{"id":7129,"date":"2025-06-01T00:40:53","date_gmt":"2025-06-01T00:40:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/?p=7129"},"modified":"2025-05-27T23:56:22","modified_gmt":"2025-05-27T23:56:22","slug":"defying-trumps-crusade-to-rewrite-american-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/?p=7129","title":{"rendered":"Defying Trump\u2019s Crusade to Rewrite American History"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Marc H. Morial<\/a><\/span> <\/span>

\u201cHe can try to rewrite history, but we have the receipts. And as the Smithsonian\u2019s exhibits magnificently illustrate, African Americans have survived \u2014 and overcome \u2014 much worse than the frothings of a puffed-up president who fancies himself a king.\u201d \u2014 Eugene Robinson<\/em><\/p>\n

The history of enslavement, segregation, and discrimination in the United States traditionally is seen as a Southern story. As schoolchildren, we are taught that slavery was a Southern institution, which the North fought to end. Lynchings and Ku Klux Klan rallies only happened in the South, as far as we were taught, as did the protests, marches, sit-ins and other courageous resistance that finally brought an end to Jim Crow.<\/p>\n

If Donald Trump has way, even this incomplete history of civil rights would be wiped from the record.<\/p>\n

But he will not have his way.<\/p>\n

Contrary to the mystical view of an imagined past behind Trump\u2019s ludicrously-titled executive order, \u201cRestoring Truth and Sanity to American History,\u201d enslavement, segregation and discrimination \u2014 and the courageous resistance \u2014 are part of the history not only of the South but of the North as well. And our Urban Civil Rights Museum in Harlem will tell those stories, whether Trump wants us to or not.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s executive order was a naked declaration of war on all cultural institutions that illuminate uncomfortable chapters of our past and a direct assault on the nation\u2019s flagship institution of its type, the Smithsonian Institution\u2019s National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC). But the \u201cBlacksonian,\u201d as NMAAHC is colloquially known, is fighting back. And so are we.<\/p>\n

The Urban Civil Rights Museum in Harlem not only will shine a light on the past \u2014 not just the traditional civil rights era of the 1950s and \u201960s, but the early roots of the African American presence in the North to the Black Lives Matter movement \u2014 but inspire social change in the present.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a museum focused on social justice, we hope to connect and communicate with the people, communities, and initiatives that are interested or becoming interested in fighting for change,\u201d said museum director and chief curator Jennifer Scott. \u201cThe museum will be a place where one can see and feel the work of the many people who fought for justice in urban centers in the North and reflect on past civil rights efforts so that we can imagine and inspire new possibilities of collective action.\u201d<\/p>\n

The museum is part of the Urban League Empowerment Center, a $242 million, 414,000-square-foot complex that will house the National Urban League\u2019s new headquarters, along with 170 units of affordable housing, below-market office space for nonprofits and community groups, and retail space.<\/p>\n

The museum will serve as a resource where visitors can learn more about the different grassroots movements in the past and present, various civil rights legislation and policies that Americans have fought for, and contemporary initiatives and tools that are available to fight inequities and injustice. We also will host public and education programs that allow people to reflect on democratic ideas and ideals and that will encourage people to engage with one another in public forums and conversations, especially through culture and the arts.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s executive order \u2014 which does not carry the force of law \u2014 declares his administration\u2019s desire that cultural and historical institutions reflect only the \u201cuplifting\u201d moments of American history. It\u2019s part of an insidious campaign to erase systemic oppression from our collective memory and advance the myth that racial gaps are, instead, the result of \u201cmerit and hard work.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the truth will not so easily be subdued. We did not know when we began planning the Urban Civil Rights Museum in Harlem that the political climate of today would make our mission even more urgent. And we don\u2019t know what the political climate will be when the museum opens its doors next year. But we do know that we will never succumb to any efforts to whitewash American history.<\/p>\n

Morial is president\/CEO of the National Urban League.<\/em><\/p>\n

Source: Published without changes from Washington Informer Newspaper<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Marc H. Morial \u201cHe can try to rewrite history, but we have the receipts. And as the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7130,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-regular-column"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7129"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7129\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7131,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7129\/revisions\/7131"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}