On January 29, members of the Chapin community gathered in the Assembly Room to listen and learn at our 19th annual Gilder Lehrman Lecture. This year’s speaker was Professor Jonathan W. White, winner of the 2023 Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize, who spoke about his book A House Built by Slaves: African American Visitors to the White House.
Professor White is the author and editor of countless books, articles, essays and reviews. He has taught American Studies at Christopher Newport University since 2009, serves on the Board of Directors for the Abraham Lincoln Institute and Abraham Lincoln Association, and is the Vice Chair of The Lincoln Forum. His book, and the subject of the evening’s talk, was introduced by Chapin Trustee and alumna Arielle Patrick ’07, who sits on the Gilder Lehrman President’s Council. She contextualized the book by saying Professor White “examines thorough, extensive primary source research on how Lincoln welcomed African American men and women to the White House. Widely praised, this book illuminates why welcoming them transformed the trajectory of race relations in American history. Not only did these visits underscore Lincoln’s commitment to engaging with his guests, asking about their personal experiences, views and insights, but it also allowed for an unprecedented amplification of the Black experience on the national stage.”
Amplifying Black voices was the throughline of Professor White’s presentation. He opened by sharing a letter written to President Lincoln by Hannibal Cox, a formerly enslaved man from Virginia. Mr. Cox described his experiences as a slave, noting how it was illegal for him to learn to read and write, how he had escaped from slavery and how he had eventually served proudly in the Union Army, where white soldiers taught him to read and write. He had earned citizenship rights, as well, through his military service. Of the hundreds of letters the President received each day, this one was found in Lincoln’s personal belongings after his assassination. The sentiments, Professor White explained, must have meant a lot to the President for him to retain it in his personal collection.
Throughout his talk, Professor White shared stories like this one to demonstrate “how Lincoln thought about the place of Black people in the United States, and how he interacted with them” during his Presidency, powerfully illustrating the evolution of Lincoln’s thinking and his ensuing policies.
He began with a story about the slow illegalization of the slave trade in the United States. In 1808, 20 years after the writing of the Constitution, Congress officially outlawed the slave trade. But as Professor White explained, “Just because something is illegal doesn’t mean that people cease to do it.” Twelve years later, in 1820, Congress passed an amendment to the law designating the slave trade as an act of piracy, a capital crime. It was another 40 years before a slave trader would be punished for these crimes.
It took Lincoln’s presidency and his steadfast determination to abolish the trans-Atlantic slave trade to confirm the first conviction and public execution of a slave trader. Many white Americans called for the pardon of slave trader Nathaniel Gordon, but Lincoln set the tone for his presidency, and for the country, by seeing the sentence through. “Nathaniel Gordon believed he had the right to traffic in human beings,” Professor White said. “And Lincoln was reminding him [and the country] that these were human beings who deserve dignity and respect.”
Professor White highlighted Lincoln’s flaws alongside his great accomplishments. Early in the President’s political career, he explained, Lincoln did not support the movement for true equality. Letters like the one from Mr. Cox shone a light on the lived experiences of slaves that Lincoln had likely never encountered or understood earlier in his life. It was also the stories of men like Robert Smalls, whose bravery greatly impacted President Lincoln.
Robert Smalls was enslaved in Charleston in 1862 when “he decided to make himself free,” shared Professor White. Mr. Smalls worked on a Confederate ship named Planter; he was a husband and a father. One of his greatest fears was that his family would be sold away. Anticipating this unthinkable event, Mr. Smalls commandeered the Planter with his family and friends. They had to sail past all the Confederate guards on the Charleston harbor and convince the Union blockading vessels that he was not a Confederate, which took great bravery in the face of incredible risk. Succeeding in securing freedom for himself, his family and friends, he became a national hero. He traveled to Washington D.C. next to share his story and was praised as “a true specimen of African bravery” by his compatriots. President Lincoln was the next to hear his story.
Professor White went on to explain the magnitude of this moment by sharing Lincoln’s stance during the first two years of the Civil War. “Abraham Lincoln opposed allowing Black men to serve in the military,” he said. “From Lincoln’s perspective, publicly at least, the war was not about slavery. It was about Union. It was a white man’s war; it was not for Black people to participate in.” He also shared that Lincoln harbored a fear that “Black men might prove cowardly on the battlefield.”
Professor White believes that it was the meeting of these two men — Smalls and Lincoln — that led to the shift in public policy that allowed Black men to enlist in the military. Robert Smalls returned to South Carolina with a letter from the War Department authorizing the recruitment of Black Americans for the Army to fight for their country and their freedom. Mr. Smalls would also go on to serve 10 years in Congress after the war.
As more Black men joined the Union Army, the movement for their citizenship and voting rights gained momentum. Delegates visited the White House to petition for their rights during Lincoln’s public visiting hours. Although he was sympathetic to their cause and leant support behind the scenes, publicly, Lincoln reiterated to these delegations that the right to vote lay with the States. As he worked to unify the country, he urged dissenting States to enfranchise their Black populations because their contributions to society would, in Lincoln’s words, “help to keep the jewel of liberty within the family of freedom.” For enslaved people, freedom did not come all at once as the Emancipation Proclamation claimed, but the Executive Order was an advance toward that reality.
Also discussed was the relationship between President Lincoln and Civil Rights activist Frederick Douglass, another crucial set of interactions that shaped the President’s views and policies. Douglass, Professor White said, had been an outspoken critic of the President’s stance on slavery and civil rights during his first two years in the White House. When first elected, Lincoln pledged to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, a most egregious law. Douglass called Lincoln “abolitionism’s worst enemy” for this and his slow actions to abolish slavery and racially prejudiced laws.
Frederick Douglass made an unplanned visit to the White House in August 1863. Douglass’ visit was motivated by the unequal treatment of Black soldiers in the Union Army. As he recruited Black men to join the Army, he had been promised, and, in turn, promised other men that they would not experience this type of discrimination. To Douglass’ surprise, he was welcomed to the White House by the President, and they engaged in a productive conversation. Both men left the encounter with an appreciation for the other person and a better understanding of their positions in the battle for equality.
A second meeting occurred when Lincoln called for Douglass to visit and advise him near the end of his first term. At that time, the future looked grim for Lincoln’s reelection bid and for the Union Army. Lincoln sought Douglass’ help with devising a plan to free as many enslaved people as possible in case he lost his reelection bid and the war, and the next president rescinded the Emancipation Proclamation. Luckily, they never needed to enact such a plan.
The two met for a third and final time during Lincoln’s second inaugural celebration. After the President’s assassination, Douglass spoke and wrote kindly of Lincoln as an example of interracial partnerships and kindness. Professor White believes Douglass spoke highly of his friendship with Lincoln as an example for white audiences, saying “at a time when racial segregation [was] taking hold legally throughout the country, he was saying to [them], if the greatest American, the greatest President, could treat me [with respect and kindness] at the White House, so should you. Be like Lincoln.”
