The Revolution did not end at Yorktown. In the extraordinary months of 1783\, the Confederation Congress met at Nass au Hall in Princeton\, the definitive Treaty of Paris was signed\, and Geo rge Washington kept his final wartime headquarters at Rockingham\, the Ber rien farm overlooking the Millstone River Valley in Franklin Township. Tha t same treaty carried Article VII\, which barred the departing British fro m "carrying away any Negroes or other Property\," and forced the new natio n to confront whether Black men\, women\, and children were persons entitl ed to liberty or property subject to return. Tens of thousands had already claimed their own freedom by crossing into British lines during the war\, and Britain refused to return them.
\nHistorian Timothy Messer-Krus e argues that the constitutional crisis that followed became one of the fo rces that led the founders to abandon the Articles of Confederation and dr aft a stronger federal Constitution. The conversation begun in the autumn of 1783 is one America has never finished having.
\nTimothy Messer-K ruse is a historian and professor at the School of Cultural and Critical S tudies of Bowling Green State University. His work sits at the intersectio n of labor\, law\, and the long unfinished business of American emancipati on. He is the author of Slavery's Fugitives and the Making of the Unit ed States Constitution (LSU Press\, 2024)\, a reappraisal of how the architecture of American law bent around the movement of self-emancipated people in the wake of the Revolution.
\nMary Tsaltas-Ottomanelli is the executive director of the Hendrick I. Lott House\, a Dutch colonial fa rmstead whose grounds include a documented stop on the Underground Railroa d in Brooklyn. Formerly of Fraunces Tavern Museum\, she curated programmin g on the occupation and evacuation of New York and the lives shaped by bot h.
\nCopies of Slavery's Fugitives and the Making of the United States Constitution will be available for sale.
\nRegistration is appreciated. For questions regarding this or any library program\, plea se call 732-873-8700 x 111. \;
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