- Originally published 4/28/04 in the Boston Globe [here]
Facing up to our ties to slavery
By Ruth J. Simmons
- Ruth J. Simmons is president of Brown University
PUBLIC DISCOURSE in the United States -- including that on many college
campuses -- is so saturated with emotional venting, name-calling, and
one-sided statements that fewer and fewer people are willing to discuss
serious ideas in an open setting. The tragic consequence of this
poisonous environment is that many able citizens will neither stand for
public office nor entertain a position that might expose them to this
indecorous behavior.
There are many who believe that universities have exacerbated this
problem by failing in their civic responsibility to create a platform
for the robust, uncontrived exchange of ideas. They complain that
because of the current competitive climate, fund-raising demands and
diverse composition of campuses, faculty, and administrators are
unwilling to take on difficult questions that might result in the
disaffection of any group.
Brown University's new Committee on Slavery and Justice, a faculty and
student investigation of an uncomfortable piece of our university's --
and our nation's -- history, is designed to foster discussion of the
difficult subject in ways that prepare students to engage in and
promote the meaningful exchange of ideas.
The committee was formed in the belief that powerful debate is one of
the hallmarks of intellectual engagement and that universities do well
when they encourage examination that rests on a factual rather than an
emotional basis. They also do well when they educate students about how
to accept and make use of the variety of valid approaches and opinions
that can proliferate on any one subject.
The purpose of this undertaking is to enable a group of scholars to
investigate the origins of Brown University, with attention to the
educational insights such a study might provide our students and the
wider community.
This review, though important in its own right, is especially important
for an institution like Brown that was founded in 1764, a period in our
nation's history when nearly all commerce and wealth was in some manner
entangled with the slave trade.
For example, construction of the university's first building involved
the labor of Providence-area slaves. Nearly all universities and
organizations with roots in this era have similar stories, often
revealed with varying levels of candor.
At Brown, many alumni and students have been offended by our
unwillingness to confront our past in an honest and forthright manner.
Understandably proud of their association with the university, they
asked that we clarify this history in the full light of what we could
uncover through rigorous scholarship.
In addition, in view of the often confusing and contentious discussion
of reparations, we wanted to move the examination away from a focus on
reparations to learn more about the many ways in which societies past
and present have dealt with retrospective justice following human
rights violations such as genocide, internment, and certain forms of
discrimination. We thought that our students would benefit from an
understanding of those histories and experiences.
Finally, we hoped that such an effort, rooted in our particular
history, would excite interest among students and help them appreciate
and accept meaningful discourse on even the most troubling subjects.
The committee's work is not about whether or how we should pay
reparations. That was never the intent nor will the payment of
reparations be the outcome. This is an effort designed to involve the
campus community in a discovery of the meaning of our past.
So often, students -- and citizens -- take the purpose of debate to be
that of stating to others their point of view rather than improving
their understanding by engaging strongly opposing arguments.
To the contrary, our Committee on Slavery and Justice brings together
different approaches and views to model the use of rigor, discipline,
breadth, objectivity, and diversity in the search for truth. The
committee therefore allows us to demonstrate how difficult,
uncomfortable and valuable this process can be.
Understanding our history and suggesting how the full truth of that
history can be incorporated into our common traditions will not be
easy. But then, it doesn't have to be.