1776 | The Women Washington Could Never Catch | 2
6/11/202637 min
Who really built American freedom — and why does the answer make so many people so uncomfortable? What happens when an enslaved woman takes the Declaration of Independence more seriously than the man who wrote it? And, when the President of the United States turns the full machinery of government against one young Black woman — why can't he catch her?
Belinda Sutton petitioned a court for fifty years of unpaid wages and won. Ona Judge walked out of the President's house while George Washington ate his dinner, and spent the rest of her life free. The founding story you were taught left both of them out entirely.
[0:00] The founding myth and its glaring blind spot
[3:00] Belinda Sutton — kidnapped at 12, enslaved for 50 years, and why she still fought back
[7:50] The petition that became one of the earliest demands for reparations in American history
[12:00] John Hancock signs off — and why the estate still refuses to pay
[17:00] How Belinda's story spread and why Ta-Nehisi Coates and Harvard both came calling
[19:30] Ona Judge — Washington's secret system for keeping his household enslaved in Pennsylvania
[24:00] The night she walked out while the President ate dinner
[27:30] Washington weaponises the federal government to hunt her down
[31:00] She negotiates with the President — and he blinks first
[34:00] "I am free" — Ona Judge's answer, fifty years later, says everything
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Join Legacy+ for bonus episodes, early access, Q&A's, fewer adverts and more.
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Stay connected with Legacy:
Instagram: @originallegacypodcast
TikTok: @legacy_productions
Explore more from Peter and Afua — essays, sources, and ideas: Substack: peterfrankopan.substack.com | afuahirsch.substack.com
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Transcript preview
First 90 secondsSpeaker 10:00
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Peter Frankopan· Host0:14
When we think of the founding of the United States, we tend to picture men in powdered wigs writing grand declarations about a noble fight for liberty and their inalienable rights.
Afua Hirsch· Host0:28
But for the men who were writing those famous words, liberty had a massive glaring blind spot, the enslaved people whose unpaid labor and exploitation built and continued to sustain the very colonies they were fighting for.
Peter Frankopan· Host0:43
So today we're looking at the real architects of American liberation, the women who didn't just ask for abstract political freedom, but fought for their right to own their own bodies and the wealth that they created.
Afua Hirsch· Host0:55
Women like Belinda Sutton, who in 1783 submitted one of the earliest demands for reparations, successfully suing her enslavers' estate for a half century of back wages.
Peter Frankopan· Host1:09
Uh, we're also gonna look at Ona Judge, a young woman who walked out of the President's house in Philadelphia and outsmarted the most powerful man in the country, George Washington, who used the power of the federal government to then hunt her down.
Afua Hirsch· Host1:21
It turns out that the true story of the founding wasn't just a group of men signing a piece of paper. It was a fierce, unapologetic,