USA Today: Slave history part of oath site

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2009-01-19-slaves-capitol_N.htm


Philip Reid, a slave at a bronze foundry, supervised the casting of "Freedom," the statue atop the Capitol. This replica sits in the Russell Senate Office Building.

By Heather Wines, Gannett News Service

By Traci Watson, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — Living in nearby huts, hundreds of African-American slaves worked six and sometimes seven days a week to build the U.S. Capitol.

They felled trees to clear the site. They sawed logs and molded bricks. They quarried stone for the Corinthian columns.

Tuesday, Barack Hussein Obama — the USA's first African-American president — will be sworn in as the 44th president on the west steps of the Capitol, a building that symbolizes freedom but was erected by those who had none.

Though Obama himself has no known slaves among his ancestors, he will stand to take the oath of office with three family members who do: his wife and two daughters. Michelle Obama's great-great-grandfather worked in slavery on a South Carolina rice plantation before being freed during the Civil War.

"It's an amazing journey," says Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., a member of a congressional task force on commemorating the enslaved builders.

Bettye Gardner, another task force member and a history professor at Coppin State University, says " 'significant' isn't even a big enough word."

Slaves for hire

FULL story at link.