Democrats in the Pennsylvania Senate bemoan a “pie-in-the-sky” approach to America’s history taken by the Trump administration after crowbars and wrenches removed mentions of slavery at a historic Philadelphia attraction.
That attraction is the President’s House, an exhibit built on the site where presidents George Washington and John Adams once owned slaves. On Jan. 22, the National Park Service, on directions from acting regional director Steven Sims, took exhibits off walls and turned off educational videos.
The materials are now in storage. Philadelphia subsequently sued the federal government for allegedly violating the cooperative agreement they had, and a group of Pennsylvania state senators is supporting its cause.
“It is not just about the reach of the President’s executive orders to remove historical displays,” they wrote in a brief filed with a Philadelphia federal court Thursday.
“It concerns the profound divisive effect that will result from gutting this nation’s history of an entire people from the eyes of our constituencies and the minds of our children – many of which descend from enslaved persons – in order to rewrite some pie-in-the-sky narrative of America’s history as the powerful and privileged wish to see it.”
President Trump’s March executive order told the Department of the Interior to make sure national parks do not “contain descriptions, depictions, or other content that inappropriately disparage Americans past or living (including persons living in colonial times).”
But that contrasts with the mission of the President’s House. Washington and Adams once lived at a house on the site, and Philadelphia and the federal government agreed in 2006 to design a somewhat-restored version that tells the stories of those who were enslaved there.
Admission is free to the house, located on the corner of 6th and Market streets. It is designated as a National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom site and tells the stories of slaves like Oney Judge, who escaped the house after Martha Washington told her she would be given to Washington’s granddaughter as a wedding gift.
Philadelphia, it says, has an equal right to the design of the house and has spent $3.5 million on it. The lawsuit claims the federal government violated the Administrative Procedures Act in making a final agency decision that is arbitrary and capricious.
Democrat state senators who joined the fight are Nikil Saval, Vincent Hughes, Christine Tartaglione, Anthony Williams, Art Haywood and Sharif Street. The sudden loss of history is causing harm and anxiety to their constituents, they say.
“If we fail to take action now and restore our constituencies’ access to these historical displays in the City of Philadelphia, those in power will continue to chip away at our American story. And this does not represent the General Assembly’s longstanding intent,” they wrote.
The federal government has asked Judge Cynthia Rufe to reject Philadelphia’s request for an injunction. Among its arguments is that the case concerns a contract, which would require it be filed in the Court of Federal Claims. It’s a stance that has so far succeeded in a court battle with Gov. Josh Shapiro in a fight over federal money for food banks.
The decision was not a final agency decision that could be challenged under the Administrative Procedures Act, the feds say. And there is no “irreparable harm,” because the exhibits are in storage and can be re-displayed later, they argue.
“But this is fundamentally a question of Government speech,” the federal government says.
“The federal government ‘has the right to speak for itself’ and ‘to select the view it wants to express.’”
A hearing on the preliminary injunction is scheduled for today.
