The U.S. government imprisoned a former slave and pioneering civil rights activist named Callie House in 1917 on bogus federal mail fraud charges. A group of modern scholars and civil rights activists are now urging President Joe Biden to right that historical wrong by issuing a posthumous pardon to officially clear House's name.
House was one of the leaders of the Ex-Slave Mutual Relief, Bounty & Pension Association. Formed in 1897 and based out of Nashville, Tennessee, the organization pushed for federal legislation that would compensate formerly enslaved Americans for the stolen fruits of their labor. As the historian Miranda Booker Perry has explained, "in the late 19th century, the idea of pursuing pensions for ex-slaves—similar to pensions for Union veterans—took hold. If disabled elderly veterans were compensated for their years of service during the Civil War, why shouldn't former slaves who had served the country in the process of nation building be compensated for their years of forced, unpaid labor?"
