Royall Must Fall: Old and New Battles on the Memory of Slavery in New England

The Memory of New England Slavery: Silence and Denial

Scholars have used the term erasure to discuss attempts at rewriting New England’s ties to slavery (Melish 1998; Wilder 2013). Rather than erasure, what is central to my study are “public manifestations of denial” or “conspiracies of silence” (Zerubavel 2007:5). According to Zerubavel (2007), silences are elephants because they are so painfully obvious. The longer we ignore them, the larger they grow and the more we have to maneuver around them. Melish’s (1998) concept of “virtual amnesia” offers some insight as well. She wrote, “The narrative of New England slavery was not untold exactly, but it was a kind of private narrative, told in discrete, isolated places” (p. xiii). The Royall House is an illustration of these contradictions in public memory. New Englanders attempted to mentally erase their ties to slavery by getting rid of some physical components of it, including African American people. Antebellum New Englanders placed restrictions on the importation of new slaves throughout the period of gradual emancipation and prevented people of color, fleeing other states, from seeking haven in Massachusetts, and many “white” abolitionists supported emigration in one form or another (Melish 1998; Davis 2003; Wilder 2013). Furthermore, “public and private passivity and invisibility” (emphasis added) were among the criteria used to judge the worthiness of slaves to be freed (Melish 1998:122). New Englanders also invented games whose object was to “make the negroes disappear” (Melish 1998:2). By 1850, the history of a free, “white” New England juxtaposed against an immoral, “black” South had been rewritten (Melish 1998). All the while, physical structures that honored slave owners, such as the Isaac Royall House, were preserved.

Even if New Englanders were to destroy these physical structures, other reminders of slavery’s legacy would continue, including the fact that New England is a predominantly “white” and racially segregated space. Many of its elite colleges and universities were built on the backs of enslaved people, who maintained the upkeep of the universities at the same time that scientific racism was taught in the classrooms (Anderson 1998). Some of the “white” students educated at these northern institutions would later become plantation owners in the south (Wilder 2013). To this day, elite institutions are predominantly “white” spaces that perpetuate denial (Moore 2008; Wilder 2013). Thus, although racist beliefs are often stereotypically associated with uneducated, conservative southerners, northern liberals are just as responsible for the perpetuation of racism.

Liberal Narratives of Guilt and Progress

Melish (1998) contended that “white” New Englanders held contradictory attitudes toward African Americans. On one hand, they expressed discomfort with the physical presence of African Americans. On the other hand, they assumed a bizarre sense of responsibility for and authority over them. In fact, the position of the American Colonization Society was a paternalistic one, arguing that deportation was in the best interest of Africans (Wilder 2013).

This guilt and sense of responsibility for people of color was an issue for “whites” involved in the civil rights movement and prevented many of them from transforming liberal ideology into actual antiracist policies (Thompson 2001; Wellman 1993). We see this in narratives of color-blind racism, in which many “white” people express concern for greater equality but oppose actions to create it (Bonilla-Silva 2001, 2010; DiTomaso 2013; DiTomaso, Parks-Yancy, and Post 2003; Pierce 2012). Liberal “whites” often commit what Desmond and Emirbayer (2011) called the individualistic and ahistorical fallacies when discussing racism. These fallacies allow “white” people to place racism in the past and blame a few extremists, while affording themselves a moral high ground (Desmond and Emirbayer 2011). Likewise, Romano (2006) found “narratives of redemption and atonement” in the reopening of civil rights trials, such as the Birmingham church bombings. Putting the offenders on trial, and seeing them in their old age, allowed southern “whites” to atone for a racist past (Romano 2006). Civil rights films, such as Mississippi Burning, followed the same narrative, juxtaposing morally righteous “white” heroes against “redneck” racist “whites,” at the same time as African Americans were put into passive victim roles (Fuller 2006; Romano 2006). These themes of liberal progress and denial are reproduced in antiracist groups, schools, organizations, and civil rights museums (Beeman 2015; Ernst 2012; Foster 2014; Hughey 2012; Pollock 2004).

In what follows, I examine this liberal ideology through a case study of public memory and the Isaac Royall House. Following Melish (1998), Lindgren (1995), and Zerubavel (2007), I do not find a complete absence of slavery in the presentations of the Royall House; however, I do find a marginalization of such history, particularly during the period of colonial revival. I argue that such portrayals of the Royall House affect public memory of slavery in New England and that with recent, more critical portrayals of New England slavery, a contest for public memory has emerged.

Methods

To study the preservation and presentation of the Royall House, I examined memos, newspaper articles, letters, and pamphlets from the archives of the Royall House Association. These documents ranged in date from 1873 to 1995. I collected any documents that made statements about the slaves or slave quarters at the Royall House and studied any document that presented the house to the public. I excluded repetitive material, such as postcard invitations that had very little information, in favor of news items covering more detail on the events. I coded for themes on the presentation of the house and Royall’s connections to slavery. I found very little variation in the story told about Royall’s slaves. Three main themes emerged: mentions of enslaved people at the Royall House were overpowered by romantic stories of famous people, such as George Washington, who stayed there; enslaved people were briefly mentioned in descriptions of Royall’s arrival to Massachusetts; and enslaved people were used to portray Royall’s benevolence. There was also very little variation in how the house was presented. The archives were saturated with portrayals of the house’s architecture and its history. I selected items that offered a range of public presentations, including flyers for programs directed at Royall House members, publications from the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR), and newspaper and magazine items that reached a broader audience. I also collected anything mentioning Julia Royall’s initiative, which I learned about through personal communication with Leslie Spieth, who was a tour guide and member of the board of directors when I began my study in 2004. Having also learned about the postcard controversy from Spieth, I looked specifically for any document mentioning it. I found only one article in the Royall House archives on the subject, and Spieth informed me that this was the only article of which she was aware.

For other public discussion on the Royall House, I conducted a LexisNexis academic search in June 2016, which yielded 133 results for “Isaac Royall.” A more recent search in January 2018 yielded 158 results from December 1981 to November 2017. I was specifically interested in the controversies surrounding the postcard and Harvard University. Of the 158 results, only two mentioned the postcard, and they did not offer any more information than what I learned from the Royall House archives. An online search of the Boston Globe yielded no recent discussion of the card. I collected and read all the articles with “Harvard” in the title or publication name (e.g., the Harvard Crimson) from the LexisNexis search. Seventy-nine articles spoke centrally about the controversy at Harvard. Several articles with identical titles were repeated in the results, leaving 69 original articles focused on Harvard. Most of the remaining 77 of the 158 articles focused on other schools, mentioning Isaac Royall only as a comparison point. I also read documents and articles from the Royall House Web site, which offered the most recent information on their current projects. It was here that I learned of the slave dwelling project started by Joseph McGill. This led me to blog posts and other news stories on McGill’s efforts.

Finally, I read the committee report and dissent on the Harvard controversy over Royall’s family crest at the law school. I analyzed the articles on Harvard to piece together the story of how student protests developed with regard to Harvard and what their demands were. I coded for themes that reflected a possible outcome of changing narratives, whether it was recommendations for more education or the development of programs. I noted any themes that strayed from the common narrative, for example, honest discussions about the lives of enslaved people at the Royall House, and the dates on which more critical stories appeared. For example, statements about the hard work enslaved people did, the fact that they were not paid, and the differences between the elegant rooms the Royalls occupied and the storage rooms enslaved people occupied were coded as breaks in the typical narrative. I pieced these articles together to analyze the developing counternarrative on Isaac Royall. Below, I offer a brief description of Isaac Royall before detailing my findings regarding the preservation and presentation of the Royall House in these documents.

Who Was Isaac Royall?

Isaac Royall Jr. was born in Antigua in 1719. His father, Isaac Royal Sr., moved the family and their 27 slaves to Medford, Massachusetts, in 1737, partly because of slave revolts in the Caribbean (Coquillette and Kimball 2015; Manegold 2011). Royall Sr. purchased Ten Hills Farm prior to the move. It was there that Royall Sr.’s brother oversaw the construction of the mansion and slave quarters. Royall Jr. inherited the estate when his father died in 1739. Because of his Loyalist ties, Royall Jr. fled Medford just prior to the Battle of Lexington in 1775. In 1781, Royall Jr. died of smallpox in England (Royall House & Slave Quarters 2017). He bequeathed 900 to 1,000 acres of land to Harvard College, which was later sold. The monies eventually were used to fund a professorship in law (Royall House & Slave Quarters 2017). Royall’s true role in the funding of Harvard Law School would later become an important factor in the decision to retire Harvard’s Royall family seal.

Preserving the Royall House

Lindgren (1995) discussed the preservation of various historic homes in New England as products of the colonial revival period. Colonial revival in the 1870s and 1880s was underscored by the cultural values of wealthy “old-family Americans” who had the means to remodel their homes in colonial style (Lindgren 1995:7). Lindgren contended that the preservation movement spoke to the central issue of the twentieth century, that is, whose culture would be preserved in a period of increased immigration and modernization.

The preservation of the Royall House resulted from the efforts of the DAR. The DAR was officially founded in October 1890 and argued that historic sites should be restored for the American lessons these sites would instill in immigrants. At the same time, they were “in favor of restrictive immigration, at least for the time being, because they believe that the returned service men and American labor in general should have the first chance at jobs and the privilege of earning an honest living” (Brosseau 1949:560).

In 1898, the Sarah Bradlee Fulton Chapter of the DAR first began to preserve the Royall House “for the sake of its history and aesthetic worth” (Wild 1908:1). The DAR opened the house in 1901, interesting “a group of patriotic men and women” to purchase the building (Wild 1908:1). By 1905, the Royall House Association had been formed, and by 1908, the association was able to open the house as a museum, emphasizing the beauty of the architecture. In a document titled “An Appeal for the Royall House,” ¹ it was stated that the house would be restored and opened to the public as a “stately relic of colonial times and of our first colonial Governor,” referring to Governor Winthrop, who had once owned the house (Royall House Association 1907).

In her description of the movement to preserve the Royall House, Helen Wild (1908) stated, “It is a monument to its former proprietors and the times they represent. Few houses . . . have stood for nearly two centuries with so few changes in architecture” (p. 8). This architecture was connected to the history of “white” New Englanders, consistent with the language of the colonial revival period. This was evident in Samuel Drake’s (1873, 1894) descriptions of his visit to the house. He inscribed animation to the architecture of the Royall House, as if it were a living organism withstanding the forces of change. He referred to the house as “a dilapidated figure of Mercury, minus wings and arms . . . unable to fly, unwilling to fall” (Drake 1894:39). What New Englanders were gaining from their visits to the slave quarters was a romantic lesson in architecture that helped solidify their view of New England as a virtuous place without slavery.

When slavery was mentioned, it was quickly dismissed or followed with an emphasis on Royall’s benevolence. For example, Wild (1908) wrote about a slave prison at the house that she quickly disregarded as hearsay: “They used to tell us that the dark hole was a prison for slaves, but the use of it for storage purposes was much more practical, though less romantic” (p. 5). In the next sentence, she wrote about sentiments that were scratched into the arched windows, which might have told the story of lost lovers during the Revolutionary War. Then, Wild stated that Royall’s “benevolence and public services before the Revolution can now be viewed unobstructed by the war clouds of his day” (p. 5). This story, in fact, was very predictable, in each document I studied from 1873 to 1995. Virtually every time Royall’s 27 slaves were mentioned, a description of his benevolence, community services, unfortunate departure, and death followed. Typically, this portrayal of Royall was rather sympathetic, depicting him as someone who sadly got mixed up with the wrong crowd (Loyalists). For instance, a pamphlet put out by the Royall House Association stated, “In spite of his generosity to Medford, and his devotion to his country, Colonel Isaac went into unwilling exile in England, dying there of smallpox in 1781” (Royall House Association n.d.-a). ²

Presentation and Public Use of Slave Quarters

After the house was opened to the public, it appeared in magazines, such as Homes and Gardens and The House Beautiful. Much of the coverage of the Royall House focused on annual art exhibitions, pageants, or dinners, at which members of the association dressed up in colonial garb and acted out scenes from colonial times. A 1933 article titled “Colonial Days Reborn at Slave Quarters Supper” ³ detailed the beautiful table that was arranged for the annual supper of the Medford Historical Society, during which invited speakers shared stories of southern homes. The speakers “illustrated the common interest which Americans whose progenitors came from Ireland, Scotland and England should take in connection with early colonial homes, built to last for generations as compared with modern structures” (“Colonial Days Reborn” 1933). Historically, this statement is situated after the passage of the 1924 Immigration Act, which favored northern European over southern European immigrants and excluded people of color.

The slave quarters were remembered not for the history they told but for their aesthetic value. The public was invited to admire the architecture of the house, including the slave quarters, where people were welcomed to hold parties and meetings. A 1915 article titled “An Old House and Its Times” (1915) detailed the architectural findings, stating that “each succeeding generation has left traces of its times and customs” (p. 70). This statement was made after the Royall House was praised as “a permanent memorial of Medford’s past” (p. 70). Even a fire that burned down part of the slave quarters was praised, because “it played its part in revealing the past by burning off the clapboards with which the brick ends of the house were covered” and “left the house looking as it did in 1775 when it was called the grandest house in North America” (p. 70). This account is especially romantic and blatant in its silence on slavery. The history revealed in the slave quarters had nothing to do with the history of slavery and everything to do with architecture. Likewise, the traces left behind that told of old times and customs were not at all connected with the lives of enslaved people at the house. This is an example of virtual amnesia, because the presentation of the Royall House in one sense acknowledged slavery in New England by speaking of Royall’s slaves and the slave quarters, as well as Royall’s wealth. Yet these recognitions were overpowered by distracting descriptions of the breathtaking architecture and furnishings of the house.

Statements regarding slavery were also suppressed by stories of patriotic heroes, such as George Washington and Paul Revere. Both of Drake’s entries in 1873 and 1894 offered an adoring and heroic portrayal of Washington, at the same time as they portrayed slaves as dependent upon such heroes. Drake referred to “poor negroes” in the same line in which he argues that Washington should be thanked for his vigilance and ability to avert disaster (Drake 1873:4). Elsewhere, Drake (1873) stated that the house represented “the last visible relic of slavery in New England” (p. 1). This was inaccurate, however. Other “relics” of slavery certainly did exist in New England at the time, even though they had not yet been preserved. Smith’s Castle in Rhode Island has been noted as the oldest plantation house in the country (Woodward 1971). The Webb House of Wethersfield was home to Joseph Webb Sr., a West Indies trader. The Webb-Deane-Stevens Museum in Connecticut boasts of its patriotic history, noting that George Washington conferenced at the house with a French commander, the Comte de Rochambeau, in 1781 (Webb-Deane-Stevens Museum 2018).

The Royall House seemed to be New England’s version of the romanticized plantation story, often seen as a southern phenomenon. In fact, a reference to the South was made in a 1957 article that discussed an exhibit of the slave quarters, “Complete with the last true Slave Quarters in New England, it just lacks the rural setting of the Virginia ‘shrines’” (Homer 1957). In addition, a 1939 article titled “Royall House Listed among Best Examples of N.E. Architecture” announced that the house along with its adjacent slave quarters was said to be a copy of Royall’s plantation home in the West Indies.

Any mention of Isaac Royall’s slaves presented them as guests rather than as unpaid laborers within an unjust system of slavery. For instance, an undated pamphlet simply titled “The Royall House” stated,

A retinue of twenty-seven slaves was brought from his tropical home to do service wherever needed. Slave quarters were built for their accommodation near the Mansion, and stand today in a splendid state of preservation—the only relic of slave times in existence in New England. (Royall House Association n.d.-b)

A 1958 article in the Boston Sunday Herald also emphasized Royall’s construction of slave quarters as an accommodation for his slaves. Furthermore, a pamphlet published by the Royall House Association portrayed Royall’s slaves as paid servants by stating that they were employed by Royall (Royall House Association n.d.-a). ⁴ Wild (1908) referred to Royall’s slaves as “faithful family servants” (p. 5). Each of these articles presented the typical description of Isaac Royall’s benevolence and public services. Portraying Royall in this manner immediately after discussing his slaves as employees whom he accommodated softened the historical realities of slavery in New England, helping produce virtual amnesia. These narratives of denial and evasion that skirt around New England’s ties to slavery planted the seeds for contemporary contests over the memory of slavery.

Contesting the Memory of Slavery

The vision of the colonial revival continued well into the 1990s but was contested when the Royall House and Slave Quarters were chosen to be part of the U.S. Postal Service Historic Preservation Series, as an “outstanding example of Georgian design” (Hart 1990:1). African Americans in Medford had mixed feelings about the commemoration and whether the slave quarters should be included. According to the Boston Sunday Globe, Representative Byron Rushing of Boston felt it was a “cheap shot” to not include the slave quarters (Hart 1990:1).

Opposing the commemoration, a Medford-born man named Mabray Kountze stated, “My father was born in bondage, and I have no great love for Slave Quarters anywhere” (Hart 1990:1).

Sharing this sentiment, Amanda Houston, director of black studies at Boston College argued that the postcard represented the commemoration of “the most shameful acts in our history” and that we “would not commemorate a house or jail or camp associated with the oppression of the Irish or Jews.” She further stated, “I don’t care if the house is made of diamonds. It speaks to the oppression of people” (Hart 1990:1). The slave quarters were removed from the postcard as a result of the controversy. The concerns of African Americans played a central role in this decision (Hart 1990).

Around the same time of the postcard controversy, the Royall House Association began reforming the way it presented its ties to slavery. In 1995, the association initiated a project called “A New Vision.” As part of this project, an archeological dig was conducted to recover artifacts having to do with the lives of enslaved people on Royall’s plantation. Since the start of this project in 1995, various scholars have contributed to the unveiling of slavery at the Royall House. In 2002, Rosalind Shaw of Tufts University and Jay B. Griffin of the Medford Historical Society taught a class on public memory and public amnesia. Students created two exhibits concerning slavery in New England, one of which was titled “Memories of the Slave Trade: Remembering the Forgotten Royalls.” Shaw and Griffin’s work challenged the dominant memory of slavery. With regard to slavery in New England, Griffin stated, “It’s overlooked because slavery is an evil most people in the country associate with the South” (Tufts University 2003). Griffin and Shaw also worked to reveal the economic significance of slavery in New England. Shaw stated, “Slavery was much more important for New England’s economy than many people think” (Decker 2003).

There is also an economic incentive for museums to tell a more truthful history of slavery in New England. Attracting visitors is a problem for museums in general. Some have resorted to having “teddy bear teas” in order to bring in more revenue (Mansfield 2015). Revealing the history of northern slavery gets more people interested in visiting the Royall House. According to the copresident of the Royall House and Slave Quarters, Peter Gittleman, “The board came around to believing that telling the story of Northern slavery was in fact something we could do that nobody else could do in New England because we have the only surviving slave quarters in New England” (Mansfield 2015:95). To tell this story, the Royall House’s Giving Voice program offers lectures, plays, and discussions on slavery in New England. In 2014, Joseph McGill’s slave dwelling project was featured. Below I discuss McGill’s work and the role it serves in contemporary public memory contests.

Sleeping in Slave Quarters: Assuaging Guilt or Creating Significant Change?

McGill began the slave dwelling project in 2010. Interested parties could pay to attend lectures with McGill and sleep in slave quarters. McGill believes it is important to preserve slave quarters, because “we tend to tell our history in the buildings that we preserve. If we choose only to preserve those places where the heroes lived, we’re short-selling our history” (Taft 2014:14).

Through his project, McGill hopes to educate people about the lives of slaves. The slave dwelling project not only hosts overnight stays; McGill also organized a living history program and a “slave dwellings as classroom” project for high school students. Students had an overnight stay in the slave quarters, toured the University of Mississippi, and discussed its ties to slavery. A project such as this clearly represents “vicarious witnessing,” whereby visitors bear witness to events that they have never experienced (Sicher 2001). Visitors use these sites in search of a usable past and identity (Sicher 2001). After staying the night in the Royall House slave quarters, one participant tearfully stated,

One of the things my father didn’t want to talk about was our slave-holding ancestry . . . when I learned the extent, I was kind of shocked and devastated. . . . I see this as an opportunity to acknowledge and repair. It’s a form of reparation. (King 2014)

It is interesting that this guest equates the sleepover with reparations. At most, it is a symbolic and somewhat economic form of reparations because guests may make donations to the slave quarters. These donations help continue educating others on slavery but do not significantly alter educational inequalities or economic arrangements that disproportionately affect people of color. McGill admits that owners of former plantations become nervous around the word reparations but insists that his project is not focused on that. He stated,

I’m not about reparations, I’m not ghost hunting, I’m not seeking artifacts, I’m about honoring the ancestors by helping to save the places that can help tell their stories and insert them into the storyline of the places that we choose to save because a lot of those places would not exist if not for the people living in those slave dwellings. (McGill 2013)

Thus, McGill reproduces some of the themes Foster (2014) critiqued, thereby offering moral cover and a psychic benefit to highly privileged, liberal “white” people (Delgado and Stefancic 2001). By not focusing on the controversial topic of reparations, “whites” can participate in a safe activity that allows them to say they have thought deeply about racism (Foster 2014). An African American woman who spent a night in the Royall House slave quarters, had a different reaction. She stated, “We built this country, brick by brick, blood, sweat, and tears, separated from family. . . . You need to do something, other than put up some monuments and apologize to me” (King 2014).

Of these projects that focus largely on preserving monuments and educating others, we must ask, what are the tangible economic outcomes? How much different are these attempts from those of early preservationist movements? Although the slave dwelling project, Giving Voice program, and other educational programs no longer romanticize a racist past, their focus is still on preservation. I argue that some of these well-intended memory projects ultimately maintain the racial status quo because they work in line with what is now and has long been socially acceptable among wealthy, liberal “whites.” As Melish (1998) noted, “white” people living in New England felt a paternalistic responsibility toward people of color. They were also anxious about African Americans migrating to the northern parts of the United States. These feelings of paternalism and anxiety persist. Today, however, anxiety stems from guilt over white privilege and with finding ways to divorce themselves of that guilt. These memory projects serve liberal “whites” by allowing them space to feel remorse for the past without upsetting their economic privilege or significantly altering the racial status quo (Beeman 2017; Foster 2014). Sleeping in slave quarters and attending lectures allow visitors to bear witness to the past but do not open up a discussion on continuing oppression, a central finding of Foster’s (2014) work. There is a direct connection between the history of slavery, policing, and convict leasing to police violence today (Alexander 2010; Blackmon 2008; Desmond and Emirbayer 2011). This would be a logical connection for sites to make but not an easy one given the economic and political factors involved (Autry 2013; Eskew 2001; Foster 2014; Loewen 1999; Ruffins 1986; Young 1993). I doubt liberal “whites” would pay for the privilege of sleeping in slave quarters if they were forced to consider the issue of reparations seriously. They engage in these projects, because they maintain “sincere fictions of the white self,” the notion that “white” people are generally good and nonracist (Feagin, Vera, and Batur 2001). What happens when these memory projects reach a larger audience? Are the results more tangible? Below I address the project at Harvard University’s law school that was tied into a larger movement.

From Michael Brown to Isaac Royall: Student Protests against Racism and the Memory of Slavery

Protests were organized across the nation after the shooting of Michael Brown on August 14, 2014, in Ferguson, Missouri. Brown, an 18-year-old African American man, was shot 12 times by “white” police officer Darren Wilson. Wilson claimed that he acted in self-defense, and the St. Louis County grand jury agreed. He was exonerated. After the shooting and several incidents of racism on campus, students and faculty members at the University of Missouri began to protest. The university chancellor, R. Bowen Loftin, and president, Tim Wolfe, resigned after they were heavily criticized for inadequately responding to complaints of racism. Protests at Mizzou ignited actions on other college campuses (e.g., Yale University and Trinity College). Isaac Royall was brought into the discussion at Harvard Law School, where students developed a campaign called “Royall Must Fall.” Their main demand was that the Royall family crest be removed from the school’s shield. The dean of the law school, Martha Minnow, learned of the shield’s connections to slavery after Professor Coquillette began discussing the results of his research published in 2015 (Coquillette and Kimball 2015). Minnow began sharing these results with students. To call attention to this history, students displayed reproductions of the shield with black tape over them. Then, on the morning of November 19, 2015, faculty members and students at Harvard’s law school found slashes of black tape placed across the portraits of African American faculty members (Bidgood 2015). Students saw this as backlash to protests against the shield. In response to the efforts of the campaign, Dean Minnow formed a committee consisting of faculty members, staff members, alumni, and students to look into the matter and recommend to the president whether the shield should be removed. The committee recognized that Royall bequeathed 900 to 1,000 acres of land to Harvard College in 1779, which later helped fund a Royall Professorship of Law in 1815. However, the committee was careful to point out that Isaac Parker, not Royall, created the Law Department through tuition and other monies (Mann et al. 2016:5). The Royall shield was not designed until 1936 and was not widely used by the university until the mid-1990s, possibly as a branding effort. One of the concerns of the committee was that removing the shield might silence history, preventing active engagement with it. Nonetheless, the committee ultimately recommended its removal, stating,

It is undeniable that the Law School of the present is very different from the Law School of 1937 for which the family crest of a slave-owner could be chosen as its official symbol without anyone seeing the association with slavery. We cannot unsee what we now know, nor should we. The Law School would not today honor Isaac Royall and his bequest by taking his crest as its official symbol. (Mann et al. 2016:10)

Julia Royall, a descendent of Isaac Royall, agreed with the shield’s removal but wanted its effect to be more than just symbolic. She stated,

The challenge is to make it animate the struggle to move forward on leveling the playing field. My hope is people will change, and it will ignite present Law students and faculty with a new bit of fire about doing the right thing. (Parker 2016:1)

Not all agreed with the shield’s removal. In a dissenting opinion, Professors Gordon-Reed and Ritgers argued that the university should keep the shield and teach a more truthful history:

It was primarily about the enslaved men, woman, and children whose forced labor enriched people like the Royalls and helped fuel the wealth of Western nations. . . . Brown University has moved forthrightly in the wake of the uncovered history of the Brown family’s slave trading activities. Perhaps we might study their model, taking only the things that are most useful to our particular circumstances. (Gordon-Reed and Ritgers 2016:2)

The dissenters recognized problems with silencing history as an outcome of public memory contests. However, their preference for retaining the shield was not necessary to accomplish what they wanted. If representing the stories of enslaved men and women was truly what was desired, the Royall crest could be replaced with one that represented the history of these individuals whose labor built the universities.

The Royall Must Fall campaign, later named Reclaim Harvard Law School, congratulated the committee on the symbolic move of retiring the shield but called for more meaningful outcomes to recruit and retain students of color. They demanded a critical race theory program, a diversity committee composed of students, faculty members, and staff members, and the recruitment and retention of staff members of color (Reclaim Harvard Law School 2015). Larger curricular changes are needed across the nation in primary, secondary, and postsecondary institutions, not just on slavery but on racism in general (Horton 1999; Loewen 1999; Pollock 2004). This will take a larger movement that challenges curricular control and funding at the state level. According to Moore (2008), elite law schools remain predominantly “white” and classroom instruction privileges “white” interpretations of history. Moore (2008) interviewed law students of color who reported racist comments by fellow students and faculty members. Because most of the powerful leaders at these elite schools are “white” and do not regularly examine racism, students of color feel a great pressure to remain silent (Moore 2008).

Yet for the most part, it has been African Americans, particularly women, who have shattered silences on racism and moved to tell more complete stories of African American history (Delgado and Stefancic 2001; Ruffins 1986, 1994, 1998). Frederick Douglas’s home was maintained by successive generations of African American women (Ruffins 1994). African Americans built educational institutions and organizations, such as the Black Women Oral History Project, to give voice to their histories, which were being silenced (Ruffins 1994). These institutions were used by some to promote “improvement” among African Americans, encouraging them to assimilate to European culture, and by others to inspire political activism (Ruffins 1986). In the 1960s, civil rights activists saw historical education as key to mobilization and challenging ideas of “black” inferiority. Frustrated with other “black”-led initiatives that favored the safer, integrationist perspective, intellectuals also developed magazines, such as Black Scholar and Third World (Ruffins 1986). African American leadership is what led to national protests against police brutality, racism on college campuses, and the removal of Harvard Law School’s shield. Thus, support for students and faculty members of color, who make up the critical mass of people breaking the silence on racism, is imperative.

Functions of Public Memory Contests: Maintaining Racism or Challenging It?

Zerubavel (2007) argued that the most insidious aspect of silence is that it is covered up by silence. We do not talk about the fact that there are certain things we do not talk about. From this perspective, there has been some progress in the presentation of the Royall House. There is now at least an acknowledgment that slavery was a hidden part of the story for a long time.

The slave dwelling project, university courses on the Royall House, Giving Voice, and other programs have changed the way New Englanders are educated about slavery. When we compare these programs with the colonial revival period of the late 1800s, we might conclude that there has been significant change. The colonial revival period was concerned with maintaining the values of “old (white) family Americans” amid increasing immigration (Lindgren 1995). Preservation today is more focused on unveiling previously untold stories of the enslaved people who worked in these homes. Therefore, contests for public memory have succeeded in challenging the dominant narrative on slavery in New England. As Delgado and Stefancic (2001) argued, well-told counterstories that describe the reality of discrimination faced by people of color can promote understanding.

However, I have argued that these changes are limited and have led to new narratives of guilt that may stifle further progress. Spending the night in slave quarters may afford descendants of slave owners the space to feel and express their remorse. These descendants may also donate money to what Dwyer and Alderman (2008) called “memorial entrepreneurs” to preserve the quarters and contribute to educational programs, but these programs do not significantly alter racist educational or economic arrangements. In fact, Ruffins (1986) argued that in the aftermath of riots, museums focusing on African American history received an injection of government and corporate funds due to “white” concern and because it was easier to support historical and cultural initiatives than it was to restructure inequality in inner-city ghettoes.

In many ways, the problem today remains the same as it did in the 1930s. In the 1930s, “whites” would only go so far in supporting the development of African American history. Stories of slave folklore were acceptable, but exposés of the economic benefit “whites” gained from slavery were not (Ruffins 1986). This has changed somewhat in New England, as some exposés have been written. In 2002, inspired by an apology issued by Aetna for insuring slaves, several writers at the Hartford Courant published a report (and later a book) on slavery in Connecticut in which they listed the names of slave owners in every county (Farrow, Lang, and Frank 2005). The coexistence of this history with the continued heavy focus on slave narratives and reconstruction of enslaved people’s lives illustrates that a contemporary battle for public memory is under way in New England.

When analyzing battles over public memory, we must ask how these memory projects are being used. Is education the end point? What comes after these educational programs in terms of advocating for real policy change? Curricular changes help achieve one type of change: that supported by racial idealists. On the other hand, racial realists, such as Derrick Bell, argue that little will change without first addressing the racialized economic conditions that continue to oppress people of color (Bell 1992; Delgado and Stefancic 2001). Universities do develop plans on promoting diversity, but how many of them follow through on these plans, and for those that do, are the efforts substantial and long term? For example, do they investigate, find, and correct weaknesses in the recruitment and retention of faculty members of color in a way that has tangible effects on the lives of students and faculty members of color, or do they provide one-time workshops or trainings?

Through silence and denial, we exert a great deal of effort to actively avoid controversial issues (Zerubavel 2007). We are not born knowing how to silence racism, we have to be socialized to focus on certain topics and not others, and what gets silenced hinges upon power. Certainly, this is the case with museums, whose stories are often determined by stakeholders, museum administration, guides, and the comfort level of audiences (Autry 2013; Eskew 2001; Foster 2014; Horton 1999; Loewen 1999; Modlin, Alderman, and Gentry 2011; Young 1993). The institution of education is tied to these public histories as well (Horton 1999; Loewen 1999; Wilder 2013). When I teach courses on racism and sociological theory, I often tell my students that it is possible to get a BA, an MA, and a PhD in sociology without having to learn anything about W.E.B. Du Bois, Anna Julia Cooper, or Harriet Martineau. These silences on women and people of color shape what students pay attention to and, for those who move further into academia, what they will then teach in the classroom and outside of it (Horton 1999). For these reasons, curricular changes are an important corrective, but we must know more about their impact. Future studies could focus on liberal visitors to Giving Voice lectures and the slave dwelling project. Are visitors moved to do anything beyond their visit or are they satisfied with getting more education on slavery for their own edification? In-depth interviews with these visitors, which analyze themes in how they talk about their visit would allow us to know if they reproduce liberal “race talk” or if they are more critically engaged with this history and plan to do something more concrete as a result. In other words, is the point for visitors to appear educated at dinner parties or to have more substantial conversations that lead to neighborhood or community organization? Are they made aware of and do they reach out to students and other activists who are leading movements against racism?

Memory projects may lead to each of these outcomes depending on the purposes they serve. On the one hand, as revealed by the historical presentation of the Royall House, contests for memory work to silence a racist past and uphold white supremacy. This is shown clearly in attempts to hide slavery from the history of New England (Davis 2003; Kammen 1991; Lindgren 1995; Melish 1998; Wilder 2013). However, these battles are also necessary to effectively challenge racism. We see this in the history of how the Royall House has been presented. With more calls to address New England’s role in slavery, and because there was an economic incentive to do so, members of the Royall House Association developed programs to educate the public about Royall and his slaves. Also, the protests over how Harvard was to remember its ties to Isaac Royall and slavery led to the removal of the Royall family crest. However, these battles can also serve as an illusion of progress with the attempt of assuaging guilt, which although meaningful to the individual, is largely symbolic on the grander scale. There is a danger in promoting this illusion when names or images are removed with few other tangible efforts to counter racism. Julia Royall, herself a descendent of Isaac Royall, has expressed concern that changes must be substantial and include more than just removing images. Although symbols of Isaac Royall may have fallen, legacies of racial injustice will persist unless attempts are made to tie memory projects into larger movements, such as Black Lives Matter, that can bring national attention to the economic and political inequalities that marginalize people of color.