Seeking Truth in Today's Troubled World

Few developments in American historical discourse have been as destructive as The 1619 Project, a politically motivated reimagining of American history that sacrifices accuracy on the altar of ideology. Conceived by Nikole Hannah-Jones and promoted by The New York Times, the project claims that the true founding of America was not 1776 but rather 1619—the year African slaves were first brought to the Virginia colony. This assertion is not merely a new interpretative lens but an outright distortion of the past, deliberately crafted to inject racial grievance into every aspect of American history. Even more troubling, it has been embraced uncritically in classrooms nationwide, further eroding the already tenuous commitment to rigorous historical inquiry in American education.

The Project’s False Premise

The core claim of The 1619 Project—that the American Revolution was fought primarily to protect slavery—is demonstrably false. Distinguished historians such as Gordon S. Wood and James M. McPherson, both Pulitzer Prize winners, have pointed out that there is no serious historical evidence to support this claim. Indeed, Britain did not launch any significant move toward abolition until decades after the Revolution. The Somerset v. Stewart decision in 1772, often cited by Hannah-Jones as evidence that British abolitionism threatened American slaveholders, applied only to England and had no bearing on the vast British Caribbean slave economy. As Wood notes, “No colonists expressed alarm that the Somerset decision was a step toward abolition in the colonies.” Simply put, the Revolution was not a pro-slavery insurrection, but a struggle for self-governance rooted in the principles of liberty that would, in time, be extended to all Americans.

Furthermore, the project conveniently omits the fact that many of the Founding Fathers were deeply conflicted about slavery. Figures such as Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, and John Adams recognized slavery as a moral failing, even as they struggled with its economic and political realities. The 1787 Northwest Ordinance, enacted under the Articles of Confederation, explicitly prohibited slavery in new territories, signaling a clear intention to limit its expansion. The 1619 Project ignores these complexities in favor of a simplistic and misleading narrative.

A Myopic and Politicized View of History

One of the most glaring defects of The 1619 Project is its reductionist view of history, in which race and oppression are the sole forces shaping American development. This narrow focus ignores the complexities of economic, political, and cultural influences that have played an integral role in shaping the country. The project gives scant attention to the anti-slavery movements that emerged in the 18th and 19th centuries, particularly in the North, where states began abolishing slavery decades before the Civil War. It also ignores the crucial role of black Americans who fought for their own freedom, such as Frederick Douglass, who explicitly rejected the notion that the Constitution was a pro-slavery document, calling it a “glorious liberty document.”

Moreover, The 1619 Project disregards the broader historical context of slavery as a global institution. Slavery was not unique to America, nor was it the defining characteristic of American identity. Arab, African, and European societies engaged in the transatlantic slave trade for centuries. Indeed, as historian David Eltis has shown, of the 12.5 million Africans transported across the Atlantic, less than 4% ended up in the territory that became the United States. The majority were sent to Brazil and the Caribbean, where conditions were often far harsher. To claim that American history is singularly defined by slavery is to ignore the broader forces that shaped the modern world.

The Intellectual Dishonesty of The 1619 Project

What makes The 1619 Project particularly insidious is its refusal to engage with legitimate scholarly criticism. When historians like Wood and McPherson pointed out factual inaccuracies, Hannah-Jones dismissed their objections, claiming that the project is about narrative rather than objective history. This admission exposes The 1619 Project for what it truly is—not a work of scholarship but a political polemic masquerading as history. The Times has even quietly altered parts of its original claims without acknowledgment, a tacit admission of its errors but without the integrity to admit them publicly.

Perhaps the most egregious example of The 1619 Project’s intellectual dishonesty is its treatment of Abraham Lincoln. In one of its essays, the project falsely portrays Lincoln as indifferent to black freedom, ignoring his deep commitment to ending slavery. This is a blatant misrepresentation of history. Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, his persistent push for the Thirteenth Amendment, and his speeches—including the Gettysburg Address, which reaffirmed the nation’s commitment to liberty—stand in direct opposition to the project’s claims. The rewriting of Lincoln’s legacy is emblematic of The 1619 Project’s broader agenda: to paint the entirety of American history as irredeemably racist, regardless of historical evidence to the contrary.

This approach is emblematic of a broader trend in academia and journalism: the prioritization of ideology over truth. When history is rewritten to serve contemporary political agendas, it ceases to be history at all. It becomes propaganda. If the goal of The 1619 Project were merely to highlight the role of slavery in American history—a worthy endeavor—there would be little controversy. But by recasting the entire American experiment as an irredeemable exercise in white supremacy, it seeks to delegitimize the very principles upon which the nation was founded.

Conclusion

America’s history, like that of any nation, is complex. It is a story of contradictions—of noble aspirations and moral failings, of liberty and oppression, of progress and setbacks. The 1619 Project seeks to flatten this complexity into a one-dimensional tale of racial oppression, ignoring the real historical forces that have shaped the nation. By rejecting facts in favor of ideology, it does a disservice not only to history but to the very people it claims to champion. True scholarship requires intellectual honesty, not historical revisionism designed to serve a political agenda.

If America is to have an honest reckoning with its past, it must begin with the truth—not the politically convenient distortions of The 1619 Project.

In Christ’s service,

~JH

Bibliography

• Eltis, David. The Rise of African Slavery in the Americas. Cambridge University Press, 2000.
• McPherson, James M. Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era. Oxford University Press, 1988.
• Wood, Gordon S. The Radicalism of the American Revolution. Vintage, 1993.
• Douglass, Frederick. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. 1845.
• Lincoln, Abraham. The Emancipation Proclamation, 1863.
• Wilentz, Sean. No Property in Man: Slavery and Antislavery at the Nation’s Founding. Harvard University Press, 2018.
• Oakes, James. The Scorpion’s Sting: Antislavery and the Coming of the Civil War. W. W. Norton & Company, 2014.