Nearly one month before America\u2019s 250th birthday, its federal government and first capital city fought over the basics of the nation\u2019s origin story in front of a three-judge appeals court panel in Philadelphia on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
At issue was the Trump administration\u2019s power to alter a memorial to enslaved people who lived at George Washington\u2019s residence in the city in the 18th century. The National Park Service removed placards and video displays commemorating the history of slavery on the site in January<\/a> in response to a sweeping executive order<\/a> from President Trump that claimed to be rolling back a \u201cdistorted narrative\u201d of America, one intended to foster \u201ca sense of national shame.\u201d The city of Philadelphia sued over the changes, and a judge ordered that the site be restored. The Trump administration then appealed.<\/p>\n At Tuesday\u2019s hearing, a Justice Department attorney said the Trump administration had the power to make the changes and to potentially further alter the site by removing the names of nine enslaved people that are carved into a stone monument. Such changes were \u201ccuratorial\u201d in nature, said the attorney, Gregory in den Berken, and the federal government, not the city, has the right to curate the site since Philadelphia turned the property over to the federal government under the terms of a 2006 agreement<\/a>.<\/p>\n The memorial, part of Independence Historical Park, sits on the site of the mansion where George Washington led the fledgling United States as president, before the capital was moved to the city that would bear his name.<\/p>\n Two of the three judges on the panel appeared skeptical that the administration has as much power as it has asserted. One, L. Felipe Restrepo, an appointee of President Barack Obama, questioned whether the government was seeking \u201cunfettered discretion\u201d over the site.<\/p>\n Mr. in den Berken attempted to reassure the judges that the National Park Service would not go that far, referring to planned displays<\/a> that the agency had posted online, which include an acknowledgment of the role that slavery played at the site, as well as references to Christian abolitionists and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.<\/p>\n The case was first heard by Judge Cynthia M. Rufe, of the Federal District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, who in February quoted George Orwell\u2019s \u201c1984\u201d in an opinion<\/a> that upbraided the government for \u201cdismantling objective historical truths.\u201d<\/p>\n Much of Tuesday\u2019s arguments revolved around more detailed legal issues involving the agreements between the city and the federal government that govern the site.<\/p>\n More than 100 onlookers listened for more than an hour as lawyers for the federal government and Philadelphia debated whether the city still had some \u201cresidual\u201d right to have a voice in the site, and whether the dispute was purely contractual in nature, which could mean that the lawsuit belonged in a different federal court.<\/p>\n Cara McClellan, an attorney representing groups allied with the city, directed the judges\u2019 attention to the symbolic stakes. \u201cJust imagine if the government removed the Lincoln Memorial right before the bicentennial,\u201d she said. \u201cThat\u2019s the kind of dangerous precedent that we must avoid here.\u201d<\/p>\n