[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 100 (Thursday, July 27, 2000)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1379-E1380]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




            NATIONAL UNDERGROUND RAILROAD FREEDOM CENTER ACT

                                 ______
                                 

                               speech of

                           HON. BARON P. HILL

                               of indiana

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, July 25, 2000

  Mr. HILL of Indiana. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of 
H.R. 2919, the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center Act. As the 
Representative of a Southern Indiana district that housed many 
``stops'' on the Underground Railroad, I am a co-sponsor of this 
legislation to promote preservation and public awareness of the 
Underground Railroad and those who helped African American slaves 
escape to freedom in the North.
  As we all know, the Underground Railroad was an informal system of 
transporting runaway slaves to freedom in the North and Canada. The 
``stations'' of the Railroad were homes of slavery's staunchest 
opponents, and the ``conductors'' took the fugitives at night to the 
next station along the secret routes. The brave individuals who took 
these runaway

[[Page E1380]]

slaves into their homes, fed them, hid them from authorities, and 
transported them to the next stop up the road did so at high risk, as 
those who aided fugitives were prosecuted, especially after the passage 
of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.
  I am proud to say that Southern Indiana played a key role in the 
Underground Railroad, one of the most powerful and sustained 
multiracial human rights movements in world history. The Ohio River, 
which separates Kentucky and Indiana, represented the border between 
slavery in the South and freedom in the North. There were twelve major 
crossing points for runaway slaves along the Ohio River, three of which 
were in my Congressional district. Once the slaves crossed the Ohio 
River, they were not only in free territory, Indiana, but they had 
placed that wide river between themselves and their pursuers.
  In Indiana, fugitives could find refuge at Bill Crawford's farm near 
the town of Corydon. Conductors transported fugitives from the mouth of 
Indian Creek in Corydon across Jackson County or Jennings County on 
their way towards Ohio. Those who took a different route over the Ohio 
River found refuge in Jeffersonville and Rising Sun. John B. Todd's 
house in Madison, the site of some of the busiest Underground Railroad 
activity in the state, was a well-known safe haven for escapees. There 
were an estimated 600 to 800 successful escapees through Kentucky and 
Indiana each year due to these brave efforts.
  Mr. Speaker, I salute both the Hoosiers who helped the fugitive 
slaves through the Underground Railroad and the slaves whose love for 
freedom motivated them to risk their lives by escaping to the North. 
The Freedom Center in Cincinnati, Ohio, will facilitate a greater 
understanding of our nation's history and honor those who risked their 
own freedom to stand by their conviction that no person should be slave 
to another.

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