I have stood numerous times at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, marveling as The White House gleams in the morning light, its columns catching the sun like polished bone. Tourists press their faces to the gates, snapping pictures of democracy’s façade.
But what few stop to remember — what this country has worked too hard to forget — is whose hands laid those stones. African Americans, both free and enslaved, shaped not just the walls of the White House and the Capitol, but the moral foundation of the nation itself. Every brick, every nail, every beam carries a heartbeat history tried to silence.
Now, as Trump demolishes the East Wing to build a grand ballroom—an edifice to ego—dust rises again from the ghosts of our labor. If you listen intently, you can hear the voices of our ancestors sharing the truth of who built this building, and beneath the marble and mirrors, there are calloused hands that once lifted beams under the weight of the sun. There are names unrecorded in history books but carved deep into the land: men and women who poured their strength, their breath, their prayers into the soil so America could stand tall, even as it refused to see them as human.
America’s Builders and Conscience
We should hold tight to the words of First Lady Michelle Obama when she said, “I wake up every morning in a house that was built by slaves.” That facticity shook the nation — not because it was new, but because it was finally spoken aloud from the heart of that very house. It was an echo of all the silent hymns hummed on scaffolds and in fields, a reminder that beauty and brutality often coexist in the same place. To build a house for freedom while being bound yourself — that is both the tragedy and the miracle of our story.
We are the nation’s builders and its conscience. The White House is not just a home for presidents — it’s a monument to survival. The Capitol dome, rising against the sky, was finished in the midst of civil war, when enslaved laborers mixed mortar beside soldiers preparing for battle. That contrast — freedom debated under roofs built by the unfree — is America’s paradox laid bare. And yet, through that contradiction, we kept building. Because we believed, even when the country did not, that someday the promise might reach us too.
The Unseen Labor of Women
To erase the East Wing without reverence for its history is to tear at the thread of our shared memory. That wing is where First Ladies like Eleanor Roosevelt met with activists fighting for justice, where Michelle Obama championed children’s health, and where Hillary Clinton worked to expand women’s rights worldwide. It is where soft power was wielded in ways the cameras rarely captured — where compassion and community were stitched into the seams of the Republic. That space carries the unseen labor of women — Black, Brown, and white — who made empathy part of governance. You don’t bulldoze that kind of spirit without consequence.
There is something sacred in what our ancestors left behind. They built while bound, yet every motion of their hands was praise. Their labor was more than survival — it was devotion. Each brick laid was a testament of faith, each plank a declaration of beauty in the face of brutality. The very bones of democracy—each bears the imprint of Black hands.
And so, when I see excavators rolling across the South Lawn, I don’t just see renovation — I see the old ghosts stirring. I wonder if the new ballroom will have enough mirrors to reflect the truth. I wonder if those who gather there will hear the whispers of those who carried the stone. Or will they dance on history’s grave, mistaking spectacle for greatness?
The ghosts will not leave these grounds quietly.
The truth is, the grandeur of America was never in its buildings — it was in the people who made them. We have always been the builders: of houses, of hope, of harmony. Our fingerprints are in the paint of this democracy, even when they tried to scrub them off. We tilled the soil, we forged the tools, we sang the songs that gave this country a rhythm. And still, we endure — not out of submission, but out of love for the possibility that this place might finally become what it claims to be.
Our contributions, both physical and spiritual, must never be erased. To honor them is not to dwell in the past; it is to claim the full story of who we are. Because memory is not a burden; it’s a bridge. It connects the builders to the inheritors, the enslaved to the free, the wounded to the healing. If we forget the hands that built the house, we lose the soul that holds it together.
The ghosts will not leave these grounds quietly.
They stand in the mortar and whisper through the oaks, reminding us that progress without reflection is just repetition in disguise.
If we cannot honor the builders, we are still building on their backs.
The question now is simple: will we continue to forget, or finally remember out loud?
Dr. Mustafa Ali is a poet, thought leader, strategist, policymaker, and activist committed to justice and equity. He is the founder of The Revitalization Strategies, a business focused on moving our most vulnerable communities from “surviving to thriving.” Ali was previously the senior vice president for the Hip Hop Caucus, a national nonprofit and non-partisan organization that connects the hip-hop community to the civic process to build power and create positive change.