chunks of flommus
SUBSCRIBE! FEEDLY RSS EMAIL

the statue of liberty is a black woman

The Statue of Liberty was first imagined by a French abolitionist named Édouard de Laboulaye.

Laboulaye was the president of a committee that raised and disbursed funds to newly freed who were once enslaved. He was an ardent supporter of the Union and was so proud of America for emancipating the formerly enslaved, he got together a group of other French abolitionists at his home in Versailles to plan a gift to America in honor of the once enslaved.

They decided on a massive statue that could serve as a monument for the whole world that freedom was possible.

Laboulaye partnered with sculptor Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi to begin working on the piece. The design went through several iterations.

The first was a Black woman with the shackles on her arms and feet broken, arms lifted in the air in power. The second iteration was a Black woman with a torch in one hand and broken shackles in her other hand. The next and final iteration is a Black woman, modeled after a Black Egyptian peasant woman (notably, she is also a Muslim) that was inspired by the Nubian monuments at Abu Simbel.

The final statue is dressed as Libertas, the Roman goddess who wore the cap of the formerly enslaved and was worshipped by those were emancipated that were once enslaved in the Roman Empire.

In one hand she holds a torch to light the way for the enslaved to find freedom and the other holds a tablet with July 4, 1776 inscribed in Roman numerals to mark the creation of a country that prided freedom over all things.

The broken chains on her feet stayed, but she is unshackled. The chains can still be seen peaking out of her robe.

The statue was dedicated in 1886, but at that point the Reconstruction had been a complete failure and Jim Crow laws were being passed all over the South. So any mention of the original intention of the statue as a celebration of the abolition of slavery was erased by White journalists, politicians, and educators.

Also of note, the Statue of Liberty was dedicated prior to Ellis Island being designated the largest “immigrant inspection station” created in 1892. Naturally as the first monument seen by immigrants, she evolved into a symbol for immigrants, asylum seekers, and refugees. Which is generally how she is understood today.

However, very few people know her real story as symbol of the end of slavery or that she’s a Black woman, which really sucks.

addendum
I contacted Snopes about reviewing their 20 year old article that incorrectly discredits this history. This information is readily available from the National Parks Service and the Statue of Liberty Museum if you’d like to pursue your own research 🙂.

—natalie michelle