Trump’s Removal Of A Philadelphia Slavery Exhibit Leads To Outrage
Philadelphia has an extensive history as it relates to African Americans. It’s the first place that Harriet Tubman lived as a free woman. It is the home of the nation’s first Black Episcopal church, the first Black hospital and the first public protest against slavery. As the place where the Constitution was created and signed, Philadelphia is central to the celebration of the semi-quincentennial, America’s 250th birthday.
But this week, a significant piece of history was removed from public display due to guidance from the Trump administration. Last March, an executive order, Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History, was issued to rid the parks of what the administration deemed “corrosive ideology.” By September, the Department of the Interior, led by Doug Burgum, ordered parks to remove anything that they determined was “inappropriately disparaging” the United States.
On Thursday, items were removed from The President’s House in Philadelphia that include signs that reference slavery and its impact. George Washington, the nation’s first president, owned more than 300 slaves at his homes in Mt. Vernon, Virginia, and in Philadelphia. In Philly, it has been documented that nine slaves worked in his home. Though Pennsylvania was a free state, Washington was able to use a legal loophole to keep his slaves in bondage.
Two of them, his cook, Hercules Posey and a lady’s maid, Ona Judge, successfully escaped. Judge ultimately made her way to New Hampshire, where she married and had children, though she was technically a fugitive for the rest of her life. Posey lived the rest of his life in New York City, also classified as a slave.
Workers armed with crowbars and wrenches removed multiple panels that honored them, including ones that said “Life Under Slavery” and “The Dirty Business of Slavery.” When asked by The Philadelphia Inquirer, they said they were following orders from a supervisor.
Activists in Philadelphia were aware that the President’s House was a target and had been working to stop the removals from happening.
“It’s a disgrace, and that’s an understatement,” lawyer and activist Michael Coard of Avenging the Ancestors told the Inquirer. “I cannot say what I’m thinking, because as a criminal defense attorney, I know better. What’s going on now is absolutely unheard of in the history of the United States of America.”
Mayor Cherelle Parker, the city’s first Black female mayor, immediately filed a lawsuit contesting the order. She says there was an agreement signed in 2006 that the city and federal government would work together on determining any changes to federal exhibits in the city.
“We are right now researching and reviewing the cooperative agreement between the City of Philadelphia and federal government that dates back to 2006,” she told the Inquirer. “It requires parties to meet and confer if there are any changes to be made to any exhibit, so anything that is outside that agreement, it requires that our Law Department review it.”
Coard says that the activists have a plan, though no specifics were provided.
Philadelphia has a big 2026 planned, bringing in visitors from around the world. The city will host early rounds of March Madness, four games of the World Cup (mostly matches between African and Black countries) and Major League Baseball’s All-Star Game. Its July 4th Celebration, which is already one of the largest in the country, is expected to be at the center of the country’s semiquincentennial.
“You can try to erase our history, but we’re still going to survive,” Jali Wicker, a passerby who stopped to record the panels being taken down, told the Inquirer, “History has shown that, slavery has shown that. … And you want to go back?”
See social media’s reaction to the removal below:
