Shielding Slavery: The Removal of the Harvard Law School Seal

Introduction

This exhibit examines the continuing resonances of the histories of enslavement in New England by exploring the debate surrounding the inclusion of the Royall family crest as part of Harvard Law School’s seal. The Royall family's fortune is derived from enslaved people’s labor on their Antiguan plantations. It also delves into themes of identity, interpretation, visibility, and public memory, reflecting both the invisibility of African Americans in the historical record and the inability of contemporary Americans to acknowledge the centrality of slavery and its legacy within American history.¹

Royall Family Background History

In 1737, Isaac Royall Sr. and his family left Antigua and came to Medford, Massachusetts after encountering drought, disease, and a foiled slave revolt in Antigua. Retaining the plantation in Antigua, Royall Jr. continued to build on his family’s wealth and investments in slave-kidnapping voyages, sugar exports, and rum manufacturing after Royall Sr’s death. In 1781, upon his death, Isaac Royall Jr. left approximately 1,000 acres of land to Harvard, which was eventually used to produce a professorship in law or medicine forever tying Royall's fortune to the Harvard Law School. This relationship was acknowledged by Harvard in 1937 when the Law School adopted the Royall crest as their own.

The Royall crest served as a visual reminder of the Royall family’s connection to the law school. The law school had been aware of the seal’s connection to slavery since at least 2000 when Harvard Law professor Daniel Coquillette began discussing his research about the history of the Law School.² Additionally, archaeological findings at the Royall House and Slave Quarters (the Royall’s residence turned historic house museum) contribute evidence about the history of enslavement at the site.³ The connection between the Royalls, slavery, and Harvard Law School was public knowledge by 2000, but it was not until 2015 when the “Royall Must Fall” group called for the removal of the Royall crest.

Royall Must Fall

Students of the Law School created “Royall Must Fall” days before ix portraits of black Law School professors were vandalized at Wasserstein Hall on November 18, 2015.⁴ The students modeled themselves on the International student activist group, “Rhodes Must Fall” in Cape Town, South Africa and Oxford, UK where students protested, demanding the removal of images of British imperialist Cecil Rhodes from the universities’ campuses. “Royall Must Fall” members argued that the shield supported a slaveholding legacy. Student groups like Reclaim Harvard Law, the Black Law Students Association, and “Royall Must Fall” participated in larger community dialogues about race, diversity, and the treatment of minority students at Harvard Law School. They felt that the seal was a public manifestation of hostility they had encountered in the classroom.⁵

Harvard Law School, Dean Martha L. Minow held community meetings to hear the demands of student activists. One of the results was the creation of a committee made up of faculty, students, staff, and alumni to debate the fate of the Law School’s controversial seal in November 2015.⁶ The committee submitted their recommendation to remove the seal to the Harvard Corporation and the emblem was removed entirely in April 2016. It’s presence was erased from doors, chairs, apparel, banners, letterheads, web pages, and social media avatars.⁷ While the Harvard Corporation agreed to officially retire the seal, both sides of this debate are worth exploring in order to understand how the Law School confronted issues of identity, inclusion, and interpretation.

Pro-Removal of the Seal:

The call to remove the seal by the Royall Must Fall group and other students was part of a larger discussion surrounding race in the university. The official recommendation to remove the seal read:

“[T]he now-visible associations of the shield divide the Law School community and hinder engaging that portion of the institution’s past; that many who become aware of its origins are more likely to see the shield as a distasteful symbol of the past rather than as an opportunity to learn from that past. At bottom, this latter view rests on the conviction that there are better ways to engage the past and its legacy in the present than by retaining a symbol that so many members of the community reject”.⁸

The removal of the seal was seen as necessary because it was a divisive symbol that failed to promote education about the past. Many students saw its removal as essential in creating a more inclusive environment for students of color in the Law School, as the removal of the seal was an immediate, visceral result of student activists and was a way to acknowledge their grievances.

Anti-Removal of the Seal:

Not all members of the community agreed that removing the seal was the best plan of action. Annette Gordon-Reed, currently the Charles Warren Professor of American Legal History at Harvard Law School, believes that maintaining the shield and “tying it to a historically sound interpretive narrative about it, [that] would be the most honest and forthright way to ensure that the true story of our origins, and connection to the people whom we should see as our progenitors (the enslaved people at Royall’s plantations, not Isaac Royall), is not lost”.¹⁰ For Gordon-Reed, the loss of the shield means the loss of historical narratives of enslaved persons, further marginalizing their role in history. This idea sees the crest as a tribute to the slave labor that allowed for the wealth of the Royalls and the law school, rather than viewing it as a symbol of oppression. And in so doing, it places enslaved people at the center of the dialogue surrounding American enslavement, rather than making it about the slave owners.

The Royall Family Legacy Today

The debate regarding the removal of the seal shows the connection between the Harvard Law school and the endowment built on the backs of enslaved people’s labor. Illustrating the continual effect of slavery today and the inherent fact that regardless of the outcome, this student activism was never solely about the shield. Today the Royall House and Slave Quarters, “home to the largest slaveholding family in Massachusetts” still exist today as a museum, “whose architecture, household items, archaeological artifacts, and programs bear witness to intertwined stories of wealth and bondage, set against the backdrop of America’s quest for independence.”¹²

1 Bruce H. Mann et al.,“Recommendation to the President and Fellows of Harvard College on the Shield Approved for the Law School” https://hls.harvard.edu/content/uploads/2016/03/Shield-Committee-Report.pdf

2 Royal House and Slave Quarters, “The Royal Bequest and Harvard Law School.”

3 Alexandra A. Chan, “Translating Archaeology for the Public: Empowering and Engaging Museum Goers With the Past,” International Journal of Heritage Studies 17 vol. 2 (2011): 170.

4 Associated Press in Boston, “Portraits of Black Harvard Law School Professors Defaced after Campus Rally” The Guardian, November 19, 2015, https://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/nov/19/harvard-law-school-black-professors-portraits-defaced.

5 Ibid.

6 Claire E. Parker, “Law School Affiliates Unsurprised, But Divided Over Seal Recommendation,” The Crimson, March 9, 2016, http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2016/3/8/affiliates-react-HLS-seal/.

7 Claire E. Parker, “After Corporation Approval, Law School Seal Quickly Disappearing,” The Crimson, March 21, 2016, http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2016/3/21/hls-seal-change-logistics/.

8 Bruce H. Mann et al., “Recommendation to the President and Fellows of Harvard College on the Shield Approved for the Law School,”9.

9 Ibid, 9.

10 Anette Gordon-Reed and Annie Rittgers, “A Different View,” https://today.law.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Shield_Committee-Different_View.pdf

11 Ibid, 2.

12 “The Royall House and Slave Quarters.” The Royall House and Slave Quarters.. https://royallhouse.org.

Bibliography

Alexandra A. Chan. “Translating Archaeology for the Public: Empowering and Engaging Museum Goers With the Past.” International Journal of Heritage Studies 17 vol. 2 (2011): 170.

Andrew M. Duehren. “Police Investigate Vandalism on Portraits of Black Law Professors.” The Crimson, November 20, 2015. http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2015/11/20/law-school-vandalism-portraits/.

Anette Gordon-Reed and Annie Rittgers. “A Different Vie.” https://today.law.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Shield_Committee-Different_View.pdf

“Bookplate of Isaac Royall Sir.” Royall House. Photograph. https://royallhouse.org/the-royall-bequest-and-harvard-law-school/

Bruce H. Mann et al.“Recommendation to the President and Fellows of Harvard College on the Shield Approved for the Law School.” https://hls.harvard.edu/content/uploads/2016/03/Shield-Committee-Report.pdf.

Claire E. Parker. “After Corporation Approval, Law School Seal Quickly Disappearing.” The Crimson, March 21, 2016. http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2016/3/21/hls-seal-change-logistics/.

Claire E. Parker. “Committee and Activists Debate Law School Seal.” The Crimson, February 5, 2016. http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2016/2/5/law-school-discusses-seal/.

“Exterior View of the Royall House and Slave Quarters.” Historic New England, Medford, Mass. Photograph. https://www.historicnewengland.org/explore/collections-access/gusn/195812/.

Feke Robert. “Isaac Royall, and Family in 1741.” 1879. Harvard Law School. Oil on Canvas, 56 3/16 x 77 3/4 inches. https://exhibits.law.harvard.edu/legacy-isaac-royall-jr.

“Harvard Law School Seal.” Harvard Magazine. Illustration. https://www.harvardmagazine.com/2016/03/hls-committee-recommends-removing-shield-linked-to-slavery.

“Harvard Law School Royall Must Fall Protest 2015.” Harvard: Royall Must Fall Facebook, Cambridge MA. Photograph. https://www.facebook.com/RoyallMustFall/photos/d41d8cd9/159834954366389/.

“Harvard Law School Royall Must Fall Protest 2015.” Harvard: Royall Must Fall Facebook, Cambridge MA. Photograph. https://www.facebook.com/RoyallMustFall/photos/pb.158532991163252.-2207520000.1446490404./159835391033012/?type=3&theater.

“Portraits of Black Harvard Law School Professors Defaced after Campus Rally.” The Guardian, November 19, 2015. https://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/nov/19/harvard-law-school-black-professors-portraits-defaced.

“The Royal Bequest and Harvard Law School.” Royal House and Slave Quarters. http://www.royallhouse.org/the-royall-bequest-and-harvard-law-school/.

“The Royall House and Slave Quarters.” The Royall House and Slave Quarters. https://royallhouse.org.

“The Royall House and Slave Quarters Today.” The Royall House and Slave Quarters, Medford, Mass. Photograph. https://royallhouse.org.

Royal Seals and wax Impressions.”1829. Harvard Law School. Photograph. https://exhibits.law.harvard.edu/legacy-isaac-royall-jr?admin_panel=1#seal