My article in the March/April issue of Social Education,  the journal of the National Council for the Social Studies, discusses how we must teach and talk about enslavement in American History. It starts with the fact that

•Enslaved people were in America before the Mayflower Pilgrims.

Thomas Jefferson’s Grave Marker at Monticello

 

America was conceived in liberty and born in shackles. This is the Great Contradiction at the heart of our nation’s story.

When the United States of America was founded in 1776, the Founding Fathers declared the lofty ideal of “all Men are created equal.” The Framers of the Constitution later set out to form a “more perfect Union” to secure “the Blessings of Liberty.”

–The American Contradiction: Conceived in Liberty, Born in Shackle” Social Education (March/April 2020)