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Callie House (1861–1928) was a leader of the National Ex-Slave Mutual Relief, Bounty and Pension Association, one of the first organizations to campaign for
reparations for slavery Reparations for slavery are reparations for victims of slavery. Reparations can take many forms, including financial compensation, legal remedy of damages, public apology and guarantees of non-repetition. Victims of slavery can refer to hist ...
in the
United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
. She was prosecuted for her efforts to secure reparations amd was jailed after her conviction by an all male and all white jury.


Biography

House was born enslaved in Rutherford County, near
Nashville, Tennessee Nashville, often known as Music City, is the capital and List of municipalities in Tennessee, most populous city in the U.S. state of Tennessee. It is the county seat, seat of Davidson County, Tennessee, Davidson County in Middle Tennessee, locat ...
. At the age of 22, she married William House. They had six children, five of whom survived. After William died, House supported her family by being a washerwoman. At 36, she began organizing hundreds of thousands of people calling for US reparations, building a powerful movement for which she was unjustly imprisoned in 1916.


National Ex-Slave Mutual Relief, Bounty, and Pension Association

While slavery was officially abolished following the 13th Amendment, many former enslaved persons were forced into sharecropping and doing menial labor as they had no financial freedom or resources. With no promise of economic relief or security from the government, House and Isaiah H. Dickerson traveled to former slave states to gather support for the National Ex-Slave Mutual Relief, Bounty and Pension Association (MRB&PA). At the time, many Americans were supportive of elderly war veterans receiving pensions. This gave former enslaved persons hope that they might receive pensions for their unpaid labor, too. The push for ex-slave pensions gained momentum and MRB&PA was chartered on August 7, 1897. It had two main goals: to petition Congress for a bill that would grant compensation (reparations) to former enslaved persons, and to provide mutual aid and burial expenses. By the late 1890s, MRB&PA became the leading grassroots association for ex-slave pensions with membership in the hundreds of thousands. With this growth, came an increase in surveillance. Three federal agencies—the Bureau of Pensions, the Post Office Department, and the Department of Justice sought to end this movement. Without evidence, only the Post Office Department could accuse organizations such as MRB&PA by citing fraud and arguing that US mail was being used to defraud slaves. On September 20, 1899, the MRB&PA was issued a fraud order, making it forbidden for them to send mail or cash money orders. Despite House's efforts (invoking 1st, 14th, and 15th Amendment rights; hiring an attorney), the Post Office Department was determined to invoke the fraud order in order to limit the MRB&PA's influence. Meanwhile, the pensions bill submitted to Congress was not taken seriously and the committee called for its indefinite postponement. Upon hearing this, House reminded the commissioner that the Constitution of the United States grants its citizens the right to petition Congress for a redress of grievances. Upon Dickerson's death in 1909, House became the leader of the MRB&PA and the movement. Despite interference with mail, the MRB&PA struggled on under House's leadership. House also decided to take the pension movement to the courts.


Reparations lawsuit

In 1915, under House's leadership, the association filed a class-action lawsuit, Johnson v. McAdoo, in federal court against the U.S. Treasury Department for 68 million dollars. $68 million was the amount of cotton tax collected between 1862 and 1868 and, it was argued, was due to the plaintiffs because this cotton had been produced by them and their ancestors as a result of their involuntary servitude. This was the first documented Black reparations litigation in the US on the federal level. The
U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (in case citations, D.C. Cir.) is one of the thirteen United States Courts of Appeals. It has the smallest geographical jurisdiction of any of the U.S. courts of appeals, ...
denied the claim based on governmental immunity as did the
U.S. Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that turn on question ...
, siding with the Appeals Court's decision.


Arrest, trial and imprisonment

The US Postal Service's accusations of fraud culminated in 1916 with House's arrest. She was convicted by an all-male, all-white jury and sentenced to one year in prison in
Jefferson City, Missouri Jefferson City, informally Jeff City, is the List of capitals in the United States, capital of the U.S. state of Missouri. It had a population of 43,228 at the 2020 United States census, ranking as the List of cities in Missouri, 16th most popu ...
. House's arrest dampened the national reparations movement, which struggled on through local branches until the 1930s.


Legacy

In 2015
Vanderbilt University Vanderbilt University (informally Vandy or VU) is a private university, private research university in Nashville, Tennessee, United States. Founded in 1873, it was named in honor of shipping and railroad magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provide ...
's African American and Diaspora Studies Program renamed its research arm the Callie House Research Center for the Study of Black Cultures and Politics.


See also

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Dorothy Tillman Dorothy Jean Tillman (née Wright; May 12, 1947) is an American politician, civil rights activist and former Chicago, Illinois alderman. Tillman served as the alderman of the city's 3rd wardmap from 1985 until 2007. A member of the Democrati ...


Further reading

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:House, Callie 1861 births 1928 deaths People from Rutherford County, Tennessee Activists from Nashville, Tennessee African-American activists African-American history of Tennessee Prisoners and detainees of the United States federal government American people convicted of mail and wire fraud American reparationists 20th-century African-American people