What's Wrong With The 1619 Project? | 5 Minute Video

In August of 2019, the New York Times published The 1619 Project. Its goal is to redefine the American experiment as rooted not in liberty but in slavery. In this video, Wilfred Reilly, Associate Professor of Political Science at Kentucky State University, responds to The 1619 Project’s major claims.

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Script:

Have you heard of The 1619 Project? It was published by the New York Times in August of 2019. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary in 2020.

Its thesis: The United States was founded in 1619, when the first slave was brought to North America.

Wait—that brings up some questions…

What happened to 1776? To July 4th? The Declaration of Independence? George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison?

According to The 1619 Project, the Founding Fathers pushed for all that “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness” stuff to protect their slave holdings. Independence from England? That was just a smoke screen.

To them, everything that’s wrong with America is tied to her “original sin” of slavery: from segregation to traffic jams (yes—traffic jams!). For The 1619 Project authors, racism is not a part of the American experience; it is the American experience.

Is this true? Let’s look at three of the project’s major claims:

1. Preserving slavery was the real cause of the American Revolution.

If you asked the Founders why they no longer wanted to be a British colony, they would have given you a long list of reasons: Taxation without representation, conflicts over debts from the French and Indian War, and the Stamp Act would be just a few.

Probably most important was the burning desire to be free—to chart their own destiny as a sovereign nation. Protecting slavery? Slavery was not under threat from the British. In fact, Britain didn’t free the slaves in its overseas colonies until 1833—57 years later, after the Declaration of Independence.

Yes, the subject of slavery was hotly debated at the Constitutional Convention, but that was after the war was won.

2. Slavery made America rich.

Slavery made some Americans rich—true enough. Eli Yale, for example, made a fortune in the slave trade. He donated money and land for the university that is named after him. But the institution of slavery didn’t make America rich. In fact, the slave system badly slowed the economic development of half the country.

As economist Thomas Sowell points out, in 1860, just one year before the Civil War began, the South had only one-sixth as many factories as the North. Almost 90% of the country’s skilled, well-paid laborers and professionals were based in the North. Banking, railroads, manufacturing—all were concentrated in the North. The South was an economic backwater.

And the cost of abolishing slavery was enormous—not merely in terms of dollars (Lincoln borrowed billions to pay for it), but also in terms of human life: 360,000 Union soldiers died in order to free 4 million slaves. That works out to about one soldier in blue for every ten slaves freed. It’s hard to look at that butcher’s bill and conclude that the nation turned a profit from slavery.

And many things have happened since 1865. In the almost 200 years since the Civil War, the population of the country has grown almost 900% and our national GDP has increased 12,000%. Slavery did not make America rich.

3. Racism is an unchangeable part of America.

This argument is more philosophical than scholarly, but it undergirds the entire 1619 Project. It’s also pernicious because it suggests that the United States is an inherently racist country that can’t overcome its flaws. Yet that’s exactly what it’s done.

Today, America is the most successful multi-racial country in history, the only white majority country to elect a black President—twice. Of course, progress has not always been smooth. There have been terrible setbacks. But to compare American attitudes about race today to America a hundred years ago, let alone to 1619, is absurd.

[rev.stephena.cakouros]

George Orwell: "Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past."

[yananfederation]

Slavery was not unique to America. It was in Latin America, Canada, Africa, India, Arabia and pretty much everywhere else in the 18th century.

[kelaarin]

It's fanfiction, treat it as such.
It was not peer-reviewed, and was rejected by 97% of historians.

[Ston]

Frank Sinatra ended racism in Las Vegas. "If my musicians can't stay in the same hotel with me, I will NOT perform here." Franky "Blues Eyes" was also good friends with Carlo Gambino and Sam Giancana. You don't want to cross them either.

[joshuawells]

And this is why we should leave the writing of history to actual historians, not journalists.

[Arguewityamama]

This entire thing, the “1619 project” made my white gay ex coworker feel it was comfortable to come on my Facebook account (I’m a black woman) and reference slavery as being the root of MY ISSUES... 😬 this shrieks of liberal/leftist ludicrously

[kelvinbel]

Every culture in antiquity had slaves. Let's boycott the planet.

[concernedkid]

That was an excellent crash course debunking some of the mess set forth by people who want to divide our country! Well done!

[darkdudironaji]

"Racism is an unchangeable part of America" says the people calling for "black only" spaces and basing experiences on skin color.
Kind of shows their true colors.

[sniper]

Also, there was no US back in 1619, so there's that.

[TBustah]

Claiming that America was founded when the first slaves arrived also doesn’t make sense because there were other English settlements in what is now the USA and other parts of North America before 1619. Are we just supposed to forget about Jamestown (1607)? They were there first, they didn’t have slaves, and they laid much of the groundwork of the country. By the time those slaves showed up, Jamestown was thriving and had been the capitol of Virginia Colony for three years. The pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock a year after the slaves, but they didn’t keep any themselves (or at least, not at the time). Their Mayflower Compact had FAR more of an influence on the country’s foundation than slavery did, and they actually made a point to befriend the Indians (even if it didn’t last).

Speaking of which, even if you want to make the case that America WAS founded on the oppression of non-whites, why 1619? The Spanish had been in Florida for just over a century by that point. Isn’t it a bit ethnocentric for these black activists to claim that their ancestors’ plight was a bigger influence than that of those conquered indigenous people, especially when it came first? XD

[Notourtube]

Everything is wrong with the 1619 project!

[jakezgab]

Thomas Sowell should be invited to PragerU to tape a video. Good patriot.

[LalakiProductions]

When even leftist historians reject your work, you know you did something wrong.

[kimberlyhovis]

Thank you so much for your videos.

On a side note, anyone who really believes that the US was founded in 1619, has obviously not read the Declaration of Independence.

[comical]

"The United States was founded in 1619 when the first slave..."

Dismissed.

[everythingstemporary]

Why is it that no other country is having their starting date from when they started African slavery? Why just the US?

[eiei]

The sad thing is lots of Gen Z actually believes nonsense like the 1619 project.

[SPQR]

Abstract:
What's Wrong With The 1619 Project?

*EVERYTHING*

[raquell]

What racism is left, is only because people keep making it an issue by talking about it