Tulsa, but also how the local sheriff in our small town (Collinsville) had been directly involved in violence himself (against the local African-American population).