Cover of "Thy Will Be Done" featuring artwork from Titus Kaphar. Main image is a traditional portrait of Washington with a shredded document—the advertisement attempting to recover the self-emancipated Ona Judge—nailed over top of the bottom half of his face.
“Marks paints a nuanced, three-dimensional picture of George Washington. He helps us understand him as both revolutionary and enslaver, as president and as captor, as a man who was troubled by the institution even as he continued to participate in it. Thy Will Be Done is an exceptional book. This is how George Washington should be taught. This is how history should be done.”—Clint Smith, New York Times bestselling author of How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America
“John Garrison Marks has written an unsparing audit of our inherited memory—proving that the real revolution is in who gets to tell the story. He reveals how the nation’s first act of self-deception became its longest-running tradition.”—Alexis Coe, American history columnist at the New York Times and New York Times bestselling author of You Never Forget Your First: A Biography of George Washington
“Impressive in chronological scope, range of sources, and methodology. Few historians work as skillfully as John Garrison Marks does in his sensitive, primarily archival reconstruction of the early history of the people freed through Washington’s will and the primarily oral history of contemporary interpretation of enslavement at Mount Vernon.”—Andrew M. Schocket, author of Fighting over the Founders: How We Remember the American Revolution
“An engaging and nuanced chronicle of the legacy of George Washington and slavery over the past 250 years. Given increasingly polarized debates about how to interpret our country’s history, Thy Will Be Done is a vital contribution to understanding our national history and memory.”—Cassandra A. Good, author of First Family: George Washington’s Heirs and the Making of America
My book comes out in 3 weeks! It tells the story of how Americans have thought, and fought, about George Washington's involvement with slavery over the past 250 years. It's proved timely in ways I never imagined. Please share!
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![[chock full o'nuts letterhead]
May 13, 1958
The President
The White House
Washington, D.C.
My dear Mr. President:
I was sitting in the audience at the Summit Meeting of Negro Leaders yesterday when you said we must have patience. On hearing you say this, I felt like standing up and saying, “Oh no! Not again.”
I respectfully remind you sir, that we have been the most patient of all people. When you said we must have self-respect, I wondered how we could have self-respect and remain patient considering the treatment accorded us through the years.
17 million Negroes cannot do as you suggest and wait for the hearts of men to change. We want to enjoy now the rights that we feel we are entitled to as Americans. This we cannot do unless we pursue aggressively goals which all other Americans achieved over 150 years ago.
As the chief of executive of our nation, I respectfully suggest that you unwittingly crush the spirit of freedom in Negroes by constantly urging forbearance and give hope to those prosegregation leaders like Governor Faubus who would take from us even those freedoms we now enjoy. Your own experience with Governor Faubus is proof enough that forbearance and not eventual integration is the goal the pro-segregation leaders seek.
In my view, an unequivocal statement backed up by action such as you demonstrated you could take last fall in dealing with Governor Faubus if it became necessary, would let it be known that America is determined to provide – in the near future – for Negroes – the freedoms we are entitled to under the constitution.
Respectfully yours,
Jackie Robinson](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:wovz3whdkughp6decczypkqq/bafkreiaofjdah5kwt4upysjxq3co47ofa7vrafpvyruxkabrc3fw4f7f5a)
