Posted on 02/05/2008 4:12:41 PM PST by Libloather
Racial heritage of six former presidents is questioned
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
By Monica Haynes, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Today, as Sen. Barack Obama takes what he hopes will be one more step toward becoming the nation's first black president, the Internet is filled with stories that state such a milestone already has been reached -- several times over.
**SNIP**
In addition to Jefferson, the books, magazines and newspaper articles found on the Web name five other U.S. presidents who may have had black ancestry, but never publicly acknowledged it: Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge and Dwight D. Eisenhower. Despite author Toni Morrison's infamous 1998 declaration, Bill Clinton was not on the list.
Van Hall, associate professor of history at the University of Pittsburgh, said it is unlikely that most of the men on the list had black ancestry because historians know their genealogy pretty well.
While he concedes he hasn't researched the issue, Larry Glasco, also an associate professor of history at Pitt, is also skeptical of the stories.
"I would guess if [the stories] were really true we'd have heard a lot more about them," Dr. Glasco said. "There would have been a lot more written about them in professional research literature."
However, Marsha Stewart doesn't need any professional research. Mrs. Stewart, a 60-year-old black woman who teaches in suburban Detroit, said Mr. Harding is her cousin. She said it's something the family always has known but didn't publicly talk about.
Whether the stories are true or not, they've become a hot topic. Information about much of the ethnic links are found in historical works written long ago and anecdotes have been passed from one publication to the next.
(Excerpt) Read more at post-gazette.com ...
And if Al Sharpton has a white great, great, great, great grandmother, he's white.
Or our 44th white president, take your pick.
OH MY GOD!
To hell with these revisionists. What a bunch of chumps.
So Abraham Lincoln was both black and gay? GOP diversity. /sarc
Maybe Bill Clinton wasn’t our first black president after all.
And Jewish.
Bill Clinton was not on the list
______________________________________________
Whoops
Had to be an oversight
/s
Four Republicans and one Democrat. The Pubs are the party of change.
That's one of the whitest looking white men I have ever seen!
They were devout pacifists. Yet their son grew up to be a Five Star General.
ROTFLMAO. With a name like Abraham, he could be our first Muzzie prez too, beating out Barack Hussein Osama Obama. ;-)
The only well researched paragraph in the article.
The rest is all the repetition of old lies.
Yes and they were all GAY.
The 'one drop' concept is [in]famous.
Probably one of the 43 Presidents had at least Amerindian ancestry.
Maybe he’s related to Rev. Ike.
Yep, most of the black people in America have some white ancestry. But it’s not helpful to claim white ancestry.
Reminds of the white guy who failed the fire department test. He researched his ancestry, and found that he was something like one-sixteenth African. He qualified for admission on a lower test score.
Buchanan was probably the first and only known gay president.
Harding probably had some black ancestry.
According to the study of jefferson's male relatives, it seems that he was of Phoenician-Carthaginian (Lebanese) descent passed from male to male to male.
LBJ was technically the first jew. His mother could trace straight matrilineal descent to a jewish ancestress.
The lying, impeached, rapist may have infested the Oval Office for eight years, but he was NEVER my President! As far as I'm concerned, the office was vacant from Jan 20th, 1993 until George W. Bush was sworn in on Jan 20th, 2001.
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