The 1619 Project (in the New York Times Magazine)

[David Lockmiller]

"Twelve Scholars Critique the 1619 Project and the New York Times Magazine Editor Responds" (The George Washington University – History News Network)
[Editor's note: Twelve Civil War historians and political scientists who research the Civil War composed a letter to The New Times Magazine concerning 'The 1619 Project.' The NYTM editor, Jake Silverstein, responded but the NYTM declined to publish the letter and his response. The scholars created a reply and Silverstein had no objection to publishing the exchange in another venue. It is published below.]

In his letter of response to the scholars, New York Times Editor Jake Silverstein wrote that “we correctly describe Lincoln’s views at the time of the meeting in 1862.” However, it is irrefutably true that Hannah-Jones incorrectly described the response of the five leaders of the black community to President Lincoln's “colonization proposal” in her essay in the New York Times Magazine.

According to historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, (“Team of Rivals” at page 469), the black delegation’s chairman, Edward Thomas, wrote the following in a letter to President Lincoln on August 16, 1862:

"We were entirely hostile to the movement until all the advantages were so ably brought to our views by you,” the delegation chief wrote Lincoln two days later, promising to consult with prominent blacks in Philadelphia, New York, and Boston who he hoped would “join heartily in Sustaining Such a movement.”

Instead of choosing to write the truth of history about this very important meeting in the White House with prominent black leaders and President Lincoln, historian Hannah-Jones (and now the winner of the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary) deliberately chose to “imagine” what the “truth of history” was. The fact is that the incontrovertible truth was available to her in the form of the delegation chairman’s letter of August 16, 1862, written only two days after the actual meeting took place, and that fact of history did not matter one iota to historian Nikole Hannah-Jones.

Nikole Hannah-Jones wrote in her Pulitzer Prize winning work: “You can imagine [emphasis added] the heavy silence in that room, as the weight of what the president said momentarily stole the breath of these five black men. . . . As Lincoln closed the remarks, Edward Thomas, the delegation’s chairman, informed the president, perhaps curtly [emphasis added], that they would consult on his proposition. ‘Take your full time,’ Lincoln said. ‘No hurry at all.’”

This was an intentional “error in need of correction” (to use The 1619 Project New York Times Editor Jake Silverstein’s own words) made by historian Hannah-Jones. By distorting the facts, historian Nikole Hannah-Jones distorted the truth of history.

Historian Hannah-Jones purposely sought to have all of The 1619 Project prospective curriculum readers believe that the five prominent leaders of the black community met President Lincoln’s “black colonization” proposal with shock and disbelief that such a proposal would actually be made to them by the President of the United States. “Already, 3,500 classrooms and five major urban school systems (including Buffalo, Chicago, and Washington, D.C.) have adopted The 1619 Project for their history curricula.” (“1619 and the Narrative of Despair,” By Princeton Professor ALLEN C. GUELZO, National Review, May 11, 2020.)