I know it's Christmas but I can't muster good cheer at the assault on #1619Project by Sean Wilentz et al. (FWIW I took Wilentz/McPherson's seminar in 19th century U.S. history when I was in grad school and they've been singing the same tune for decades.) nytimes.com/2019/12/20/mag…
Given their own platform - writing books for huge publishers & articles at the drop of a hat in major magazines/newspapers - what I find galling is their complaint about a "closed process". To think that the Times wouldn't pick _them_ to curate its historical enquiry! 
As for the "displacement of historical fact by ideology," they really mean that _their_ ideology has been suddenly displaced - which is outrageous since they have dedicated their entire professional lives to this, people!
Then there's the implication that racial identity or representation is irrelevant to the writing and framing of history, and that to mention it is somehow to exchange facts for ideology. This shows how far we still have to go to change our profession for the better.
Wilentz was not happy earlier this year when I criticised his book on 'antislavery constitutionalism' in the NYRB. Since then, the Review has published the full text of a lecture he gave doubling down on his thesis. Hardly a man without a platform! nybooks.com/articles/2019/…
"The process remains opaque" LOL. How did the same pretty small coterie of (almost entirely white, male, older) historians get to monopolise the writing of long review essays in the NYRB and other publications for decades? It's _opaque_, isn't it?
As for the specific arguments about the Revolution and Lincoln, I'm happy that the Times has defended its writers and pushed back at the telling off it's received.
Slavery's entanglement w/the Revolution, & Lincoln's racial views, are complex topics - but the Project is trying to undermine a complacency among most Americans about the supposedly inevitable efflorescence of freedom in US history. Centering unfreedom offers vital correctives.
The Project won't be the final word, nor has it reached the general public (or schoolchildren, gasp!) in a vacuum. Ordinary Americans have been cosseted for decades by versions of the 'freedom narrative' which make it hard to understand persistent inequalities.
That narrative is still very powerful, and it'll carry on animating numerous bestsellers by famous historians for decades to come. The genius of the Project is that it's persuaded people to take another look at the narrative - which, I guess, is why its guardians are uneasy./
