Diana carlin is a professor emerita of communication at Saint Louis University and a retired faculty member, an administrator at the university of kansas. Her research and teaching are in political communication, with an emphasis on women in politics. First ladys political debates and president ial rhetoric. She published book chapters on first ladys martha washington. Lady bird johnson. Barbara bush. Hillary clinton and Michelle Obama. And is completing one on julia grant. She taught a course on the rhetoric of first ladies at kansas and an interdisciplinary course on first ladies at Saint Louis University and American University in fall 2022. She also teaches courses on first ladies for the ocean, a Lifelong Learning institute at cu, and lectures on first ladies for a variety of community groups. She was a panelist at the 2021 White House Historical association asian symposium and the 2020 colloquium. She is a Founding Member of flair, the first ladys association for research and education, and serves as players treasurer. Welcome, dr. Carlin to history. Happy hour. Good evening, everyone, and thank you very much, samantha and the white house. Historic association for the invitation to share this presentation of first ladies and civil rights. Ive chosen two photos for this title slide down in the lower left. Theres a photo of the washington hands, which would have been probably either in new york or philadelphia, showing them at home with their grandchildren and up in the upper right corner. There is a servant who was one of their enslaved workers who they brought from mount vernon to their president ial home. And this would have been a typical scene, apparently up in the upper right hand corner as Eleanor Roosevelt with Marian Anderson. And theres a very interesting story that will go with that photo to show the contrast and the change in times between the washingtons and Eleanor Roosevelt. And then what happened after eleanor . So lets begin with the washingtons. If you think about the history of our first ladies in civil rights, its a checkered past. And we have to begin to look at the washington and a precedent that they set. They brought their enslaved servants to the president s home, both in new york and philadelphia when they went to philadelphia for the second capital. They had to circumvent a philadelphia law in order to keep their enslaved workers with them. There was a law that said that any enslaved person who was in the city of philadelphia for more than six months was freed. So what washingtons did was they sent their enslaved workers back and forth between mount vernon and their president ial home. And this was a way of having anyone, not having anyone there for more than six months during one of those transition periods. Marthas personal oil made by these men owner, also known as on each judge, escaped. She knew when the transition was happening and she used that as an opportunity to leave slidell. Theres a wonderful book that i recommend to you to find out about the washingtons and their runaways enslaved worker. Its called never caught by Erica Armstrong dunbar and it shows the relentless pursuit that the washingtons had mainly at marthas insistence. President posted notices and papers. They sent people looking for her, but on it never was caught. And so the story at least had an ending of freedom for her. Marthas letters. A new edition has just been published by the now cutting mt. Vernon and has every letter that she wrote or received from the time she was widowed with her first husband, daniel custers. Most of the almost all of the letters between the washingtons, however, were burned. So there were only three that escaped kind of by accident. But in those letters, you really get marthas view of slavery, where she accepted it as an institution, and also accepted the inferiority of those individuals who they enslaved. When Michelle Obama gave a speech at the 2016 Democratic National convention, she noted that she woke up every morning to in a house that was built by enslaved workers and the White House Historical association took that as cue for them to do some research. And so they had a multiyear project called slavery in the president s neighborhood. And if you havent looked at it on the Historical Association website, i really encourage you to do that. These are some of the facts that they present in that section of their web page. But enslaved workers did indeed build the white house, and they rebuilt it. After the war of 1812. Many of those were hired out, but there were definitely enslaved labor from quarrying. The stone all the way to the finishing touches. Eight president s after the washingtons also brought their own enslaved workers or hired them. That was jefferson madison, monroe, John Quincy Adams, which is going to be a surprise when we hear what is mother abigail thought about slavery. Andrew jackson, martin van buren, tyler polk and taylor. 12 president s at some time in their lives, foreign slave workers, washington, jefferson, madison wrote. Jackson. Van buren. Harrison. Tyler polk. Taylor johnson and grant and grants probably a surprise that he married into a missouri slave owning family, and he was given some enslaved workers by his father in law that he worked side by side with them, and he did eventually give them their freedom at the white house. These enslaved workers performed a variety of jobs. They were chefs, gardeners, stable hands, maids, butlers, valets, ladies, ladies and. And did all sorts of other cleaning and other work around the white house. So we had this long history up until the lincolns of having a lot of enslaved workers in the white house itself. But things changed with first ladies, beginning with this with Abigail Adams, who had a very, very different opinion of slavery from her predecessor, martha washington. Abigail was an abolitionist and shortly after john adams was inaugurated, and abigail wasnt there at the time. That was not a typical first lady. Martha was not there for georges inauguration either. But martha had written a letter at one point in her life to john which said that and fortunately how could they, the southerners, reconcile human bondage with the ideology of freedoms that america had fought for. And abigail hired a free africanamerican named james, who worked at their farm. And during the early days of the atlas administration, she wrote to her husband about a rather upsetting incident in which she was trying to get james educated. And she believed in education. She was part of a first education, first lady. And so she fought for him to attend to local school. But there was a neighbor who objected and she responds to that neighbor. And she told her husband with the question, is this the christian principle of doing to others as we would have others do to us . Abigail eventually prevailed, not surprisingly, and james was educated after abigail. The next first lady, to show any interest in civil rights and equality for africanamericans was mary lincoln, who had come from a slaveholding family that some of her family fought for the south. But mary saw the horrors of slavery, and many of her family members did free their enslaved workers. Mary seamstress Elizabeth Keckley was a free African American and she informed mary of the plight of many of the former enslaved workers who were fleeing to the north during the civil war and that they were living in poverty. They were starving. And mary personally gave hundreds of dollars of her own money to those individuals to keep them fed and clothed. And she also wrote letters on behalf of some of these freed slaves for government positions, including for Elizabeth Keckley. Between the civil war and Eleanor Roosevelt, who really was the first lady who took so many stances on this issue, there was lucy hayes, who you just heard about in a recent op Ed White House history happy hour. Lizzie hayes was known for her temperance stance, but she was also an abolitionist and had been an abolitionist early on in addition to being a suffragist. And she encouraged her husband before the white house years and during and before the civil war to defend runaway slaves who had escaped from kentucky into ohio. And then as first lady, she was concerned not only with the plight of africanamericans, but also native americans. And she personally funded a scholarship for native american girl, and she assisted an African American woman in getting admitted to oberlin college. She invited the first africanamerican professional musician, marie williams, to perform at the white house and Frederick Douglass introduced her. She also invited other black music groups, including students, to sing at white house events. Helen nellie taft, whos in the bottom left hand corner, developed an appreciation for Cultural Diversity when they were in the philippines and. That taft was the governor general of the philippines at the time. She found that there was a color line and that the soul pianos were not being invited to events. Well, she changed all of that. And they really considered her to be very egalitarian. She also looked at the plight of africanamerican immigrants who were in washington, d. C. , and tried to do some things for them. And she invited them to White House Open houses, which had not been done before, and added africanamericans to the staff. She believed that education was a great equalizer, and she supported the start of kindergarten classes for black children. Well, shes best known for bringing the cherry trees to washington. Her civil rights activities are lesser known, but they were certainly very important. Next to her in the middle of a lower row is glenn wilson, who was Woodrow Wilsons first wife. She was a southerner whose family were also slaveholders. And she was not the most progressive of our first ladies on this in this particular area. But she did do some things that were very important and something similar to what well talk about with Lady Bird Johnson. And that was that there were the housing situation was terrible for africanamericans and immigrants. And she helped with the passage of something known as the l. A. Bill. And she worked through a group called the National Civic federation womens division. And she took members of congress to see this awful housing situation. And really worked very, very hard with members of congress to get that bill passed. Lou . Henry hoover on the bottom right was a trailblazer in many, many ways. And theres been a wonderful history happy hour program on her in the last year also. But when the first 20th century africanamerican congressman, oscar stanton, the priest from illinois, was elected to congress in 1929, the depressed were not getting the usual social invitations. And mrs. Hoover wanted to do something about that. And jesse priest, mrs. Dupree, still welcome. So typically, first ladies often host teas, especially for the spouses of members of congress. And so she worked to get a special tea for mrs. Priest, inviting cabinet wives and other congressional wives. So she knew would make mrs. Priest feel comfortable and who agreed with her and the president about the importance of African Americans in the Republican Party and also about having them more involved in the political scene. So she had the tea party and it was a firestorm. They received hate mail. There was incredible criticism in newspapers, editorials about what she had done and all she had done was extended the courtesy of mrs. Duprees to served president hoover to show his support for what his wife had done, then invited Booker T Washington to the white house. And he also invited some of the president s of some of the historic black colleges to the white house. So this was a statement by the two of them where they hung together, but they certainly did not let the criticism stand in their way of continuing to do some work with the leaders of the black colleges. And also to make everyone know that this was an important part of the stamps that he was taking as a republican. So after that group of first ladies and there was eleanor and you know, mrs. Roosevelt is known for completely changing the whole atmosphere of what a first lady does. And extending it beyond what anyone had ever thought before she worked extensively with civil rights leaders. She was way ahead of her husband. So every one of the leaders of the major civil Rights Groups she worked with, she joined the naacp. She also cochaired the National Committee to abolish the poll tax and she worked for anti lynching legislation with lynching was a major problem in the early thirties and she was unsuccessful with wrenching legislation. But she certainly made her position known. She was invited to address the 1936 national conventions, and she also convened a National Conference of women at the white house. Eleanor was also very supportive of the tuskegee airmen, and the photo on the bottom is a photo of her flying with them, and she showed that she not only supported having African American troops in the military, but that she was confident of what they were doing. One other thing that was interesting about eleanor, before i talk about mary and anderson is that the ku klux klan put a bounty of 25,000 on her head at one point. Probably the thing that she is most noted for in the most public declaration of her support for equal rights was resigning from the daughters of the american revolution. Marian anderson, a control to who was internationally known, wanted to sing. There, and they had a whites only policy. There was public sentiment that she should be allowed. However, the d. A. Did not back down. Eleanor originally decided to invite ms. Anderson to the white house and then she decided that she needed something bigger. So she worked behind the scenes with secretary of the interior and they scheduled a concert at the lincoln memorial. And this is a picture on the top of Marian Anderson singing at the lincoln memorial. And it was also broadcast on radio. 75,000 people integrated audience was there to see and hear Marian Anderson. And this is a copy of the famous letter that she sent to the d. A. My dear mrs. Henry and robert, i am afraid that i have never been a very useful member of the daughters of the american revolution. So i know of very little difference to you whether i resign or whether i continue to be a member of your organization. However, i am in complete disagreement with the attitude taken in refusing Constitution Hall to great artist. You have set an example, which seems to me unfortunate and i feel obliged to send into you my resignation. You had an opportunity to lead in an enlightened way, and it seems to me that your organization has failed. I realize that many people will not agree with me. The feeling is i do. This seems to me the only proper procedure to follow very sincerely, yours. So that was eleanor who really opened the floodgates for wider first ladies to take very, very active positions. Mamie eisenhower does not one who anyone would really expect to have publicly done much. And she didnt. But behind the scenes, she was very supportive and defended her husbands decision to send federal troops into little rock to integrate the schools. In 1953, the first year that they were in the white house, they had they reinstated the easter egg roll, which had been stopped for several years, mainly during the war years. And she noticed that there were only white children. And so she made it very clear that in 1954, the White House Easter Egg Roll would be integrated. And so that happened only a few months before the famous brown v board of Education School desegregation decision. She also was very much involved with the National Council of women, and they made her an honorary member, and she had them at the white house frequently. She and her husband hosted the first state dinner at which a president of a country, haiti, of african descent, attended a state dinner. So mamie did her little thing behind the scenes, oftentimes with the defense of her husband, but also some very, very public statements that she made about equality. Jackie kennedy also made some statements with some of her activities. She supported a memorial to the black activist mary mcleod. The soon she made several visits and to poverty stricken areas in washington, d. C. And she also requested that a black opera singer sing at the white house. So following some of the leads of some of her predecessors in terms of using entertainment, Lady Bird Johnson took the next major step, and that was in 1964, after the passage of the civil rights bill. She went on a whistle stop tour, campaigns to her tour. It was difficult for Lyndon Johnson to go into the south after the passage of the civil rights bill. But lady bird, who had Southern Roots and who had family from alabama and used to spend much of her childhood there, summers said she would take it on, and she gave some pretty dramatic speeches that made it very clear what her position was. She said in one speech, i know that many of you do not agree with the civil rights bill or the president s support of it. It would be a bottomless tragedy for our country to be racial divided. This is not a challenge only