Nonetheless, misinformation about “the Moses of her people” abounds. Congress is currently studying whether her historic home should be turned into a national park. She is the subject of numerous children’s books and educational materials. According to the March 2008 Journal of American History, she’s the third most identified African American historical figure (after Martin Luther King Jr., and Rosa Parks). While Tubman has become one of the most recognized symbols of the anti–slavery era, the actual facts of her life have become shrouded beneath her status as a revered public icon. That Tubman’s legacy would be misappropriated for political use was not particularly surprising to Sernett, who writes in the introduction to his book that Tubman may be “America’s most malleable icon.” Luker then told Morgan, “Cite your source or quit pimpin’ out Harriet Tubman.” “Whoever wishes to use the dubious quote as a political zinger ought to cite a reliable source.” “My impression is that this is a late 20th-century quote from a fictionalized account of Tubman’s life,” Sernett told Luker. None could trace the quote to primary sources. Sernett is the author of the recently published Harriet Tubman: Myth, Memory, and History. Within days, the validity of the quote was called into question by Ralph Luker of the History News Network, who contacted scholars who have researched Tubman-including Milton Sernett, professor emeritus of history at the Maxwell School (and African American studies at SU). When asked how she managed to save hundreds of enslaved African Americans via the Underground Railroad during the Civil War, she replied bitterly, ‘I could have saved thousands-if only I’d been able to convince them they were slaves.’” In response to the failure of some women to support Clinton (and by implication, failure to be liberated), Morgan wrote: “Let a statement by the magnificent Harriet Tubman stand as reply. It all started when feminist political analyst Robin Morgan updated her infamous 1970 essay “Goodbye to All That” to castigate the racist and sexist divisions in the campaign, particularly as hurled against Clinton. As if there weren’t enough controversy during the campaign between Democratic presidential hopefuls Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, an unlikely firestorm erupted in February, when historical icon Harriet Tubman was pulled into the fray.
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