We Shall Not Be Moved: Juneteenth and the case for unity.

June 19th is Juneteenth.

The date that slaves in Texas were emancipated in 1865.

Once all the slaves in the United States were made aware of their freedom, a question that had been asked for a long time, even before emancipation, arose again:

"Now what? Where do the freed go?"

I think many now don't think about this question being asked. Many just want to celebrate that slaves were freed.

But the question of the black person's place in America was still being debated.

The celebration of freedom masked a deeper reality: America had no consensus on what to do with four million newly freed people. Would they be full citizens? Would they be integrated? Or remain subordinate?

There were many at the time, including abolitionists that DID NOT believe that blacks and whites could live together in an integrated society. Some believed that blacks were biologically inferior, or that there would be stiff competition for jobs and resources.

Among those voices was President Abraham Lincoln.

Lincoln, despite his role as the Great Emancipator, harbored serious doubts about racial integration. In an 1862 meeting with Black leaders at the White House, Lincoln stated plainly: "You and we are different races. We have between us a broader difference than exists between almost any other two races." He went on to advocate for colonization, the voluntary emigration of freed Blacks to colonies outside the United States. Lincoln believed that the "physical difference" between the races was "a great disadvantage to us both" and that separation was the most practical solution.

Many abolitionists who opposed integration worried about economic competition and couldn't imagine integrated society.

Haiti, Central or South America, Liberia and other places were all places that were considered.

Black leaders voiced a different opinion: This is our country too. We want equal rights and equal assimilation into American society.

The American Colonization Society, founded in 1816, had established Liberia as a destination for freed Blacks. Lincoln allocated funds for colonization efforts, though they largely failed. The assumption was clear: America was a white nation with no place for Black citizens.

What Black Leaders Actually Demanded

This wasn't a timid request or a negotiation. It was a declaration. Frederick Douglass, the most prominent Black leader of the era, rejected colonization outright. In response to Lincoln's 1862 proposal, Douglass wrote: "This is our country as much as it is yours, and we will not leave it." He argued that Black Americans had built the nation's wealth through their labor, fought in its wars, and had as much claim to its future as any white citizen.

Douglass and other Black leaders weren't asking for separation or special treatment. They were demanding what the Declaration of Independence had promised: equal rights, equal protection under the law, and full participation in American civic life. They wanted to vote, to own property, to educate their children, to work and compete on equal terms. They wanted, in short, to be Americans, not in some qualified, second-class sense, but fully and completely.

This vision of integration was radical precisely because it took America's founding documents seriously. It insisted that "all men are created equal" meant all men, not just white men. It demanded that the nation live up to its stated ideals rather than carve out exceptions based on race.

Freedom is in question. But the question is do you want freedom FROM American society or freedom to be IN American society?

This distinction is crucial. Freedom FROM America meant separation, emigration, building a new society elsewhere. Freedom TO be in America meant integration, assimilation, claiming full citizenship rights within the existing nation. Black leaders overwhelmingly chose the latter. They had no interest in leaving. They wanted to stay and transform America into what it claimed to be.

When Freedom Became a Weapon

In light of Carmelo Anthony's incident and the Black Lives Matter movement, these questions are being asked again.

We're living through a moment when these questions have resurfaced, but today's answers differ dramatically from what Black leaders demanded in 1865.

With these questions seems to be coming renewed and atrocious calls for violence against whites. Many of these influencers and celebrities using the long-gone history of slavery and oppression to justify their position.

In 2020, as protests erupted across the country, some voices went beyond calls for justice and reform. Nick Cannon, in a podcast that went viral, spoke about white people as "a little less" and suggested that melanin deficiency was connected to a capacity for violence and savagery. He later apologized, but the sentiment had been expressed. Professor Tommy Curry of the University of Edinburgh has argued in academic settings that violence against white people can be justified as self-defense against systemic oppression. These aren't fringe voices shouting into the void, they have platforms, audiences, and institutional support.

The rhetoric has shifted from "we want to be included" to "we want to be separate" and sometimes even "we want revenge." Historical grievances, slavery, Jim Crow, systemic racism, are invoked not to build bridges but to justify division and, in extreme cases, violence.

These celebrities and the progressive, leftist media would have you believe that this is a brave, necessary and justified position to take.

But there is one position that is sadly as radical to certain groups today as it was back in 1865.

Integration and assimilation.

Blacks and whites, living together and working together. Two groups enjoying the same rights and privileges in citizenship and vision to create an even more perfect union, in love and respect for shared humanity. Moving forward to reconcile the past and move forward into the future.

Integration as the Radical Position

This is what makes our current moment strange. The position Douglass and many others fought for, integration, is now treated with suspicion. Judging people by character rather than skin color is dismissed as naive.

How did we get here? How did the dream of living together become controversial?

There was a song during the civil rights era in the 1960s called "We Shall Not Be Moved". It was a variation of a gospel song called "I Shall Not Be Moved."

Both songs called for faith and remaining rooted in your values despite what may come your way.

These gospel songs were rooted in faith, in Psalm 1's vision of a righteous person standing firm on truth.

When Civil Rights protesters adapted this gospel song, they weren't just borrowing a catchy melody. They were making a theological claim: that their demand for integration was rooted in God's truth, in the fundamental equality of all people before their Creator. They were saying that racism was not just unjust, it was sinful, a violation of the divine order.

When Civil Rights protesters adapted this gospel song, they weren't just borrowing a catchy melody. They were making a theological claim: that their demand for integration was rooted in God's truth, in the fundamental equality of all people before their Creator. They were saying that racism was not just unjust, it was sinful, a violation of the divine order.

Here's a line from that song:

Black and white together, we shall not be moved. Like a tree planted by the water. We shall not be moved.

That phrase, "black and white together", was the whole point. Not black people over here and white people over there. Not separation or revenge or endless grievance. Together. United. Moving forward as one nation.

Many civil rights protest songs such as "We shall overcome" and "We shall not be moved" were variations of well-known gospel songs.

Coincidence?

I think not.

They were standing on a foundation of Truth and American values, a foundation that they believed they were heirs of by the words enshrined in the Declaration of Independence.

The Choice Before Us

The Civil Rights leaders understood something profound: they weren't asking America to become something new. They were asking America to become what it had always claimed to be. They were holding the nation accountable to its own stated principles.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Gospel songs and founding documents both proclaimed universal truths about human dignity and equality, rooted in something higher than opinion.

In this 250th anniversary of this great nation of ours even with its flaws, troubled history, and mishaps, we can stand on this truth.

America is not perfect. It has never been perfect. The gap between its ideals and its reality has often been vast and painful. But the ideals themselves, equality, liberty, justice, remain true and worth fighting for.

But we must choose it.

We must choose integration over separation, unity over division. We must see each other as fellow citizens, not as enemies defined by race.

We must choose to be like a tree planted by the water and not be moved!

Rooted in truth. Rooted in shared values. Standing firm against the voices of division and revenge.

We shall not be moved.

Live Free!

Comments or feedback? Reach out to me directly at jordan@jordanblackwood.com