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SA bill apologizes for slavery

7 December 2007 | By Andy Garden, Flat Hat Staff Writer | The Flat Hat » news

The College is well-known for its colonial past, but a less-celebrated part of that history is its role in slavery. A recently passed Student Assembly bill, sponsored by Tiseme Zegeye ’08, seeks a Board of Visitors-established commission to investigate the College’s past.

The bill, entitled The Research Into and an Apology for William and Mary’s Role in Slavery Act, is part of a growing movement by states and universities to examine and, in some cases, apologize for their slaveholding pasts. In April, the Virginia State Senate and General Assembly voted to express “profound regret” for their slaveholding past, and the University of Virginia recently apologized as well.

“Some people think what I am doing is very radical and has come out of nowhere, but that is not true. Attempts to confront our racial past are happening all over the country,” Zegeye said in an e-mail.

The bill seeks to redress the College’s slaveholding past. According to a forthcoming publication by English professor Terry Meyers in the Bill of Rights Journal, the College owned a tobacco plantation whose slaves helped fund College scholarships.

In addition, many of the College’s most famous buildings, including Wren, the Brafferton and the President’s House, were likely built using slave labor, according to Colonial Williamsburg Historian Carl Lounsbury.

It was also reported that colonial students and professors were allowed to bring their personal slaves to school with them, and presidents of the College were known to own slaves.

Zegeye’s bill calls for the BOV to “establish a commission to research the full extent of the College of William and Mary’s role in slavery,” report its findings publicly and establish a memorial to the “contributions of slaves at the College.”

According to Zegeye, all senators were in favor of recommending that the BOV establish a commission, although some did not favor issuing a formal apology.

“It wasn’t something that the student senate needed to get involved in when we have so many other pressing issues,” Senator Joe Luppino-Esposito ’08 told the Daily Press. Luppino-Esposito voted in favor of establishing a commission.

Zegeye told The Flat Hat that she hopes to present a report to the Board in February detailing the request.

“I am asking the BOV to apologize because they represent WM as an institution, the same institution that was responsible for our role in slavery,” she said.

  1. Wow! I’m glad this student assembly bill erases the torment of thousands of slave laborers who are alive to read it!!!

    I’m sure this makes up for the physical pain it took them 400 years ago to place bricks around campus!!!!!

    Good work guys!!!!


    — zach    Dec 7, 03:35 PM    #

  2. More looking backward at the College instead of looking forward. No wonder the school is collapsing in the US News rankings.


    — MacSuile    Dec 7, 03:40 PM    #

  3. Thankfully, I think the SA Senate has very, very little to do with US News rankings. However, I’m glad the FH noted that the “Virginia State Senate and General Assembly” were involved. It’s kind of like saying ‘US Senate and Congress.’ Virginia House of Delegates — what? Maybe our rankings would be helped by an understanding of where our State funding comes from instead.


    — J E    Dec 7, 10:43 PM    #

  4. macsuile, why don’t you go get into a decent grad school, or get a good job, or make some art, and help to make the college look good, rather than writing a bunch of stupid comments about gene nichol and poor old alma? when did you graduate?


    — wow    Dec 8, 10:21 AM    #

  5. Up to a quarter of the people in their society were slaves like us. We built their roads. We built their walls. We did all the back-breaking labor. Our women did their laundry and their cooking. At times they toiled beside us. They were often sexually abused by our masters. And we died in the tens of thousands.

    Yet they have not apologized to this day. They took away my tribal name and gave me one of theirs (mine was “barbaric” and too hard to pronounce). How long must we wait for justice?

    We are the Celts. They were the Roman conquerers, whose society ran on slavery. I demand an apology from everyone on campus whose name ends in an “a” an “o” or “us”. Aut viam inveniam aut faciam. We shall not be ignored. As to your mere 400 year wait, parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus.


    — giusbullus    Dec 8, 04:43 PM    #

  6. Look, I’m sorry man. It seemed like a good idea at the time. By the way, good work on that aqueduct!


    — Orlando Regulus    Dec 8, 05:14 PM    #

  7. Well, si post fata venit gloria, non propero. And when the Romans said they wanted to whip up a little something, we were thinking a small barn or maybe a pub. Who knew? They weren’t kidding about the whip either.


    — gius b.    Dec 8, 06:01 PM    #

  8. Musa sat quietly on the hill watching the running figure in the distance grow closer. He could see it was a man and that he was waving something. Soon a voice wafted across the sand: “Musa, I have news, Musa, do not shoot”. It was Wahid. Musa pondered his friend’s long strides. He had to admit that though Wahid was a Furawi and not a Konjara like himself, he could run like a herd of tiang before a grass fire. They had been hiding in the Jebel Marra since, how long had it been? It was best not to think about the time when the government bomb hit his home in Zaligi. It brought back the stench of burning flesh.

    “What have you now, my brother? You run as if the Janjaweed were in your dust.”

    As his panting slowed Wahid grinned broadly, clinging tightly to the paper in his hand. “It is important news from where ancient rulers are revered, I think. But my English is not such as yours, Musa”. He handed over the tattered document.

    Musa read, silently and slowly, the torn and dirty paper before him. “Please Musa” exclaimed Wahid, “Is it weapons, money, medicine? What do they offer?”

    “It is from their Sa, a word I do not know, but who must be sons of great warriors. They have been servants, but long ago, of a King who was called William and his Queen known as Mary. They are wearing hats which are flat, by which they show their repentance, and wish us to know they have apologized for their fathers who once owned slaves.”

    “Yes,” said Wahid “My cousin was taken as a slave five years ago when the Janjaweed raided our village. It is a terrible thing. When did the Sa elders release their slaves?”

    “It says about 140 years ago. A ruler named Abraham, but not of the prophet, did so.”

    “They live so long Musa? Do all of them traverse the centuries or only their kings and the noble Sa?”

    Musa laughed, but gently so as not to offend Wahid. “No, Wahid, they mean to say that many, many generations have passed and the original slave masters are but dust. The Sa wish us to know they have not held slaves for the life of their father’s, grandfather’s, great-grand father’s and beyond, but they are sorry even so.”

    “So no arms, no money, no medicine? How will this free my cousin, who is a slave now, not 140 years ago?” cried Wahid.

    Musa shook his head slowly and looked at his friend. He glanced at the back of the paper, read briefly, and then his hand opened and the paper began a slow zigzag into the dirt at his feet. He was steeled against all disillusionment by years of disease, genocide, war and near-starvation. It was not their fault, these Sa in their strange land. He now realized they were probably the very small children of the elders of William and Mary’s ancient tribe. He thought it best to keep this to himself, as Wahid would not understand. The Sa meant no harm by this waste of time and effort. On the back of the paper he had read of the sex show approved by their leader. Clearly these were a spoiled, idle and silly tribe, not just the children, but their elders as well. They’d be of no help. And the war in Darfur would continue unabated.

    Later they used the paper to start a small fire to cook their tiny handful of remaining dukhn into a runny asida. The fire had to be kept low, as it could attract bullets. Ahmed had died due to just that kind of mistake. A fortnight ago they had buried him in a nearby wadi, having waited for a moonless night. The soil there was easier to scoop by hand and the darkness made them feel safer. Waiting was not proper and the body had begun to putrefy, but they had no choice. The Sa, safe in their blessed land, knew nothing of this, felt no sorrow and sent no condolences. But they had provided kindling. Kindling, and also laughter – the wry, halting kind used to hold back tears.


    — skukuza    Dec 10, 12:37 PM    #