IA
119THCONGRESS
1
STSESSION H. J. RES. 67
Supporting the designation of August as ‘‘Slavery Remembrance Month’’,
to serve as a reminder of the evils of slavery, its continuing effects,
and the freedom fighters who fought to end this horrific crime against
humanity.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
MARCH3, 2025
Mr. G
REENof Texas (for himself, Mr. CLEAVER, Mrs. MCIVER, Ms. NORTON,
and Mr. J
ACKSONof Illinois) submitted the following joint resolution;
which was referred to the Committee on Oversight and Government Re-
form
JOINT RESOLUTION
Supporting the designation of August as ‘‘Slavery Remem-
brance Month’’, to serve as a reminder of the evils of
slavery, its continuing effects, and the freedom fighters
who fought to end this horrific crime against humanity.
Whereas this resolution may be cited as the ‘‘Original Slavery
Remembrance Month Resolution’’;
Whereas it was during the month of August in the year
1619, that the enslavement of African people in the
American colonies destined to become the United States
of America occurred;
Whereas the House of Representatives and the Senate recog-
nize August as ‘‘Slavery Remembrance Month’’ and com-
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memorate the lives of all enslaved people while also con-
demning the perpetration and perpetuation of slavery in
the United States of America and across the world;
Whereas the following Members of Congress are post-
humously recognized, individuals who served during and
after the Reconstruction Era, as honorary cosponsors of
this resolution: the Honorable Joseph Hayne Rainey
(SC–01), Member of Congress from 1870 to 1879; Jef-
ferson Franklin Long (GA–04), Member of Congress
from January 1871 to March 1871; Robert Carlos De
Large (SC–02), Member of Congress from 1871 to 1873;
Robert Brown Elliott (SC–3), Member of Congress from
1871 to 1874; Benjamin Sterling Turner (AL–01), Mem-
ber of Congress from 1871 to 1873; Josiah Thomas
Walls (FL-At Large), Member of Congress from 1871 to
1876; Alonzo Jacob Ransier (SC–02), Member of Con-
gress from 1873 to 1875; Richard Harvey Cain (SC-At
Large), Member of Congress from 1873 to 1875 and
1877 to 1879; John Roy Lynch (MS–06), Member of
Congress from 1873 to 1877 and 1882 to 1883; James
Thomas Rapier (AL–02), Member of Congress from
1873 to 1875; Jeremiah Haralson (AL–01), Member of
Congress from 1875 to 1877; John Adams Hyman (NC–
02), Member of Congress from 1875 to 1877; Robert
Smalls (SC–07), Member of Congress from 1875 to 1879
and 1882 to 1883 and 1884 to 1887; James Edward
O’Hara (NC–02), Member of Congress from 1883 to
1887; Henry Plummer Cheatham (NC–02), Member of
Congress from 1889 to 1893; John Mercer Langston
(VA–04), Member of Congress from 1890 to 1891;
Thomas Ezekiel Miller, Member of Congress from 1890
to 1891; George Washington Murray (SC–01), Member
of Congress from 1893 to 1895 and 1896 to 1897; and
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George Henry White (NC–02), Member of Congress from
1897 to 1901;
Whereas there are seminal moments in the annals of time
that affect the rest of time;
Whereas, during the month of August in the year 1619, a
sinful seminal moment in time occurred that invidiously
sculpts and shamefully yet haunts the United States of
America;
Whereas August 20, 1619, became a seminal moment in time
when the first 20 enslaved Africans were brought against
their will to what was then Point Comfort, now Fort
Monroe, in Hampton, Virginia, and forced into chattel
slavery;
Whereas all, including Africans, who captured, enslaved, and
sold captives to transatlantic slave traders are condemned
for their perpetration and perpetuation of the evils of en-
slavement;
Whereas, over the period of the Atlantic slave trade, from ap-
proximately 1526 to 1867, millions of humans were ab-
ducted and shipped from Africa, and approximately
10,700,000 arrived in the Americas as personal property;
Whereas the majority of enslaved Africans brought to British
North America arrived between 1720 and 1780;
Whereas about 6 percent of African captives were sent di-
rectly to British North America;
Whereas, by 1825, in what has been called the New World,
the United States included about 25 percent people of
African descent;
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Whereas the deadly, wicked Middle Passage from West Africa
to the West Indies was dangerous and horrific for
enslaved people;
Whereas mothers, fathers, children, sisters, brothers, aunts,
uncles, cousins, as well as people from all walks of life,
including artisans, traditional healers, spiritual leaders,
agriculturists, artists, chefs, blacksmiths, merchants, and
educators, survived the wicked Middle Passage only to
suffer the evils of slavery in the Americas;
Whereas, according to some historians, about 12 percent of
the enslaved people who embarked did not survive the
voyage;
Whereas sharks have been said to have followed the slave
ships to feed on bodies of slaves thrown overboard;
Whereas, although the enslaved sexes were separated, men,
women, and children were often kept naked, packed close
together, and the men were chained for long periods;
Whereas enslaved people suffered a variety of miserable and
often fatal maladies as a result of being subjected to in-
humane living and working conditions;
Whereas infant and child mortality rates were twice as high
among enslaved children as among Southern White chil-
dren;
Whereas enslaved people often worked from before sunup to
after sundown, 6 to 7 days a week, often without suffi-
cient food;
Whereas enslaved Black families lived with the perpetual,
dreadful fear of separation caused by the depravity of 1
or more family members being sold;
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Whereas it is estimated that approximately one-third of
enslaved children in the upper Southern States of Mary-
land and Virginia experienced family separation through
the sale of parents, including the sale of mothers or fa-
thers away from children;
Whereas many of the enslaved, liberated enslaved, freed, and
abolitionists have not received their righteous status in
history as freedom fighters;
Whereas Prince Hall, a Black freedman, lived in colonial
Boston, Massachusetts, circa 1735 to 1807;
Whereas Prince Hall was an ardent pioneer abolitionist,
human rights activist, and freedom fighter who preceded
Sojourner Truth, John Brown, Nat Turner, and Harriet
Tubman during the American Revolutionary period;
Whereas, in 1775, after being denied by an all-White Masonic
lodge, freedom fighter Prince Hall and 14 other free
Black freedom fighters formed their own lodge;
Whereas freedom fighter Prince Hall was elected as the lead-
er, or ‘‘Worshipful Master’’, within the newly formed Af-
rican Lodge #1, later renamed African Lodge No. 459;
Whereas because of this action the freedom fighter Prince
Hall is also renowned as the ‘‘Father of Black Free-
masonry’’;
Whereas Prince Hall Freemasonry is the oldest human rights
fraternity in the United States of America, predating the
Nation’s founding;
Whereas Prince Hall Masons advocated for racial uplift, edu-
cation, and improving the condition of Black people in
America;
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Whereas the freedom fighter Nat Turner was born into slav-
ery in Southampton County, Virginia, in 1800;
Whereas Southampton County was home to many planta-
tions, and enslaved people outnumbered free Whites;
Whereas freedom fighter Turner learned to read and write at
a young age, becoming deeply religious;
Whereas freedom fighter Turner was sold to several different
masters over the course of his life, the last time in 1830;
Whereas freedom fighter Turner preached to fellow enslaved
people, developing a loyal following;
Whereas freedom fighter Turner began planning a revolt with
a few trusted fellow enslaved men from neighboring plan-
tations;
Whereas freedom fighter Turner led a liberation rebellion be-
ginning in August 1831, quickly growing from a small
handful of enslaved people to more than 70 enslaved and
free Blacks;
Whereas the liberators went from house to house in South-
ampton County, freeing enslaved people;
Whereas the liberators were ultimately defeated by a State
militia that had over twice their manpower, with 3 artil-
lery companies reinforcing it;
Whereas freedom fighter Turner was captured 6 weeks after
the liberation rebellion was put down, whereupon he was
promptly convicted and sentenced to death;
Whereas, in retaliation for the liberation uprising, Virginia
officially executed 56 Black people, with at least 100
more killed by militias through extrajudicial violence;
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Whereas the liberation rebellion caused widespread panic
among slaveholders throughout the South, resulting in
widespread violence against defenseless enslaved people;
Whereas, in the wake of the liberation rebellion, the Virginia
General Assembly passed legislation making it illegal to
teach enslaved or free Blacks to read and write;
Whereas the Underground Railroad was a liberation network
of freedom fighters who helped around 100,000 enslaved
people escape to freedom in the North;
Whereas the liberation Underground Railroad began when a
freedom fighter ‘‘conductor’’ often posing as an enslaved
person would enter a plantation and attempt to guide
runaways;
Whereas liberated escapees would travel 10 to 20 miles each
night between safe houses or ‘‘stations’’ to avoid detec-
tion, waiting in safe houses for the next freedom fighter
along the line to be alerted to their presence;
Whereas freedom fighters supporting escapees at each station
(many of whom were White), knew only of local efforts
and not the entire liberation operation;
Whereas Harriet Tubman, born Araminta Ross, lived as an
enslaved person through her young life where she en-
dured regular whippings and suffered a traumatic head
injury at the hands of an overseer enslaver, which caused
narcoleptic episodes and migraines throughout her life;
Whereas freedom fighter/liberator Tubman escaped from slav-
ery along the liberation Underground Railroad, the net-
work of abolitionist freedom fighters who guided the lib-
erated to the North traveling primarily at night to avoid
bounty hunter enslavers;
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Whereas freedom fighter Tubman returned to the South no
less than 13 times to liberate 70 enslaved people, includ-
ing much of her family, for which she would be given the
name ‘‘Moses’’;
Whereas freedom fighter Tubman deftly led those she liber-
ated North during the fall and winter, when would-be en-
slaver captors would stay inside to avoid the cold;
Whereas, in freedom fighter Tubman’s own words, ‘‘I never
ran my train off the track and I never lost a passenger’’;
Whereas, during the Civil War, freedom fighter Tubman
served as a nurse, scout, and spy in the Union army, be-
coming the first woman to plan and lead a military oper-
ation in the United States, liberating 700 enslaved people
in the slave State South Carolina;
Whereas, later in life, freedom fighter Tubman continued
working to improve the lives of oppressed people, raising
funds for and building schools and a hospital in the name
of formerly enslaved people while participating in the
women’s suffrage movement;
Whereas freedom fighter John Brown, a White abolitionist
who ran an important stop on the liberation Under-
ground Railroad, dedicated his life to ending slavery;
Whereas freedom fighter John Brown lead a militia in guer-
rilla attacks on proslavery towns in Kansas, losing one of
his sons in the liberation struggle;
Whereas Brown, with the help of freedom fighter Harriet
Tubman, planned and organized a liberation invasion of
the South to liberate all slaves;
Whereas Brown began his liberation invasion at Harpers
Ferry, West Virginia, but was surrounded and captured
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by Federal troops led by enslaver Robert E. Lee, losing
2 more sons in the fighting;
Whereas the 13th Amendment to the Constitution was passed
by Congress on January 31, 1865, and ratified on De-
cember 6, 1865, and provides that ‘‘Neither slavery nor
involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime
whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall
exist within the United States, or any place subject to
their jurisdiction.’’;
Whereas, beginning in the 20th century, African Americans
began to relocate from Southern farms to Southern cities,
from the South to the Northeast, Midwest, and West, in
a movement known as the ‘‘Great Migration’’;
Whereas the relocation of formerly enslaved people and their
descendants also included unfavorable, and at times un-
just, interactions with law enforcement that often re-
sulted in imprisonment and convict leasing;
Whereas convict leasing, slavery by another name, was a sys-
tem that allowed prisons to lease imprisoned people to
private entities, often corporations and plantations;
Whereas the remains of 95 persons, thought to be of African
ancestry, who were subjected to the convict leasing sys-
tem in the State of Texas, were discovered in 2018 at the
construction site of the James Reese Career and Tech-
nical Center of the Fort Bend Independent School Dis-
trict in Sugar Land, Texas;
Whereas, while slavery was abolished, descendants of the
enslaved continue to live with the effects of slavery’s
progenies, including convict leasing, Black codes, Jim
Crow laws, mass lynching, lawful segregation, police bru-
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tality, mass incarceration, and institutionalized invidious
discrimination (racism); and
Whereas, despite the horrors of slavery and against all odds,
enslaved people became thought leaders and revolution-
aries and changed the course of American history: Now,
therefore, be it
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives1
of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3
This resolution may be cited as the ‘‘Original Slavery 4
Remembrance Month Resolution’’. 5
SEC. 2. SLAVERY REMEMBRANCE MONTH. 6
That the House of Representatives and the Senate— 7
(1) supports the annual designation of a ‘‘Slav-8
ery Remembrance Month’’ to serve as a reminder of 9
the evils of slavery, its continuing effects, and the 10
freedom fighters who fought to end this horrific 11
crime against humanity; 12
(2) condemn slavery and its evil progenies, in-13
cluding— 14
(A) convict leasing; 15
(B) Black codes; 16
(C) Jim Crow laws; 17
(D) mass lynching; 18
(E) lawful segregation; 19
(F) police brutality; 20
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(G) mass incarceration; and 1
(H) institutionalized invidious discrimina-2
tion; 3
(3) encourage all to acknowledge the impor-4
tance of slavery remembrance; and 5
(4) authorizes and requests the President to 6
issue a proclamation calling upon the people of the 7
United States to observe such month with appro-8
priate ceremonies and activities. 9
Æ
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