A Living Legacy: Canadian Anti-Blackness and the Transatlantic Trade of Enslaved Persons

Introduction by Councilor Marcus Chambers

Hello and welcome to the Anti-Racism Speaker Series put on by the City of Winnipeg Equity Office in partnership with the Human Rights Committee of Council.  Thank you all for joining us here today.  My name is Marcus Chambers, I'm a City Councilor for the Saint Norbert Seine River Ward, Chair of the Winnipeg Police Board and the acting deputy mayor of the city of Winnipeg.  I'm also the Co-chair of the Human Rights Committee of Council.

Let me begin with our land acknowledgement.  We gratefully acknowledge that we work and reside in Treaty One Territory, the home and traditional lands of the Anishinaabe, Ojibway, Ininew Cree, and Dakota Peoples, and in the National homeland of the Red River Metis.  Our clean drinking water comes from the Shoal Lake 41st Nation and Treaty 3 Territory. 

Before we begin today, I have a few housekeeping items I want to let everyone know the City of Winnipeg is recording this session for educational purposes.  Questions posed by participants are included in what is recorded.  This collection of personal information is authorized under Section 36-1B of the Freedom of Information and Privacy Protection Act, and will be used for the continued informational and educational purposes.  It will not be used for or disclosed for any other purposes unless required or permitted by law.  If you have any questions, contact the corporate access and Privacy Officer of the City of Winnipeg.  A recording of today's event will be made public or available, on  CityNet and winnipeg.ca websites.   We will be discussing anti-racism in the City of Winnipeg.  What's the keynote is complete, you will have an opportunity to ask questions of our expert.  If you have questions you'd like to address today, you can submit it by asking the “Ask a Question” in the Microsoft Teams event.  You can also choose to ask anonymously by making sure to select that option before clicking “Send”.  We will make every effort possible to ask all applicable questions during our time here today.  For anyone wishing to turn on closed captions and subtitles, please select “Caption Subtitles” on your video controls, you will see the change the caption language from English to French select “Settings”, then “Captions Subtitles” and choose the language you want, the setting button looks like the little wheel or cog.

Lastly, on United Nations international Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, today’s speaker is a good friend of mine Laurelle Harris.  Here to provide greetings and an introduction to Laurelle and her and her keynote speech today is Mike Jack, the Chief Administrative Officer for the City of Winnipeg.  Welcome Mike.

Greeting and Presenting Guest Speaker by Michael Jack

Thank you Councilor, thank you for that introduction.  I want to welcome everyone any of our elected officials on the line, our staff and members of the public want to thank everyone for joining us today.  As mentioned, my name is Michael Jack and I'm pleased to be here with you for today's presentation in our Anti-racism in Action 2022 Speakers Series. 

First, I would like to acknowledge the Treaty acknowledgement provided by Councilor Chambers and mentioned that as CAO I'm also very grateful to be part of such a diverse civic team.  Our team includes members from many different ethnic, cultural, religious, and linguistic backgrounds, and it reflects diversity in gender identity and sexual orientation as well.  This is a great source of inspiration, pride and strength.  Today, the world commemorates the International Day of the Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade.  What does this mean for us here in Winnipeg?  The historian Alpha Cooper has said that slavery is Canada's best kept secret.  For many of us, including me, there's a lot to uncover about this and learn.  Most of us have thumbs of the enormity cruelty of the Transatlantic Slave Trade as a side perpetrated over centuries.  Thanks to scholars like Doctor Eric Williams and Professor header Baptist, we're getting to learn more about slavery's role in history that became central to Western economies, laying the foundation for generations of inequality supported by racist ideology.  But for many of us, it's a shock to learn about Canada's role in perpetuating and profiting from slavery, and the impact that slavery continues to have in the present is for many of us, still a mystery, something that isn't taught in schools and something many of us just don't know much about. 

We're very fortunate that Miss Laurelle Harris is with us today to shed light on these critical questions as a lawyer, scholar, teacher and community builder, she's deeply knowledgeable and deeply engaged with these issues.  Miss Harris is an experienced litigator, mediator, and arbitrator who founded her own firm Harris Law Solutions. She's also the principal consultant at Equitable Solutions Consulting where she helps organizations strengthen their commitment and effectiveness in implementing anti-racism, equity and inclusion.  She is someone with a tremendous passion for community well-being as honorary lifetime member of Women’s Health Clinic, she's devoted many years of volunteer service to community health.  She cares deeply about justice, serving as a director with the Manitoba Law Foundation, member of the Legal Aid Manitoba Advisory Committee and Chair of the Manitoba Bar Association Equality issues section.  In addition to all of these things, Laurel Harris is an accomplished scholar and educator with a focus on anti-racist, intersectional, feminist analysis.  In addition to her undergraduate and professional studies, she's done graduate working women, women studies, and Black studies at Ohio State University.  She's taught women studies at the undergraduate level and the U of M Faculty of Law.  And she's a popular and sought after lecturer and clinician in the areas of anti-racism, equity and inclusion.  I wanna thank you so much for agreeing to be our keynote speaker today.  It's a great learning opportunity for all of us.  I'm really looking forward to your presentation, so welcome.

Keynote address by Laurelle Harris

Thanks so much. I really appreciate that. Welcome Mr. Jack, and I didn't recognize myself in parts of it, but thank you so much.  It was very, very kind of, those words were very kind.  Good afternoon everyone.  My thanks to his worship Mayor Brian Bowman, City Council, the administration of the City of Winnipeg for the invitation to speak with everyone today. As Mr. Jack mentioned we're marking the United Nations International Day of Remembrance of Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave trade today.  The practice of enslavement has existed in many parts of the world at various points in time.  The Transatlantic trade of enslaved persons however, was unique in a few ways.

First, it was unique in its sheer scale as well as its duration lasting for over 300 years.  It was also unique because enslaved persons remained enslaved for life, and their status was inherited by their children.  It's also played a pivotal role in the formation of our geopolitical landscape and the systemic racism in this country, and the city that we're grappling with today.  The effects of global trade of enslaved persons continues to be seen in the ongoing oppression of Black people in Canada and around the world.  The original sins of genocide of Indigenous peoples and the enslavement of Indigenous and Black people are part of the foundation of this country, and we can't turn away from those.  This address is about decisions, it's about decisions that have been made the consequences to Canadian society that flow from those decisions, and decisions that have yet to be made.  Decisions about what we value and what we do not.  Decisions about whether we tolerate injustice and decisions about what justice means to us.  These are decisions that we all have to make as individuals and collectively to find a path forward towards a more fair and just country.

59 Years ago, in April 1963, the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King wrote to religious leaders from his jail cell in Birmingham, AL.  He wrote in response to their expressed opposition to the timing of nonviolent direct action that had been taken by freedom fighters in support of desegregation.  Doctor King admonished those who would have preferred the conflict itself to just go away.  And those who wanted other actions to be tried first to give officials in Alabama another chance to make voluntary changes, even at the expense of those that were waiting for justice and their ability to participate in and benefit from our society.  At the expense too often of the very lives of Black children and adults, Doctor King called that approach a negative piece marked by the absence of tension, instead of a positive piece which is marked by the presence of justice.  Doctor King didn't see tension as an inherently negative state.  He disagreed with those who advocated that the tension created by nonviolent direct action was something to be avoided in and of itself, right?  Doctor King saw the tension created by the protests in opposition to the state as a necessary catalyst for change.  So, first critics though avoiding disruption and unrest caused by the confrontation between the makers and enforcers of legal segregation, and protesters was preferable to the labour pains required to birth justice.  And today, that's what we're living with.  We're living with the effects of a negative piece in Canadian society.  

Too often there is very little tension felt by those who don't experience the effects of systemic and other forms of racism.  Indigenous folks, Black and other racialized peoples, however, continue to live with the effects of racism on our lives.  These effects not only have an impact on human dignity, but they're causing serious harm to folks’ health, financial security, educational.  The harms to Indigenous, Black and other racialized folks that we see in Canada today are not accidental.  They are the result of decisions which have been made by people to create and maintain systems of inequality over centuries, starting with colonization and enslavement.  Whether because of actions that were taken and or because folks have failed to take action, none of the effects of racism are random accidents without a cause.  Whether people are institutions intend to cause harm, nevertheless, results and so as a society we can't use our lack of intention to cause harm to others as a justification for inaction.  In her book “Policing Black Lives: State Violence in Canada from slavery to the present”, Canadian scholar and bestselling author Robin Maynard wrote “Black subjugation in Canada cannot be fully understood and therefore cannot be fully redressed, or countered without placing it in its historical context.”  So this addressed today this talk is intended to place Canadian anti-blackness into that context, into its proper context, so that we may understand what's required of us.  And that we understand the urgency involved in creating a positive piece marked by the presence of justice for all.  Before I start to talk about the history of enslavement in Canada, it's important to center that period of history and its surrounding time periods.

Black history didn't begin or end with a period of enslavement.  Thousands of years of history precede European colonization of the African continent.  I've previously said that when given the opportunity we learn and we teach about the things that we actually value.  The devaluation of all humans emanating from Africa has deep roots in Western culture.  This devaluation has served an important function, it maintains systems of inequality that benefits some at the expense of others.  The relationship between European nations and nations of the African continent was not one where European states envisioned existing in cooperation with other equals.  The contributions of the continent of Africa were only valued in the currency of colonialism, resources, and profit.  The profit, which flowed from the exploitation of those resources, the land born, embarrassment of riches including gold, desperately needed to fund the activities of European monarchies.  It also held another commodity, a source of labour to support commercial activities for profit which was only achievable by the use of unpaid and unfree labour. 

European African contact didn't commence with European colonization at all.  For example, commencing in the 8th Century, the Moors where black Muslim Africans conquered and occupied territories which now form part of modern-day Malta, Portugal, Spain and Italy for several hundred years.  The more she empire brought with its advancements in astronomy, sciences, mathematics, art, architecture and design, and they brought that those gifts to other parts of Europe to long before the balance of Europe caught up.  The oldest university in the world, which is still in continuous operation, was actually founded in Fez, Morocco, in 859CE.  And it's taught and still teaches subjects such as linguistics, grammar, law, medicine and astronomy.  The second oldest university in continuous operation in the world was established in Cairo, Egypt in 9CE.  By contrast, it would be over 100 years before the first European University was founded in 1088.  There were also other great African empires and kingdoms, as well as smaller decentralized but nevertheless ordered societies, that had their own laws, their own languages, commerce, education systems.  Mansa Musa was the ruler of the empire of Mali from 1312 through 1337, and it's considered the wealthiest man to man to have ever lived.  He came to power when his predecessor was believed to have died at sea while leading an exploratory expedition across the Atlantic Ocean, almost 200 years before Christopher Columbus sailed his first voyage in 1490.  The Mali Empire's riches were funded primarily from the mining of gold and salt.  And Mansa Musa was so wealthy that the vast amount of gold that he simply gave away while he was on his hushed Ameca, devalued the price of gold in Egypt for approximately 12 years.  So European nations were well aware and had contact with Africa, and they knew that it wasn't an empty continent that was filled with illiterate sub-humans.  Too ignorant to have advanced civilizations, Africa wasn't in need of civilizing, although that later became one theme that justified colonization and slavery.

A similar myth has been perpetuated here in Canada about Indigenous peoples in order to maintain control over this land and the resources.  No more obvious example of harm these myths 'cause is a legacy of residential schools.  Residential schools, along with other tactics taken, were used to deprive Indigenous peoples of their connections to land culture, language, and family in the name of civilization.  Less obviously, similar myths about the nature of Black people abound the history of systemic racism in this country is as old as the first European colonies, and one way that racist structures are maintained is to deprive oppressed peoples of their own history, and to rewrite the narrative to suit those whose goal is to maintain power.  And in this way we've lost and had erased important history from Africa and Canadian history, which is also Black history.  The role of Canada, Canada's role in the Transatlantic slave trade as but one example of a history that some have chosen to erase, because they favor narratives more comfortable to our belief that Canada's relationship to Black people is fundamentally different than the relationship between the United States and its Black citizens.  This selective memory has been unfortunately reinforced by Canadian Canada's official policy of multiculturalism which has served to reduce our understanding of Black people to and culture to food and drink, music and art.  These aspects of culture can't be divorced from our history without regard to the legacy of oppression and the resistance to that oppression, because that's what gave birth to that culture.  There's value in embracing the cultural differences of all Canadians don't get me wrong.  Doing that without acknowledging you're seeking to understand deep systemic inequalities that are countries based upon serves only to mask the realities of our history and our present.  Canadian black history, when it's discussed, all is usually limited to representations of Canada as the promised land for people escaping enslavement in the US.  This is an oversimplification of Canada's history in relationship to Black people, and it's deeply misleading and it serves to mask the continued anti-blackness that permeates our society.  For example, the period during which Upper Canada was the terminus for the Underground Railroad for those escaped slaves to reach only lasted for about 30 years.  By contrast, slavery was legal and practiced in what is now Canada for over 200 years.  For more context, Canada has only been a country for 155.  This significant part of our history is so erased that Canada doesn't even appear on most maps that demonstrate the flow of enslaved persons and commodities from the global slave trade.  Fortunately, there are many Canadian scholars who join others around the world to tell the true story of enslavement and the early lives of Black Canadians.  So much of this address is based upon the work of Canadian historians and academics, such as a full Cooper Charmaine Nelson, Robin Maynard, Natasha Henry, Ken Donovan, Rosemary Sadlier, are Bruce Shepard, Walter Tucker Polski, and James Walker to name a few.  Each of them have ensured that this history has been preserved for us to learn.  To set the stage for our exploration of Canada's role in the slave trade, understanding a bit about the scale of the Transatlantic slave trade is really helpful. 

According to Steven Mintz who's a professor at the University of Texas at Austin over the period of the Atlantic slave trade, which took place from around 1526 to 1860, twelve and a half million or so enslaved Africans were shipped across the Atlantic.  The volume of enslaved persons carried off from Africa reached 30,000 per year by the 1690s and 100 years later, 85,000 per year.  More than eight out of 10 Africans that were forced into the slave trade crossed the Atlantic between 1700 and 1850.  By 1820, nearly four Africans for everyone, European had crossed the Atlantic and about four out of every five women who crossed the Atlantic were from Africa.  The vast majority of those enslaved people were taken to South America and the Caribbean, followed by the American colonies in the Canadian colonies.  Only about 10.7 million Black people actually arrived in the Americas, though.  The Atlantic slave trade, according to Professor Mintz, was likely the most costly in human life of all long distance global migrations, and estimates are that 2,000,000 Black people died during the middle passage.  The middle passage was marked by gruesome conditions, chained together in dark, cramped slave ports, some of which had doors of no return that open directly onto the sea.  Enslaved adults and children were loaded into the holes of slave ships, chained together side by side, left in their own waste for the journey.  Illness and disease, and drowning and hold when ships to con water was commonplace.  Starvation and near starvation was in fact as was the rape of Black women.  It's a defining feature for the descendants of people who have been enslaved that we know that we only exist because of the sexual assault in the rape of Black women.  I recently just found out through DNA testing that my Black father's first ancestor is a Portuguese man, proof in my DNA of those rapes.  So when we think about what it means to be the descendant of a person who is enslaved and to remember the victims of slavery during transport across the Atlantic.  Enslaved persons, there were many instances in history where enslaved persons were actually thrown overboard to drown on masks for one reason or another.

One example is the slave ship entitled “The Song” it was a British slave ship, and 100 enslaved persons were thrown overboard in 1790 after the ship’s navigators made errors that prolonged their journey. Unexpectedly they were running out of water and but that wasn't the decision, far from being this life or death decision, the decision to throw those 132 enslaved persons overboard with so that they could make an insurance claim for the value of the goods lost, those human beings.  If the enslaved persons died on board, the insurance company wouldn't compensate the owners of the human cargo.  So rather than lose some without compensation, the decision was made to try to recover the losses by way of murder instead.  Another ten enslaved persons jumped overboard and defiance, and that's not the only time in history that we know of where enslaved persons chose freedom by jumping into the sea rather than accept the enslavement that had been thrust upon them.  We know of these events because the insurance company actually denied the claim of the owner and the owner sued.

Black and Canadian author M Nervouse Phillip wrote an award-winning volume of poetry about the events which occurred also entitled on, turning to Canadian history specifically.  The first Black person recorded to have been in Canada wasn't enslaved, his name was Matthew DaCosta and he was a person of African Portuguese descent with and was an interpreter for Samuel de Champlain.  The earliest record of an enslaved Black African in New France is the sale of a child from either Madagascar or Guinea.  In 1629, the child believed to have been around six years old, was brought to New France aboard a British ship as the child slave of Sir David Kirk, who is a trader in privateer for King Charles the First.  The child was later sold to a French clerk named Olivier LaBelle, if sometimes referred to as ivier Le Tab, and then transfer to junkyard in 1633.  The enslaved child was baptized and given the name Olivia Jean Lesion in the colony of New France for the rest of his life and died in 1654.  We'll never know what his name actually was.

Robin Maynard and her book “Policing Black Lives: State Violence in Canada from Slavery to the Present” wrote in New France the buying and selling of Black men, women and children, and the nonconsensual unpaid labour extracted from approximately 4000 Indigenous and Black enslaved people helped build the infrastructure and wealth for White settlers during the 17th and 18th centuries.  As French colonists settled in Canada and they expanded their colonizing ventures, it became clear that there was a chronic labour shortage that couldn't be remedied by the use of indentured workers from France.  So chattel slavery began in earnest here in new in what is now Quebec in 1680, when King Louis the 14th authorized chattel slavery in New France after the governor of the colony wrote to him stating that quote, “laborers and servants are so scarce and costly, and that those who attempt extensive work are ruined.  In consequence, we believe that the surest means of obviating this difficulty would break would be to bring here slaves.  So the purpose of importation of enslaved persons was very clear, right?  It was a cheap, disposable form of Labor and it was necessary to do that because the likelihood of death, and as a result of those working conditions was great.”  Enslaved persons were purchased from the English from American colonies from the Caribbean and from Africa.  Madagascar was a particularly popular place of origin for many of New Frances enslaved Blacks.  Slavery in New France was regulated by a French legal code entitled the “Code Mar”, and even though it wasn't officially adopted in New France, it was nevertheless followed.  And according to a Cooper Canada's colonial officials use that code to give legal foundation to slavery, so under that code that is the law. Effectively, that declared insulate people to be movable.  That means like they were personal property in the same category as livestock, furniture, and trade goods.  The Cold War also regulated other aspects of the lives of enslaved persons such as relations between master and slave and the status of slave children, which was that they would take on the enslave status of their mother.  Slave marriages and other aspects of life for enslaved people.  We do have historical information about the day-to-day lives of enslaved persons living in France.  Perhaps one of the most known stories of an enslaved woman in New France is that of Mary Joseph Angelic who is an enslaved woman, who is thought to have burned down much of old Marie Allen during an attempt to escape.  To this day, historians still aren't sure whether she was actually in fact responsible for the fire, but she was tried, convicted, and sentenced to have her hands cut off and to be burnt alive in 1734.  Her appeal was there was an appeal of her sentence to the High Court, and at the end her sentence was reduced but she was tortured to reveal the accomplices.  The accomplices she was believed to have had by encasing her legs in wooden braces, and then they were systematically crushed during questioning.  After her torture was complete, and she never did reveal any accomplices, she was paraded through the streets of old media on a cart, to be vilified, and then she was hanged in her body was burned.  Mary Joseph Angelic enslaved persons in Canada were subjected to physical torture at the whim of White people, and authority as punishment for not working to the satisfaction of the slaveholder for running away for any other offense which may have been perceived.

The first malicious in Canada, according to Rob Maynard, were formed to catch enslaved persons who freed themselves one of the first crimes that Black people could commit to steal one's own person.  Just as there's a historical record of advertisements of slaved, enslaved persons for sale in the colonies, there's also a historical record of newspaper advertisements offering rewards for the return of runaway slaves.  There are many myths and stereotypes that remain about Black people which stem from the period of enslavement.  One is that of inherent dishonesty, and this stems in part from the belief of sale slaveholders that to run away from one's owner was theft.  Similarly, Black people were not able to give evidence in camp in court.  Even in the modern era, it's common that the evidence of White people is found to be more reliable than the competing evidence of Black people. So, for example in the 1990s, a Black judge in Nova Scotia acquitted a Black youth after preferring his evidence to that of the White police officer, who is the only other witness at the trial.  And after objecting that there was no reason not to prefer the evidence of the police officer, the prosecutors appealed the decision and wanted it overturned alleging that the judge was biased.  At the end of the day, the Supreme Court of Canada agreed with the trial judge and then the acquittal held, but not before to appeal, courts agreed with the prosecution.

The myth of laziness, another myth about Black people and other stereotype stems from the expectation, that Black people were expected to give their unfree labour to the satisfaction of the owner with what without regard to their wants or physical needs for rest.  In fact, in the Caribbean slaves faced such hard conditions that many died very quickly, and so the volume part of the reason the volume of enslaved persons made their way to Brazil and South America.  So anything less than meeting the expectations of those slaveholders constituted late laziness, it was punishable by the owner.  Bearing in mind that as I said, just now, enslaved black people were often worked quite literally to death.  There was no reasonable limit on what could be demanded right by force, so the myth of laziness is one that's been baked into our society, and it's perpetuated through cultural liberalism that reinforces it.  I see this frequently.  I see this phenomenon play out in workplaces where Black people bear greater expectations for performance by their bosses, and their discipline for minor infractions by employers in ways which are not imposed on their White coworkers.

Sexual violence was also a feature of slavery under the French and the British in Canada.  There's little published out on sexual violence in New France, but Kevin Donovan’s 2014 research on the French owned colony of Illinois, and found that White slaveholders frequently raped, and otherwise sexually course Nicks, plighted their Black female slaves as part of a shared culture of abuse.  That was shared throughout the French Atlantic world and originated, as I said, on slave ships.  After enslavement, the work that was available to Black women was similar to what they did during the period of enslavement, which was frequently to work as nannies or domestics.  Black women were not permitted other forms of employment.  As White people refused to hire for other positions, so as a result, black women were forced to continue to work as nannies to White children as domestics.  Working extremely long hours, again, at the whim of their employers and often experiencing sexual violence and exploitation at work. This phenomena has continued, and there are works that continue to highlight the plight of racialized and Black domestics in Canada, and how they are subjected to terrible working conditions and sexual violence.  Many Black women in the post slavery period were forced into prostitution, and that's a fact.  That fact arises from the fact there was little or no other work that was permitted to Black women.  It wasn't taken into consideration though, that this was the case when they were targeted for profit for prosecution because of the prostitution they were forced to engage in.  The long hours also meant that Black women couldn't be available to care for their own children, and then myth of Black people being poor parents was born to this day.  We see that Black children are overrepresented in Canada's child welfare system, second only to Indigenous children, to this day we see Black women being seen as sexually voracious and unbreakable.  Black women today continue to be disproportionately experience sexual assault and sexual harassment with little redress.

In the British colonies, slavery was also a defining feature of Atlantic Canada, Ontario, and Quebec.  The practice was deeply entrenched in colonial life in economics.  In addition to enslaved persons that had been held in New France and were permitted by their owners to retain them under British rule, and those that were purchased in the British colonies, at least 1200 enslaved people were brought across the border by White loyalist masters who became the elites of the British colonies after the American Revolutionary War.  Slave trading activities connected diverse economies across the Atlantic, and there was a brisk trade between capitalists of eastern Canada and the rest of the world with respect to the commodities of insulate that were traded in this during the period of enslavement.  The economic value of unpaid Black labour was, of course, significant.  So in addition to the benefits that White owners gain from unfree labour, White settlers participated in and profited from the global Atlantic slave trade settlements in Quebec City, Montreal, and Halifax were transatlantic network ports that frequently receive ships containing enslaved people arriving from the Caribbean.  According to Charmaine Nelson, another historian, White settlers were deeply economically implicated in the trade of commodities it produced by enslaved people as well, including the sugar that we used to make Canadian rum and molasses.  Unpaid and nonconsensual Black labour was critical for the economic growth of the colonies.  Enslaved Blacks were also a source of wealth because they were passed down from parent to child and wills.  According to a few Cooper, at least 6060 of the slave ships that had been used during the British slave trade were actually built in Canada.  And West Indian slaves were also bought by Canadian slaveholders and merchant slaveholders.  Sorry producers of salt cod sold salt cod from Atlantic Canada to slaveholders in the West Indies to feed enslaved people who are working on the sugar plantations.  And therefore you can see how all of these economies were intrinsic to the development of the colonies that are now Canada.

Slave ownership was prevalent among political leaders clergy.  People were owned by other folks from almost every level of society, including governors, clergy, military officers, merchants, priests, blacksmiths, tailors.  Uhm?  Braindance founder, who has made a St in 1990, she was a slaveholder.  The first mayor of Saint John new as a slaveholder, his name was Gabriel Ludlow and he served as mayor from 1785 to 1790 and placed several restrictions on the growing Black community.  For example, Black people weren't allowed to take an oath to gain the status of Freeman within city limits.  Many of these restrictions state in place long after he left office and deeply affected Black people's lives.  Six out of the sixteen members of the first Parliament of Upper Canada were slave owners or had family members who were sitting slaves.  Fourteen of the seventeen members of the second Parliament Upper Canada had either enslaved Black people or were from slaveholding families.  These were the people that were in power, and their loss supported their worldview and their laws are the laws that we have built our laws upon as time has gone on.  James McGill, who was the founder of McGill University, was among Montreal richest people when he died in 1813, bequeathing 46 acres of land and £10,000, which is a huge sum to establish a College in his name.   He also held public office, he had three terms in the legislature and Lower Canada, and he was a slave owner.  He was also a slave trader and a merchant who sold produced by slaves in other colonies, so his immense profits from slavery became the university those are the assets upon which McGill University has been founded.  Further embedding racism into the university's foundation, only White and male students and professors were admitted upon its establishment.

Slavery was abolished in the British Empire on August 1st, 1834, which is now very recently only last year recognized for the first time in Canada as Emancipation Day.  The condition of free Blacks in Canada, unfortunately, was a continuation of their treatment during the 200 years in which slavery was legal.  On these shores and segregation was a hallmark of early Canadian life.  Free Black Canadians were met with numerous and intentional obstacles trying to establish themselves.  According to James Walker, the small land grant, grants that Black folks who fought for the British received were smaller than those that were granted to White Loyalists and they didn't permit self-sufficiency through agriculture.  So those folks were forced to seek occasional labouring jobs in neighboring White towns.  So they were then again became vulnerable to exploitation and discrimination.  And employment and wages throughout the Maritimes Blacks received, Blacks were poor as was in upper Canada.  Poverty was a basic component of the early Black experience.  Remember that first mayor of St. John, NB I was just speaking of, according to Natasha Henry this the restrictions he placed on Black people her in place long after he was gone.  Until 1870, Black folks were prohibited from practicing a trade or selling goods in Saint John.  They were barred from fishing at Saint John Harbour, and they couldn't live within city limits unless they were employed as a servant or labourer.  So when I say these were the result of deliberate decisions, these are the decisions we're talking about that created Black poverty.  Racial segregation practices forced Black people into service sectors like being servers, waiters, waitresses, janitors, sleeping car porters, domestic servants, laundresses.  White business owners and the governments didn't hire or promote Black people.  Traditionally speaking Black folks then became important members of the labour movements, such as the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters.  And as everyone is probably aware that TV series “The Porter” which was filmed in Winnipeg, tells that story of the legacy left for us by the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters and the folks that began to organize.  So the exclusion of Black people from more lucrative forms of employment, and forcing folks to remain in those unskilled jobs was the result of deliberate exclusion.  And it has to be understood that context it was intentional that Black people would be poor to this day.  Black folks have lower standards of living in their households relative to the total Canadian population.

Similarly, Black children were excluded from White school by way of legislation in Ontario and Nova Scotia.  The last segregated school didn't close in Nova Scotia until 1980, and the last segregated school Ontario didn't close until 1965.  Other provinces, including Alberta, New Brunswick, NPI, it was acceptable practice for White residents to deny Black Families Act access to local public schools often or intimidation attached.  So myth of Black folks not being intelligent which persists to this day was supported right by these actions.  And to this day, for example, Black children are still being streamed out of academic streams in schools and put into and lower expectations in Sioux of them.  Black folks have been excluded from higher education in Canada as well.  We're just talking about McGill University and its founding, in 2020, only .5% of McGill faculty are Black.  Charmaine Nelson, doctor, Charmaine Nelson is one of only ten black professors among the university, 1700 tenured and tenure track professors in 2020.  For comparison sake, the Black population of Montreal in 2016 was 16.8% of the total population, so you can see that the legacy of these practices, these deliberate decisions is stark and they're still with us.  Segregation was a common feature in Canadian universities, so I just one example, Queens University refused to admit Black students from 1918 until 1965, and the policy was still on the books, even though it wasn't enforced until 2018 to this day, Black students remain underrepresented in universities across Canada, including in Manitoba.  The newly formed Scarborough Charter is an effort on the part of universities who are signatories to start combating systemic anti-blackness and higher education.

Turning to some history in Western Canada, opposition to Black migration to the Prairies was opposed by the Canadian government.  One wave of migration occurred at the beginning of the 20th Century from Oklahoma in response to Jim Crow laws that were being instituted there when Oklahoma became a state.  So that those folks, about 1000 Black folks from Oklahoma, moved to the Canadian prairies, particularly Alberta, between 1909 and 1911.  And established several rural…there are several Black families that live here now in Winnipeg.  Who of those Black folks are out of Oklahoma?  And such as the Mays family who settled in Saskatchewan.  Opposition to Black migration in the Canadian prairies was really significant, according to our Bruce Shepherd, the immigration branch of the Federal Department of the Interior was saying that “Blacks should not be allowed to settle in the Canadian plains”, and it was opposed heartily.  Uhm, it's important to note that those entrenched views about Black folks that came from the practice of chattel slavery also were held by others and other parts of the world, right?  Because this was a system that was global, so the views of the immigrants who also were coming to the prairies at the time were also reinforcing the government position.  Terrible, but poignant example that is manageable, example is comes from a quote from a woman from Brandon, who in response to 194 Oklahomans arriving in Winnipeg after coming up through Emerson by train, wrote and the Manitoba Free Press published her letter.  She wrote those who had never lived in Black-inhabited areas and had only been in contact with well-disposed Blacks, would find those who did know their habits, however, could only see Blacks as undesirable.  They could never be colonized, or settlers.  In concluding she argued as negroes flourished in a hot country and do as little work as possible.  It is hoped that Jack Frost will accomplish what the authorities apparently cannot.

Organizations like the Ku Klux Klan, the KKK, and other White supremacist organizations were active on the Prairies.  The clan began organizing in eastern Canada, BC, and Manitoba as early as the 1920s.  In Saskatchewan in the late 1920s, there were approximately 20,000 members of the KKK, and they were not marginal.  The White supremacist we see today are not considered part of the fabric of Canadian society, but the KKK members included Protestant ministers in Saskatchewan, their cargo gations were aware and were not troubled by this.  Moose Jaws clan financially supported the wing of a hospital, which boasted a plaque celebrating law and order, separation of church, and state freedom of speech and press, and White Supremacy.  So the Black population throughout this period was treated as a source of danger. 

Pathological representations about the nature of Black men as being criminally dangerous for common, and there was a significant focus on the safety of White women requiring protection from Black men and their lust right, and that was used as an instrument of racial terror.  So there were instances of near lynching of Black men, newspapers with length Black men to danger in crime, using terms such as Black greatness, beast.  More headlines, such as the Black Peril or an ego atrocity, White girl flogged and assaulted by later arrivals at Edmonton.  So the racism that we're talking about today that racism in policing has its roots in slavery, and so that those the laws that have disproportionately criminalized Black folks were still seeing those results today.  The Ontario Communities Commission did a multi-year multi study examined racial profiling and discrimination by the Toronto Police Service.  And some of the findings included that even though Black folks only represent 8.8% of Toronto's population, they represented almost one-third, 32% of all the charges in the charged data set White people and other racialized groups that were underrepresented.  Uhm, Black people were overrepresented, over 1/3 of the charges that were out of sight driving charges such as driving without valid insurance, which can only be discovered after the police had observed the race of the driver, or had stopped and questioned the driver.  Uhm, Black folks were involved in approximately one-quarter, 25% of all special investigations unit cases resulting in death, serious injury, or allegations of sexual assault at the hands of police.  Those are just a few examples of the ways in which the manner that we have in our culture maintained almost in a hidden way.  All of these stereotypes around Black folks and criminality there's as we've seen, there's a direct, unbroken connection from the period of slavery to systemic racism and the harms that black folks are suffering right now today.  Too often those harms are attributed to individual choices without consideration given to the system of inequality that's been baked into our society, and the act and the anti-blackness which is part of our culture.

So through it all, Black people in Canada, we've been here and we've formed an integral part of the fabric of our country, of this city.  Black folks have made invaluable contributions to all facets of society, and our resilience and the determination of black folks to persist.  Despite all of the barriers that were intentionally placed in our way is remarkable, and it's too often those parts of history are also unrecognized.  As I said earlier, the labour movement in Canada wouldn't be what it is without the organizers of the Union of Sleeping Car Porters. The contributions of Black business owners, politicians, educators, artists, lawyers, all make our country a better place and this is all Canadian history, and it's our present as well and we can't turn away from any of it.  We can't turn away from the good and we can't turn away from the bad.  I hope that this talk inspires those who've been listening to embrace, and to learn more about our history and then to do something about it.  The time for our inaction has passed.  The negative piece that is the absence of tension can't hold anymore.  We all have to step into our future together with each one of us actively with urgency, working to disrupt and dismantle what is so harmful, our culture, our society and our people.  Thank you so much for your time and your attention this afternoon, and thank you.

Question and Answer Period moderated by Diane Burelle and responded to by Laurelle Harris

Diane:  Thank you, Miss Harris, for your most powerful keynote address commemorating the United Nations International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave trade.  The history of Canada that you've outlined consisted of such profound violations of human rights and freedoms White settlers have gained economically from these atrocities.

Laurelle:  Yep.

Diane:  Yes, they unfortunately, it's very unfortunate and the legacy of this history is ongoing, and we must all be aware of the impacts of such violations from generation to generation.  We have to recognize that the legacy of this history in Canada is still felt today by the Black community.  Racism, systemic anti-blackness as you've outlined, persist and directly impact all social determinants of health and wellness.  We must work together to dismantle all forms of oppression because everyone deserves to live, work, study, and play in a safe environment free from discrimination, racism, and violence.  There are some great questions, Miss Harris, I'm going to read one out to you here.

Laurelle:  Sure.

Diane:  One attendee wrote, thank you so much for this thought-provoking lecture.  I recently found out that some African colonies and Haiti are still paying compensation to France, because they fought for their freedom and France has lost money due to this.  Also, you hear so many things that make you realize slavery might have ended, but its effect is still very much present and it seems like it never ends. Do you think advocacy is enough to change things in the long run, and how does a Black person or Person of Colour not get mentally tired from this constant struggle and having to prove yourself?

Laurelle:  Uhm, so though that's a great question, so I'm actually gonna answer the second question first, which is how do Black folks stop from being exhausted.  Don't we are exhausted?  So your friends, your colleagues, your family members who are Black or racialized, and are experiencing systemic and other forms of racism are being affected every single day.  There's actually lots of research out there that has proven that exposure to everyday racism.  Those little everyday slights that add up is actually incredibly detrimental to the physical and mental health of the people that experience them.  So what we do is what we've always done, which is what all folks who have lived with depression have done every respective of their race, which has put one foot in front of the other and keep going.  But it's important to remember that yeah, we're exhausted, we're tired, and this work is tough work, so thank you for acknowledging that because it's not necessarily always seen.

In answer to the second question, advocacy is not enough when people talk about what do you do to be an anti-racist?  Not acting is supporting racism.  So you know, I'm not saying that every single person is a horrible human being, do not mistake what I'm saying at all, but what I'm saying is that when we choose to just not do something about it we're supporting that system remaining in place, so advocacy is important.  But actually, taking concrete steps to do that is even more important, and there are different things that folks can do.  I won't take up a lot of time talking about that, but action is what's next for sure.

Diane:  Absolutely, we all need to act together and start dismantling once and for all.  Another question for you Miss Harris is, would you say the lack of reparations to Black folks?  It's still a way of not acknowledging slavery?

Laurelle:  Absolutely.  Absolutely, when the myth has been that you if people acknowledge that slavery existed in Canada, that it was really kind of minor, and the degree to which Canada's wealth was built on the backs of Black folks here that were enslaved here in Canada that were enslaved in other parts of the world, which formed part of that those commodities being traded, and bought, and sold that wealth was built on the backs of enslaved people.  And so and Black folks are never going to be able to economically recover as a group from that.  And so reparations in some form that doesn't necessarily have to be a cash payment, but reparations in some form is called.  For example, I would love to see universities that you’ve built with the money from slavery fund the education of Black folks at bringing Black folks into the university.  Support folks rise when all of those systemic barriers remain deeply in place.  So the answer, yet my short answer was yes, and my long answer is yes I think that reparations in some form is a way to begin to repair harm.

Diane:   Thank you for that, there's a comment thanking you very much appreciating this presentation today another made the statement really.  It's hard, hard to look back on our ancestors, those who may have participated in being the White settlers oppressing to that degree.  Many are stating that they wish this history could be part of teaching curriculum.

Another comment, it's a comment that another participant has provided.  I'll read it out to you.  This is the first paragraph from a Free Press article published March 4th, 2022, Philadelphia, Black retired football players who were denied payments for dementia in NFL’s $1 billion concussion settlement can seek to be retested, or have their claims rescored to eliminate racial bias in the testing and payout formula under revised plan finalized Friday.  Outrage over the use of “race norming” in the dementia testing, which assumed that Black people have a lower cognitive baseline score, making it harder for them to show mental declines linked to football, force the NFL players’ lawyers back to the negotiating table last year, so just another really underscoring.

Laurelle:  Yes, issues, right?  The persistent issues, and you Robin Maynard said, we don't I, I'm paraphrasing now, but we don't know where we are unless we know where we came from right?  And so all of those perceptions around Black people being inherently physically stronger, or Black people being inherently less intelligent all of that stuff has its roots in slavery, and it's been as I said earlier, baked into our culture and it influences all kinds of things, including these types of assessments.

Diane:  Thank you, it inherited this social constructs that we need to actively, and critically examine, and dismantle, and renew about.  One more question for you, miss Harris is, what is more effective when trying to support, and make people aware is posting posts of what happened, more useful and posting what we can do now?

Laurelle:  I guess everyone is grappling with the action that's needed and that's the biggest, biggest great barrier struggle right now, right?  Yeah, I mean there are a lot of things about when we talk about folks supporting Black people, but it being performative what people are talking about is posting on social media, but then actually not doing anything in one’s own life to do that work to start undoing racism.  So it's important to post and raise awareness, and posting about the history, posting about what we do next is really, really important, but it has to be accompanied by action and posting alone is doesn't make one an anti-racist, right?  And so examining the ways in which we are benefiting from these systems personally is part of the action.  Actually doing things to advocate and support anti-racist initiatives is disrupting racism when you see it is important, and one of the hardest things for some folks to do is to call out racism when it's happening.  You, if racists don't call Bob at the dinner table is always talking that way, but you don't want to ruin Christmas dinner.  That's really tough, right?  But when we remain silent and allow Uncle Bob to simply continue in those in that way what no good, no good is happening.  So the very least we have to start disrupting it where we see it.  That's what Martin Luther King Junior was talking about when he was talking about a negative piece being the absence of tension, right?  Not wanting to call out your friends when they say something or do something that's really racist, because you don't want to cause a problem in the friendship well just let's not draw equivalencies right?  Disrupting a friendship is important, but is it more important than the Black folks being incarcerated disproportionately?  Is it more important than Black kids being in the child welfare system?  Is it more important than Black folks not being able to get jobs or stay in their workplaces without discrimination?  So we have to accept that part of what the work of anti-racism is being uncomfortable, and allowing that tension to exist because really Black people can't undo racism.  The work that has to be done we can support that work, but the work actually has to come from White folks to dismantle those structures themselves, right?  So, posting is good, but doing something about it is more.

Closing Remarks by Natalie Durocher

Thank you so much Miss Harris for this very again a powerful keynote address that you provided us this event over the lunch time, so thank you.  And also for your insight and your responses to everyone's questions.  It's been, I know for me, especially very impactful and you've given us a lot to think about today.  So thank you so much again for your time. 

And for the rest at this brings close to this week's Anti-Racism Speaker Series events.  I know for me it's been such a great week.  It's been an emotional one, and I know that I have so much more to learn and I'm looking forward to furthering that learning.  So thank you everyone, and on behalf of the Equity Office and the Human Rights Committee of Council, we do want to thank again all our speakers who have supported our learning this week through their powerful keynote addresses.  We will be posting the videos of all speaker events on our Anti-Racism in Action 2022 website, along with their transcripts and questions that were either asked and we didn't have the opportunity sometimes to cover all of them, so we'll make sure to post those as well along with responses for everyone some consideration.  

And I'm also happy to say that we're also planning to continue this series with more dynamic, great speakers such as Miss Harris who will help us commemorate more important equity, diversity and inclusion dates and events.  I'm going to ask everyone to look for those sessions to be added in the coming weeks and months on our website, and I will make sure to share the link. The Anti-Racism In Action 2022 website in the chat before we leave.  And also I wanted to give a big thank you to all my very talented and dedicated colleagues who have worked diligently behind the scenes in the creation and delivery of this amazing week.  We couldn't have done without the collaboration of everyone, so great job everyone.  And also thanks to all of you in attendance today, and to all who have attended, and joined, and attended these speaker events throughout the past week.  Everyone you've made the commitment to join us in furthering our knowledge on racism issues and systemic barriers not only in Winnipeg, but also throughout Canada and as we learned today, the wider world and to further support our respective roles when it comes to the elimination of racism in our community.  So thank you again so much everyone for your time, and we're wishing you a great rest of your day.

Chat:

  1. Thank you so much for this thought-provoking lecture.  I recently found out that some African colonies and Haiti are still paying "compensation" to France because they fought for their freedom and France has lost money due to this.  Also, you hear so many things that makes you realize slavery might have ended, but its effect is still very much present and it seems like it never ends. Do you think advocacy is enough to change things in the long run?  How does a Black person or Person of Colour not get mentally tired from this constant struggle and having to prove yourself?
  2. Would you say the lack of reparations to Black folks is still a way of not acknowledging slavery?
  3. Just a comment.  This is the first paragraph from a Free Pres article published March 4, 2022.  “PHILADELPHIA -- Black retired football players who were denied payments for dementia in the NFL's $1 billion concussion settlement can seek to be retested, or have their claims rescored to eliminate racial bias in the testing and payout formula, under a revised plan finalized Friday.  Outrage over the use of ‘race-norming’ in the dementia testing -- which assumed that Black people have a lower cognitive baseline score, making it harder for them to show mental declines linked to football -- forced the NFL and players' lawyers back to the negotiating table last year."
  4. Thank you so much.  I really appreciate this series.
  5. Thank you so much for this thought-provoking lecture.  I recently found out that some African colonies and Haiti are still paying "compensation" to France, because they fought for their freedom and France has lost money due to this.  Also, you hear so many things that makes you realize slavery might have ended, but its effect is still very much present and it seems like it never ends.  Do you think advocacy is enough to change things in the long run?  How does a Black person or Person of Colour not get mentally tired from this constant struggle and having to prove yourself?
  6. Thank you!  I've learned so much...pretty disgusted by my ancestors.  I sure wish this history would be part of the teaching curriculum.
  7. Would you say the lack of reparations to Black folks is still a way of not acknowledging slavery?
  8. Laurelle Harris, thank you so much for your presentation.  It was very informative.
  9. What is more affective when trying to support and make people aware?  Is posting posts of what happened more useful then posting what we can do now?
  10. What advise would you give to those who feel they have to conform in order not be stereotyped when dealing with work place challenges?
  11. What would be some good reading material that’s recommended?
  12. Thank you for your presentation.  I am a Black woman.  I have called out the systemic discrimination of my employer.  It has resulted in me being pushed out into early retirement and bringing a lawsuit against them as a private citizen.  How does a single person fight an organization when all the upper executives support the bias and discrimination of their colleague?
  13. Hello and thank you for your wisdom.  Do you have any comments on the current confirmation hearings for US Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson?
  14. Thank you Ms. Harris for your deeply meaningful and direct presentation of the legacy of slavery and colonialism in Canada and it’s living effects today.  And for the urgent demand for action now!
  15. Thank you so much Ms. Harris for all the work you are persistently doing to make us aware of the deep way Canada is connected to the societal violence we still endure due to the African Atlantic slave-trade legacy, as well as combating racism institutionalized in our country, and to support all of legal work to help to challenge our society.
  16. It has been a great series!  Thank you for putting this together.
  17. Anti-Racism in Action 2022 website: www.winnipeg.ca/interhom/anti-racism/default.stm