Biography
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. TheArrest, 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 inLegacy
In 2015See also
*Further reading
* * * *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