segment by gerald ford from the oval office. but at the episode which a signature live from new york it's saturday night. so we did inject itself slightly into that show. but it was really ron who was a guest host, who was the start of many of the different skits that he was in and it's a really fascinating episode. i encoura you to watch the entire episode. >> watch the full program online anytime at c-span.org/history. just search kathryn brownell or the presidency. >> begins on c-span2 or an intellectual feast every saturday american history tv documents america's stories, and on some days booktv brings you the latest in nonfiction books and authors. funding for c-span2 companies television companies and more including charter communication

communications. >> chard is proud to be recognized as one of the best internet providers, and we're just getting started building 100,000 miles of new infrastructure to reach those who need it most. >> charter communications, along with these television companies, supports c-span2 as a public >> american history tv on social media. follow us at c-span history. >> we are so excited to be here to celebrate rachel warns for the "the 272: the families who were enslaved and sold to build the american catholic church." in 1838, a group of america's most prominent catholic priests sold 272 insulate people to save their largest mission m project, which is now georgetown

university. in this groundbreaking account, professors warns follows one family through nearly two centuries of enslavement to uncover the howling origin story of the catholic church in the united states. swarns is a journalist, author and associate professor of journalism at new york university writes about race and race relations as a contributing writer for the "new york times." articles about georgetown universities roots in slavery touched off a national conversation about america's universities and their ties to thisio painful time in history. our work has been recognized and supported by national endowment for humanities, the ford foundation, the leon levy center for biography, the biographers international organization, among others. as a correspondent for the times, she reported from russia, cuba, guatemala, and southern

africa and covered immigration and presidential politics in michelle obama and her role in the obama whiteth house. she is author of american tapestry, the story of the black-white and multiracial ancestors of michelle obama, and theth co-author of unseen, unpublished black history from the "new york times" archives. swarns will be joined in conversation today with michel martin, the host of learning edition. previously she was the weekend hostns of all things considered and host of the consider this saturday podcast where she do under deep reporting and interviewing experienced to dig in the weeks news. she spent more than 25 years as a journalist and has been honored by numerous organizations. at the now please join me in welcoming to politics and prose rachel swarns and michel martin. [applause] >> friendly amendment, a host of

morning edition. sorry. thank you for a host of morning edition. >> there are more of us to deny command trouble. >> welcome, and welcome home, neighbor. nice to be back in d.c. quite a journey. you know, how many of you read her original "new york times" piece in 2015? i know know it'ss been a while. you remember? do you ever wonder when somebody writes particularly deep reported article and then a book comes out, if there's more to say? do you ever like, is really more to say? >> i can assert that there is, and i was wondering why you understood when you understood that there was so much more to say. what was it at that the first piece which was so impactful answer deep reported and so shocking to some that made you understand that there was much more to say? >> well, it's so cool to be sitting alongside you and you

see you for so many years. litti even came to this story and it started in 2015. students were protesting at georgetown. they were concerned about two buildings that carry the names of two of the priests who happened to be early presidents all and the administration chd the names that the administration had been considering, changing the names even before that. but the the protest caught the eye of a georgetown alum, a ceo of a tech company in cambridge, who said, okay, protest about the buildings, about this history, change the names. but the 272, like what happened to them. and so he reached out to a faculty member at georgetown, as

i mentioned, georgetown had already been looking into this and trying to think about its own history and slavery and how to wrestle with it. and he said, okay, well, what happened to their descendants? and he was told they all died. and he said they all died like nearly 300 people. they all died. no descendants. and that seemed implausible to him. there were certainly other people in the working group at georgetown who thought there were descendants. but this guy said there weren't. and so this guy, richard cellini, said to himself, that makes up no sense. and richard was someone he's a white guy, ceo of a tech company, a republican guy who had not been involved in racial justice issues in any way before, but he loved georgetown. and he said, you know, like, i

think we kind of oh, you, you know, something to these people. we the existence is connected to these people. and so he hired a team of genealogists who started digging and trying to find descendants. and then he reached out to a colleague of mine at the times who was on the business side. business reporter rather and said, hey you know, i think i got an exclusive for the times about a slave sale in the 1830 that benefited georgetown. and she was kind of like, okay, interesting. is that even a story? and so it is my great, great fortune that she didn't just delete the email. i mean, you have to remember, this was before the 1619 project. you know, this kind of reporting wasn't tanahashi coates had done his case for reparations, but it wasn't the kind of reporting that we typically do. but she remembered that there was someone on the staff who had might have a sense of this and

she remembered the book i had done about michelle obama's ancestors tracing her enslaved back to the 1800s. so she forwarded the email to me and i knew immediately i knew it was a story. my reporting. michelle obama's ancestors had allowed me to explore how slavery shaped american families and. i thought that this would be the next step to look at how slavery shaped one of our elite institutions. so but what i didn't know was, you know, who who were the 272. and that's that's what i needed to find out what i wanted to find out. can i just tell you, i, i, i, i was so moved by every aspect of that story, which is i didn't understand the back story until i read the book that think about this. let's, can we just marinate in that for a minute. this white guy who had not thought very much about slavery or enslavement didn't have any connection to it and understands

that an institution that he cares deeply is deeply enmeshed in it, and he digs into his pocket, does some work, and then reaches out to you and your colleague reaches out to you and. there we have it. and i just think that, you know, it's first of all, that's reporting one on one, folks. for those of you who really do just what i always tell my interns, answer the mail, please, please, please, please don't read your email. please do read your email and i would say ask like a very fundamental question, which was just who were and what were their names, you know, this is the quote from a book you said this is not a disembodied group of people who are nameless and faceless. these are real people with real names and real descendants. and that's what that was his quote that's what he that's what he said. what he felt. in fact in fact, let us just ask if there are any among us today

who are directly connected to this story, will you show yourself so can the descendants? yeah. can you stand can we welcome you and honor you. thank you for being here. i thank you for being here. what did you she just said, say what you just said to. we're still here. my family in southern illinois right? yeah. and we are glad you're still here. thank you for being here. thank you for allowing your story to rise. your article focused on georgetown. in the book, it focuses on the bigger story of the role of slavery in the building of the american catholic church. as briefly as you can. what was it? why was so important, so, you know, i started again by looking at this sale, and i think it would be helpful to tell. just a quick story that will make you understand how i got from the sale to the larger

picture. and to do that, i just want to tell a story which i tell a lot. but i think as a journalist, i'm not a historian. i often think about when you're writing about slavery, being aware that there are a lot of folks who are going to say, oh, no, no, thank, you know, turn the page, turn your head and so how do you bring that story to people? how do you get people to hear? and the way i feel is the best way to get people to hear is to tell a story that's compelling, to introduce families that people might want to read about. so when i talk about the 272 and how i got to georgetown and then the catholic church, i like to bring people back to november of 1838 to give you a sense of what it was like for these people. and, you know, in 1838, these folks were brought from southern maryland to alexandria, virginia. and if you had been there, would

have seen them scores of people being loaded on to a ship forcibly loaded elderly people, parents, children, babies, witnesses describe people falling to their knees, weeping, begging for mercy. and these were people who were being torn from all the people they loved and the world that they knew, being being shipped, you know, down south. they were owned by the nation's most powerful jesuit priests. as you heard before, who happened to be among the slave holders in maryland. and they were selling these folks when times got hard, as people did, because they were their most prized assets and they wanted to save this school. and as i started digging and realizing, okay, wow, hey, i happened to be black and catholic, had no idea that priests were involved in the slave trade, no idea that slavery helped to save, you know, this institution.

i started looking at the priests and looking at this history and what i learned was it wasn't just georgetown, the jesuits built the early catholic church, first in the british colony. and then in early america. and these priests who relied on slave labor and slave sales built, you know, the first archdiocese, the first cathedral, all early convents priests who operated plantations and sold people built the first catholic seminary. so the underpinnings of the church were built by priests who were deeply, deeply involved in slavery. you write in the book, without the enslaved the catholic church in the united states as we know it today would not exist. that's right. one of the things that also struck me about the book is that you describe how oppression led

oppression the entire how interweave the various forms of oppression have been and i found that very, very interesting. and of course, upsetting. but could you talk a little bit about the catholic church and its attitude toward indigenous people and how the attitude toward indigenous people and a kind of a a transformation of its attitude toward indigenous people kind of led to its accept sense of the enslavement of people of african descent, which i found really fascinating. one of the things that's really fascinating about the catholic and its we should be very clear that it's not just the catholic church, right? it's protestant churches to you know, it's slavery's foundational for a lot of things. but the catholic priests, you know, there were white people who viewed black people as

animals. a purely catholic said, okay, no, we think they have souls and we want to nurture their souls, but we're okay about enslaving them and selling their bodies. and people say how is that possible? and what did rome have to say? and that's what michel is getting at. and it's slavery is an ancient practice, as we know. it's in the bible. the jesuits often pointed to it. saint paul talking about the response abilities of slaves and masters. when europeans went into africa and then into the americas, they enslaved indigenous people initially and there were protests by priests in rome, said, okay, we won't do that. but about but there was still this insatiable need for labor. and so africans filled that gap and the church rome remained silent about africans, too. and if you also want to look at you know, kind of oppression leading to oppression, you know,

the priests who came to maryland came from england where they were persecuted, catholics were persecuted. and maryland was a refuge for for catholics. but in trying to embed themselves and to be recognized as establishments of society, slavery was part of establishment society. that's that's what it was. and and they became part of that. it's important to know, though, that there were always voices who raised questions. the priests. there were priests. all along the way who had concerns about it. and also one of the other things that i found fascinating about the book is how at times when catholics were persecuted, not well, persecuted, done rapture, if that's the right word, but marginalized within the politics of maryland they turned to because protestants wouldn't work for them once again they turned to africans in order to

save their properties and their their kind of livelihoods and you share that you are also you identify as catholic from birth assume yeah cradle catholic. so do you do you mind if i ask how this recording how did it influence your kind of faith walk do did it challenge your faith walk in any way so you know i think it's interesting i was doing this work i'm catholic i'm a practicing and you know i'm going through these records and some of these records are i've been doing this kind of research a long time. but, you know, bracing records, getting used to seeing if you were if you were writing about enslaved people, you were writing about people who are viewed as property. so that's what you're looking for.

you're looking for tax here. you're looking for property. you see these estate records that list, you know, the coffee tables, the tablecloths the pigs, the dishes and the list of the human beings. so that's sobering. and then i'm going to mass right here. so but, you know, i think what has been interesting to me is the families themselves and the experience of the families themselves. i tell the story of one family in particular, the mahoney family and and the matriarch of that family, a woman by the name of angie arrives in the 1600s. not just a few decades after the first priests arrive. and she's a free person. she's an indentured servant whose freedom stolen. she's forced into slavery by catholic gentry. but she holds on to the one thing that she has, which is her

story. and she tells who will listen that she should have been free and that her her liberty was stolen. and she tells her children that her grandchildren that that story has passed on. people in her family, her descendants resist. some of them are, one or two of them killed and overseer and executed. they go to court. they sue the jesuits, some of them, when their freedom that way, some of them don't harry mahoney saves the church his wealth in the war of 1812 and garners a pledge from the jesuits that his he neither he nor his family will ever be sold. and that's a pledge that's broken in 1838. so. at times the priests were quiet and black people to go to mass to participate in the sacraments. there were penalties for not doing that. there is an instance where of

two families, a priest decided that two families who had engaged in fidelity be punished. he sold their children. and so after the civil war, what did families do? you can ask, you know, would you stay catholic after your year? the priest said split up your family and so folks interestingly you know people a number of people stayed a number of people left thousands left because. the church remained segregated afterwards. but members of this mahony family, many of them stayed not only they stay, but they became lay leaders. some of them became religious leaders, and they worked to make the church true to its ideals of being a universal church. they set up black parish is to joined, became nuns and ran schools for black children. some of their descendants are

catholic to this day. and those record it's actually those sacramental records have been really important to genealogy and to myself in terms of tracking these families and you know and these descendants who are among us many of them still catholic have been in the forefront of pressing the church. and george to recognize this history. i look those folks and in a crazy way, you know, i find inspiration there. i see folks who said to themselves, church does not belong to the sinful men who are in it. this church, they don't control god. they don't control, you know, the son, the holy spirit, none of that. and and it was their church. and they decided to make it that. and to me, that inspires me. so i'm still going. one, i want to remind you that this is a conversation that we

cannot participate in. there's only sadly there's one mic there. and i hate to make this a fitness, but my recommendation would be that we're going to to questions from you in just a minute. two. so if you have one that you want to share if you would perhaps begin making your way to the microphone and what you've mentioned that you're not an historian, but, you know, historians and journalists are basically in conversation each other. and i'd like to ask, you know, we call it the first draft of history. and you all that i don't i don't know what the appropriate digital term would be. the personal history. i'm not sure what the right is that even first. you know, not even using that word of. but what was the most i don't know as a this wasn't really how you got started in journalism, right? you get started in journalism kind of chronicle what's around you right now, not what happened. 304 hundred years ago. so i was just interested in whether was there any part of

yourself that you had to to sort of transform from in order to do this work or you had to change your practice in some way or there was a lot of learning involved. i realized that there was so much about american history, even as a reasonably educated person that i just didn't know. i've always been a records person. i covered courts early in my career, local courts, federal courts. so i've always been a records person as a journalist. so records have been like kind of important to and interesting to me. so learning. i had to learn a whole swath of of records. but i, i think, i've also been someone who always loved a good mystery and the hunt for me is really, really interesting and it was really when i got started on article that led me to the book about michelle obama. i was searching for her great great grandfather. who was born into slavery and was biracial.

and i had gone to a cemetery and i was amazed. i could go to the archives and find where he was buried. the plot, you know, the number who was next? him. i thought, you know, i, i had everything i had it all together and then i got to this cemetery and it was in birmingham. and this old, neglected african american cemetery with the grass up to my knees and the tombstones. and many of you may know that even the dead were segregated. right in the day in the south. so i spent an entire day there, completely unsuccessful. i never found his tombstone, but there was something about that. just something about that that that grabbed me. and i thought, you know, actually there is like nothing i'd rather be doing than this. and i came home to my husband. i said, good lord, i don't know what happened. something happened to me out there, like, maybe i need to get another degree. he's like, maybe not that. not that. and then i wrote this imagery of

two kids is he's like, what are you doing? mentioned. but you know, when a publisher approached me after that story and he said, okay, that's the thing. and so that's that's what it was just kind this i don't know, this weird thing that just kind of got me that i joke it's my midlife crisis the 19th century and i don't know yeah. let's go to your conversation, your questions, thoughts now. and please join us. and we know who we are. so we would love to know who you are. that's okay. yes, i'm my name is nathan weisler, and i'm a my name is nathan, and i'm a recent graduate of montgomery college and i now live overseas and in hoping to teach american history in schools overseas. that something i really feel very passionately about. i began reading the book and one

thing that struck me in particular was reading about the story of solomon northup, in particular, and in particular about, and the particular about the very emotional details of his homecoming. and what i was wondering is, what i was wondering is, what i was wondering is in the course of your research what did you think, what did you think was, what did you believe to be among the most striking parallels and contrast between the story of solomon and that of an and louisa? >> okay. it's a good question. first for those, solomon northup was a slave, was a free black man, was kidnapped, so back in a slave and, of course, from

having to pay compensation for people who are wrongly re-enslaved. >> right. >> and his story is very instructive because, as i mentioned, one of the challenges when you're writing about insulate people is, is the material, frankly. it's like really, really hard to find the material. you know, enslaved people were a lot and i practice barred from learning toth read and write. so the kinds of things she would rely on, letters, journals and i can of thing, are not there. sore you're looking for those records that areyo mentioned, ad you also looking for contemporary voices of people at the time who can illuminate something for you. solomon northup was summoned toe a shift to louisiana and wrote very vividly about a lot of things, about what new orleans was like, about what the plantation life was like. and that was very instructive.

he alsoo wrote about being reunited with his family and, unfortunately, that was not something that happened to the two two sisters who were split by the sale. but his experience was very helpful and you get to his voice, which is helpful. thank you. >> i am visiting from new york. great talk. i'm wondering if also reading about the other scandal which broke about catholic church and whether there's an overlap. that is the thing of talk but is the boarding school. was her overlap in terms of the same church organization over both of these are how was that? >> i think you're talking about the indigenous -- >> the boarding school, yeah. i'm glad you mentioned that because i've not want my sort of introduction of the subject

about oppression leading to oppression for people to think indigenous people were so beautifully treated because we are now seeing -- >> right, right. >> the wayth in which the operative phrase was sort of killed the indian to save the man. but t horrendous abuses that wee people were subjected to ambition only spiritually and all that is coming to light now. the truth is i don't have an answer for you. i wish i did. i don't. you know, i can certainly see and ask the same kinds of questions because there are certainly feels like there are parallels there. >> i could see the peril of being that people whoth have the power felt they had the authority to develop different grades of humanity, you know? you with this level of human and you with this level of human, and if you want this level of human this is what you get. i think that seems to be sort of all of a piece.

>> and caring families apart, right? >> and destroying the culture and substituting your own. >> others? others would like to join our conversation? >> i just wanted to mention that michelle was also on "nightline" for decades. >> i was 12. [laughing] >> anyway, i guess i don't even know where to begin here. you know, selling slaves, i mean, they sold slaves to stay in business and then they molested thousands and thousands of children. i have a really hard time with this. >> where are you going with this, margie? >> well, i just think you know it's you sortua of shocking peoe

when hear all this, even the cardinal who was the cardinal of the dishes of columbia is now, he was defrocked and now he's being, he's been re-indicted and for what he did, and it's like, do these people have no shame? i mean, it's okay to sell slaves? it's okay to molest kids? i don't know. what is religion about if this is what you do when you're a religious person? i don't know. i just, you know, i was wondering if any of this came into, and if any of these slaves, you know,w, i mean many slaves were impregnated and things like that. so does any of this come into your storyline of you know some of these people are probably descendents of some of the slave owners. a beade is even a priest. any of thiss ever come out? >> summit book doesn't deal at all with this sex scandals in the church.

you know, and there is lots of work in journalism, very important work in journalism that has been done to expose that. and ii would say that what i do is try to show kind of what, how slavery fueled the growth of the church, how, what the priests did, how they treated people. again, i'm mindful of the fact that it wasn't just the catholic church. episcopal church, all the protestant church, baptist, i mean this was, this was sadly it was what was happening at the time. but you know it is an ugly, ugly history. there's no way around it. and the reason why it shocked me was because enslaved people have been left large it out of the story but the catholic church traditionally tells about

itself. and that'sd true. it's also true though, and important to note,s that as a mitch and before that they were priests who raised questions and concerns about this. it's important because one thing that you often hear when you are talking about slavery is we are studying slavery is people who say don't bring your morality to the table here. it was legal, it was the time. you can't bring your 21st century judgments to it. but the truth is that within the catholic church at the time they were priests who were raising questions. there were priests who were protesting. there were priests who, one of the priests i write about in the book is a guy by the name of joseph carberry who ran a plantation where this mahoney family was enslaved here and when he learned that this sale was coming, he objected.

and when he was overruled when the tradersam gain come he encouraged members of the family to run. now, what's complicated about that, i think oh gosh, joseph carberry is awesome, but some of the mahoney is france, i mentioned the sisters, and and louisa. lisa runs with the mother, hides. the ship leaves, takes her sister and another family other family members, louise and her mother returned to the plantation where they're welcome to back by joseph into slavery where they remain, louisa remained. she's one of the last people in the records of my comp enslaved by the jazz woods. so it a complicated situation but, you know, unfortunately, it just wasn't in the purview of the reporting i did. i didn't deal with the sexual

scandal. >> did the ever apologize? >> yes. >> who else would like to join our conversation? >> hello. my name is kylie matthews and on the fourth great-granddaughter of louisa mahoney. i'm alsoin a rising fashion at georgetown law of right now and, and from what i've experienced, i would say that the university is more responsive, or they tend to be more reactive than proactive in their accountability efforts and are especially motivated by press and media. some wondering from the v pointf view of a journalist what you think the most effective way to kind of keep like preserve this narrative and keep attention on this story would be just with like our collective attention spans the way it is.

.. so in 2016, one of the things that georgetown did was offer or what is, in effect, legacy status or preface preference in admissions to descendants who were interested in going to georgetown and changed the names of the building is, as you know, created an institute which is now coming online and then. created a fund. students actually protested and said, hey, you know, georgetown, you need to do more need to do more for these defendants and they have a referendum passes we will test ourselves, who looking to raise money for descendents because they felt the university should dodo more. no, we're not going to do that the race for the thousand year programs.

that way figure $200,000 was just a bit of the judgment for their part apologized. descendad promised to raise $100 million to benefit racial reconciliation programs and programs for descendants, that would be the large just effort made by the roman catholic church in america. address this history. it has had a slow start. they have not as much money as they had hoped and. as you know, as you might imagine, descendants are, you know, have mixed feelings about all of these things and are asking, you know, could more be done? you know, how should this look? they have their own ideas about how this should look so question you ask is kind of how to kind of keep them focused on on what

needs to happen. you i'm a journalist so you know i'm not in the advocacy. you know, i'm not laying. yeah, that's not what i do. but i certainly can say from from experience and just in the story, you know, pressure from students and raising attention, issues involving has certainly drawn attention. and you know, in covering institution and we've done a lot of that, you know that sometimes can be i would say that know people georgetown has been criticized on all sides descendants by people who think they need to do more by alums who are like what are you doing and where why? where are you going with this? what is certainly true is that georgetown and the jesuits have been, you know, right in the thick of what is now a growing

movement among institutions and municipalities around the country to acknowledge and try to grapple with this history. we're talking about places like evanston and, you know, the state of california. so this is all happening here. you know, i never thought i would see. and the question you're asking is, you know, how do we make them do more? i think part of that is what what you guys have done is descendants, which was when my first story ran only the georgetown memory project. richard schilling, these independent nonprofit, had identified a handful of descendants. you know there are now known least 6000 descendants and and when people found out this history and you can imagine kind of what it might be like to find out this kind of history that your ancestors were sold to save this institution.

people i like to say people wept, people raged, and then they organized. and i think that organization and that pressure has, you know, had an impact. let me ask you this, though, because we've we've had two questions now about. thank you for about, you know, history, teaching of history and what role that history should play in our current moment. you know, your book arrives at a moment of backlash about the even teach ing history that this kind of history in institutions, not just, you know, colleges and in people being, you know, fired. that's right. you know, showing classic works i think you talked about the fact you started this work. you know, your book, your your initial article landed before or some of the work that has become sort of polarizing, like the 6019 project for whatever fair or unfair sort of the critiques about it. but your book now lands in a moment where literally people are getting works thrown out of

the classroom because one person complains, because one person doesn't like it. i'm just interested in your take on that. yeah. i mean, i think we all know that history is a battleground right now and particularly history involving race and history involving, you know, the teaching about race and slavery. and for me, even when i first wrote that first article in 2016, this kind of work felt urgent. it feels even more urgent to me now. did it feel dangerous, though? no. mean there are i have either colleagues of yours who. no longer allow their addresses to be known. i've done interviews with them where they won't let us, what city they're in because of fear. the threats to their families and children that a fact. right. so right. i'm just curious if right so if feels if it feels similarly fraught presenting this work. i mean this is a very the people you've come here voluntarily you are clearly very interested in open and receptive to. you know what rachel has to say and the work that she has done. i guarantee you it might not be the same in other.

and so yeah, i think i think we as journalists, i think we all are more mindful than we might have been a couple of years ago. certainly, i should say that members of my family have thought about, you know, and worried a bit about it in terms of, you know, where this lands and how people respond. but as i said, you know, to me, it feels it feels urgent. and, you know, i can't shy away from from doing the work. but i'm also and and mindful and careful, sir. my name is brett. and wednesday, i was driving to the grocery store. i decided to turn on fresh air with terry gross. and you are. and i was feeling great it was wonderful day and. 15 minutes unless i can really get into the story and 30

minutes or less. i started getting angry 45 minutes or less. i was furious. so typically piggyback on some of the comments. if 45 minutes were left, i got that angry. how do you do your research without reading your teeth along the way and with the universities that's widespread. who'd from slavery with affirmative action decision coming down soon right. how do the universities are compelled since race is the focal point with the decision if it comes down against affirmative action, how does that handcuff the university's ease with this legacy issue that exposed? is is this all of a sudden a different kind of issue that they're going to have that the

courts but the schools, will they be handcuffed now because of a decision when now we have legitimate reasons why this legitimacy is. but anyway, you know what i'm talking about, right? you've got two questions there. one is about a, how do you how do you do this work? and as i mentioned, it's not it's not easy work to do. there are times, you know, where, you know. come across a document i read something and i just i just have to just i just stop. i have to take a breath and close my eyes and take another breath and i going because we need to know if i don't look and

if i look away, then, you know, i think this work needs to be done. so you so i keep reading when you get up to the next morning, is it difficult to approach knowing what you get ready to get into, you know, so here's the thing is, you're right. it's. it is heartbreaking. it's it's terrifying. i mean, some sometimes i what i do, i think, again, as a journalist to be able tell the story, i need to kind of put myself there. so i've conversations with my son, who's a teenager. and, you know, i think about those sisters, louisa and anna and the priest telling them, you've got to run. and i had two children, young children. they had elderly parents. what do you do? do you run? what do you do?

you know, i, i, you know, those things weigh on me, you know. but but the thing that's important to know, though, too, is that this is a story of heartbreak for sure. but it is also a story of resistance and struggle. it's also a story of family and faith and remember that i came to this as someone, a catholic woman who had never heard that catholic enslaved anybody. i had never heard anything. i did not know about these people. so i very motivated and to tell a story that i felt had not been told. enslaved people had been left out of the. and so that what kept me going now on affirmative i was going to say that we've got about five who would love to be part of our conversation. yes you to a quick movie movie so you know i would say

affirmative is colleges i'm a professor at nyu colleges all across the country are bracing for this and readying for it. it's not, you know, part of my purview but you're right that a lot of are going to be trying to figure out what to do and and i will leave it alone. well, i asked toni morrison that question once, that story that you just asked. i asked her, you know, because some of her books are so deeply disturbing. and so the details and i said, is it hard for you to write these stories? she said, as hard as it was to live them right. hi. how how is everyone this evening? my name is julie hawkins and is i am from southern maryland. my mom was from st mary's. my dad was from charles. i grew up strictly catholic where i came from in southern maryland like she said earlier, where we're from, that was the seat of catholicism. i know any of the religion until i left st county to go to college because everybody i grew up with was catholic. catholic catholicism wasn't it wasn't a religion for us. it was our way of life.

so i didn't hear this story until about 2015. i on ancestry and our history was we're from here. we were from southern maryland, nowhere else. i kept connecting to someone down in louisiana and alabama and we went back and forth about, well, i know you're from the deep south, yada, yada make the story short because long winded about 2016, i started hearing about the grew to seven to also my son was at gonzaga college school in washington d.c. which also benefited right which also benefited with the students there because of the story started doing their own research of the people at gonzaga. my son thomas's mom there talking about your home, st mary's and the priest, as he said. so old people from southern maryland. my grandmother had just we came from a family where i mean i had friends that would come down white friends that felt we were

part italian because my grandmother would be saying the rosary every day. that's all we knew i mean, seriously, every day. no being if you needed something. she knew every saint to call to get you going. if you lost something of it. you know, you catholics know what i mean. it's not just the catholic, okay, so bridget, celine is a friend of mine. i started talking to richard and he started filling me in along with other duties. 17. but here's the thing from people. for me, being from southern maryland, i'm not a part of the families that was sold, but we are the part of the fans who lost family. right. and we want to find them. as a matter of fact, i'll go ahead and do my little stint now. but we're doing i got money from georgetown, me and a team to do a gathering in maryland over labor day weekend. so anybody that would like to come who is a descendant, we would welcome you because the maryland side, we're still trying to figure out who are the people we lost. but my family. we have etonians, i have bona. she knows the surnames. i'm a hawkins. we have dorsey. have a mason and we're still in maryland. but let me tell you this.

when i found this out, i was so glad my grandmother just passed i was so glad because she would have been devastated. we looked up, i mean, catholics. so it was our way of life. when i found out i like someone just said, i cried, i became angry. and i even thought about the catholic church. i'm catholic to this day. my entire family had to think through it, talk myself through it. but this is what i want to know. and just like just said, i grew up five miles from newtown manor, about ten miles from saint, and it goes my grandmother's bones family was from some kind of a plantation. these are the plantations. we never heard this story at all. i went to catholic school. everybody i had priest and nuns, and then i came from a community that was very you know, they honored their black history. they on it. we never heard this story. i've never heard of it. never we never heard it from the we never heard it from the jesuits. would i guess, you know, never think about they wouldn't want you to know. we never heard about it. i was even wondering, you know,

like my grandmother, i was one and it was so much trauma. people were hiding that they just didn't talk about it. and as the generations went on, it just went away because i'm from south america, i'm from all these areas where the plantations were. yeah, well, i feel like there's a book in you and you might consider. everybody keeps telling me, well, one you like that? did you have a specific question for rachel? you know, i just wanted to share that, but i did have the question. do you think it was that we did not know about this at all? so i think sometimes it was, you know, there's some some families where people have told me they thought their elders deliberately didn't tell them, i will say this, i don't mean to cut you off. my grandfather used to tell me in his family as she grew up at newtown manor, but they were free people of color right. but he used to tell me that his great grandmother would always say, you know, they sold some of us down the river. right. and i had no idea what that was until this. and i think he was talking about

the good, too. so thanks for sharing that. yeah and can we have you join us? hi i'm lorraine carter. my question is quick. i'd like know because you are journalists and you say because you're a journalist, you're kind of director of your information as far as being a journalist, what i wanted to know, once you started this book, once this book was exposed, what kind of dialog did you with the diet, the diaries that the these. yeah, right. and the interaction you had because now you have this exposure and everyone, particularly in america, this is a hidden story that is not being told. so you are telling the story and wanting to know as far as have i have looked back sure know what your position okay and even though you say you're a journalist, what is your position to bring to bring it further for more for the

catholic church, just like georgetown an endowment and i understand giving out scholarships whatever this is not compared to what happened to the people in maryland. so i'm wondering, because you have the what the direct. line to be having a dialog with them have you had that in what. if you have had it, what was the outcome or what is being actually done right? it's not what they're giving the people that are enslaved because america, most of us are people. we're in say this is just one portion. yeah. so, you know, again, i am a journal so i don't get involved with, you know, directing policy or even advocate for things what, what i am very involved in and care and what my next stage

of my work is trying to create. i'm working on creating a digital archive of that would it's not just universities it's not just the catholic church, other religious organizations. it's banks, it's insurance companies. i want to create a digital archive where the data sets of. those records are available so that journalists scholar, community members, families can see them and then take steps that they want to take that communities want to take advocates want to take. but it's not it's not my role as a journalist. and also so what you were saying that there was no actual direct interaction with the diocese with, you know. yeah, i don't not certainly not in terms of. no one's asking me you no one from the catholic church is asking me or hey rachel swarns what should we do?

or like it's just not the role that i play. it's not okay. yeah. so you just wrote the book. so this is exposure for that. do want to take it further, right? you know, there's a similar project it's very interesting in the united kingdom where, the people who whose vast fortunes, including members of the royal, were built on enslavement, particularly in the islands. and it's very interesting to see these folks reckon with, in fact, there was a journalist who actually left the bbc, when she realized that, you know that's so interesting. yeah. who once she realize that you know her family had been and she wanted to dig into it further she she couldn't do both. so she has now decided decided that that is going to be her focus. her focus? yes, ma'am. we can we can go just pull it down. yeah. yeah, just. okay, i'm just just. yeah, just talk, okay? just talk. okay. so they work. oh, rachel, i want to publicly acknowledge you and thank you.

we talked back in, of course, may of 2016 after the article with, the breaking big article. we has a mixing. oh, by the way, my name is rochelle prater, but wanted to thank you because i, i know the title that article was a million questions, which i had at the time. and thank god a lot of them have been answered. but the point i wanted to make clear, i said something to you in an article that i felt like i won the lottery and. for those people who may look at that article and read that article, i want to share is the emotional because my family was some of the family that was to louisiana and how i won the lottery. i've had so much in my life. family loss there's gone and would have loved to have known

this history and understood it. but now i have cousin julie. i have cousin peggy. i have cousin jeremy. i have cousin kevin porter. one of the things that has happened is that families have now found each other these families that were split by the sale have found each other. so so that splits your efforts. that is the return on that story breaking is that we are reuniting and this is failure in african-american community. this typically doesn't happen and it continues to happen every day. and just like julie, our hearts beat at one on that goal, we go find as many as we and we to come together, as many as we can. and for the lady that was before, that's how we impact how to deal with this history not only know on a national and a world level. thank you so much and i think

this will be our final as you. yes. hello. and then after your ritual and i put you on the spot i'd like you to kind of give us a concluding fire after this lady shares her her thoughts with us. just give us something to take. i just want to thank you. and i'm really looking forward to your archive of records my family name also includes the name, camp and given. but we're from virginia and given the exchange and trafficking of people in the delmarva peninsula, i that more records will be useful to. me too because that research is hard to do. and i also wanted to push back gently on this concept that it was oppression that bred oppression, giving the people bulls that came down centuries before. and the catholic that basically said enslaved to build the new world, just want to know what you think of that and know if you could just expand on that

when you say that the papal. yes, these were i knew. okay. but what you said earlier that that the priests somewhat you know, they had to enslave people because they couldn't enslaved native people, you know. no. well, first of all, let me just say that that that was not racialist phrasing. that was one of the things i was saying, is that what was interesting to me that i learned from the book was that how well, i mean, don't we see this in the world today, you know, you are angry and afraid, so you then oppress somebody else because you're angry and afraid and a sort of i mean, given it as law, i'm just wondering, because the people bills were law once those came down, it just became the motive operation versus that being because you were oppressed in europe. i just think, you know, i just pushing back that, wondering your comments response to that. yeah. and just so that i'm clear, the you're talking about when i said what the when they came and were

seeing themselves as persecuted and feeling like they wanted to join, you know, nice society be part of that it was kind of pushing them away, that kind of thing yeah so they they, i mean they did talk about that know they didn't talk about, you know, wanting to be. the truth is, of course, that it was the economy me and that they were also you're absolutely right, very explicit about what their intentions were and why they were doing both terms of rome, in terms of, you know, enslaving people. you was part of conquest in and about, you know, about money and and with the sale even the priest who was pushing the hardest for it had a vision of building schools in the northeast. and he was very, very, very clear that in order to do that,

he would need money and the jesuits would need money to do it. and this was the way that they were going to do it. i said, thank you. so, rachel, thank you for spending this evening with us. thank all of you for being here and spending this time with us. and i understand you're going to sign signs and also sign some books, but i just was wondering if i could just ask to kind of leave us with a concluding thought. i mean, there's so much here. there's so much. it's just, as you said, it's a story of heartbreak. it's a story of love it's a story of resistance. it's a story of reunion. it's a story of a family and coming, families broken apart by violence. families brought together through love and persistence. and i just. yes, wondering about that. but i and you said that so nicely yourself. but i guess if would just kind of give us a concluding thought, like when do you would you put your you close your laptop night

and when you thought about what this project has meant to you and to the families, what is it that comes to mind? what what do you what do you when you're going to go on to another project some point? but i'm just saying what, what has this meant to you? i'm i think it's important for these folks, these folks who are long gone to be seen and and be recognized and to be acknowledged. and i think that it's important for us as american is to understand that this is our history. i think the work that i do, i'm from a historian and that, you know, i'm engaged with the past, but i'm engaged with the past because i'm really interested in how we live with this history and what we do with it. and so i think what matters to me is, again, that we are we are of it that we interrogate history, that we don't just you

know, journalists are accustomed to this. right. if there's if the ceo is handing you a financial record your asking questions, ask questions, the history that you've been taught, why is it that you don't things and and i think just recognize using these folks and having them seen is really important rachel swarns descendants all of you, thank you all so much for being here. thank professo rert discussed barack obama's 2004 hundred national convention. here is a portion. >> you seen the bulk of the bands and the main strategies but democrats are committed to

basic american values. he emphasizes that when he talked about the idea that parents need to read to the kids, he talks about what he called the slander, defense or welfare. he makes it very clear he's committed to hard work, patriotism and he's done that he talks about patriotism going after a real enemy. you see how they go directly stating has to committed to basic american values and he confronts both of what i talked about. he says democrats, we are patriotic and o'clock after our enemies.

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latest in nonfictio books and authors. funding for c-span2 from these television companies and mark including cox. >> when you're connected, you're not alone. >> cox along with these levion companies c-span2 as a public service. >> c-span's american history tv continues, people had a full schedule on the prayer from god for c-span.org/history. so sorry. i always get nervous. this is actually one of the hardest lectures that i give, and it's because there's this mixture of history, but there's also some personal stories in it. and for me, i just kind of a little bit of background. so for those of you that don't know or have heard who's ever heard of the ludlow massacre,