The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age

    CANCELING ALEXANDER HAMILTON

    By rmrd0000 on Mon, 11/09/2020 - 4:20pm |

    The Woke are at it again.

    The question has lingered around the edges of the pop-culture ascendancy of Alexander Hamilton: Did the 10-dollar founding father, celebrated in the musical “Hamilton” as a “revolutionary manumission abolitionist,” actually own slaves?

    Some biographers have gingerly addressed the matter over the years, often in footnotes or passing references. But a new research paper released by the Schuyler Mansion State Historic Site in Albany, N.Y., offers the most ringing case yet.

    In the paper, titled “‘As Odious and Immoral a Thing’: Alexander Hamilton’s Hidden History as an Enslaver,” Jessie Serfilippi, a historical interpreter at the mansion, examines letters, account books and other documents. Her conclusion — about Hamilton, and what she suggests is wishful thinking on the part of many of his modern-day admirers — is blunt.

    “Not only did Alexander Hamilton enslave people, but his involvement in the institution of slavery was essential to his identity, both personally and professionally,” she writes.

    “It is vital,” she adds, “that the myth of Hamilton as ‘the Abolitionist Founding Father’ end.”

    The evidence cited in the paper, which was quietly published online last month, is not entirely new. But Ms. Serfilippi’s forceful case has caught the eye of historians, particularly those who have questioned what they see as his inflated antislavery credentials.

    Annette Gordon-Reed, a professor of history and law at Harvard and the author of “The Hemingses of Monticello,” called the paper “fascinating” and the argument plausible. “It just shows that the founders were nearly all implicated in slavery in some way,” she said.

    Comments

    If this is what the historically challenged got out of Hamilton, it had a plethora of 'dramatic license', from a thread at Kos some time ago,  a Hamilton fan:

    "The 1619 project was laughable, particularly the one where the claim was made that slavery was a big promoter of the development of American capitalism. Plantation owners hated capitalists, who understood (correctly) that slavery was completely incompatible with capitalism. See the second act of “Hamilton” for an accurate portrayal of how southern slaveowners knew even in the 18th century that capitalism threatened their way of life."

    My response:

    Theatrical presentations are not the place to learn history. In 5 minutes you could learn that more than half of all US exports from 1810 to the 1850’s were cotton. You would also find this BBC article The hidden links between slavery and Wall Street.


    by NCD on Mon, 11/09/2020 - 11:57pm

    Jefferson caught a lot of crap even as President for sleeping with slaves. I mean, i understand the whole lack-of-self-determination thing, as if 100s of years of 8-year-olds given away in arranged marriages reflects choice & will, but wasn't that a little bit woke - as close to dating black women - and sharing the crib/mansion with Hemings - as a Southerner was likely to get? I mean i don't know the details, but this didn't seem to be just go out to the slave house and pick one for a nooner or sleepover - one would have to attribute something of love for a time when women couldn't own property or vote or choose mates or appeal beatings or deny husbands sex whatever their color. 


    by PeraclesPlease on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 1:23am

    I think I get your point and agree.  The business correspondence of two slave owning, slave raping "one-eyed" slave trading billionaires gives some idea of the immorality of the time, light years more vile than Jefferson:

    “In surviving correspondence, they actually brag about raping enslaved people who they’ve been processing through the firm,” said Calvin Schermerhorn, a professor of history at Arizona State University. “This seemed to be as much a part of Franklin and Armfield’s culture of business as, say, going to the bar after a successful court case..."


    by NCD on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 1:15pm

    Another way to put it is that there is a connection between racial and sexual differences that is still being worked out. The next generations are already working on this. 

    If I am to believe what my child reports.


    by moat on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 8:26pm

    This very good article is not about "woke history" in the least, it is about a serious history scholar doing research the correct way and being reviewed about her work by her peers, all serious and esteemed scholars of history.

    That you don't understand the difference between all the woke crap history being produced right now and what is described in this article is precisely why I asked you to stop hijacking my thread on people who are brave enough to criticize woke crap.

    Just because something is about revising history and has something to do with blacks and/or slavery does not equal Critical "Woke" Theory. Critical theory is what is what the woke crap problem is and it has infected all the humanities in colleges like a disease so that young PHD's in the humanites allover the world are now virtually Post-Modern narrative propagandists with little difference from our first Post Modern President. They are telling quite different narratives than him but they are basically practicing the same thing.


    by artappraiser on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 2:36am

    AA

    The article highlighted Hamilton's involvement in the slave trade. It reminded me that author and playwright Ishmael Reed thought the play was so flawed that he wrote a play to correct the errors. Reed thought "Hamilton" should close.

    https://digitaledition.baltimoresun.com/tribune/article_popover.aspx?guid=0b4b4234-7c19-40f7-ba96-1f580125a690

    It also reminded me of a July Op-Ed that wondered if "Hamilton" would be canceled

    https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/hamilton-cancel-culture-disney-plus-streaming-20200708.html

    Harvard historian Annette Gordon-Reed provided sone corrections to the historical record

    https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2016/10/correcting-hamilton/

    Lin-Manuel Miranda himself said the #CancelHamilton criticisms were valid

    https://www.menshealth.com/entertainment/a33234610/hamilton-criticism-lin-manuel-miranda/

    Try to keep up. Stop making me the target

     


    by rmrd0000 on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 2:14pm

    I know Annette well and what she thinks.

    I am also aware that some of the biggest fans of "Hamilton" are young Afro-Americans. People like "stories" that inspire them, especially in Broadway shows. 

    DEFINITELY  a case of apples and oranges here: Broadway shows and real history as practiced by scholars. 

    And if you are right that "cancellation" has happened, a lot of black fans are going to be mightily disheartened. Think like: cancelling Wakanda. It's an interesting conundrum actually, something that's gonna be a big one for "the woke". Will they cancel it or won't they?


    by artappraiser on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 2:25pm

    P.S. a similar cancellation would be stopping performances of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar because it's not accurate history.


    by artappraiser on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 2:29pm

    a P.P.S. Also might be of interest here: I seem to remember a few tweets from Annette about the show Hamilton and what a big fan she is of it. Not going to try to dig them up though, it was around the time that Disney put it up for view on TV as a treat during lockdown, that's why she was tweeting about it


    by artappraiser on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 2:35pm

    I remember seeing Ben-Hur as a kid and thinking, "what a great documentary".
    Same with Quest for Fire later (hat-tip to Robin Williams)


    by PeraclesPlease on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 2:29pm

    So you are a mind-reader

    I posted links that show that #CancelHamilton exists

    You make it personal as if I created #Cancel Hamilton

    It should also be noted that I didn't write Ishmael Reed's corrective play


    by rmrd0000 on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 2:55pm

    no you did it with your sarcastic title. I don't try to read your mind, I read your words over time and interpret them as I think you intend them.

    Here's one great thing about participating on forums (and why smart published writers have long welcomed criticism): Instead of blaming the reader for misinterpreting you, or getting angry at a critic, you appreciate each instance of misinterpretation or criticism as a free-of-charge lesson in improving your communication skills.

    Edit to add: goes triply for political activism or advocacy of any kind. If you are turning people off, you're doing it wrong.


    by artappraiser on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 4:17pm

    Your statement 

    I know Annette well and what she thinks.


    by rmrd0000 on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 4:27pm

    I've met her twice and read most of her books and follow her on twitter. Does that work for you?

    Edit to add: I also know what camp she fits in within the academic world. It's not "the woke". Though like with trolls on the internet, the smart don't feed them. She stays away from arguments with and about the woke because she's smart and doesn't want to draw them. I am pretty sure she has participated though in private academic discussions about the woke. I doubt she's under as much pressure to bow to the woke as lesser lights, as her work appeals as best sellers, as well as Pulitzer winning quality, and she never causes a ruckus, she's a prize for any university. Still, being a top prize also usually means not causing a ruckus.


    by artappraiser on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 4:47pm

    Here is Gordon-Reed

    Resistance to white supremacy has been at the core of black Americans’ struggle since the first Africans arrived on the American continent. The identity formed in that crucible has not been about exclusion of others, hatred of them, or gaining dominance. Unlike white supremacy, it is not a racist formulation. It has, instead, been a measure of justifiable self-defence; a posture of determined insistence on our humanity in the face of all who would deny it. The Black Lives Matter movement – which came into existence in 2013 in response to the acquittal of George Zimmerman, the vigilante who killed the African American teenager Trayvon Martin – is firmly in this tradition. Now these words on the lips of hundreds of thousands, on posters worldwide and written in broad letters on the street leading up to the White House, constitute one of the most explicit and widespread repudiations of white supremacy in history.

    The people marching overseas to protest against the killing of another black man in America are aware of the racism in their own countries, whether it is dealing with black citizens or confronting negative feelings about immigrants in their midst. The expressions of sympathy are clearly not all about America. In fact, particularly in Europe and South America, these problems have their origins in the same system of slavery that fuelled and maintained white supremacy in the US. One of the most dramatic moments in all of the protests happened, not in the US, but in Bristol, when, on June 7, a crowd of protesters pulled down and dumped into the harbour the statue of Edward Colston, a slave trader responsible for the forcible transfer of thousands of Africans into slavery, with scores – some estimate around 20,000 – dying in the process. Whatever one thinks of the action, the destruction of a statue of a man who helped put in motion the spread of African slavery throughout the Western hemisphere, and the legacies that grew out of the institution, linked participants in anti-racism demonstrations around the globe in a fitting way. There will be no quick fix in all of this, but the growing condemnation of white supremacy offers some hope for the future, and not only in the United States. A valuable discussion has been launched; its genesis in the very people in whom Du Bois placed such confidence.

     

    https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/hope-global-protests-against-racism-george-floyd-essay-annette-gordon-reed/


    by rmrd0000 on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 7:12pm

    Knew you were going to go hunting for something anything instead of honestly discussing things. You're the one who makes it personal, it's a game for you you are forever trying to prove you know the truth and the light by cherry picking scripture out of people's oeuvre (including most notably, MLK, Jr.) not interested in nuance, etc. don't appreciate it when people participate on your threads. 

    Enough I'm done here.

    Before I go just let me say all your work trying to cherry pick your way to a picture of Roxane Gay that agrees with your view of the world after I posted one damn article about her hasn't convinced me in the least, not the least to change my mind about her, especially after I read her book Bad Feminist. You wasted your time posting all the shit you did, obviously targeted at me.

    All you seem to be interested in is  proving I am wrong. I can see it, I'm not stupid. You do the same with others. They can see it too. That's making it personal. And not taking correspondents interests seriously.  And insulting to the intelligence of correspondents. And a fucking waste of time. Good luck finding partners for your game. Good lord what a silly game you play. Bye bye.


    by artappraiser on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 7:48pm

    I posted a link to an opinion piece by Roxane Gay because her article was just published. 

    You seem to think that you are constantly on my mind. You are not.

     


    by rmrd0000 on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 8:08pm

    I quoted from a Roxane Gay article. People can decide if I am cherry-picking

    https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/05/opinion/trump-supporters-election-2020.html

    There is a link to the Annette Gordon-Reed article

    We have a current government that is reluctant to transfer power

    They are launching frivolous suits in court

    A party is refusing to accept the results of an election.

    The Woke are not the danger we face.


    by rmrd0000 on Tue, 11/10/2020 - 7:57pm