Global Slavery Remembrance Day Hampton, Virginia!!! 

March 25, 2010

Crown Plaza Hotel

Settlers Landing Road

The United Nations has designated March 25th as International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

Each year this date will be remembered by the United States in Hampton, Virginia, the orginial landing site of the first Africans to arrive in 1619, in what would become the United States of American.

Contact Venita Bentiez @ www.globalslaveryremembranceday.com

Venita Benitez Familys’ Royal Bloodline The Alpha Omega

Connections to the Holy Bible:  I have blood lines to Biblical Kings of Israel, Judah (including the Southern Kingdom), and Tyre. My Biblical ancestors include: Jezebel and her husband Ahab; Solomon, King of Judah and Israel, and his wife Naamah; David, King of Jildah and Israel, and his wife Bathsheba; Ruth (The Book of Ruth) and her husband Boaz; Noah (of the Ark) and his wife Naamah; Methuselah; and Adam and Eve.

Henry II, Plantagenet, (King) of England married Eleanor, Queen Consort of both France and England; their son John Plantagenet (King) of England married Countess Isabella of Angouleme; their son Henry III (King) of England married Eleanor of Provence; their son Prince Edmund Crouchback Plantagenet married Blanche of Artois, Countess of Lancaster; their son Henry Plantagenet, 3rd Earl of Lancaster married Maud Chaworth Matilda de Chaworth, Countess of Lancaster and of Leicester; their daughter Eleanor Plantagenet of Lancaster and Countess of Arundel married Richard FitzAlan, 10th Earl of Arundel; their son Richard FitzAlan, 11th Earl of Arundel married Lady Elizabeth De Bohun, Countess of Northampton (Lady Elizabeth’s Magna Charta Lineage. The Baronial Order of Magna Charta’s continued relevance has been enhanced by its participation in 1987 with the display and interpretation in Philadelphia of a thirteenth century Magna Charta owned by Ross Perot which helped support the increased interest in America’s tradition of freedom arising from the Bicentennials of the Declaration of Independence in that year and the United State Bill of Rights in 1991; by appointment in October 1993 of the Marshal of the Order to the Board of Trustees of the Magna Charta Trust in England; and supporting the founding of the Magna Charta Research Foundation, Magna Charta Education Foundation, and Magna Charta Charity Foundation.)”; their daughter Lady Elizabeth D’Arundelle FitzAlan Duchess of Norfolk married Sir Robert (Gousell) Goushill, Lord of Hault-Hucknall; and their daughter Lady Elizabeth Goushill, Duchess of Norfolk married Sir Robert Wingfield M.P.; and their son Sir John Wingfield, Knight of the Bath married Elizabeth FitzLewis (John and Elizabeth were great-grandparents of Edward Maria Wingfield, The adventurer and first elected president of Jamestown, Virginia Colony in 1607); and their son Sir John Wingfield married Anne Touchett; and their son Sir Lord Anthony Wingfield of Leatheringham (Sir Anthony Wingfield was Esquire to the Body to the King; was Knighted by his royal master, Henry VIII, later made comptroller of the household, and installed at Windsor; a Knight of the Garter on May 3, 1541. Sir Anthony was Captain of the Yeoman 47 of the Guard and placed several people in the Tower of London, including Thomas Cromwell and the Earl of Surrey) married Elizabeth De Vere; and their daughter Elizabeth Wingfield married William Naunton; and their daughter Ursula Naunton married Robert Gosnold III (Robert was the uncle to Bartholomew Gosnold, famous founder of Martha’s Vineyard in 1602); and their daughter Elizabeth Gosnold married Thomas Keene, Sr.; and their son Thomas Keene, Jr. (Thomas was the immigrant ancestor Immigrated in 1653 from England to Kent Island, Maryland and then relocated to Virginia); married Mary Thorley; and their daughter Suzanna Keene married John Garner; and their son Thomas Garner married Mary Bushnell; and their son Vincent Garner married Jemima Williams; and their son Benjamin Garner married Diana Shumate; and their daughter Honor (Anne) Garner married William Chappelear; and their son Elias Chappelear (he was unable to marry Mary (lizabeth) Lawson, Native American, because of a racist law in Virginia, however they lived together for 45 years and had 15 children together. Our Chappelear familiy’s are members of the Huguenots Society. But let us get back to this racist law in Virginia that denied our family of many things and I plan to ask why…..
PENAL LAW: A Web
Court Opinions

LOVING v. VIRGINIA

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
388 U.S. 1 (1967)
MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WARREN delivered the opinion of the Court. This case presents a constitutional question never addressed by this Court: whether a statutory scheme adopted by the State of Virginia to prevent marriages between persons solely on the basis of racial classifications violates the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment. [n. 1] For reasons which seem to us to reflect the central meaning of those constitutional commands, we conclude that these statutes cannot stand consistently with the Fourteenth Amendment.

1 Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment provides: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
In June 1958, two residents of Virginia, Mildred Jeter, a Negro woman, and Richard Loving, a white man, were married in the District of Columbia pursuant to its laws. Shortly after their marriage, the Lovings returned to Virginia and established their marital abode in Caroline County. At the October Term, 1958, of the Circuit Court of Caroline County, a grand jury issued an indictment charging the Lovings with violating Virginia’s ban on interracial marriages. On January 6, 1959, the Lovings pleaded guilty to the charge and were sentenced to one year in jail; however, the trial judge suspended the sentence for a period of 25 years on the condition that the Lovings leave the State and not return to Virginia together for 25 years. He stated in an opinion that:

“Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.”

After their convictions, the Lovings took up residence in the District of Columbia. On November 6, 1963, they filed a motion in the state trial court to vacate the judgment and set aside the sentence on the ground that the statutes which they had violated were repugnant to the Fourteenth Amendment. The motion not having been decided by October 28, 1964, the Lovings instituted a class action in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia requesting that a three-judge court be convened to declare the Virginia antimiscegenation statutes unconstitutional and to enjoin state officials from enforcing their convictions. On January 22, 1965, the state trial judge denied the motion to vacate the sentences, and the Lovings perfected an appeal to the Supreme Court of Appeals of Virginia. On February 11, 1965, the three-judge District Court continued the case to allow the Lovings to present their constitutional claims to the highest state court.

The Supreme Court of Appeals upheld the constitutionality of the antimiscegenation statutes and, after modifying the sentence, affirmed the convictions. The Lovings appealed this decision, and we noted probable jurisdiction on December 12, 1966, 385 U.S. 986.

The two statutes under which appellants were convicted and sentenced are part of a comprehensive statutory scheme aimed at prohibiting and punishing interracial marriages. The Lovings were convicted of violating ï 20-58 of the Virginia Code: “Leaving State to evade law. — If any white person and colored person shall go out of this State, for the purpose of being married, and with the intention of returning, and be married out of it, and afterwards return to and reside in it, cohabiting as man and wife, they shall be punished as provided in ï 20-59, and the marriage shall be governed by the same law as if it had been solemnized in this State. The fact of their cohabitation here as man and wife shall be evidence of their marriage.”

Section 20-59, which defines the penalty for miscegenation, provides: “Punishment for marriage. — If any white person intermarry with a colored person, or any colored person intermarry with a white person, he shall be guilty of a felony and shall be punished by confinement in the penitentiary for not less than one nor more than five years.”

Other central provisions in the Virginia statutory scheme are ï 20-57, which automatically voids all marriages between “a white person and a colored person” without any judicial proceeding, [n. 3] and ïï 20-54 and 1-14 which, respectively, define “white persons” and “colored persons and Indians” for purposes of the statutory prohibitions. [n. 4] The Lovings have never disputed in the course of this litigation that Mrs. Loving is a “colored person” or that Mr. Loving is a “white person” within the meanings given those terms by the Virginia statutes.

4 Section 20-54 of the Virginia Code provides: “Intermarriage prohibited; meaning of term ‘white persons.’ — It shall hereafter be unlawful for any white person in this State to marry any save a white person, or a person with no other admixture of blood than white and American Indian. For the purpose of this chapter, the term ‘white person’ shall apply only to such person as has no trace whatever of any blood other than Caucasian; but persons who have one-sixteenth or less of the blood of the American Indian and have no other non-Caucasian blood shall be deemed to be white persons. All laws heretofore passed and now in effect regarding the intermarriage of white and colored persons shall apply to marriages prohibited by this chapter.” Va. Code Ann.  20-54 (1960 Repl. Vol.).

The exception for persons with less than one-sixteenth “of the blood of the American Indian” is apparently accounted for, in the words of a tract issued by the Registrar of the State Bureau of Vital Statistics, by “the desire of all to recognize as an integral and honored part of the white race the descendants of John Rolfe and Pocahontas . . . .” Plecker, The New Family and Race Improvement, 17 Va. Health Bull., Extra No. 12, at 25-26 (New Family Series No. 5, 1925), cited in Wadlington, The Loving Case: Virginia’s Anti-Miscegenation Statute in Historical Perspective, 52 Va. L. Rev. 1189, 1202, n. 93 (1966).

Section 1-14 of the Virginia Code provides: “Colored persons and Indians defined. — Every person in whom there is ascertainable any Negro blood shall be deemed and taken to be a colored person, and every person not a colored person having one fourth or more of American Indian blood shall be deemed an American Indian; except that members of Indian tribes existing in this Commonwealth having one fourth or more of Indian blood and less than one sixteenth of Negro blood shall be deemed tribal Indians.” Va. Code Ann. 1-14 (1960 Repl. Vol.).

Virginia is now one of 16 States which prohibit and punish marriages on the basis of racial classifications. [n. 5] Penalties for miscegenation arose as an incident to slavery and have been common in Virginia since the colonial period. The present statutory scheme dates from the adoption of the Racial Integrity Act of 1924, passed during the period of extreme activism which followed the end of the First World War. The central features of this Act, and current Virginia law, are the absolute prohibition of a “white person” marrying other than another “white person,” [n. 7] a prohibition against issuing marriage licenses until the issuing official is satisfied that the applicants’ statements as to their race are correct, [n. 8] certificates of “racial composition” to be kept by both local and state registrars, [n. 9] and the carrying forward of earlier prohibitions against racial intermarriage. [n. 10]

5 After the initiation of this litigation, Maryland repealed its prohibitions against interracial marriage, Md. Laws 1967, c. 6, leaving Virginia and 15 other States with statutes outlawing interracial marriage: Alabama, Ala. Const., Art. 4, i 102, Ala. Code, Tit. 14, i 360 (1958); Arkansas, Ark. Stat. Ann. i 55-104 (1947); Delaware, Del. Code Ann., Tit. 13, i 101 (1953); Florida, Fla. Const., Art. 16, i 24, Fla. Stat. i 741.11 (1965); Georgia, Ga. Code Ann. i 53-106 (1961); Kentucky, Ky. Rev. Stat. Ann. i 402.020 (Supp. 1966); Louisiana, La. Rev. Stat. i 14:79 (1950); Mississippi, Miss. Const., Art. 14, i 263, Miss. Code Ann. i 459 (1956); Missouri, Mo. Rev. Stat. ½ 451.020 (Supp. 1966); North Carolina, N. C. Const., Art. XIV, i 8, N. C. Gen. Stat. i 14-181 (1953); Oklahoma, Okla. Stat., Tit. 43, i 12 (Supp. 1965); South Carolina, S. C. Const., Art. 3, i 33, S. C. Code Ann. i 20-7 (1962); Tennessee, Tenn. Const., Art. 11, i 14, Tenn. Code Ann. i 36-402 (1955); Texas, Tex. Pen. Code, Art. 492 (1952); West Virginia, W. Va. Code Ann. i 4697 (1961).
<br><br>
Over the past 15 years, 14 States have repealed laws outlawing interracial marriages: Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Indiana, Maryland, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah, and Wyoming.

The first state court to recognize that miscegenation statutes violate the Equal Protection Clause was the Supreme Court of California. Perez v. Sharp, 32 Cal. 2d 711, 198 P. 2d 17 (1948).

7 Va. Code Ann. ï 20-54 (1960 Repl. Vol.). 8 Va. Code Ann. ï 20-53 (1960 Repl. Vol.). 9 Va. Code Ann. ï 20-50 (1960 Repl. Vol.). 10 Va. Code Ann. ï 20-54 (1960 Repl. Vol.). 

I. In upholding the constitutionality of these provisions in the decision below, the Supreme Court of Appeals of Virginia referred to its 1955 decision in Naim v. Naim, 197 Va. 80, 87 S. E. 2d 749, as stating the reasons supporting the validity of these laws. In Naim, the state court concluded that the State’s legitimate purposes were “to preserve the racial integrity of its citizens,” and to prevent “the corruption of blood,” “a mongrel breed of citizens,” and “the obliteration of racial pride,” obviously an endorsement of the doctrine of White Supremacy. Id., at 90, 87 S. E. 2d, at 756. The court also reasoned that marriage has traditionally been subject to state regulation without federal intervention, and, consequently, the regulation of marriage should be left to exclusive state control by the Tenth Amendment. While the state court is no doubt correct in asserting that marriage is a social relation subject to the State’s police power, Maynard v. Hill, 125 U.S. 190 (1888), the State does not contend in its argument before this Court that its powers to regulate marriage are unlimited notwithstanding the commands of the Fourteenth Amendment. Nor could it do so in light of Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390 (1923), and Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535 (1942). Instead, the State argues that the meaning of the Equal Protection Clause, as illuminated by the statements of the Farmers, is only that state penal laws containing an interracial element as part of the definition of the offense must apply equally to whites and Negroes in the sense that members of each race are punished to the same degree. Thus, the State contends that, because its miscegenation statutes punish equally both the white and the Negro participants in an interracial marriage, these statutes, despite their reliance on racial classifications, do not constitute an individual discrimination based upon race. The second argument advanced by the State assumes the validity of its equal application theory. The argument is that, if the Equal Protection Clause does not outlaw miscegenation statutes because of their reliance on racial classifications, the question of constitutionality would thus become whether there was any rational basis for a State to treat interracial marriages differently from other marriages. On this question, the State argues, the scientific evidence is substantially in doubt and, consequently, this Court should defer to the wisdom of the state legislature in adopting its policy of discouraging interracial marriages.

Because we reject the notion that the mere “equal application” of a statute containing racial classifications is enough to remove the classifications from the Fourteenth Amendment’s proscription of all invidious racial discriminations, we do not accept the State’s contention that these statutes should be upheld if there is any possible basis for concluding that they serve a rational purpose. The mere fact of equal application does not mean that our analysis of these statutes should follow the approach we have taken in cases involving no racial discrimination where the Equal Protection Clause has been arrayed against a statute discriminating between the kinds of advertising which may be displayed on trucks in New York City, Railway Express Agency, Inc. v. New York, 336 U.S. 106 (1949), or an exemption in Ohio’s ad valorem tax for merchandise owned by a nonresident in a storage warehouse, Allied Stores of Ohio, Inc. v. Bowers, 358 U.S. 522 (1959). In these cases, involving distinctions not drawn according to race, the Court has merely asked whether there is any rational foundation for the discriminations, and has deferred to the wisdom of the state legislatures. In the case at bar, however, we deal with statutes containing racial classifications, and the fact of equal application does not immunize the statute from the very heavy burden of justification which the Fourteenth Amendment has traditionally required of state statutes drawn according to race. The State argues that statements in the Thirty-ninth Congress about the time of the passage of the Fourteenth Amendment indicate that the Framers did not intend the Amendment to make unconstitutional state miscegenation laws. Many of the statements alluded to by the State concern the debates over the Freedmen’s Bureau Bill, which President Johnson vetoed, and the Civil Rights Act of 1866, 14 Stat. 27, enacted over his veto. While these statements have some relevance to the intention of Congress in submitting the Fourteenth Amendment, it must be understood that they pertained to the passage of specific statutes and not to the broader, organic purpose of a constitutional amendment. As for the various statements directly concerning the Fourteenth Amendment, we have said in connection with a related problem, that although these historical sources “cast some light” they are not sufficient to resolve the problem; “[at] best, they are inconclusive. The most avid proponents of the post-War Amendments undoubtedly intended them to remove all legal distinctions among ‘all persons born or naturalized in the United States.’ Their opponents, just as certainly, were antagonistic to both the letter and the spirit of the Amendments and wished them to have the most limited effect.” Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483, 489 (1954). See also Strauder v. West Virginia, 100 U.S. 303, 310 (1880). We have rejected the proposition that the debates in the Thirty-ninth Congress or in the state legislatures which ratified the Fourteenth Amendment supported the theory advanced by the State, that the requirement of equal protection of the laws is satisfied by penal laws defining offenses based on racial classifications so long as white and Negro participants in the offense were similarly punished. McLaughlin v. Florida, 379 U.S. 184 (1964). The State finds support for its “equal application” theory in the decision of the Court in Pace v. Alabama, 106 U.S. 583 (1883). In that case, the Court upheld a conviction under an Alabama statute forbidding adultery or fornication between a white person and a Negro which imposed a greater penalty than that of a statute proscribing similar conduct by members of the same race. The Court reasoned that the statute could not be said to discriminate against Negroes because the punishment for each participant in the offense was the same. However, as recently as the 1964 Term, in rejecting the reasoning of that case, we stated “Pace represents a limited view of the Equal Protection Clause which has not withstood analysis in the subsequent decisions of this Court.” McLaughlin v. Florida, supra, at 188. As we there demonstrated, the Equal Protection Clause requires the consideration of whether the classifications drawn by any statute constitute an arbitrary and invidious discrimination. The clear and central purpose of the Fourteenth Amendment was to eliminate all official state sources of invidious racial discrimination in the States. Slaughter-House Cases, 16 Wall. 36, 71 (1873); Strty of measures which restrict the rights of citizens on account of race. There can be no doubt that restricting the freedom to marry solely because of racial classifications violates the central meaning of the Equal Protection Clause.

11 Appellants point out that the State’s concern in these statutes, as expressed in the words of the 1924 Act’s title, “An Act to Preserve Racial Integrity,” extends only to the integrity of the white race. While Virginia prohibits whites from marrying any nonwhite (subject to the exception for the descendants of Pocahontas), Negroes, Orientals, and any other racial class may intermarry without statutory interference. Appellants contend that this distinction renders Virginia’s miscegenation statutes arbitrary and unreasonable even assuming the constitutional validity of an official purpose to preserve “racial integrity.” We need not reach this contention because we find the racial classifications in these statutes repugnant to the Fourteenth Amendment, even assuming an even-handed state purpose to protect the “integrity” of all races.

II. These statutes also deprive the Lovings of liberty without due process of law in violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The freedom to marry has long been recognized as one of the vital personal rights essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men. Marriage is one of the “basic civil rights of man,” fundamental to our very existence and survival. Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535, 541 (1942). See also Maynard v. Hill, 125 U.S. 190 (1888). To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State’s citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discriminations. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State. These convictions must be reversed. It is so ordered.

MR. JUSTICE STEWART, concurring. I have previously expressed the belief that “it is simply not possible for a state law to be valid under our Constitution which makes the criminality of an act depend upon the race of the actor.” McLaughlin v. Florida, 379 U.S. 184, 198 (concurring opinion). Because I adhere to that belief, I concur in the judgment of the Court. http://www.wings.buffalo.edu/law/bck/web/loving.htm.

I had a RACIST FAMILY back in the day:
The Garner’s and the Chappelear’s continue to write their volumes of books saying in them that my great, great, great grandfather Elias Chappelear died alone, dismissing his fifteen (15) children with Mary Lawson of Virginia — –. Some really interesting emails from my cousin Jay Garner, a very kind man, he says as resent as 2006 when got in touch with a bloodline cousin to express my feelings, here is a glimpse of a few emails from J. Garner: May 11, 2006 ï likely owe you an apology not for the factualness of my response, which was all true, as far as I know, but for perhaps sounding too glib in dismissing your obvious pain of having been shunned (or your family shunned) by white cousins. Not my intention. I could say a lot more about race relations in America, but I would likely just mess up again in any response. Regards JG… May 10, 2006 from J. Garner: George Washington’s great grandfather, Col. John Washington, is my 10ggrandfather. The Garner Keene book is Garner Keene Families of Northern Neck Virginia by Ruth Ritchie & Sudie Rucker Wood, originally published in 1952 by the Jarman Printing Co in Charlottesville, VA. It was reprinted by the Higginson Book Company, 148 Washington St, P.O. Box 778, Salem, MA 01970 Phone 978.745.7170 in the late 1990s or early 2000. I would call them if you would like to secure a copy, although there may be copies available at the library or thru Inter-Library loan. Elias Chappelear is mentioned in the book on p. 77.

Here’s my grandfather’s WILL:The will of William Chappelear, Elias father, does mention Elias several times:, William Chappelear, of the count of Rappahannock, I give to my beloved Wife, Ann Chappelear, the farm upon which I now live, 250 acres, together with such farming utensils, horses, stock, etc. To my daughter, Mary Welch, one-ninth part during her natural life, the same to go to her daughter , Anne Best. The residue of the estate give to my wife, Ann, for life, then to be divided among my children. To my son, Benjamin, one-fourth part; to my daughter , Maria Palmer, one-fourth part; to my son , Elias, one-fourth part; to my daughter , Anne Raeger, and to my son-in-law, Henry Raeger, one-fourth part, but should my daughter, Anne Raeger, die without heir, her part to be divided among the above named children in such proportions as above named, so that my daughter, Elizabeth de Latourandais, and her heirs shall receive an equal share with my son, Benjamin, my daughter, Maria Palmer, and my son Elias. My daughter , Mary Welch, to receive only one-half a share during her life and at her death to go to her daughter, Anne Best , and her heirs. But my desire to be expressly understood that my daughter, Elizabeth de Latourandais, and her heirs are not to receive any other portion of the estate give to my wife , Anne Chappelear, except that part given my daughter, Nancy Raeger. My estate both real and personal to be divided among my following named children: my daughter, Mary Welch; my son, Benjamin; my daughter Maria Palmer; my son, Elias Chappelear; my daughter , Nancy Raeger; my daughter, Elizabeth de Latourandais. I charge my daughter, Maria Palmer, with the sum of 253 dollars; my son, Benjamin, the sum of 363 dollars; my daughter, Mary Welch, the sum of 130.25 dollars; my son Elias, with the sum of 642.85 dollars; my daughter, Nancy Raeger, with the sum of 961.13 dollars. I desire by ex’ors to pay to my daughter , Elizabeth, for her sole and separate use, the sum of 400 dollars, 250 dollars is to be paid out for building her a dwelling house, to be erected upon land set aside for her by a deed of trust. My son, Benjamin, my sole ex’or”. Signed: William Chappelear (seal). Witnesses: A Turner, Robert Deathrage and J. W. Fletcher. Division of the estate showed that William owned 477 1/2 acres of land and twenty-one slaves (W.B. A, pg. 47 , Rappa’ck Co. — –My family continue to disown Elias family offspring’s just because he fell in love with Mary Lawson, a Native American Indian do to Virginia’s racist law and according to knowledge he was disinherited which is a direct violation to his fathers will and the order a court of law.

Here’s an email I got from a Garner cousin: Email: May 9, 2006. I am rather more dubious about my lines connection to the main G-K line than some of my cousins, but I have it as I got it (for now). The interesting thing is my line is the line of Cactus Jack John Nance Garner, the VP under FDR during his first two terms Email: On May 10, 2006 GARNER, JOHN NANCE (1868-1967). John Nance (Cactus Jack) Garner, the thirty-second Vice President of the United States, the first of thirteen children of John Nance and Sarah (Guest) Garner, was born on November 22, 1868, in a log cabin near Detroit, Texas. J. Garner.

Email: May 9, 2006 I located the web site of your cousin Dr. James Hamilton. Do the descendants of Elias & Mary Lawson go by the surname of Chappelear or by Lawson-Chappelear? I see it as the former in some of his reports published at his site but he captions pics of his mother and maternal grandparents as the latter. Look forward to hearing from you Jay Garner)”;

Now let us continue with my  Royal Bloodline by Venita Benitez:

My grandfather Elias Chappalear and Mary Lawson; their son Alious Lawson married Adda Bundy; their daughter Ollie Lawson married Oscar Louis Deane (the son of Morton Deane; their daughter Nancy Ophelia Deane and William Veney; their only daughter Lillian Renee Deane who married Antonio Benitez, Sr., their children are Antonio Benitez, Jr., Venita Maria Benitez, Yolanda Mercedes Benitez and Carmen Lillian Benitez.

These are our children:

Jeff Lee Benitez; Antonio Benitez, III; Phillip Sutton; Marquis Benitez; John DeBerry; Peter Isaiah Benitez Harris; Nikkia Benitez; Andrian Benitez; Jamale Benitez Porch; Avery Benitez; Austin Benitez; Jaylen Bryant Sutton and GeGe Sutton.

There is so much more that I would like you to know about us but the story is way too long and detailed that I need to take a break from it all for a few years before my book in 2010. The past three years of studying this has been very painful for me.

With Love, Venita Maria Benitez, United States of America

founder: www.globalslaveryremembranceday.com or www.projecta23.com

August 23rd is International Slavery Remembrance Day and March 25 is International Day Of Remembrance Of The Victims Of Slavery And The Transatlantic Slave Trade.

Let me share with you my cousin Dr. Hamilton’s research on much more about our family. The late Dr. Hamilton, my wonderful and beloved hardworking cousin. His mother Ruth, father’s name was James H. Lawson (Chappelear). James H. Lawson (Chappelear) brother of Alious Lawson (Chappelear). Alious Lawson  was my GGGrandfather. Before Dr. Hamilton passed away in February 2008, Dr. Hamilton sent me what his mother wrote about her son Dr. Hamilton and I would like to share some of her love for her son with you.

She begins with “Some of My Royal Blood Lines by Ruth Aura Lawson-Chappelear Hamilton Proctor

“My son, Dr. James G. Hamilton, is researching my family tree. Thus far, his research has revealed that I have blood lines leading to the following Royal Dynasties: Angelus, Anjou, Ardennes, Arpad, Babenberg, Blois Burgundy, Capet, Carolinian, Comments, Franconia (Salian), Guelph (Welf), Hohenstauffen, Hohenzollern, Lascaris, Limbourg, Merovingian, Namur, Normandy, Piast, Premyslid, Saxon, and Valois.

My royal ancestors include Emperors and Empresses, Kings and Queens, and reigning Princes and Princesses of the Kingdoms of: Anglia, Germanic England; Antioch (Asia Minor city in Pisidia now Turkey); Aragon, Spain; Austrasia (Germanic Gaul now France); Austria; Bavaria, Germany; Bohemia, Czechoslovakia,; Ancient Britain, Bulgaria; Burgundy, France:

The Byzantine (Eastern Roman) Empire; Castile, Spain; Colchester, England; Cologne, Germany; Constantinople (now Istanbul, Turkey); the Dalcassians in Ireland; Dalriada in Ireland & Scotland; Deira in England; Denmark; Dublin, Ireland; England, Great Britain; Egypt; France; Franconia, Germany; Germany; Heruli, England; Holland (The Netherlands); the Holy Roman Empire; Hungary; Hy Kinsale in Ireland; Ireland; Israel in Palestine; Italy; Jerusalem and Judah in Palestine; Kent, England; Kumans; Leinster, Ireland; Leon, Spain; Lorraine, France; Man and Mercia, England; Munster, Ireland: Naples, Italy; Navarre, Spain; Neustria (in Gaul now France); Northumberland, England; Norway; the Picts (in Coledonia now Scotland); Poland; Pomerania (formerly a Prussian province in Germany, now in Poland); Powys, Wales; Provence, France: The Saxons of Germanic England; Saxony, Germany; Scotland; the Scythians (Sakas), who migrated from Central Asia to Russia; Sicily, Italy: Soissons, France; Sweden; Transjurane (Upper Burgundy), France; Tyre, Lebanon; Vandals (Germanic North Africa); Wales; and Wessex and Wight, England.

Other Royal Blood Lines — In addition, I have royal blood lines to the ruling count and countesses, granddukes and grandduchesses, dukes and duchesses, and margraves of: Angouleme and Anjour France; Argyllshire, Scotland; Austria; Auvergne, Bar, Blois, Boulogne, and Brittany, in France; Catalonia, Spain: — Champagne and Dreux, France; Flanders, Belgium; Holland, the Netherlands; Kiev, Russia; Luxembourg; Toulouse, France.

I also have blood lines to Gallo Roman Senators and Consuls, Viking Leaders, Dukes, Marquesses, Earls, Viscounts, Counts, Barons, Spiritual Lords, Companions of William “the Conqueror” (as well as to him), Magna Charta Sureties, Noblemen named in the Magna Charta, Original Knights - Order of the Garter and Order of the Bath, leaders of the first and subsequent Crusades, Crusader Kings of Jerusalem, and to Saints in the Christian Church.

Connections to the Holy Bible: Furthermore, I have blood lines to Biblical Kings of Israel, Judah (including the Southern Kingdom), and Tyre. My Biblical ancestors include: Jezebel and her husband Ahab (112GGP); Solomon, King of Judah and Israel, and his wife Naamah (116GGP); David, King of Jildah and Israel, and his wife Bathsheba (117GGP); Ruth (The Book of Ruth, afterwhom I was named) and her husband Boaz (120GGP); Noah (of the Ark) and his wife Naamah (140GGP); Methuselah (142GGF); and Adam and Eve (149GGP).

Extensive Connections to the British Royal Families –

“My son has already traced over 50 blood lines to Kings of England. By two of these lines, Edward III (Plantagenet), King of England 1327-77, is my 16th GGF. Tracing the ancestry of Queen Elizabeth, the current resigning monarch of England by the blood lines of the Kings of England, Edward III is her 18th GGF. This makes the queen my 17th cousin twice removed and she is related to me (Ruth Hamilton-James and Venita Benitez) more than 50 times. Kings of England traditionally intermarried with other Royal Families. Having already found 54 blood lines to the Kings of England, I can multiply by up to 54 all the Royal lines they lead to. My blood lines to Royalty, as well as the Peerage, multiplied many times because of their tendency to marry cousins.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Queries in genealogical publications are an excellent way of obtaining information about your ancestors. In Part I of “Tracing Your Family Tree” (The Melting Pot, Vol. 1. No 3, published in Simsbury, CT) my son wrote about his query in - Nutmegger, published by the Connecticut Society of Genealogist.

He received two very helpful replies to this query which sought the maiden name of Mary, wife of Thomas Garner (my 4th great grandfather) of Stafford (now Fauquier) County, VA. One response came from Florence /vest Ellison of San Antonio, TX and the other was from Ruth Albright Kysor of Junction City. KS, both of whom are my sixth cousins.

From them we learned that Mary was the daughter of Charles Bilshnell of New England. Although the same Bushnell genealogy is in Hartford, CT and Richmond, VA, I have not as yet determined my relationship to Horace Bushnell of Connecticut. Our blood lines could meet in England instead of here in America.

Thomas was the son of John Garner and Susanna Keene of Garner’s Creek, Westmoreland County, Va. John was a neighbor and friend of Col. John Washington, the great grandfather of General George Washington, our first President. Over the years there was a close relationship between the Garner and Washington Families.

Spencer Garner (my second cousin twice removed) married Alice Bailey Washington and General Washington signed the security agent for their marriage bond. I need more information to determine the relationship between George and Alice.

The General’s brother, John Augustine Washington, married Hannah Bushrod (my third cousin fourth removed), daughter of Col. John Bushrod and Mildred Corbin of Bushfield, in Westmoreland County, VA. John and Hannah’s son, Supreme Court Justice Bushrod Washington (my fourth cousin third removed) inherited Mount Vernon upon Martha Washington’s death. As a result, the last four private owners of Mount Vernon were my collateral cousins and are buried there.

Another Garner relationship was the overseer for the slaves on the President’s plantation. And George Washington has his first Headquarters in (Little) Washington, VA in Rappahannock County were my family lived. No doubt, further research may reveal other connections to George Washington.

John Garner (my fifth great grandfather) was also the ancestor of John Nance Garner, Vice President of the United States during the first two administrations of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The Vice President was from a branch of the Garner’s that lived in Prince William County, VA.

It is possible that John Nance descends also from John and Rachel (Henry) Garner of Anderson County, TN. Mrs. West sent me information about an Obediah Garner ( 1790-1822) who was married to Jane, daughter of Isaac and Jane Nance.

The information that Mrs. West sent was extensive and I am deeply indebted to her for her assistance. Included were pedigree lines that connected our Keenes to ten (10) Magna Charta Barons. After two years of additional research my son found other Magna Charta Barons, and connections to the Royal Families of Europe and Soviet Block countries.

Our family history is being researched by my son Dr. James G. Hamilton. Listed on the following page are the Hereditary Societies he has already found eligible ancestors for: To join them we need to find sponsors or be invited by the members, and may have to overcome discriminatory barriers.”

HEREDITARY SOCIETIES:

Below is the list of hereditary societies that my son has already found eligible ancestors for membership in:

The Baronial Order of the Magna Charta (1898);
The Colonial Order of the Acorn (1894);
The Descendants of the Illegitimate Sons and Daughters of the Kings of Britain (1950);
The Guild of S. Margaret of Scotland (1975);
The Huguenot Society of the Founders of Manakin in the Colony of Virginia (1922);
The Jamestown Society (1951);
The National Society Americans of Royal Descent (1908);
The National Society Colonial Dames XVII Century (1915);
The National Society Daughters of the Barons of Runnemede (1921);
The National Society Sons and Daughters of the Pilgrims (1908);
The National Society Southern Dames of America (1962);
The Order of Americans of Armorial Ancestry (1962);
The Order of the Crown in American (1898);
The order of the Crown of Charlemagne in the United States of America(1939);
The Order of Three Crusades 1096-1192 (1936);
The Plantagenet Society (1902);
The Society of Descendants of Knights of the Most Noble Order of the Garter (1929);
The Society of The Ark and The Dove ( 1910);
The Somerset Chapter Magna Charta Barons (1932);
The United Daughters of the Confederacy (1894).

I, Venita Benitez, am currently a member of the Wingfield Family Society at Please learn all about the first President of America in May, 1607, our family, the voyage and the settlement of Jamestown, the New World (America). I plan to join each of the societies after I finish my book in March 2010.  Okay yes, book is finished.  It is called ”first seeds of civil war are sown” in Hampton, Virginia in 1619.

May He Rest In Peace… Michael Jackson “we come a long ways from being slaves”

I read that Marlon Jackson, Michael Jackson’s brother, is planning to support and turn a former slave port into a luxury resort and museum that will feature the Jackson Five holograms … and a life-size replica of a slave ship.  The development will be built in Nigeria.   The luxury resort will include concert halls, golf courses, casinos – and a memorial for Africa’s former slave trade.  

It is intended to be another place for visitors to be able to explore the former transatlantic slave trade and honor the millions who died in what were horrific human rights abuses.

Once a year on March 25^th in Hampton, Virginia we give remembrance of all victims of slavery and seek out ways to abolish today’s modern day slavery!!!

Save The Date: March 25^th, Hampton, VA.

Global Slavery Remembrance Day                   Press Release

Global Slavery Remembrance Day is please to share with world the following exciting news of Mr. Luis  de Baca’s nomination for the post of Ambassador-At-Large to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons.  Mr. de Baca, an attorney with strong  credentials and experience in the problem of trafficking, will succeed  Mark Lagon, now Executive Director at the Polaris Project, who held this position under the Bush Administration.

 __________________________________________________________________ 

THE WHITE HOUSE PRESS RELEASE

Office of the Press Secretary
___________________________________________________________________
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                    March 24, 2009

President Obama Announces Another Key State Department Post

WASHINGTON, DC – Today, President Barack Obama announced his intent

to nominate Luis C. de Baca as Ambassador-at-Large to Monitor and

Combat Trafficking in Persons at the State Department.

President Obama said, “I’m grateful that this fine public servant has

agreed to join my administration, and I am confident that with Secretary

Clinton he will be an indispensable part of our team as we work tirelessly to

stand up for human rights and the rule of law.  I am confident that his

unique experiences and proven ability will make him a strong advocate for

our values and for justice around the globe.”

President Obama announced his intent to nominate the following individual today:

Luis C. de Baca, Nominee for Ambassador-at-Large to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, State Department 

Luis C. de Baca is Counsel to the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary, on

detail from the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.  On

the Committee, his portfolio for Chairman John Conyers, Jr. includes

national security, intelligence, immigration, civil rights, and modern

 slavery issues. At the Justice Department, de Baca served as Chief Counsel

of the Civil Rights Division’s Human Trafficking Prosecution Unit. During the

Clinton Administration, he was the Department’s Involuntary Servitude and

Slavery Coordinator and was instrumental in developing the United States’

victim-centered approach to combating modern slavery.  He has

investigated and prosecuted human trafficking cases in which victims were

held for prostitution and other forms of sexual exploitation, farm labor,

domestic service, and factory work. De Baca received the leading honor

given by the national trafficking victim service provider community, the

Freedom Network’s Paul & Sheila Wellstone Award, and has been named the

Michigan Law School’s Distinguished Latino Alumnus. De Baca graduated

from Iowa State University and holds a J.D. from Michigan Law School,

where he was President of the Hispanic Law Students Association and an

editor of the Michigan Law Review.

THANK YOU President Obama, Sincerely Venita Benitez June 8, 2009

The CONTRABAND HISTORICAL SOCIETY is an organization of concerned citizens, whose mission is to research, preserve and promote the history, legacy, and contributions of the Slaves who were considered “Contraband of War“, and were liberated on May 24, 1861 at Fortress Monroe, Virginia by Commanding Officer, Major General Benjamin F. Butler.  Butler’s far-reaching gesture prompted thousands of slaves to run to Hampton to Fort Monroe to get behind Union lines and join in the Union’s war effort in exchange for their liberation.  As a result, Fort Monroe became known as “Freedom’s Fortress”.

Our Vision is to establish a museum to foster better race relations through living history and creative and performing arts venues, which will encourage understanding of the Contraband Slaves and their efforts toward creating a moral, spiritual and unified community. 

CONTRABAND SLAVES assisted the Union Army’s war efforts towards preserving the Union in exchange for their freedom.  Resurrected the City of Hampton from the fire of August 7, 1861, which destroyed the town and established and designed “the Grand Contraband Camp” in the heart of what is now called downtown Hampton. 

Named several streets within the Grand Contraband Camp:  Grant Street, Lincoln Street, Union Street, Hope Street (now High Court Lane”, and liberty Street (Armistead Avenue)

Established one of the nation’s first self-contained Black Communities in 1861.  Creating businesses, churches, schools, financial institutions and social order in the new community 

PRESERVING A LEGACY… HAMPTON… PRELUDE TO FREEDOM

The legacy of the Contraband Slaves speaks of a determined people; a spiritual people who were forced to adopt a new way of life, new religions, new languages, and yet were able to use those awkward circumstances and experiences to elevate themselves to freedom. 

The descendants of the Contraband made enormous contributions to the global village in which we all live.  Song, dance, art, drama, music, literature, scientific discoveries, inventions, sports, religion, and historical records of family ties are but a few of the legacies handed down from generation to generation for all the world to enjoy, despite their human suffering. 

OUR MISSION To CONDUCT RESEARCH to find as many descendents still living in Hampton and around our nation. To CREAT COHESIVE LINKS with churches that were organized by Contraband Slaves throughout Hampton Roads and around our nation. To NETWORK SHARING historical documentation, which will allow us to establish an archive of artifacts and information to be housed in a center built by descendents of contraband Slaves and our historical society. To CREATE EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITIES for children, which will give them a broader understanding of slavery and encourage them to consider another view of the slave issue as interpreted by the descendents of former slaves. To CONDUCT LECTURES and multimedia presentations, which will invite notable scholars, authors, performers and artists to present education entertainment venues.

HISTORY IN THE MAKING

A successful Memorial Celebration honoring Contraband Slaves took place on June 17, 2000 at the Freedom’s Fortress (Fort Monroe) Old Parade Ground.  The event marked the 139^th year of the Contraband decision by major General Benjamin Butler.

Join us for our annual reenactments.  Celebrate our Ancestors at “Freedom’s Fortress.”  The Memorial Service usually begins at 1:00 p.m.  Come fellowship with us on the Old Parade Ground.  Help us establish an International Slavery Living History Museum at Fort Monroe.

Let us begin on May 23, 2010.

Let our voices be heard.

For more information call:

Gerrie L. Hollins at (757) 265-1269 or e-mail us at: contrabandsoc@yahoo.com

City of Hampton Celebrates

Global Slavery Remembrance Day

By: Calvin Pearson, City of Hampton Resident

On December 17, 2007, the General Assembly unanimously decided to establish March 25th as the Annual International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade. On March 25, 2009, the City of Hampton, Virginia was the United States inaugural official host site to commemorate Global Slavery Remembrance Day for the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery And The Transatlantic Slave Trade.  Hampton Mayor Molly Joseph Ward declared by proclamation that day as Global Slavery Remembrance Day in the city of Hampton, Va.  Venita Benitez, founder of Global Slavery Remembrance Day.

Transatlantic slave trade, just like the systematic elimination of the Native American Indian in the United States, and the Holocaust in Germany, are human tragedies that changed the world. We can not change history or the impact that it had on past generations. But we should always recognize and learn from the perils and transgressions of mankind’s inhumanity against one another. The Global Day of Remembrance minds us of the millions of lives lost through the transatlantic slave trade, their legacy in building these United States of America, and their rebellion and revolution against slavery. Slavery or the capture of humans to be sold into servitude began in 1444 in Spain, Europe, and other parts of the world. Transatlantic slave trade, as it became known during the 16^th to 19^th centuries was begun by the Portuguese who were the first to embark upon the slave trade starting around 1562. From the 16^th to 19^th centuries an estimated 12 million Africans were captured and transported to the West Indies, the Caribbean, and North America.

Why was Hampton Virginia chosen to host the first Global Slavery Remembrance Day celebration in the United States? For three hundred and ninety years many historians and scholars have written that the first Angolan Africans landed at Jamestown on the banks of the James River in Virginia. But they did not land at Jamestown. As more archives are being researched, many historians are now refuting the earlier version that they landed at Jamestown, and have now documented that the 20 and odd Negroes actually landed in Hampton at Point Comfort, today’s Fort Monroe. Many American and foreign historians for the past twenty five years have published documentation based on new archives that proves beyond a reasonable doubt that the first Africans came shore at Point Comfort. Documentation proves that the first ships carrying Africans never traveled to Jamestown. Today’s historians confirm the research by historian Engel Sluiter who documented that Angolans captured in the 1618-20 Portuguese campaign were loaded aboard a ship named Sao Joao Bautista in Luanda on the African coast in July 1619.

The Bantu people of Angola were advanced and highly organized. They created complex yet peaceful nation-states, which evolved political, religious and military institutions, where elders were greatly respected and children were cherished. Wisdom and art were esteemed highly, and Bantu proverbs in the form of Anansi tales later passed to the West and down through the generations as the ‘Brer’ Fox and Rabbit folk stories of Uncle Remus. They wove silk textiles, were skilled musicians, and invented a
variety of musical instruments, including a stringed, boxlike device that became the American banjo. The Bantu manufactured iron, produced carbonized steel, hunted and fought with bows and arrows. Bantu were farming and herding people who forged iron tools and weapons, built the stone towers and temples of Great Zimbabwe, possessed jurisdiction, income raising, military and legislative functions. These advances and upper aristocracy ambition would create rivalries among the dozens of Angolan nation-states around 1510. One way to defeat their enemy was to raid their camps, capture women, men and children, and sell them to slave traders.  The Portuguese, who had been invited to live in Angola as guests, saw this as an opportunity to capitalize on transporting Africans to other countries looking or free laborers. Africans were also captured by white and black slave traders. Captured Africans would then be sold for export to America as human cargo through the transatlantic slave trade.

Between 1618 and 1620, thousands of Africans were enslaved during the war between King Alvaro III of Congo and his uncles, and sold into slavery. There was also the war between the Portuguese leader Endes de Vascondes and a band of marauding mercenary soldiers called Imbangala, against the Kingdom of Ndongo. The people enslaved by Vascondes were from a narrow corridor between Lukala and Lutete Rivers. Among those slaves who boarded the Sao Joao Bautista in 1619 spoke the Kikonga language and were enslaved in Kongo’s province of Nsundi. Portuguese law required all Africans to be baptized and made Christian before their arrival in America.

 The Africans boarded the slave merchant ship Sao Joao Bautista in 1619 and departed for Vera Cruz, Mexico, when it encountered the English ship “Treasurer” and the Dutch ship “White Lion” in the West Indies. The Treasurer’s voyages were being financed by former Virginia Governor Samuel Argall and Lord Rich. Rich was one of the more famous and influential investors in the Virginia Company. The Treasurer had been commissioned by Samuel Argall to pirate ships of their cargo, but the voyage in 1619 was the first time they had ever captured human cargo.  In May 1619 Samuel Argall was removed from office for his involvement in piracy.

The Treasurer and the White Lion each captured Africans from the Sao Joao Bautista and by some accounts raced towards the coast of Virginia. The White Lion arrived first at Point Comfort (today’s Fort Monroe in Hampton, Virginia, located thirty miles from Jamestown) on August 30, 1619. Among its cargo were 20 and odd Negroes. No one has been able to determine the numerical value of 20 and odd, but research shows from the ships log that 25 Africans came ashore. They were called Negroes because the Portuguese people referred to all people with dark skin as Negroes. John Rolfe, widowed husband of Pocahontas, wrote in a letter that he personally saw the arrival of the ship and the unloading of the Africans at Point Comfort. John Colyn Jope who was the captain of the White Lion who brought the first Africans to Virginia at Point Comfort wrote in his memoirs that he unloaded the 20 and odd Negroes at Point Comfort. This became the official first landing of the first Africans in the new world. Three days after the White Lion arrived; some of the Africans were traded to the new Virginia Governor, George Yeardley and his cape merchant Abraham Piersey for provisions. Governor Yeardley purchased seven Africans and they were later transported to Jamestown by a smaller boat. The White Lion never sailed to Jamestown to unload Africans. Some of the original Africans have been unaccounted for, but it is known that Governor Yeardley only purchased seven of them. So what happened to the other twelve to eighteen Africans? How many stayed at Fort Monroe?  Two of the original Africans who arrived on the White Lion in 1619 were Antonio and Isabella. In January 1625, according to the Virginia census, those two Africans, Isabella, Antonio and their son William were living in Kecoughtan (today’s Hampton) in Capt. William Tuckers home, who was the commander at Fort Point Comfort (today’s Fort Monroe). Twenty other Africans, either slaves or indentured servants resided in other communities. It has been documented that William, the son of Isabella and Antonio was the first African American child born in America in present day Hampton around 1623.

Four days after the White Lion carrying the first slaves to Virginia arrived; the ship “Treasurer” sailed into the harbor at Point Comfort to unload their cargo of Africans for provisions. But the settlers knew the Treasurer’s history of piracy and with Samuel Argall no longer in office; the ship was not allowed to dock. The Treasurer then fled to Bermuda where they sold fourteen Africans.

So Hampton Virginia was chosen as the first inaugural site of celebration because that is where the first documented Africans landed in the New World in 1619. Although they arrived as indentured servants, their arrival would mark the beginning of slavery in America. So it is justly deserved that the first celebration and all subsequent celebrations recognize Hampton Virginia as the birth place of slavery in the United States.

Slavery in the United States lasted as a legal institution until the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1865. Between 1619 and 1865, slavery took many forms. The early arrivals by many accounts were indentured servants who were able to gain freedom by working three to seven years to pay off their bondage debt. Gradually as the need for Southern Colonies to have free labor to harvest crops increased and the social equality of arriving Africans diminished, slavery became a way of life for non-free Africans.  From 1654 until 1865, Virginia and most southern states, had adopted slavery for life laws. Slaves were of African descent and were owned primarily by whites, but some Native Americans and free blacks had slaves.  In 1860 the fifteen southern states had a total population of twelve million people, and four million of those were classified as slaves.

Revolt and rebellion would eventually be the catalyst to the end of slavery in the West Indies, the Caribbean, and that undeniable quest for freedom would soon invade the plantations in the United States. In Santo Domingo (today’s Haiti) and the Dominican Republic, events would take place that would escalate the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade. It was August 22-23 1791, when a slave by the name of Toussaint Louverture, in the French Colony of Santo Domingo, organized a revolt to gain their freedom. Soon the revolt in the United States would begin. But it would not come easy or without personal sacrifice. Abolitionist such as Denmark Vesey, and Nat Turner would give their lives in South Carolina and Virginia to lead revolts against plantation owners. The migration of Northerners and a humanistic overhaul of segregation laws starts to influence the future of slaves in Southern states. People like Frederick Douglas and Sojouner Truth would become abolitionist for change as they barnstormed across states preaching women and human rights. Harriet Tubman would use the “Underground Railroad” to leave three hundred slaves to freedom on nineteen trips through Southern states, never to be captured. Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote Uncle Toms Cabin, and she exposed all of America to the cruel and inhuman treatment of Africans in America.  A blow to freedom came in 1854 when Dred Scott went to court to gain his freedom. But the Supreme Court decided that he was a Negro, and no Negro could bring a suit to court because the Negro was not considered to be a citizen of the United States. In 1859 John Brown led a raid on Harpers Ferry Amory. He was eventually hung, but became a martyr for abolitionist.

In 1860, an opponent of slavery, named Abraham Lincoln was elected President of the United States. He was a Republican who received most of his votes from Northerners. The Southerners believed that Lincoln’s views and policies would split the states and end slavery. On December 20, 1860, southern states, including South Carolina,  Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Arkansas, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia succeeded from the United States of America and formed a separate Union within the United States called the Confederate States of America. The South decided to seize U.S. Federal forts within their jurisdiction. They fired on Union occupied Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861, starting the American Civil War.

Free blacks joined the Union army. Black slaves escaped from the plantations to join the Union Army in hope of gaining their freedom. In Virginia a historic event took place at Fort Monroe that would lead to the end slavery. On May 27, 1861, three run-a-way slaves escaped from their plantations and made it to Fort Monroe to seek refuge. Major General Benjamin Butler made a decision that escaping slaves who reach Union lines could not be reclaimed by their plantation owners. General Butler declared the slaves contraband of war, resulting of tens of thousands of slaves fleeing to Hampton at Fort Monroe. Contraband camps would be erected around Fort Monroe and the fort would get the nickname of (Freedoms Fortress).

Because the first Africans in North America and the New World landed at Fort Monroe and the first slaves were granted their freedom at Fort Monroe, Hampton has been referred to as the “Birthplace of slavery and freedom”. 

In 1994 the Virginia Department of Historic Resources researched Hampton’s claim and confirmed that the first Africans did indeed arrive in Hampton. They granted Hampton the right to erect a highway historical marker at Fort Monroe proclaiming that to be the official landing site of the first Africans. On May 24, 2007, Fort Monroe with the city of Hampton as sponsor, erected that highway marker as part of the Fort Monroe’s Anniversary Celebration.

It is easy to understand the confusion of the early versions of history. When the English Settlers left England all they knew was that they were headed to Jamestown in Virginia. When their ship finally arrived in the port of today’s Hampton Roads Harbor after a three month journey, they assumed they were at Jamestown. So some early historians, and letters written by arriving settlers to family back in England, said they arrived had arrived at Point Comfort at Jamestown, not knowing that they had arrived at Point Comfort, today’s Fort Monroe, thirty miles away from Jamestown. They assumed that the entire region was named Jamestown. And so began the inaccurate historical record that has dominated the American way of life through history books, movies, publications, and the tourism industry.  

Why is it important where the first Africans landed? History should be an accurate account of facts. History is not a fictional fairy tale, epic movie, or special interest group’s distortion of facts to promote tourism. Ask those immigrants who landed at Ellis Island or Plymouth Rock if it’s important. The first Africans who landed at Point Comfort were not immigrants, but their landing was one of the most significant events in our country’s history. The first generations of Africans to Virginia were skilled farmers and artisans. Along with their culture, they also brought many ideas and innovations. It has been written that in 1648 the governor ordered rice to be planted as a suggestion from the Africans.  

Hampton, founded on July 9, 1610 is the oldest continuously English speaking settlement in the United States and will be celebrating its 400^th birthday in 2010. In 2019, Hampton will be celebrating the 400^th Anniversary of the arrival of the first Africans in 1619 and the true story on how the ancestors of today’s African American community arrived, survived, and died to make America a great country needs to be truthfully told. Hampton is where it all began. The first southern reading of the Emancipation Proclamation was read at today’s Hampton University. By far, Hampton, Virginia is the most historical African American city in the United States and its history should be celebrated.

Come to Hampton in 2010 and celebrate the city’s rich African American history. Donations are being accepted to erect a statue in 2019 to celebrate 400 years of African American history. Come to Hampton, where it all began. 

“Please join Global Slavery Remembrance Day on March 25^, 2010 commemorating the remembrance of all Victims of Slavery each year.  Sincerely, Venita Benitez”

Congress… Let Us Be Heard  March 4, 2009

“Elisa Burchett:
The Horror and Shame Remembered; The Transatlantic Slave Trade

“It is with shame and horror that we remember the lives of these men, women and children. This day provides an opportunity to raise global awareness of this brutal period. 400 years of the Transatlantic Slave Trade.” Mr. Kiyo Akasaka, U.N. Undersecretary for Communications and Public Information

The energy of Africa set in motion the first annual International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, at United Nations Headquarters in New York. The sound of drums filled the Economic and Social Council with energetic dancers jumping, kicking, backs bending and springing forward with the swiftness of a spring, legs and arms reaching out and around, and all this in stark contrast to the stillness of the delegates who sat looking on, somberly.

Among the delegates and distinguished guests sat Mr. Kiyo Akasaka, Undersecretary-General for Communications and Public Information, smiling and mildly entertained in contrast to Harry Belafonte’s intense demeanor, appearing somehow rooted in the center of the sound and spirit of it all, the rhythms of Guinea, Mali and Senegal. Then, the sound changed to that of the Caribbean with steel drums ringing. In the blink of an eye, we had traveled, via sound, The Middle Passage.

A bell was tolled, a symbol of the transatlantic voyage and the re-creation of the ship La Amistad, en route from West Africa to the Caribbean today. Within that moment of silence as the single stroke of the bell dissipated, the international community came another step closer to finally dealing with slavery and its consequences, today, on both sides of the Atlantic. Slavery has had lasting affects not only on the people of the African Diaspora but it also opened the door to deeper intrusion into the continent of Africa itself - a fact most people are vaguely aware of.

Tanzanian Ambassador Mahiga said slavery was an ugly feature of almost all societies, since biblical times and the Transatlantic Trade was the high water mark, leaving Africa vulnerable to deeper intrusion by foreign powers. He remembered those who died from harsh conditions, brutality and broken hearts. He then called attention to the existence of slavery today and called on the United Nations to fight it in all its forms. Most notable of his statements was an invitation, a welcoming of Africans in the Diaspora, the millions of people of African descent to join their brothers and sisters in Africa in the “reconstruction of Africa”. His words echoed in my heart – “building a bridge between people of African descent”.

On February 5, 2008, a bill created by African-American Congressman Donald Payne of New Jersey was signed into law by President George W. Bush. The bill established a United States Commission to coordinate activities for the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the Transatlantic Slave Trade Act. Congressman Payne said, “Democracy was built with slave labor. Sadly, their contribution was never recognized during their lifetimes.” But, the congressman said it is also important that we focus on the tragedy of slavery in the 21st century, one of the greatest human rights challenges of our times. “As we remember, let us renew our commitment to eradicating current injustices around the world today.” He remembered the 12 to 25 million slaves who were transported, of which some 2 million died.

The UK Ambassador stood and recognized his countries role, saying, “We remember the millions of countless victims. We are reminded of our own shameful role. Our forefathers did wrong and they should have known at the time that they did wrong.” He also honored William Wilberforce, a leading abolitionist in the UK, a man who “dared to stand up to demand that slaves be freed in Britain”, he said. It was a long and exhaustive struggle that ultimately lead to a vote to abolish slavery in Britain in 1882.

Ambassador Christopher Hackett of Barbados and one of the speakers on behalf of CARICOM (the Caribbean Community), a driving force behind this event, lightly addressed the sensitive issue of reparations. He mentioned that this anniversary has become a reality, thanks to the support of member states. Ambassador Hackett said more than 15 million victims of the slave trade had been transported by force from West Africa to the Caribbean and American plantations. Many died en route and were thrown overboard, an experience that should not be repeated, nor forgotten.

“They rose above their hardships. We see the successes of their descendents in the Caribbean and in the United States. It would be appropriate to call for some form of compensation fund to assist the people of our societies to cope better”, he added. The ambassador spoke also for those in Brazil, Cuba and the Dominican Republic.

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad spoke of the greed and hypocrisy that for over 3 centuries allowed the conjunction of Arabs and merchants, along with others, to profit from the abuse of Africans. In their greed, he said, they sought means to justify it in legal and moral terms. Ambassador Khalilzad noted that slaves were not the only victims but the societies practicing slavery became victims as well, by undermining their own integrity and taking centuries to heal. In the ambassador’s words, it was the anti-slavery movement that has kept our country on its moral course.

Cape Verdean Ambassador H.E. Antonio Lima stood, clearly emotional after the bell tolled Amistad. He said, “I feel very moved today. The slave within me is moved. A person standing erect, a person with dignity. This small slave that exists within me asks you to ensure that this day of remembrance be an effort to remember what has happened. That is not an unhealthy going over of it. It is our common history because each and every one of us is a human being. This is not an indication of hostility. It is a breaking the silence, just as the slaves broke their chains. Africa suffers from the consequences of the slave trade. The media has not been extremely helpful. It is essential that we have the 25th of March so that we can remember and say it out loud.”

The keynote speaker, Harry Belafonte, with shaven head, spoke for quite some time. He read page upon page of his painstakingly thorough and well-thought-out message. He spoke of slavery and its shaping of the modern world, of Eleanor Roosevelt who kept in close, personal contact with him during the U.N. Commission on Human Rights’ creation of the document known today as the “Declaration on Human Rights”, of the “Slave Route Project” and it’s objective to break the silence of the slave trade, the slave trade’s contribution to the “underdevelopment of Africa, and the 15 billion dollars a year in revenue produced by slavery as a trade even today”. As Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF for over 21 years, Mr. Belafonte spoke of the present day horrors experienced by the victims of the contemporary global slave trade. “Fingers point to the developed world as the villain and the statistics are horrifying. Today, human bondage is ten times larger”, he said. Slavery still exists but it has gone deeply underground. He called slavery by its new names - unidentified orphans, carpet makers, female escorts, migrant workers, refugees and cheap labor.

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon asked the question, “How to atone?” That, paradoxically, is difficult to ascertain by some - and in a world where slavery still exists, the sooner we figure it out, the better. This first International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of the Transatlantic Slave Trade falls on the 60th anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights. Ban Ki-moon appealed to all to give life to the words of article 4: “No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.” “Let us carry it forth”, he said.

On Wednesday, March 26, 2008 an exhibit will be opened at United Nations Headquarters entitled, “The Middle Passage: White Ship/Black Cargo”.

Elisa Burchett
UNHQ Bureau Chief
U.N. OBSERVER & International Report

Please also see:

International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade http://www.un.org/events/slaveryremembrance

Past injustices should spur battle against modern forms of slavery – Ban Ki-moon http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=26090&Cr=slavery&Cr1

EXHIBIT ON SLAVE TRADE OPENS AT United Nations HEADQUARTERS,
26 March http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2008/note6133.doc.htm

Universal Declaration of Human Rights
http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html

The Slave Route Project
http://portal.unesco.org/culture/en/ev.php-URL_ID=25659&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html

AMISTAD America’s ATLANTIC FREEDOM TOUR
http://www.amistadamerica.org

NOMINATE FOR THE 2008 ANTI-SLAVERY AWARD
http://www.antislavery.org/homepage/antislavery/award.htm

Anti-Slavery International http://www.antislavery.org

Coalition Against Trafficking in Women-International (CATW) http://www.catwinternational.org

“DATELINE: 25 MARCH 2008, UNITED NATIONS HEADQUARTERS, NEW YORK CITY

SHOTLIST:

FILE – RECENT, UNITED NATIONS HEADQUARTERS, NEW YORK CITY

1. Wide shot, exterior, United Nations Headquarters

25 MARCH 2008, UNITED NATIONS HEADQUARTERS, NEW YORK CITY

2. Wide shot, conference room

3. Various shots, African drummers and dancers

4. Wide shot, conference table

5. SOUNDBITE (English) Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General, United Nations:

“This chapter in human history is all the more reprehensible because the trade yielded significant prosperity in countries where slavery was perpetrated under colour of law. These States paid no monetary price for their progress, but they incurred a terrible cost in the form of the entrenched racism that we still battle today.”

6. Various shots, Jamaican steel drum performance

7. SOUNDBITE (English) Harry Belafonte, UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, actor and singer:

 “It is impossible to disrupt the life of 100 million people within the African continent without disrupting the economic, political and social character of its people. The inhumane ramifications of that disruption continue to severely cripple the peoples of Africa and the African Diaspora.”

8. Various shots, moment of silence

9. Wide shot, press conference

10. SOUNDBITE (English) Donald Payne, US Congressman from New Jersey (D):

“I am hopeful that the bill I introduced in congress to establish a commission to commemorate the 200 anniversary of the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade, which was signed into law by president Bush on February 5th, will help promote a greater understanding of the horrors of enslaved people and its aftermath, and will also add to the important dialogue about race, which has currently entered into our debate in this country.”

11. Wide shot, conference room

STORYLINE:

Academy Award winner and human rights activist Harry Belafonte along with Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon were among the speakers at a Solemn Ceremony held today at the United Nations to pay tribute to victims of slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

The observance featured artistic performances by drummers and dancers from Guinea, Mali and Senegal, poetry from Liberia and a steel pan troupe from the Caribbean. 

Mr. Ban spoke about the historical context of the slave trade saying that it is all the more reprehensible because it “yielded significant prosperity in countries where slavery was perpetrated” while incurring “a terrible cost in the form of the entrenched racism that we still battle today.”

Mr. Ban noted that even today, millions around the world, including children, are suffering under the yoke of racism, forced labour, sexual exploitation and human trafficking.

Mr. Belafonte stated that “The inhumane ramifications” of the economic, political and social disruptions caused by the slave trade “continue to severely cripple the peoples of Africa and the African Diaspora.”

US Congressman Donald M. Payne, whose bill to establish a United States Commission to coordinate activities for the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the Transatlantic Slave Trade Act was recently signed into law by President George W. Bush, was also among the speakers.

Later, at a press conference, he said that he hoped the new law will help promote “a greater understanding of the horrors of enslaved people and its aftermath” and will contribute to “the important dialogue about race, which has currently entered into our debate in this country”  

A General Assembly resolution had designating 25 March as an annual day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade in December 2007. It also decided to erect a permanent memorial at the UN to acknowledge the tragedy and consider the legacy of slavery.”

“United Nations A/RES/62/122

General Assembly Distr.: General

8 February 2008

Sixty-second session

Agenda item 119

07-47109

Resolution adopted by the General Assembly

[without reference to a Main Committee (A/62/L.32 and Add.1)]

62/122. Permanent memorial to and remembrance of the victims

of slavery and the transatlantic slave trade

The General Assembly,

Recalling its resolution 61/19 of 28 November 2006, entitled

“Commemoration of the two-hundredth anniversary of the abolition of the

transatlantic slave trade”,

Recalling also the designation of 25 March 2007 as the International Day for

the Commemoration of the Two-hundredth Anniversary of the Abolition of the

Transatlantic Slave Trade,

Taking note of the report of the Secretary-General, 1 which focuses on

initiatives undertaken by States to implement paragraphs 101 and 102 of the Durban

Declaration of the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination,

Xenophobia and Related Intolerance aimed at countering the legacy of slavery and

contributing to the restoration of the dignity of the victims of slavery and the slave

trade,2

Recognizing how little is known about the four-hundred-year-long transatlantic

slave trade and its lasting consequences, felt throughout the world, and welcoming

the increased attention that the General Assembly commemoration brought to the

issue, including the raising of its profile in many States,

Recalling in particular paragraph 101 of the Durban Declaration which. inter

alia, invited the international community and its members to honour the memory of

the victims,

1. Welcomes the initiative of the States members of the Caribbean

Community to erect in the halls of the United Nations a permanent memorial in

acknowledgement of the tragedy and in consideration of the legacy of slavery and

the transatlantic slave trade;

_______________

1 A/62/270.

2 See A/CONF.189/12 and Corr.1, chap. I.

A/RES/62/122

2

2. Notes the establishment of a voluntary fund for the erection of a

permanent memorial, expresses sincere appreciation to those Member States that

have already made contributions to the fund, and invites other interested parties to

do likewise;

3. Decides to designate 25 March as an annual International Day of

Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade,

beginning in 2008, as a complement to the existing International Day for the

Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition of the United Nations

Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization;

4. Requests the Secretary-General, in collaboration with and building upon

the work undertaken by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural

Organization, including its Slave Route Project, to establish a programme of

educational outreach to mobilize, inter alia, educational institutions and civil society

on the subject of remembering the transatlantic slave trade and slavery, in order to

inculcate future generations with the causes, consequences and lessons of the

transatlantic slave trade and to communicate the dangers of racism and prejudice;

5. Also requests the Secretary-General to report to the General Assembly at

its sixty-third session on the establishment and implementation of the programme;

6. Decides to include in the provisional agenda of its sixty-third session an

item entitled “Follow-up to the commemoration of the two-hundredth anniversary of

the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade”.

75th plenary meeting

17 December 2007”

 “Successful Passage of Resolution for Permanent Slave Trade Memorial at United Nations
Caps CARICOM’s Year of Rememberance

 Will The Fear Of Desegregation Segregate Us Again

 In A Time For Justice And Freedom?

Because I Have A Dream Too!

CONGRESS….  Let us be heard!   February 1, 2009

On this day, I (Venita Benitez) am addressing the following leadership for help!!:  President Obama, Vice President Biden, Secretary of State Madam Hillary Clinton, Committee Members, House of Representatives, Senators and Courts of the Untied States to finally, once and for all, AMEND the 1807 ACT prohibiting the illegal importation of Slaves (Negro, Mulatto, or person of color) into the United States and enforce an Amendment, in 2009, to the 1807 ACT that would include all illegal importation of ALL Today’s Modern Day Slaves regardless of race, age and/or gender in America stopping Today’s Global Modern Day Slavery, Sex Trafficking, Child Labor Slavery and Disposable People Slavery of human beings.  President Obama, your oath to protect the Constitution is being challenged starting today until the 1807ACT is Amended and ratified!  “This has to be a top priorty…, What we have to do is to creat better, more effective tools for prosecuting those who are engaging in human trafficking… Sadly, there are thousand who are trapped in various forms of enslavement here in our country…,  It is a debasement of our commom humanity. Barack Obama Presidential Campaign Forum August 16, 2008.”    Anointing fall on me, LORD, let the power of the Holy Ghost fall on me, anointing fall on me… I’m not saying anything about Baal to be removed from the Capitol’s entrance. We won’t go there.   In reality Baal stands guard at the U.S. Capitol entrance.  The entire concept of the U.S. Capitol building was borrowed from Rome’s pagan temple dedicated to ALL the gods of Rome - it was called The Pantheon – yet, the Romans borrowed the concept from Babylon.  It was explicitly the desire of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson to have this concept in the Capitol’s design; therefore, they rigged the bidding process to make sure this design included this “Babylonian” concept of the “Pantheon of the gods.”  Demons- their origin, names, activities, future, and the use of the sign gifts in combating their oppression:  (Baal 1 Kings 16:31 was a chief deity and represented Satan himself).  I’m speaking about an enslaving spirit of fear (Romans 8:15).  We are a Nation that placed our hand on a bible to be sworn in, aren’t we?  Please Amend and let’s work together on the illegal importation of Today’s Modern Day Slavery in America.   

“BY AUTHORITY OF CONGRESS

THE

PUBLIC STATUTES AT LARGE

OF THE

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

FROM THE

ORGANIZATION OF THE GOVERNMENT IN 1789 TO MARCH 3, 1845.

ARRANGED IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

WITH

REFERENCES TO THE MATTER OF EACH ACT AND TO THE SUBSEQUENT ACTS ON THE SAME SUBJECT,

AND

COPIOUS NOTES OF THE DECISIONS

OF THE

COURTS OF THE UNITED STATES

CONSTRUING THOSE ACTS, AND UPON THE SUBJECTS OF THE LAWS

WITH AN

INDEX TO THE CONTENTS OF EACH VOLUME,

AND A

FULL GENERAL INDEX TO THE WHOLE WORK, IN THE CONCLUDING VOLUME,

TOGETHER WITH

THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE, THE ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION, AND THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES;

AND ALSO,

TABLES IN THE LAST VOLUME, CONTAINING LISTS OF THE ACTS RELATING TO THE JUDICIARY, IMPOSTS AND TONNAGE, THE PUBLIC LANDS, ETC.

EDITED BY

RICHARD PETERS, ESQ., COUNSELLOR AT LAW.

The rights and interest of the United States in the stereotype plates from which this work is printed, are hereby recognized, acknowledged, and declared by the publishers, according to the provisions of the joint resolution of Congress, passed March 3, 1845.

VOL. II.

BOSTON,

LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANY,

1861.

STATUTE II.

(March 2, 1807: Act of March 22, 1794, ch.11. Act of May 10, 1800, ch. 51. Act of Feb. 28, 1803, ch. 10. Act of April 20, 1818, ch. 91. Act of May 15, 1820, ch. 113, sec. 4, 5.)
CHAP.XXII.– An Act to prohibit the importation of slaves into any port or place within the jurisdiction of the United States, from and after the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and eight. (See notes to act of March 22, 1794, chap.11, vol. i. 347.)Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That from and after the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eight, it shall not be lawful to import or bring into the United States or the territories thereof from any foreign kingdom, place, or country, any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, with intent to hold, sell, or dispose of such negro, mulatto, or person of colour, as a slave, or to be held to service or labour.

(Importation of slaves into the U.S. forbidden after Jan. 1, 1808. Forfeiture of vessels fitted out for the slave trade after Jan. 1, 1808.)
SEC. 2. And be it further enacted, That no citizen or citizens of the United States, or any other person, shall, from and after the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and eight, for himself, or themselves, or any other person whatsoever, either as master, factor, or owner, build, fit, equip, load or otherwise prepare any ship or vessel, in any port or place within the jurisdiction of the United States, nor shall cause any ship or vessel to sail from any port or place within the same, for the purpose of procuring any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, from any foreign kingdom, place, or country, to be transported to any port or place whatsoever, within the jurisdiction of the United States, to be held, sold, or disposed of as slaves, or to be held to service or labor; and if any ship or vessel shall be so fitted out for the purpose aforesaid, or shall be caused to sail so as aforesaid, every such ship or vessel, her tackle, apparel, and furniture, shall be forfeited to the United States, and shall be liable to be seized, prosecuted, and condemned in any of the circuit courts or district courts, for the district where the said ship or vessel may be found or seized.

(Penalties for being engaged in such expeditions.)
SEC. 3. And be it further enacted, That all and every person so building, fitting out, equipping, loading, or otherwise preparing or sending away, any ship or vessel, knowing or intending that the same shall be employed in such trade or business, from and after the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eight, contrary to the true intent and meaning of this act, or any ways aiding or abetting therein, shall severally forfeit and pay twenty thousand dollars, one moiety thereof to the use of the United States, and the other moiety to the use of any person or persons who shall sue for and prosecute the same to effect.

(Forfeitures and penalties for importing slaves from Africa, &c. after Jan. 1, 1808. Distribution of the forfeitures. Slaves imported to remain subject to regulations of the states.)
SEC. 4. And be it further enacted, If any citizen or citizens of the United States, or any person resident within the jurisdiction of the same, shall, from and after the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eight, take on board, receive or transport from any of the coasts or kingdoms of Africa, or from any other foreign kingdom, place, or country, any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, in any ship or vessel, for the purpose of selling them in any port or place within the jurisdiction of the United States as slaves, or to be held to service or labour, or shall be in any ways aiding or abetting therein, such citizen or citizens, or person, shall severally forfeit and pay five thousand dollars, one moiety thereof to the use of any person or persons who shall sue for
and prosecute the same to effect; and every such ship or vessel in which, such negro, mulatto, or person of colour, shall have been taken on board, received, or transported as aforesaid, her tackle, apparel, and furniture, and the goods and effects which shall be found on board the same, shall
be forfeited to the United States, and shall be liable to be seized, prosecuted, and condemned in any of the circuit courts or district courts in the district where the said ship or vessel may be found or seized. And neither the importer, nor any person or persons claiming from or under him, shall hold any right or title whatsoever to any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, nor to the service or labour thereof, who may be imported or brought within the United States, or territories thereof, in violation of this law, but the same shall remain subject to any regulations not contravening the provisions of this act, which the legislatures of the several states or territories at any time hereafter may make, for
disposing of any such negro, mulatto, or person of colour. (See notes to act of March 22, 1794, chap.11, vol. i. 347, 348.)

(Further penalties on citizens and residents, &c. for bringing slaves to the U. S. from any foreign place. Imprisonment and penalty not to exceed $10,000.)
SEC. 5. And be it further enacted, That if any citizen or citizens of the United States, or any other person resident within the jurisdiction of the same, shall, from and after the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eight, contrary to the true intent and meaning of this act, take on board any ship or vessel from any of the coasts or kingdoms of Africa, or from any other foreign kingdom, place, or country, any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, with intent to sell him. her, or
them, for a slave, or slaves, or to be held to service or labour, and shall transport the same to any port or place within the jurisdiction of the United States, and there sell such negro, mulatto, or person of colour, so transported as aforesaid, for a slave, or to be held to service or labour,
every such offender shall be deemed guilty of a high misdemeanor, and being thereof convicted before any court having competent jurisdiction, shall suffer imprisonment for not more than ten years nor less than five years, and be fined not exceeding ten thousand dollars, nor less than one thousand dollars.

(Penalties for buying slaves from the neighbouring territories, &c. Forfeiture not to extend to the seller or purchaser of any slave sold under the regulations of the legislature of any state.)
SEC. 6. And be it further enacted, That if any person or persons whatsoever, shall, from and after the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eight, purchase or sell any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, for a slave, or to be held to service or labour, who shall have been imported, or brought from any foreign kingdom, place, or country, or from the dominions of any foreign state, immediately adjoining to the United States, into any port or place within the jurisdiction of the United States, after the last day of December, one tbousand eight hundred and seven, knowing at the time of such purchase or sale, such negro, mulatto, or person of colour, was sought within the jurisdiction of the United States, as aforesaid, such purchaser and seller shall severally for fee and pay for every negro, mulatto, or person of colour, so purchased or sold as aforesaid, eight hundred dollars; one moiety thereof to the United States, and the other moiety to the use of any person or persons who shall sue for and prosecute the same to effect: Provided, that the aforesaid forfeiture shall not extend to the seller or purchaser of any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, who may be sold or disposed of in virtue of any regulation which may hereafter be made by any of the legislatures of the several states in that respect, in pursuance of act, and the constitution of the United States.

(Vessels may be seized, having slaves on board. Naval force of the U. States may be employed for the purpose of enforcing this act. Penalties, fine and imprisonment. Proceeds of prizes divided between the U. States and the officers and men making the seizures. Every negro and mulatto found on board any vessel captured to be delivered to persons appointed by the respective states to receive them. An account to be transmitted to the governors of the respective states.)
SEC. 7. And be it further enacted, That if any ship or vessel shall be found, from and after the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eight, in any river, port, bay, or harbor, or on the high seas within the jurisdictional limits of the United States, or hovering on the coast thereof, having on board any negro, mulatto, or person of colour for the purpose of selling them as slaves, or with intent to land the same, in any port or place within the jurisdiction of the United States, contrary to the prohibition of this act, every such ship or vessel, together with her tackle, apparel, and furniture. and the goods or effects which shall be found on board the same, shall be forfeited to the use of the United States, and may be seized, prosecuted, and condemned, in any court of the United States, having jurisdiction thereof. And it shall be lawful for the President of the United States, and he is hereby authorized, should he deem it expedient, to cause any of the armed vessels of the United States to be manned and employed to cruise on any part the coast of the United States, or territories thereof, where he may judge attempts will be made to violate the provisions of this act, and to instruct and direct the commanders of armed vessels of the United States, to seize take, and bring into any port of the United States all such ships or vessels, and moreover to seize, take, and bring into any port of the United States all ships or vessels of the United States, wheresoever found on the high seas, contravening the provisions of this act, to be proceeded against, according to law, and the captain, master, or commander of every such ship or vessel, so found and seized as aforesaid, shall be deemed guilty of a high misdemeanor, and shall be liable to be prosecuted before any court of the United States, having jurisdiction thereof; and being thereof convicted, shall be fined not exceeding ten thousand dollars, and be imprisoned not less than two years, and not exceeding four years. And the proceeds of all ships and vessels, their tackle, apparel, and furniture, and the goods and effects on board of them, which shall be so seized, prosecuted and condemned, shall be divided equally between the United States and the officers and men who shall make such seizure, take, or bring the same into port for condemnation, whether such seizure be made by an armed vessel of the United States,or revenue cutters thereof, and the same shall be distributed in like manner, as is provided by law for the distribution of prizes taken from an enemy: Provided, that the officers and men, to be entitled to one half of the proceeds aforesaid, shall safe keep every negro, mulatto, or person of colour, found on board of any ship or vessel so by them seized, taken, or brought into port for condemnation, and shall deliver every such negro, mulatto, or person of colour, to such person or persons as shall be appointed by the respective states, to receive the same; and if no such person or persons shall be appointed by the respective states, they shall deliver every such negro, mulatto, or person of colour, to the overseers of the poor of the port or place where such ship or vessel may be brought or found, and shall immediately transmit to the governor or chief magistrate of the state an account of their proceedings, together with the number of such negroes, mulattoes, or persons of colour, and a descriptive list of the same, that he may give directions respecting such negroes mulattoes, or persons of colour. (The district courts have jurisdiction under the slave trade acts, to determine who are the actual captors under a state law, made in pursuance of the 4th section of the slave trade act of 1807, and directing the proceeds of the sale of the negroes to be paid, “one moiety for the use of the commanding officer of the capturing vessel.” The Josefa Segunda, 10 Wheat.312; 6 Cond. Rep. 111.
The offence against the laws of the United States under the 7th section of the act of 1897, is not that of importing or bringing into the United States, persons of colour, with intent to hold such persons as slaves, but that of hovering on the coast of the United States with such intent. And although it forfeits the vessel and any goods or effects found on board, it is silent as to disposing of the coloured persons found onboard, any further than to impose a duty upon the officers of the armed vessels who make the capture to keep them safely to be delivered to the overseers of the poor, or the governor of the state, or persons appointed by the respective states to receive them. United States v. Preston, 3 Peters, 57.
The persons sold as slaves under an order of the district court of Louisiana, in a case where the decree was afterwards reversed, were illegally sold, and they are freed. Ibid.)

(Slaves not to be transported in vessels under forty tons burthen, to be disposed of, &c. Penalties. This section not to prohibit taking on board or transporting on any river or bay within the jurisdiction of the U. States.)
SEC. 8. And be it further enacted, That no captain, master or commander of any ship or vessel, of less burthen than forty tons, shall, from and after the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eight, take on board and transport any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, to any port or place whatsoever, for the purpose of selling or disposing of the same as a slave, or with intent that the same may be sold or disposed of to be held to service or labour, on penalty of forfeiting for every such negro, mulatto, or person of colour, so taken on board and transported, as aforesaid, the sum of eight hundred dollars; one moiety thereof to the use of the United States, and the other moiety to any person or persons who shall sue for, and prosecute the same to effect: Provided however, That nothing in this section shall extend to prohibit the taking on board or transporting on any river, or inland bay of the sea, within the jurisdiction of the United States, any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, (not imported contrary to the provisions of this act) in any vessel or species of craft whatever.

(Vessels of larger burthen, sailing coastwise, to have the names of slaves for sale inserted in their papers, &c. The shipper to swear the negroes were not imported into the U. States after January 1, 1808. Penalties on departing without such list. Penalty for negro or mulatto taken on board.)
SEC. 9. And be it further enacted, That the captain, master, or commander of any ship or vessel of the burthen of forty tons or more, from and after the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eight, sailing coastwise, from any port in the United States, to any port or place within the jurisdiction of the same, having on board any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, for the purpose of transporting them to be used or disposed of as slaves, or to be held to service or labour, shall, previous to the departure of such ship or vessel, make out and subscribe duplicate manifests of every such negro, mulatto, or person of colour, on board such ship or vessel, therein specifying the name and sex of each person, their age and stature, as near as may be, and the class to which they respectively belong, whether negro, mulatto, or person of colour, with the name and place of residence of every owner or shipper of the same, and shall deliver such manifests to the collector of the port, if there be one, otherwise to the surveyor, before whom the captain master, or commander, together with the owner or shipper, shall severally swear or affirm to the best of their knowledge and belief, that the persons therein specified were not imported or brought into the United States, from and after the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eight, and that under the laws of the state, they are held to service or labour; whereupon the said collector or surveyor shall certify the same on the said manifests, one of which he shall return to the said captain, master, or commander, with a permit, specifying thereon the number, names, and general description of such persons, and authorizing him to proceed to the port of his destination. And if any ship or vessel, being laden and destined as aforesaid, shall depart from the port where she may then be, without the captain, master, or commander being first made out and subscribed duplicate manifests, of every negro, mulatto, and person of colour, on board such ship or vessel, as aforesaid, and without having previously delivered the same to the said collector or surveyor, and obtained a permit, in manner as herein required, or shall, previous to her arrival at the port of her destination, take on board any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, other than those specified in the manifests, as aforesaid, every such ship or vessel, together with her tackle, apparel and furniture, shall be forfeited to the use of the United States, and may be seized, prosecuted and condemned in any court of the United States, having jurisdiction thereof; and the captain, master, or commander of every such ship or vessel, shall moreover forfeit, for every such negro, mulatto, or person of colour, so transported or taken on board, contrary to the provisions of this act, the sum of one thousand dollars, one moiety thereof to the United States, and the other moiety to the use of any person or persons who shall sue for and prosecute the same to effect.

(Manifests to be delivered to officers of customs where such slaves carried coastwise are landed. Penalty for landing a negro or mulatto without a permit.)
SEC. 10. And be it further enacted, That the captain, master, or commander of every ship or vessel, of the burthen of forty tons or more, from and after the first day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eight, sailing coastwise, and having on board any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, to sell or dispose of as slaves, or to be held to service or labour, and arriving in any port within the jurisdiction of the United States, from any other port within the same, shall, previous to the unloading or putting on shore any of the persons aforesaid, or suffering them to go on shore, deliver to the collector, if there be one, or if not, to the surveyor residing at the port of her arrival, the manifest certified by the collector or surveyor of the port from whence she sailed, as is herein before directed, to the truth of which, before such officer, he shall swear or affirm, and if the collector or surveyor shall be satisfied therewith, he shall thereupon grant a permit for unlading or suffering such negro, mulatto, or person of colour, to be put on shore, and if the captain, master, or commander of any such ship or vessel being laden as aforesaid, shall neglect or refuse to deliver the manifest at the time and in the manner herein directed, or shall land or put on shore any negro, mulatto, or person of colour, for the purpose aforesaid, before he shall have delivered his manifest as aforesaid, and obtained a permit for that purpose, every such captain, master, or commander, shall forfeit and pay ten thousand dollars, one moiety thereof to the United States, the other moiety to the use of any person or persons who shall sue for and prosecute the same to effect.APPROVED, March 2, 1807.”

An overview by: Venita Benitez

EMANCPATION CELEBRATION FROM THE ABOLITION OF TE SLAVE TRADE

EXHIBIT I:

In 2009, this Act needs to be amended quickly because it does not include the illegal importation of ALL Slaves but only the African Slave Trade (Negro, Mulatto, or person of color).

EXHIBIT II:

“Published in 2007 by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Culture Organization (UNESCO) 7, place de Fontenoy, 75352 Paris 07 SP, France (UNESCO). “According to estimates by the United Nations, there are close to 300 million slaves in our world today.  Millions more men, women and children are exploited in conditions that closely resemble slavery.”

EXHIBIT III:

“An estimated 246 million children between 5 and 18 years old live in slavery.”

EXHIBIT IV:

“Disposable People Slavery: Organ harvesting, the plight of immigrants and the underground organ trafficking industry. The injustice of disposable people trafficking for purposes of organ removal globally including in the United States…”

EXHIBIT V:

First Lady Hillary Clinton:

We are facing Global Sexual Exploitation in the United States of America.: “(Hillary Clinton Lviv Opera House, Lviv, Ukraine, First Lady to Fight Prostitution.” AP Online, 18 November 1997)” It is a violation of human rights when women are trafficked, bough and sold as prostitutes. “Trafficking in women plagues the United States as much as it does underdeveloped nations.  Organized prostitution networks have migrated from metropolitan areas to small cities and suburbs.  Women trafficked to the United States are forced to have sex with 400-500 men to pay off $40,000 in debt for their passage”

Pay close attention to the March 2, 1807 ACT  

ON March 2, 1807, the United States Congress decided to approved an act to abolish the importation of Slaves (The African Slave Trade) effective January 1, 1808 (428) ninth Congress, March 2, 1807 – Act Prohibiting Importation of  Slaves, ch. 22, 2 Stat. 426 1807. (African) Slaves were no longer allowed to be brought into any part of the United States from anywhere in the world. (African) Slave imports were stopped by this law passed by the United States Congress on March 2, 1807.  Again, effective January 1, 1808, the Slaves were Africans…. This ACT doesn’t protect the illegal importation of Today’s Modern Day Slavery into the Untied States of America.   

“The Ninth United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, consisting of the United States Senate met in Washington, D.C. March 4, 1805 to March 3, 1807, during the first two years of the second administration of United States President Thomas Jefferson.  The ninth United States Congress duration:  March 4, 1805 – March 3, 1807.  The U.S. Congress decided to approve this act of abolishment only the day before their duration ended.  President of the Senate was George Clinton, President pro tempore was Samuel Smith, Speaker of the House was Nathaniel Macon, the member had 34 Senators, 142 Representatives and 3 Non-voting members.  The Senate majority was Democratic-Republican and House majority was Democratic-Republican. Their 1^st session December 2, 1805 – April 21, 1806 and finally the 2^nd session December 1, 1806 –March 3, 1807 so by the skin of their chain, they decided to approved on March 2, 1807 Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves (African Slaves).”  Again, this ACT does not protect Today’s Modern Day Slavery.

“Slaves were first brought to American in 1619. They were brought to Jamestown, Virginia from Africa. After that, slaves were brought to all parts of the Americas from Africa and other parts of the world. By the mid-eighteenth century, there was an abundant of slaves in all of the thirteen colonies.” History is repeating itself!“After the Revolutionary War, the North passed legislation to abolish slavery; however, with the invention

of cotton gin in the south, the need for slave labor rose dramatically. By 1807, there were more than four million slaves in the south. So, with this many slaves in 1807, The US congress put a stop to the slave imports in America.”  Population Fear! That’s what it was all about?  Fear?   We have the worst kinds of slavery known today ever in mankind…. Please AMEND the 1807 ACT.

“The U.S. influenced by Wilberforce and his colleques, officially abolished the slave trade on January 1, 1808.  This message of hope and Freedom throughout the world to recognize the dignity at all human beings.  William Wilberforce, a man of conscience who worked to abolish the transatlantic slave trade. In 2007, the U.S. Congress passed a bi-partisan resolution that commended Wilberforce on his efforts to spread a message of hope and freedom throughout America and to recognize the dignity of all human beings.  “Well this message of hope and freedom still needs to spread some more while we commend Wilberforce on his efforts”  Congress, are you listening?

“”With the abolition of the transactlantic slave trade in 1808 “a day called for thanksgiving” festivals of freedom.

Black activists used these festivals of freedom to encourage community building and race uplift.   “This is our answer!  This is how we go back, read history and start implementing community building” 

The 14^th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified July 28, 1868.

It was the 15^th Amendment, ratified in 1870, which finally gave African Americans the right to vote.  It states that “the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by and States on account of race color, or previous condition of servitude.  Black people are now citizens…

In practice, however, it took almost 100 more years and the passage of the voting Right Act of 1865 to remove barriers such as POLL TAKES, LITERACY TESTS, and INTIMIDATION that prevented African Americans and other people of color from freely exercising their right to vote.  Who are other people of color in 1865?   For almost 100 more years we had to put up with barriers such as POLL TAKES, LITERACY TESTS, and INTIIDATION?””  What the hell was this?  We can’t blame Jefferson Davis for the hatred in our country nor in our world…. That’s for sure!  He believed in Unity too.  “…Our people have accepted the decree. It therefore behooves them to promote the general welfare of the Union, to show the world that hereafter, as heretofore, the patriotism of our people is not measured by lines of latitude and longitude, but is as broad as the obligations they have assumed and embraces the whole of our ocean-bound domain.” He always spoke of the fact that the United States was now one country and on the theme of reconciliation.

““In 1887, following a speech in Georgia, Davis became seriously ill. When he recovered, he considered his days of public speaking over. But a convention of young men was held in March of 1889 at Mississippi City, only six miles from Beauvoir, and a delegation asked him to address them. He began his remarks with:”
“Friends and fellow citizens,” but he stopped and said:
“Ah, pardon me, the laws of the United States no longer permit me to designate you as fellow citizens, but I am thankful that I may address you as friends. I feel no regret that I stand before you a man without a country, for my ambition lies buried in the grave of the Confederacy.”

He continued with these memorable words for his young audience:
“The faces I see before me are those of young men; had I not known this I would not have appeared before you. Men in whose hands the destinies of our Southland lie, for love of her I break my silence, to speak to you a few words of respectful admonition. The past is dead; let it bury its dead, its hopes and aspirations. Before you lies the future - a future full of golden promise; a future expanding national glory, before which all the world shall stand amazed. Let me beseech you to lay aside all rancor, all bitter sectional feeling, and to take your places in the ranks of those who will bring about a consumammation devoutly to be wished - a reunited country.””

“President Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act, August 6, 1965.

Note that the 15^th Amendment makes no mention of sex.  It was not until the passage of the 19^th Amendment in 1920 that women were explicitly given to vote.

Mitch Kachun explores the multiple functions and contested meanings surrounding African Americans emancipation celebrations from the abolition of the slave trade to the fiftieth anniversary of U.S. Emancipation.    

William Wilberforce (1759-1833)

U.S. House Resolution in Honor of Wilberforce

H. Res. 158: Observing the 200th Anniversary of the Abolition of the British Slave Trade
Observing the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the British slave trade and encouraging the people of the United States, particularly the youth of the United States, to remember the life and legacy of William Wilberforce, a member of the British House of Commons who devoted his life to the suppression and abolition of the institution of slavery, and to work for the protection of human rights throughout the world.

Whereas in 1780, William Wilberforce was elected at the age of 21 years to the British House of Commons;

Whereas Mr. Wilberforce and his friends were active in at least 69 different projects focusing on issues such as prison reform, education, child labor conditions, animal cruelty, and the reformation of the culture;

Whereas Mr. Wilberforce was mentored and counseled by former slave trader and author of the hymn “Amazing Grace,” John Newton, on the horrors of the slave trade;

Whereas at the time, 11 million human beings had been captured and taken from Africa to the Western hemisphere and forced into slavery and bondage;

Whereas at the time, the British Empire controlled the largest portion of the slave trade;

Whereas Mr. Wilberforce devoted his life to the suppression and abolition of the institution of slavery;

Whereas a dedicated group of like-minded reformers, the Clapham group, assisted, supported, and encouraged Mr. Wilberforce in his fight against the slave trade;

Whereas Mr. Wilberforce fought for 20 years in the House of Commons to pass legislation banning the slave trade;

Whereas on February 23, 1807, Britain passed a bill banning the slave trade;

Whereas Mr. Wilberforce helped inspire and encourage those who fought against slavery in the United States, including political leaders like John Quincy Adams, spreading a message of hope and freedom throughout America and the promise of the future;

Whereas Mr. Wilberforce labored 46 years to abolish the institution of slavery in the British Empire, ceaselessly defending those without a voice within society;

Whereas in 1833, Mr. Wilberforce was informed on his death bed that the House of Commons had voted to abolish slavery;

Whereas in 2006, the United States Department of State estimated that between 600,000 and 800,000 men, women, and children were trafficked across international borders;

Whereas the International Labour Organization estimates that there are more than 12 million people in forced labor, bonded labor, forced child labor, and sexual servitude around the world; and

Whereas the people of the United States, particularly the youth of the United States, are called upon to form clubs and groups dedicated to working against the modern slave trade, human trafficking, and the degradation of human dignity: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved, That the House of Representatives–

(1) observes the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the British slave trade;

(2) commends to the people of the United States the example of William Wilberforce and his commitment to each and every person’s human dignity, value, and freedom;

(3) encourages the people of the United States, particularly the youth of the United States, to–

(A) observe the anniversary of the abolition of the British slave trade;

(B) reflect on Mr. Wilberforce’s selfless dedication to the fight against slavery and his commitment to the neediest in society;

(C) commit themselves to recognize the value of every person; and

(D) form high school clubs and groups working against modern day slavery and the trafficking of persons; and

(4) condemns to the highest degree all forms of human trafficking and slavery which are an assault on human dignity and of which Mr. Wilberforce would steadfastly resist.

Bill Sponsors and Co-Sponsors

Rep.Joseph Pitts [R-PA]
Rep. Robert Aderholt [R-AL]

Rep. James Barrett [R-SC]

Rep. Roscoe Bartlett [R-MD]

Rep. Marsha Blackburn [R-TN]

Rep. Roy Blunt [R-MO]

Rep. John Boozman [R-AR]

Rep. Dan Burton [R-IN]

Rep. John Campbell [R-CA]

Rep. Eric Cantor [R-VA]

Rep. John Carter [R-TX]

Rep. Steven Chabot [R-OH]

Rep. James Clyburn [D-SC]

Rep. John Doolittle [R-CA]

Rep. Tom Feeney [R-FL]

Rep. Jeff Flake [R-AZ]

Rep. James Forbes [R-VA]

Rep. Jeffrey Fortenberry [R-NE]

Rep. Trent Franks [R-AZ]

Rep. Scott Garrett [R-NJ]

Rep. John Gingrey [R-GA]

Rep. Louis Gohmert [R-TX]

Rep. Charles Gonzalez [D-TX]

Rep. Alcee Hastings [D-FL]

Rep. Walter Herger [R-CA]

Rep. David Hobson [R-OH]

Rep. Jim Jordan [R-OH]

Rep. Jack Kingston [R-GA]

Rep. Doug Lamborn [R-CO]

Rep. Donald Manzullo [R-IL]

Rep. Thaddeus McCotter [R-MI]

Rep. Patrick Mchenry [R-NC]

Rep. Mike McIntyre [D-NC]

Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers [R-WA]

Rep. Gary Miller [R-CA]

Rep. Jerry Moran [R-KS]

Rep. Marilyn Musgrave [R-CO]

Rep. Randy Neugebauer [R-TX]

Rep. Donald Payne [D-NJ]

Rep. Mike Pence [R-IN]

Rep. Thomas Petri [R-WI]

Rep. Charles Pickering [R-MS]

Rep. Ted Poe [R-TX]

Rep. Michael Rogers [R-MI]

Rep. Peter Roskam [R-IL]

Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger [D-MD]

Rep. Peter Sessions [R-TX]

Rep. John Shadegg [R-AZ]

Rep. Christopher Smith [R-NJ]

Rep. Mark Souder [R-IN]

Rep. Lee Terry [R-NE]

Rep. Todd Tiahrt [R-KS]

Rep. Timothy Walberg [R-MI]

Rep. David Weldon [R-FL]

Rep. Addison Wilson [R-SC]

Rep. Frank Wolf [R-VA]

Source: Library of Congress - Thomas”

CONGRESS, Can We Be Heard, Too?  PLEASE!!!

Happy Birthday Abe!!!

from

 ProjectA23.com

 in

Dallas, Texas

16^th President Abraham Lincoln

200^th Bicentennial Birthday

February 12, 1809 – 2009.

Twenty 23 days after January 20, 2009, Presidential Inaugural, President Barack Obama finds himself once again in another once in a lifetime historical moment in time.  He will be speaking at the 200^th (2/12/1809-2/12/2009) Bicentennial Birthday Celebration for the 16^th President, Abraham Lincoln, on February 12, 2009 hosted by the Bicentennial Commission and the Abraham Lincoln Association at a special banquet! This is a once in a life time opportunity for all of us to reflect, share and celebrate the life of the 16th President, Abraham Lincoln, as never before, too.  President Lincoln believed in liberty and his funeral service was held at the U.S. Capitol under the dome for that holds LIBERTY! It holds liberty but not the same liberty for all.  He believed in the Union (the United States of America).  In 1858, the overseer of the liberty cap was removed by Secretary of War Jefferson Davis.  President Lincoln believed in UNITY for all human beings: “I intend no modification of my oft-expressed wish that all men everywhere could be freed.” LINCOLN ( Take Note: March 4, 1861-April 15, 1865.   Lincoln was a Republican during March 4, 1861, his Vice President was Hannibal Hamlin, then Lincoln changed to the Demorcratic Party, Vice President was Andrew Johnson… Known to be the worst President in history.  Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson were, respectively, a Republican and a Domocrat who ran on the national Union ticket in 1864)

Abraham Lincoln online writes the following below:

President Lincoln Mourned at the U.S. Capitol

Lying in state at the U.S. Capitol has been an American tradition since Senator Henry Clay died in 1852. But it was the body of Abraham Lincoln, the first president to be assassinated, which has forever hallowed the spot.

On April 19, 1865, President Lincoln’s remains arrived here at 3:00 p.m., following a White House funeral and procession down Pennsylvania Avenue. While artillery thundered a salute, soldiers bore the coffin up the eastern steps where six and one-half weeks earlier he delivered his famous Second Inaugural Address.

A New York Herald reporter contrasted the two events. “Then the President lived and now he lay in his coffin, murdered by an assassin. Then he spoke pious words of peace and good will, and of his steadfast determination to preserve the Union. Now he spoke still more powerfully in his death, and every man felt the force of the lesson…”

The services in the great rotunda would be private on this day, but crowds had flocked to the grounds since morning, anticipating the great procession. One reporter noted, “The people gathered in groups, picnicked on the grass or covered the marble steps.”

Meanwhile, under the great dome workmen had draped the massive paintings and sculpture in black cloth, adding a black sash to the statue of George Washington. In the center of the room stood a catafalque, now ready to receive Lincoln’s body. This small wooden platform later became modified to hold modern caskets, but on this day it was covered with black broadcloth trimmed with silver fringe and stars. To honor Lincoln, the wartime president, two muskets with bayonets and two sword bayonets stood crossed on either side.

At 3:30 p.m. twelve soldiers from the Veteran Reserve Corps laid the president’s coffin on the catafalque, and invited dignitaries took their places nearby. They included guests such as Robert Todd Lincoln, the president’s eldest son, the new president and most of his cabinet, high-ranking military men, delegations from Illinois and Kentucky, and members of the press.

A reporter wrote, “No flag was displayed in the rotunda. On every hand were the black hangings and the black crepe, and the effect was inexpressively gloomy.” Dr. Phineas D. Gurley, the Lincoln family’s Washington pastor, read a burial service which moved many listeners to tears, then offered a prayer and benediction. By 4:00 p.m. the service concluded and guests began to drift away. A reporter noticed that Robert Lincoln and President Johnson were among the first to leave and Lieutenant General Grant and Vice Admiral Farragut were among the last.

As visitors moved out of the room, James Nokes, the public gardener, arrived with baskets of flowers which he arranged around the coffin. Then the rotunda was cleared and soldiers were stationed by the doors leading to the room and elsewhere in the building. During the evening the 24th Veteran Reserve Corps guarded the remains and the building, relieved the next morning by members of the 12th Veteran Reserve Corps.

A reporter wrote that after the burial service concluded the city resumed a more normal pace. “Still, no one forgets that in the heart of the Capitol our murdered President sleeps to-night, beneath the statue of that liberty for which he died, and that to-morrow the people of this city, whom he protected and who loved and honored him, are to see his face for the last time.”

Public Viewing at the Capitol

Finally, at 8:00 a.m. on April 20, the public was allowed to view President Lincoln in the rotunda. The brilliant sunshine of the previous day had given way to rain, soaking those who endured the wait. A New York Times reporter said “thousands wended their way up the Capitol steps, into the grand rotunda, by the bier and coffin of the President, and then out at the eastern entrance. The people clung to their friend with tenacity, and their silent homage was deep and tearful.”

A Washington reporter wrote, “The number viewing the remains is very large, the crowd passing through at the rate of 3,500 per hour.” He said the total was about 40,000, but if the weather been better “the number would have been probably twice as many. The coffin was covered with a profusion of natural flowers, from the hand of affection.”

Reporter Noah Brooks, who knew the Lincoln family well, was allowed to view the spectacle from atop the Capitol dome. He wrote, “Looking down from that lofty point, the sight was weird and memorable. Directly beneath me lay the casket in which the dead President lay at full length, far, far below; and, like black atoms moving over a sheet of gray paper, the slow-moving mourners, seen from a perpendicular above them, crept silently in two dark lines across the pavement of the rotunda, forming an ellipse around the coffin and joining as they advanced toward the eastern portal and disappeared.”

Early the next day Lincoln’s body would arrive at a railroad depot, bound for the long journey to his burial site in Springfield, Illinois. The black-draped railroad car also contained the coffin of his son Willie, who died in the White House at age 11. A reporter noted that Lincoln came to Washington as “untried, unpopular, and almost despised,” but was now “the recipient of an homage and devotion unexampled in the history of the nation.”

LIBERTY CAP

PRESS RELEASE

December 1, 2008                                             Contact Person:Venita Benitez       go to www.libertyfreedom.org Look at the lost of the Liberty Cap of former African Slaves in America “no justice in America”  Recent status coming on December 10, 2009.

CONGRESS, let us be heard:

Status: On November 20, 2008 in Washington DC, I met with the offices of Congressman Pete Sessions and Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson to submit the Liberty Cap request for an H.R. Resolution for entry in January 2009.

Congressman Pete Sessions’ office is in pursuit of locating information from the Capitals’ formalities to such a request as well as identifying which committee in Congress to review.  U.S. Congressman Pete Sessions represents Texas 32nd District.

Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnsons’ office is in pursuit of identifying which committee in Congress to review H.R. Resolution.  U.S. Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson represents Texas’s 30th Congressional District.

Most have more than likely no idea of anything called a liberty cap. That unfortunate truth is due in no small measure to a misguided effort to obscure its existence.  Also known as the Phrygian cap it is a soft, red, conical cap with the top pulled forward, worn in antiquity by the inhabitants of Phrygia, a region of central Anatolia. In sculpture, paintings and caricatures it represents freedom and the pursuit of liberty.

Its importance to all Americans is as basic to our principles as the U.S. Stars & Stripes and the Bald Eagle. As those two symbols represent our unity, courage and power, the liberty cap is the symbol that represented our zeal for liberty. In 1765 the Cap was used by the Sons of Liberty and many Patriot soldiers in the American Revolution wore Liberty Caps bearing the phrase “Liberty or Death”. After the revolution, many coins, for example the 1793 Liberty Cap Half Cent and other paraphernalia of state, such as the seals of the US Army and Senate, showed Caps, often on poles. The cap was to be a prominent display of the Capitol of the United States, seat of the U.S. Congress in Washington, D.C. built on a hill popularly called Capitol Hill. The iron dome is surmounted by a statue of a woman representing freedom (lady Freedom). In the original design Lady Freedom wore the liberty cap.

Through centuries of evolution from the British American revolutionary war to the U.S. Civil war America has strived to become an international symbol for liberty and justice for all. The absence of the liberty cap is one remaining example of efforts to deny liberty in its totality. Political winds from a time when the enslaved on American soil were denied the status of full humanity or citizenship sought to use this issue to maintain their immoral thesis. Remembering Slavery is committed to the fulfillment of the symbol of liberty to and for all. Join us in the effort and celebration of liberty that has been denied for far too long.

For more information please contact us    libertyfreedom.org “coming soon” Please continue to read below. www.globalslaveryremembranceday.com 

Phrygian cap/Liberty cap

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

Bust of Attis wearing a Phrygian cap (Parian marble, 2nd century BC).

The Phrygian cap is a soft, red, conical cap with the top pulled forward, worn in antiquity by the inhabitants of Phrygia, a region of central Anatolia. In sculpture, paintings and caricatures it represents freedom and the pursuit of liberty..

THE LIBERTY CAP, Former African Slaves in America, AMERICANS, JUSTICE and THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.  We are all a people, beings.  My former DRILL SERGEANT would say to us “Soldiers…   You’re in the Army now and learn this quickly there is only one color we see and that’s green!”   

In 1854, when sculptor Thomas Crawford was preparing models for sculpture for the United States Capitol, Secretary of War Jefferson Davis (later to be the President of the Confederate States of America) insisted that a Phrygian cap not be included on a statue of Justice on the grounds that, “American liberty is original and not the liberty of the freed slave” (Gale, p. 124). The cap was not included in the final marble version that is now in the building. As Europe lurched into the Enlightenment, the Liberty Cap, as it was to become known, was widely adopted as a symbol of freedom from political tyranny by the various groups, some of them masonic, who were plotting revolutions (and later carried them out.) One early example, in Brittany in 1675, was the “Revolt of Red Caps” - a series of riots protesting unfair tax laws.

As some of these conspirators rose to political power, notably in France, the Cap (known as the bonnet rouge, or bonnet de la liberte) became prominent in many expressions of the newly conceived hope for liberty, as for example in Augustin Dupre’s depiction of Liberty as a young woman in the Libertas Americana Medal of 1783, which shows a pole supporting a Liberty Cap (a ‘liberty pole’) behind her head.

It was part of the uniform of the Sans-Culottes. Louis XVI was forced to wear the Cap and drink the health of the people when the Tuileries were taken. After the revolution, the Cap was everywhere, from milestones to official documents. Donning a Liberty Cap became de rigueur for all members of the Assemblies.

There were close links between the French Revolution and the American struggle for Independence. In 1765 the Cap was used by the Sons of Liberty and many Patriot soldiers in the American Revolution wore Liberty Caps bearing the phrase “Liberty or Death”. After the revolution, many coins, for example the 1793 Liberty Cap Half Cent (inspired by Dupre’s medal, above), and other paraphernalia of state, such as the seals of the US Army and Senate, showed Caps, often on poles.

In the 1820’s, the Liberty Cap meme spread to the South Americas, where fresh revolutions were hatching. It now appears, for example, on the flags or other insignia of the Argentine army and navy, Haiti, El Salvador, Paraguay and the Brazilian state of Santa Catarina.

Back in the US, the original design for a statue of ‘Lady Freedom‘, produced in 1855 by the sculptor Thomas Crawford, was for an “Armed Liberty” wearing a Liberty Cap.

Ironically, the associations with freed slaves proved too much for Jefferson Davis (then the War Secretary and later the president of the Confederacy), who objected to the design. When the statue was erected atop the Capitol dome in 1863 the Liberty Cap had been swapped for a helmet with an Iroquois eagle headdress.

Sculptors for both the Statue of Liberty and Lady Freedom designed their lady liberties in the context of their own beliefs of art and freedom, contingent upon their personal backgrounds and exposure to aesthetic techniques. They also worked under the watchful eye of their patrons, each of whom envisioned the statues in light of their own political agendas and concepts of American freedom. Even before the first sketches were drawn, outside pressures and expectations began to dictate the form of these lady liberties, shaping them into what would be considered acceptable icons of the American ideal.

General Assembly President’s Message             (check against delivery)

H.E. SHEIKHA HAYA RASHED AL KHALIFA THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSEMBLY AT THE COMMERATION TO CELEBRATE 200 YEARS OF THE ABOLITION OF THE TRANS-ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE

UNITED NATIONS, HEADQUARTERS, NEW YORK
26 MARCH 2007

Deputy Secretary-General,
Excellencies,
Distinguished delegates,

I have the honor to give the following statement on behalf of the President of the 61st session of the General Assembly.

The President deeply regrets that she is not able to be here in person to celebrate such an important event, as she is currently on an official visit to the Middle East.

The transatlantic slave trade stands as one of the most inhuman enterprises in history. It began in the 15th century when Portugal and subsequently other European kingdoms – Spain, Great Britain, France and Belgium - were able to expand overseas and reach Africa.

It is a deplorable fact of history that the slave trade was driven by colonial expansion, emerging capitalist economies and the insatiable demand for commodities; with racism and discrimination serving to legitimate the trade.

Powerful businessmen, diplomats, church leaders, senior politicians, lawyers and merchants were among those who owned plantation slaves in the 18th century before the trade was outlawed.

Fortunes were made and financial institutions flourished on the back of human bondage. Capital gained from investments in slavery financed investments in related products such as tobacco and sugar, or in art, property and land.

The wealthy became influential from their investments and slavery became an accepted part of the political economy of the time.

Demand for African labour grew as the colonies grew. The forced removal, an estimated 25 million people from 1500 to 1900, around 13 million due to the trans-Atlantic slave trade, had a major affect on Africa.

Africa was impoverished while it contributed to the capitalist development and wealth of Europe and other parts of the world.

Africans traders such as Antera Duke and powerful tribal leaders also enslaved Africans and sold them to merchants.

Some African rulers resisted the devastation, such as:

• King Alfonso of Kongo in the 16th century;
• Queen Njingha Mbandi of Ndongo (in modern day Angola) in the 17th century; and,
• in the 18th century King Agaja Trudo of Dahomey.

The 25th March 2007, marks 200 years – to the day – that a Parliamentary Bill was passed to abolish the slave trade in the then British Empire.

This event marked the beginning of the end for the transatlantic traffic in human beings.

However, it was not until 1833 that the act emancipating British slaves was finally passed.

It is hard to believe that what would now be a crime against humanity was legal at the time.

The bicentenary offers us all a chance to say how profoundly shameful the slave trade was, and to remember the millions who suffered. It also gives us the opportunity to pay tribute to the courage and moral conviction of all those who campaigned for abolition.

These people included slaves and former slaves like Olaudah Equiano, church leaders, statesmen like William Wilberforce, Thomas Clarkson, Granville Sharp and countless ordinary citizens who lobbied for change.

Later in France Victor Schoelcher campaigned relentlessly, which contributed to the French decree abolishing slavery on April 27, 1848.

Excellencies,
Distinguished delegates,

While reflecting on the past, we also need to acknowledge the unspeakable cruelty that persists today.

Slavery comes in many guises around the world - such as bonded labour, forced recruitment of child soldiers, human trafficking and the illegal sex trade.

The first article of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights reminds us that;

“All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.”

Today’s commemoration, marking the bicentenary of the act abolishing the trans-Atlantic trade in slaves, must also encourage us all to live up to the Universal Declaration, and to redouble our efforts to stop human trafficking and all forms of modern slavery.

Thank you very much.

Plymouth’s Mayor John Hawkins, England’s (considered to have been the first and his father) slave trader, was responsible for seven ships in two squadrons sailing to Guinea in 1566. Another member of this expedition was Hawkins’ cousin Francis Drake.

In 1567, after a service in St Andrews Church attended by the 400 men of Hawkins’ crews, he sailed to the West Indies via Guinea again. After much bloodshed on the Guinea coast, 500 slaves were transported to the Caribbean. According to slavers’ accounts of the time, this would probably have involved killing at least three times that number of people.

Hawkins made three voyages to what is now Sierra Leone between 1562 and 1569 – enslaving around 1,200 Africans. William Hawkins Jr. was Mayor elect of Plymouth in 1568.  Plymouth became the main base of their operations.  In addition, under political pressure from Spain, their fleet shifted to the other side of the channel. William and John continued buying cargoes in Plymouth from privateers and ‘ransoming’ Huguenot prizes.

London Merchants were still financing slaving voyages to West Africa out of Plymouth. Ships were still sailing to the Caribbean in 1575, including eight Hawkins vessels and six others.  He sailed in 1562 to Upper Guinea, capturing negroes and Portugese ships (later restored to their owners), selling the slaves in Hispanioa for beefhides, thus beginning the triangular slave trade. In 1564, Hawkins began public service, continuing the trade, returning home by way of Newfoundland. On one return Queen Elisabeth I found it worthy of notice that regarded the opening of the slave trade as an achievement worthy of honourable commemoration, for when she made Hawkins a knight she gave him for a crest, the device of a negro’s head and bust with the arms tightly pinioned, or in the language of heraldry, “Demi-Moor proper bound with a cord.”

International Day for the Remembrance of The Slave Trade and its Abolition is intended to inscribe the tragedy of the Transatlantic Slave Trade in the memory of all people. The night of August 22-23 1791, in Santo Domingo (today Haiti) and the Dominican Republic saw the beginning of the uprising that would play a crucial role in the Abolition of The Transatlantic Slave Trade. An African Slave by the name of Toussaint Louverture, about 57 years old, in the French Colony of Santo Domingo, organized and brainstormed their revolt and this is the beginning of the Abolition of The Transatlantic Slave Trade. This is the only African Slave victorious REVOLT known in the history of the humanity.