Keynote: The Past and the Future Are Linked: Introducing the Freedom Corridor

IT'S A PLEASURE, REALLY, TO GIVE THIS KEYNOTE TALK at the inaugural conference of the Freedom Corridor project.I want to begin by saluting my colleagues whom I've worked with on the organizing committee: Nalo Mitchell, Carolyn Farrar, Alberta Robinson, Kate Williams-McWorter, Brian Mitchell, Art Wilson, Kamau Kemayó, and especially here at Illinois College, your very own Brittney Yancy. Together, this committee is the personification of the Freedom Corridor's origin from Springfield to Jacksonville to Pittsfield to Barry to Quincy to Hannibal and to, of course, New Philadelphia.Now, this talk that I'm going to give is to introduce the Freedom Corridor, from New Philadelphia to the history of this country, to the world context for our freedom narrative. This is, of course, a history of the past, but it's also about our present and future, because the true greatness of each of us and collectively all of us is in the future. That's what makes history so exciting, the constant urge to make life better. That's what this is really all about.It's no accident that we're meeting here at Illinois College. There are three main reasons. First, it was founded as an abolitionist institution and became a station on the Underground Railroad. Its first president, as has been pointed out, was Edward Beecher, the brother of Harriet Beecher Stowe, the author of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Lincoln is understood to have said to her, “So you're the little woman who started this great war!” The second reason is we have the fortune of Professor Brittney Yancy being hired to initiate a program in African American Studies here at Illinois College. Finally, she is being supported by the Illinois College administration and faculty in hosting this conference and being supportive of the Freedom Corridor. So thank you, Professor and President Farley, and thank you, Illinois College.Now, more specifically, at the center of this Freedom Corridor narrative, one can find two men, Abraham Lincoln and Frank McWorter. Both came to Illinois from Kentucky, and their connection has been documented by the Looking for Lincoln project with a sign in Barry, Illinois. You will also find brochures that explain this connection between Abraham Lincoln and the McWorters.So, in this talk, our first concern is to connect the New Philadelphia story with the general pattern of freedom seeking by African Americans and how that is central to our Freedom Corridor, and the general history of this country. This will lead us to discuss the history of the freedom narrative against slavery as well as freedom quests more broadly on a world level. This is a nineteenth-century story that was carried on in the twentieth century as we carry it now forward into the twenty-first century.I will end with a reflection on why the Freedom Corridor is just a first step in our journey to rewrite our history, placing the freedom we need as a future goal, recognizing the journey we have been on and the need to continue.So more specifically, why are we at this conference? One of the great lessons of the history of this country is that it begins as an anticolonial struggle against British colonialism. That's the upside. That's the good part of that history. But there are definitely some downsides.Now, I will argue that the US was founded as a racist, patriarchal, settler colony. I know that sounds like sloganeering from somebody, some woke guy up here, but let me break it down for you. Forty-one of the fifty-six men who signed the Declaration of Independence owned slaves. Ten of the first twelve presidents of the US owned slaves. The cost was the enslavement of Africans in North America who suffered for four hundred years. The legal end of slavery was only 159 years ago. So, we continue to deal with the legacy of this institutionalized barbarism.No, nothing about slavery was good, certainly for Black people, even the slaveowners, because they were taught the negative values of greed and assumed privilege by living off the labor of people they didn't have to pay.Women didn't get the vote until the Nineteenth Constitutional Amendment was passed and ratified in 1919, 143 years after the Declaration of Independence. That's the patriarchal point. And genocide was used against the Native Americans, and still today, 13 percent of their descendants are living on more than three hundred reservations. So, what is good is that the fight for freedom, justice, and equality has been a constant feature reignited by every generation. This applies to women, the elderly, the working class in general, and everybody, and of course, African Americans.We have to remember that the first president, George Washington, then one of the richest men in the country, owned slaves. Born into a slave-owning family, marrying a woman who owned slaves, he nevertheless left a will that all of his slaves after his death and his wife's death should be set free.So, this conference is about an answer to why history is important for us today. We are here because the past continues to live in the present. Even today, the fact is that Black Lives Matter is a lesson that still has to be taught. We have to wonder why that obvious slogan is so controversial.Carter G. Woodson, a great twentieth-century historian, said, “Those who have no record of what their forebearers have accomplished lose the inspiration which comes from the teaching of biography and history.” This is why we turn to the Freedom Corridor and begin with New Philadelphia.Frank and Lucy McWorter were part of the Black liberation struggle in the abolitionist movement. They are among the many whose names we need to know, names we need to speak to each other as we live their legacy in our time. We will hear more names at this conference, and they are featured in your program.Because of these McWorters, we have a new national park here in Illinois that upholds the legacy of the freedom struggle. Every spot on the Freedom Corridor is full of such names. That's one of the goals of this conference, to hear them, to know them, and to represent them in our time.These McWorters founded a town they called New Philadelphia in 1836. This was the first town in the United States platted and legally registered by African Americans. In sum, they were able to purchase sixteen family members out of slavery. For these reasons, Congress made it a national park.They were joined by both Black and white people, among them their close friends and abolitionists the African American Walker family, initially from Missouri, as well as the Shipmans and Eckelbergers, abolitionists of European descent, and of course, many others. The New Philadelphia story is not just about itself. It represents a case of the national narrative of freedom.It's also important to recognize the contributions of the local community in keeping the memory alive, arranging to secure the property for the national park, and working with others to get the congressional act making it a National Park Service historic site. Several people who have contributed in these ways are here, and there are many more. This is the danger of using names, but let me mention a few: Phil and Linda Bradshaw, Larry and Natalie Armstead, Joe Conover, Harry and Helen Wright, Carol McCartney, Marynel and Jerry Corton, Claire and Terry Martin, Kaye and David Iftner, and many more. Thank you all.This is a poem I wrote to capture the New Philadelphia experience; I call it “Seven Ways to Freedom.”Now, this poem describes the particularity of New Philadelphia, but it also represents a template that can be used to sum up the freedom narrative of African Americans generally—in other words, freedom seekers: the Underground Railroad as a network, buying themselves out of slavery, joining the Union Army to fight in the not-so-Civil War, setting up a community, becoming part of a community, getting legislation passed, finding ways to impact public policy, and living free in an abolitionist village.There's seven ways to freedom, but those aren't the only ways. There were also slave revolts. Herbert Aptheker defined a slave revolt as an action involving ten or more slaves with “freedom as the apparent aim and contemporary references labeling the event as an uprising, plot, insurrection, or the equivalent of these.”1 In all, Aptheker says he found records of approximately 250 revolts.There's also manumission, where slaveowners volunteered and set their enslaved people free.But there were also conventions where the freed African Americans gathered to discuss freedom and to begin to encourage more people to become part of the freedom seeking in the country.And then lastly, there were publications. You might be familiar with the great slave narratives, people who told their own stories of what it was like to be a slave, how they grew up. But there were also other publications as part of the abolitionist movement. There were newspapers, for example.Now, the armed struggle against the slave confederacy was joined by men from Illinois, including from places in the Freedom Corridor. Black men were present, including men from New Philadelphia and the McWorter family. Of the 150 total units of colored troops, the Twenty-Ninth US Colored Infantry was the only unit organized in Illinois, in Quincy.Now, there were almost five hundred thousand free African Americans living in the United States at the outbreak of the Civil War, about 10 percent of the entire Black population. And of course, free is a concept we have to understand in the context of the times, because obviously Black people were not free in the sense of being first-class citizens.Also, at the very year that the McWorter family was moving to set up their home in Hadley Township in Pike County, Nat Turner was in Virginia planning his armed revolt against slavery. He was a religious man, just as Frank McWorter and Lucy McWorter were religious people. Frank had the opportunity for negotiations and entrepreneurship, while Nat was forced into war. Nat Turner was a martyr for freedom in 1831.Now both positions, negotiation and armed struggle, were taken up in organized conferences at a national level and a state level starting in 1830, again, the time when the McWorters entered Pike County. Meetings in Illinois were subsequently held in Alton, Galesburg, and Chicago. There are extensive minutes of these meetings demonstrating how Black people were taking ownership of their freedom struggle, not simply relying on others.Now, the legal struggle to deal with slavery begins with the adoption of the Northwest Ordinance on July 13, 1787, by the Confederation Congress, the one-house legislature operating under the Articles of Confederation. This law had two aspects covering the territory of what became six states: “There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory other than the punishment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.”That's the first part. In other words, no slavery there. But then it goes on: “Provided always that any person escaping into the same from whom labor or service is lawfully claimed in any one of the original states, such fugitives may be lawfully reclaimed and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labor or service as aforesaid.”2That's the second part. In other words, the ordinance prohibited slavery in some places, but also permitted capturing freedom seekers by slaveowners in states that had legal slavery. That's why they call them fugitives. They were taking the slaveowner's point of view in calling those fleeing enslavement fugitives rather than freedom seekers. Both systems—free and unfree—were recognized, but the contradiction remained. The issue at the origin of this country was whether it was going to be a slave or a free nation: States were formed on one side of the question or the other. Of the original thirteen states, six were slave states and seven were free. So seven to six. But then the next fourteen, seven were free and seven were slave states. The entire country was debating this question: Was the US going to be a slavery country or was it going to be a free country? One area of the country was based on slavery, plantation-level agricultural production, rice, sugar, tobacco, cotton, and one was where industry was developing, the northern states.Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act in 1850, allowing slaveowners to invade the North to recapture freedom seekers who had escaped and, by so doing, Congress put free Black people at risk of being kidnapped and dragged into slavery. The Fugitive Slave Act was the law. Lincoln had a personal position of being against slavery and thinking that evolutionary change would lead to the end of slavery, but he supported the Fugitive Slave Act.Now remember, the statement that people think defines the founding of this country, “all men are created equal,” was coined by the same people and institutions that upheld the enslavement of Africans and genocide against Native Americans. This is the heart of the American dilemma.While this was happening in the US, we have to also ask the question, what was happening globally? What was the rest of the world like? Let's take a look at France. Their revolution in 1789 raised high the principles of liberty, equality, and fraternity. What lofty goals. But when their Haitian slaves tried to embrace them as well, they were forced to fight to win their independence from in of these goals years turn to the Haitian What he have to about this is not a of to us that we it is the adoption of that no or white can be the property of his So each revolution be on the nor the 1789 were and of the forward was when in the United States to this organizing on two main to a the of in this context from twelve to ten a were for well the of the enslaved people, who were working from to you up when it was and you worked until the You worked from to for no at that into context going on in the country. This was a between the states. were no slavery was a to for free In other words, the country we in had a It was going to be free or you were a being a you were with the they would you with a slave they didn't have to about this free or slave was made in when the Constitutional Amendment was passed by Congress and ratified by a of states. In that it was out of This is we to The after Congress passed the the Illinois ratified The first state to the Amendment was Illinois. But it's also important to remember ratified the Amendment in years only to the states in it not call for the total of slavery. In other words, he said, for those states in end where he but as for slavery in the states that were in the he didn't and he slavery to continue there. So it was two years that the Amendment or the is as Freedom and many of us in me on You know, some the the struggle In Illinois, there were Black Black Black were from to these Black people not or against white people, in of three or more risk of being or and not in a and were to own or This is an important context to understand the law that the McWorters passed, them to and be and in legal In other words, that law in made an for the McWorter family. The of legal slavery not the of the Black It was not until the of the Amendment to the US and adoption of the Illinois of that the legal But obviously well into the twentieth century and now into the twenty-first that should not be is who was a great abolitionist from Chicago. also important for us in Illinois to remember the abolitionist as he against the Act put forward by Illinois He a in Congress to calling a not a of an American he was on the of He was and by from so that he had to take time off to and didn't until years we have to such in our there are some who their to while in that be especially in Illinois, is was the The case made slavery had in Illinois, a free and then to Missouri, a slave and to be free based on the fact that he had in Illinois. US said, has no to for his freedom, and upheld slavery in the United States the of Black in The of by with the of the President held that a slave, who had in a free state and territory where slavery was Illinois, was not to his freedom, that African Americans were not and be of the United and that the which had free all of and of was after the Civil War, Congress against slavery with a of The Amendment slavery in Amendment to all people in the US in Amendment Black American men the to vote in the Congress made a great forward with the Civil Act of It was to all in their and legal It was the of legislation to passed by The act all in and public from said the about this The of this will the not only of the but of any other class of who may themselves It will the of that of on this under carried on in of the of and the of friends of freedom, until at it in all and a the which the world has the and the of those in the of and liberty, the the act was down in by the by from The was that the not so was legal and until the is the fact that there is a high in after but nothing after was the author of the what I'm to They a high after the who the Civil Act of So all the going to know about going to and about from who wrote the first the first of the the country was the in the was in Washington, Of course, the next G. What I'm to get you to understand is been this constant struggle going on in this country. a hundred years the In this one person was the question I put to you we need a freedom the country after that in of people in into a freedom of a new one after as the country, just like the abolitionist of the The is in we can to the question, what is what is Black The about what history is, said, like the of the future than the history of the The said, will be to me because I to But the George to two of his and that still with “Those who not remember the past are to That's why I give this to remember our history has been a constant struggle, from the anticolonial against the British to the from slavery now against the against Black people, by their for That's why we have the the Freedom Philadelphia, as a National a national park, the of African Americans in their seven ways to It all of the of New Philadelphia, Black and Its even is how it us to think these six as a but we to out to and to College, Galesburg, and of and the Freedom going all the from to is here will become an of the statement of the Freedom The Freedom Corridor is a of and to and that the of and those that for the of and all of The Corridor is to between historic and community with the of becoming a central in and teaching of the African American and other here to us by this freedom We have from states and six and we will continue to on The here will you and you to you so started with New we have six And In us as we to more in Illinois, more in Missouri, and as I end this talk, let me with you a poem by that is so to what we are America be America America be America it be the it used to it be the on the a home where he is was America to America be the the it be that great of nor any be by one was America to let my be a where with no opportunity is and life is is in the we been equality for freedom in this of the who are you that in the who are you that your the the and the the from the the the I finding only the same of the the man, full of and in that of the the Of the ways of the Of take the for own the to the the to the the to you the people, the the who the I'm the one who our the while still a of a so so so even every and in every made America the it has I'm the who those of what I to be my I'm the one who left and from Black I a of the said the not The on down when we who have nothing for our all the all the all the all the who have nothing for our the almost let America be America that has been where every is made and whose and at the whose in the our call me any you of freedom not those who live like on the take our it was America to I this will of the and of our and of and and the people, the the the and the all the of these great make America you very