America’s Original Sin is America’s Origin

History is written by the winners. There is always a dominant narrative that emerges and becomes the “official” history of any event or epoch. It means that the truths of those who “lost” are often lost to history. In any history, however, there is always a minority report.

It has been said that racism is America’s original sin. The Southern Poverty Law Center states that it is not America’s original sin but America’s origin. Every strand in the warp and woof of our country’s fabric is shot through with slavery and racism. In this election year it is especially important that we take a more honest look at our history because it is influencing our political process in disturbing ways. Over the next few weeks I will explore this in more depth. For this week I begin with some pieces of history that are not well known, but fill in crucial parts of the narrative that paint a more honest picture of who we are as Americans.  Warning: the stories we tell ourselves and the stories we were taught leave out a lot.

Most of us learned in US history in high school that the first slaves were brought to America in 1619 and landed in Jamestown, Virginia. The narrative that is left out is that the brutal slave trade was already thriving in the Americas. Portuguese and Spanish colonists in Central and South America began trafficking enslaved humans in the 1400’s. It is likely that Christopher Columbus transported the first enslaved Africans in the 1490’s to what is now the Dominican Republic.

The Spanish occupation of Florida in the early sixteenth century was the beginning of slavery in what was to become the United States. Linda Heywood and John Thornton of Boston University state that the earliest slaves arrived in 1526.

The reason any of this matters is because what we were taught truncates the narrative. The slave trade has a much broader history than the atrocities of the early colonies. Slavery was global. Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean, Peru and Brazil, to name a few, were slave trading and slave holding areas. African people endured centuries of enslavement.

In 1663 a Virginia court set the precedent for generational slavery by declaring a child born to an enslaved mother was also a slave. This law made the slave trade in America unique in the world, a dubious distinction at best.

In 1661 Maryland was the first state to pass anti-miscegenation legislation. In the l960’s twenty-one states still had those laws in place. Alabama was the last state to repeal the ban on interracial marriage in 2000. Let that sink in a moment, just twenty years ago.

The date of 1776 as the date of American independence is celebrated and revered. What is less known is that all references to slaves were removed by Thomas Jefferson, himself a slave owner. Thomas Jefferson had six children by his house slave, Sally Heming. The truth is ugly; this woman endured years of rape and was forced to bear her rapist’s children. As the Southern Poverty Law Center notes, “We enjoy thinking about Thomas Jefferson proclaiming ‘all men are created equal.’ But we are deeply troubled by the prospect of enslaved woman Sally Heming declaring, ‘me too’.”

Eight of the first twelve presidents were slave owners. They had a deeply vested interest in the institution of slavery.

It is commonly believed the southern colonies were the only slave holders. In reality all the colonies held slaves. Massachusetts was the first colony to declare slavery an institution. In Rhode Island a law required the release of slaves after ten years of forced labor. Since the north was first to abolish slavery it is easy to think it never existed. Between 1774 and 1804 all the northern states abolished slavery.

The slave trade continued to grow in the south. The invention of the cotton gin in the late eighteenth century changed the face of the southern economy. Shifting from tobacco and rice crops to cotton was a turning point in the expansion of the slave trade in the south. It is estimated that enslaved people made up one-third of the population in the south. The growth of the colonies, westward territorial expansion and industrial growth were all dependent on the institution of slavery.

High school history teaches that the importing of slaves was outlawed in 1808. What it doesn’t teach is that it made the domestic slave trade boom. A slave was considered three-fifths of a human being. They were bought and sold like cattle at an auction.  

The Civil War was fought over the issue of slavery. The southern states wanted to secede so they could continue the institution of slavery. The northern colonies, having abolished slavery and the growing voices from Quaker and Mennonite communities protesting slavery all set the stage for a bloody and brutal war.

By the late 1800’s the Ku Klux Klan was thriving in the south. After the Civil War and the outlawing of slavery, the backlash to keep white supremacy in place was brutal. To this day the KKK, other hate groups and white supremacy groups keep the shameful legacy of racism alive and well.

In this election year, it is crucial that we learn our history, the whole story. It isn’t pretty but it is who we are. It is clear that the “official” end of slavery and efforts at reconstruction did little to improve the situation of African Americans. Efforts to legally redress discrimination have been minimally successful. In 1964 President Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act. In 1965 the Voting Rights Act was passed to correct disparities in voter access.  That law was repealed by a 2013 court ruling.  Let that sink in, too.