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Cory James Young

@coryjamesyoung.bsky.social

2.9K followers 820 following 520 posts

assistant professor of history at UIowa | personal account | northern slavery, legal history, Black America | i ♥️ WNY

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Jun 16

I contributed this article to a special issue of the Journal of the Early Republic on "Free State" slavery. It previews one of my book's principle interventions: the concept of hereditary term slavery during the age of gradual abolition.

It is a privilege to appear in print with my co-contributors.

Project MUSE - Hereditary Term Slavery and the Pursuit of Restitution in Antebellum Pennsylvania

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muse.jhu.edu

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · 1d

Sure is, and these provisions became ubiquitous in state constitutions as well, which is what applies here.

There’s an effort to repeal these provisions at the state level that has been broadly successful, if not universal.

Voters End Slavery Loophole at the Ballot Box in 7 States - Ballot Initiative Strategy Center

WASHINGTON — Ahead of National Freedom Day, the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center (BISC) highlights voters’ use of ballot measures to eradicate slavery from state constitutions across the nation. In t...

ballot.org

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · 1d

Sources:
www.thegazette.com/crime-courts...

www.aclu-ia.org/press-releas...

State begins moving Iowa City historical society materials, despite lawsuit

Despite a lawsuit fighting the State Historical Society of Iowa's unexpected and "haphazard" closure of its Iowa City research facility and archives — and a court hearing scheduled in the dispute next...

www.thegazette.com

Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · 1d

People incarcerated in Iowa state prisons earn between 28 and 95 cents per hour according to the ACLU. This is legal because the Iowa state constitution still permits slavery for people convicted of crimes.

You used to be able to learn about this history in the materials the state is disappearing.

Screenshot of a 10/7/25 Cedar Rapids Gazette article lede reading: “IOWA CITY - Despite a lawsuit fighting the State Historical Society of lowa's unexpected and
"haphazard" closure of its lowa City research facility and archives - and a court hearing scheduled in the dispute next week - the state on Monday began moving some of the historical documents with help from prison inmates.”

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · 8d

If you have a few dollars to spare.

Help Jamal’s family leave the war zone and rebuild their life!

Hi my loves! My name is Caroline, and I created this fundraiser to help Jamal support his family as they fight to survive the genocide in Gaza, evacuate to safety, and eventually rebuild their lives f...

chuffed.org

Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · 13d

This is so deeply fucked

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · 14d

The Chicago Manual of Style has a section titled “Managing Moments of Normal Panic” which, although laudable, I fear may be inadequate for the times.

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · 19d

I'm not sympathetic to arguments that these changes are bad because monuments are essential for understanding our history. I didn't buy it when neo-Confederates said it in 2017 and I don't buy it now.

But I do take issue with creating monuments that venerate the Lost Cause, which is what this does.

Independence National Park will ‘alter’ slavery exhibits in accordance with Trump executive order

The planned changes follow an executive order signed by 1968 Wharton graduate and President Donald Trump directing the National Park Service to remove exhibits that “inappropriately disparage American...

www.thedp.com

Reposted by Cory James Young

Dr. William Horne @wihorne.bsky.social · 28d

These people genuinely know nothing of the history—white conservative state & vigilante violence has been arguably *the defining feature* of U.S. history. They apparently also know very little of the present, in which, again, the very opposite is the case.

Ida Bae Wells @nhannahjones.bsky.social · 28d

The MSNBC commentator saying that most political violence has historically come from the left just once again showed how we suffer from failing to learn history. Lynching, pogroms, race riots, the political violence that ended Reconstruction, and against the Civil Rights Movement. Come on.

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Sep 3

A college buddy of mine learned about Spotswood Rice in an Emancipations course we took with Justin Behrend as sophomores.

Said buddy wrote and, years later, recorded a folk song about him.

Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Aug 31

It's that time of the semester where I'm once again marveling at the Wikipedia page for "Ancient Egyptian race controversy."

However long you think it is, it's longer.

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Aug 29

Source.

Screenshot of a selection from the first page of the 24 June 1865 issue of the Burlington (Vt.) Patriot newspaper, reading: Let us hear no more, then, of these mistaken or seditious pleas for Lee. All loyal men owe hatred to the murderers of their brethren; and applause for the chief criminal is not only an abandonment of justice, but a covert form of treason to the country.

Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Aug 29

And in response: "Let us hear no more, then, of these mistaken or seditious pleas for Lee. All loyal men owe hatred to the murderers of their brethren; and applause for the chief criminal is not only an abandonment of justice, but a covert form of treason to the country."

Pentagon Is Reinstalling Portrait of Confederate General at West Point Library

www.nytimes.com

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Aug 29

They sure got it in 1865!

"Yet, by all the rules of moral measurement, Benedict Arnold was not half so perfidious and criminal as [Robert E.] Lee."

A screenshot of part of the first page of the 24 June 1865 issue of the Burlington (Vt.) Patriot newspaper, reading:

Who will say that the following from that paper is not a correct portrayal of the character of Robert E. Lee?

"The name most execrated in American history is that of Benedict Arnold. Among their earliest lessons our children are taught to lisp it with a shudder; and it is impressed upon their minds, that his name is held in infamy, even by the nation in whose behalf the treason was performed.--Yet, by all the rules of moral measurement, Benedict Arnold was not half so perfidious and criminal as Lee."

Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Aug 29

It’s wild that 250 years later every U.S. American grade schooler knows that to call someone a Benedict Arnold is to call them a traitor.

We should have swapped Arnold out for Robert E. Lee first chance we had.

Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Aug 24

Moreover, some of this concern is entirely fabricated. Find me a single Democratic politician talking about critical theory.

Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Aug 22

If they achieved their freedom, they may have avoided being sold to Florida two years later. In 1828, Monroe sold nearly two dozen people to a would-be sugar baron in the new U.S. territory.

You can read about this history in detail thanks to the "Take Them in Families" project.

Take Them In Families… – "This is the history of the forced relocation of enslaved families from a Founding Father and former U.S. President's Virginia plantation, of illegal African captives, and of ...

taketheminfamilies.com

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Aug 22

It's decently well known that John Adams and Thomas Jefferson both died on the 50th anniversary of the ratification of the Declaration of Independence.

Less well known is that two people James Monroe enslaved, George and Phebe, sought their freedom the same day, disappearing before dawn on the 4th.

An advertisement from the 15 July 1826 Central Gazette reading:

Ten Dollars Reward.
Ranaway from the farm of James Monroe, Esq. in Albemarle county, on Monday night last, a negro man named George and his wife Phebe.
GEORGE is about 30 years of age, strait made, six feet high, tolerably dark complexion, had on domestic cotton clothes; but he will no doubt change them.
PHEBE is about 28 years of age, common size, dark complexion, and when she went away was clad in domestic clothes. The above negroes are supposed to be making for the county of Loudon, or probably have obtained free papers, and are endeavoring to get to a free state. If taken in this county I will give a reward of Ten Dollars: or Fifteen Dollars if taken out of the county and secured in any jail so that I get them again.
WM MOON,
For COL. JAMES MONROE
July 8, 1826--tf

See https://highland.org/highland-and-slavery/.

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Reposted by Cory James Young

nanmac2000.bsky.social @nanmac2000.bsky.social · Aug 18

@hcrichardson.bsky.social
Great article! It just happens to be by my son.
oaklandside.org/2025/08/18/t...

I teach in deep East Oakland. My kids are experts in how power works.

A high school history teacher in Sobrante Park reflects on how his students are eye witnesses to social inequity.

oaklandside.org

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Aug 18

A modern sequel to Robert Putnam’s classic sociological essay on disengagement called Scrolling Alone.

Reposted by Cory James Young

Seth Cotlar @sethcotlar.bsky.social · Jun 29

I find myself thinking about historian Robert Paxton’s 2004 definition of fascism far too often than I’d like these days. Note that these sentences were written back when Donald Trump was a NYC playboy libertine who donated to Democrats.

Fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victim-hood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legalrestraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion.

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Reposted by Cory James Young

Jamal abu hashem🇵🇸 @jamalzuhir.bsky.social · Aug 11

Here is Jamal from Gaza whose family lost everything and he is trying with all his might to rebuild their lives and help them with the crazy costs in Gaza and travel outside Gaza when the crossings open. I hope you support us. Your little support, even if it is $5

chuffed.org/project/1389...

Help Jamal’s family leave the war zone and rebuild their life!

chuffed.org

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Reposted by Cory James Young

Joe Stieb @joestieb.bsky.social · Aug 11

If I had tried to sell my book from my office at the War College I would have been fired in milliseconds.

Olga Nesterova @onestpress.onestnetwork.com · Aug 9

Trump showcasing his merch to Aliyev at the Oval Office 🤦‍♀️

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Cory James Young @coryjamesyoung.bsky.social · Aug 11

Any recommendations for good "welcome to a History PhD program!" essays for incoming students? I'm looking for something fortifying.

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Reposted by Cory James Young

Lindsay Beyerstein @beyerstein.bsky.social · Aug 10

When I say that antivax terrorism isn't new, I mean it. In 1721, Massachusetts preacher and civic leader Cotton Mather got a bomb thrown through his window for his support of smallpox inoculation.

The Hellfire Preacher Who Promoted Inoculation - JSTOR Daily

Three hundred years ago, Cotton Mather starred in a debate about treating smallpox that tore Boston apart.

daily.jstor.org

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