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George Washington Owned 317 Slaves
Why are slave owners on our currency if the 13th amendment was 155 years ago?
The Almighty Dollar
George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Ulysses S. Grant, and Benjamin Franklin are all revered for their contributions to American history. Four of them were presidents and Franklin’s name appears on the four key documents that established this country. These men are so embedded in the fabric of the United States, their names and faces are printed on our currency, the words “In God We Trust” etched on the other side. There is something else that these men all have in common, they all owned slaves.
I distinctly remember learning about the founding fathers in America’s floundering public school system and being very confused and disturbed by this fact. The first president of the United States owned slaves? My teacher uncomfortably explaining that things were different back then and slavery was just a part of our country’s history. Yeah I get it, but why are we learning about them with such reverence, why aren’t we taking a layered look at these men? Why are you telling me Franklin helped invent electricity, huh? You mean the lightning rod? Why the hell are they on our money still, 150 years after slavery was abolished?
Public school history teachers don’t want to have these conversations, at least mine didn’t, I suppose they weren’t woke enough. The internet was still in its infancy back then so prior generations sort of get a pass right? I don’t want to shovel too much blame onto those before us, America’s education systems brainwashed these generations. In my opinion, public education seemed designed to stifle free thought, which is why a middle school teacher might not want to engage in talks about this. However, I would soon realize that the majority of white America didn’t want to have these conversations. These are difficult discussions to have, especially when you are indoctrinated from a very young age to swear fealty to the flag, the nation, and its violent history.
I remember protesting the Iraq war my freshman year of college because I thought destroying Iraq was about securing oil fields and war profiteering, not about avenging 9/11. Hindsight is 20/20 and everyone’s a better football coach Monday morning, but history has proven my assertions about the Iraq war correct. This country needs a factory reset. America needs to take a serious look at where we are as a society, and we need to do whatever we can to ensure that this movement continues into legislative halls and voting booths. Anything less is complicity and complacency with a system that is oppressing large swaths of our population.
New Jim Crow
While the George Floyd uprisings are born out of police brutality, the police state and private prison complex are both a symptom of a much larger issue. Oppression is alive and well here, and slavery still exists. Whether we consider the prison complex taking advantage of slave labor, or felons working slave wages at dead end jobs, the message is clear. Oppression did not end with the 13th amendment, it simply evolved into the Jim Crow south, and later became our nation’s prison complex, a most grotesque form of predatory capitalism.
The United States imprisons more people per capita than any other developed nation in the world and while blacks make up 13.4 % of the United States population, they make up 40 % of the prison population, staggering. These numbers are a result of police patrolling and “policing” communities at the bottom of the socioeconomic totem poll, largely filled with people of color. Too often I hear people tell me the onus isn’t on them to solve our nation’s current problems, that we are not responsible for the sins of our fathers. Wrong. Active participation in a system that continues to oppress and enslave fellow American citizens makes us all culpable, our country can do better.
This two party system of government has failed us. Our elected officials, serving without term limits, are more concerned with lining their pockets and securing re-election than they are about passing meaningful legislation. The CARES Act, passed swiftly with bipartisan support, will go down in history as another massive transfer of wealth from the American taxpayer to the billionaire oligarch class. These people have to go. Criminal justice reform should have been achieved decades ago and our police state has been careening out of control for just as long. Fervent political engagement at the local and national level is the only cure for what ails this nation.
Factory Reset
There isn’t a quick fix for America, too many things are wrong. However, we can address a few glaring issues that could correct the ship’s course. Citizens United, the 2010 Supreme Court ruling which allows corporations and unions to spend money freely on elections, has to be overturned. We have to remove money from our elections and set limits on what campaigns can spend on advertising. This will level the playing field and force politicians to debate one another and run on platforms important to their constituents. Politicians seeking another term will have to appease their voter bases and not the corporate donor class that purchases our legislators. We need to elect courageous public servants who will draft and pass a constitutional amendment to overturn this Supreme Court decision.
Additionally, we will not have effective government until we institute term limits for our elected officials. The two party system has allowed both sides to centralize power and has created a culture where the end game is to raise massive sums of money. The lack of term limits, coupled with unlimited and unfettered financial contributions, allows both parties to prop up candidates that should have retired decades ago. These people do not represent their constituents, they work for the corporate donors that give them stock tips. Two juggernaut parties, ideologically opposed to one another, will never get anything done and will always stifle important and meaningful legislation unless it benefits the corporate donor class.
Lastly, this country needs to assess how our money is allocated for America’s social safety net. Money needs to be allocated for education and resources that will prop up and support marginalized communities. This country is only as strong and unified as it’s most vulnerable populations, the COVID-19 pandemic has made this very clear. Quality healthcare and top notch education are basic human rights, they need to be efficiently delivered to all of our citizens. The American taxpayer deserves better, our money shouldn’t be spent on bombs over Baghdad, it should be spent on books over Baltimore.
The faces on our currency are relics from an era that is long gone, it is time to turn the page and lay the foundation for a progressive path forward. Our democracy experiment is in danger from bad actors at home and abroad. We need to defend and protect these freedoms by relentlessly participating in the political process to force change. If American citizens won’t stand up and fight for the future of our country, who will?
