Slavery exhibit swapped overnight at Philadelphia’s Independence Park

The Trump administration has replaced an exhibit on slavery at Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia with a version that advocates say sanitizes the nation’s history.

The President’s House site at the park includes an excavation of the home where George Washington lived when he served as president, with surrounding panel displays and videos focused heavily on the stories of nine enslaved people who lived with and served him.

Michael Coard, a founding member of the local advocacy group the Avenging the Ancestors Coalition, said the new panels whitewash history by taking out panels previously in the exhibit, such as one titled “The Dirty Business of Slavery.”

That panel stated, “The men who wrote the U.S. Constitution created a document based on the ideal of liberty, but liberty and enslavement were bitterly intertwined.” It describes how Britain outlawed the slave trade before the United States and that even though the U.S. stopped importing slaves in 1808, the number of slaves continued to increase “including births to enslaved women resulting from rape by white men and forced breeding.”

Another original panel described how, when including Washington’s Mount Vernon estate, the first president “controlled the lives of more than 300 enslaved Africans and their descendants.”

“It’s not going to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,” Coard said of the new panels.

In a statement, Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle L. Parker said the previous panels were removed overnight.

“Overnight, under the cover of darkness, the federal government removed panels at the President’s House that told a thorough history of Philadelphia,” Parker said. “That it did so at night shows it understands this action is shameful, that it violates community trust.”

The Interior Department, which oversees the National Park Service, confirmed that new signs had been put in place, following a favorable court ruling earlier this month in ongoing litigation over change at the site. The department did not respond to questions on when the switch occurred.

“The Department is pleased the Courts have sided with the Trump administration on restoring truth and sanity to our country,” said Interior spokeswoman Katie Martin in an email. “These new panels are full of historical context and highlight the momentous events that took place in the President’s House and the other sites at Independence National Historical Park.”

She said the new panels still “acknowledge the evils of slavery, including its injustices and hypocrisies” and continue to tell the stories of the nine enslaved people, adding that it was telling “the full story.”

President Donald Trump last year issued an executive order seeking to scrub federal institutions including national parks and Smithsonian museums, of “corrosive” partisan ideology and information seen as disparaging historical figures. In practice, parks have been removing information on historical racism, sexism, slavery, climate change, Indigenous persecution and gender rights.

The National Park Service replaced the signs at the President’s House exhibit sometime overnight between Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning, Coard said.

The Avenging the Ancestors Coalition is party to a lawsuit against the changes being lead by the City of Philadelphia.

Coard called the replacement of the panels an act of racism that went against history.

“This is nothing more than Big Brother’s Ministry of Truth, where the government turns the truth into a lie and the lie into a truth,” he added, referencing the totalitarian state in George Orwell’s book “1984.”

The original exhibit had been on display, partially disassembled, for months as the legal battle played out.

The Park Service first removed the panels from the exhibit in January, but a judge later ruled they needed to remain in place. The administration restored about half the panels before a subsequent circuit court decision paused that work, with about half the signs missing.

A circuit court decision earlier this month ruled the replacement of the panels could go forward, although the city and Coard have vowed to appeal.

The new panels, available on the Interior Department website, include about 200 references to enslaved people or slavery, with four panels particularly focused on slavery, including one entitled “Fighting for Freedom.”

Advocacy groups said the new panels nevertheless softened the descriptions of slavery. A new panel describes how Washington complied with the laws of the time on slavery, on which he was deeply economically dependent, and mentions his private expressions of discomfort with slavery. It also highlights how he signed measures that both restricted and perpetuated slavery.

“The President’s House site was specifically designed as a memorial to nine enslaved people at George Washington’s Philadelphia residence. This exhibit challenges park visitors from all over the world to consider the perspective of those enslaved people when learning about the Founders’ ideals of independence and liberty,” said Ed Stierli, a director with the National Parks Conservation Association, in a statement when the new panels were first made available online in April.

“The panels on the Department of the Interior website include cherry-picked historical quotes and are no substitute for the original exhibit,” he added.