{"id":94708,"date":"2025-08-15T04:00:25","date_gmt":"2025-08-15T08:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/?p=94708"},"modified":"2025-08-15T16:36:31","modified_gmt":"2025-08-15T20:36:31","slug":"historians-defend-the-smithsonian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/news\/historians-defend-the-smithsonian\/","title":{"rendered":"Historians Defend the Smithsonian"},"content":{"rendered":"

Updated August 15, 2025\u2014<\/em>On August 12, 2025, the White House notified<\/a> the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution that the administration will undertake a review of exhibitions, materials, and practices at eight Smithsonian museums \u201cto ensure alignment with the President\u2019s directive to celebrate American exceptionalism, remove divisive or partisan narratives, and restore confidence in our shared cultural institutions.\u201d<\/p>\n

The AHA reiterates its support<\/a> for an independent Smithsonian Institution that belongs to all the American people. At the request of the Board of Regents, the Smithsonian is already undertaking its own review in accordance with its commitment to scholarship, research, and informed analysis of historical evidence. The AHA urges the administration and the American public to respect and value the expertise of the historians, curators, and other museum professionals who conduct the review and revision of historical content according to the professional standards of our discipline.<\/p>\n

Historians practice our craft with integrity. Political interference into professional curatorial practices and museum and educational content places at risk the integrity and accuracy of historical interpretation and stands to erode public trust in our shared institutions.<\/p>\n

\n

AHA executive director Sarah Weicksel spoke with national media outlets covering the Trump administration\u2019s announcement of a \u201csweeping review\u201d of the Smithsonian to \u201censure alignment\u201d with the administration\u2019s goals. Weicksel was featured in WBUR\u2019s Here & Now<\/i><\/a>, the New York Times<\/i><\/a>, <\/span>Newsweek<\/i><\/a>, and the Wall Street Journal<\/i><\/a>. \u201cOnly historians and trained museum professionals are qualified to conduct such a review, which is intended to ensure historical accuracy,\u201d Weicksel said. \u201cTo suggest otherwise is an affront to the professional integrity of curators, historians, educators and everyone involved in the creation of solid, evidence-based content.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

The American Historical Association has released a statement in support of the Smithsonian Institution, the target of the recent executive order, \u201cRestoring Truth and Sanity to American History.\u201d<\/a> This order \u201cegregiously misrepresents the work of the Smithsonian Institution\u201d and \u201ccompletely misconstrues the nature of historical work.\u201d<\/p>\n

AHA executive director Jim Grossman was quoted in the New York Times<\/a><\/em> and appeared on NPR<\/em>\u2019s All Things Considered<\/a> and Morning Edition<\/a> on the work of the Smithsonian and its importance to the public.<\/p>\n

To date, 36 organizations have signed on to the statement.<\/p>\n

\n

Historians Defend the Smithsonian<\/strong><\/p>\n

Approved by AHA Council, March 31, 2025<\/em><\/p>\n

The Executive Order \u201cRestoring Truth and Sanity to American History<\/a>,\u201d issued on March 27 by the White House, egregiously misrepresents the work of the Smithsonian Institution. The Smithsonian is among the premier research institutions in the world, widely known for the integrity of its scholarship, which is careful and based on historical and scientific evidence. The Institution ardently pursues the purpose for which it was established more than 175 years ago: \u201cthe increase and diffusion of knowledge.\u201d The accusation in the White House fact sheet<\/a> accompanying the executive order claims that Smithsonian museums are displaying \u201cimproper, divisive, or anti-American ideology.\u201d This is simply untrue; it misrepresents the work of those museums and the public\u2019s engagement with their collections and exhibits. It also completely misconstrues the nature of historical work.<\/p>\n

Historians explore the past to understand how our nation has evolved. We draw on a wide range of sources, which helps us to understand history from different angles of vision. Our goal is neither criticism nor celebration; it is to understand\u2014to increase our knowledge of\u2014the past in ways that can help Americans to shape the future.<\/p>\n

The stories that have shaped our past include not only elements that make us proud but also aspects that make us acutely aware of tragedies in our nation\u2019s history. No person, no nation, is perfect, and we should all\u2014as individuals and as nations\u2014learn from our imperfections.<\/p>\n

The Smithsonian\u2019s museums collect and preserve the past of all Americans and encompass the entirety of our nation\u2019s history. Visitors explore exhibitions and collections in which they can find themselves, their families, their communities, and their nation represented. They encounter both our achievements and the painful moments of our rich and complicated past.<\/p>\n

Patriotic history celebrates our nation\u2019s many great achievements. It also helps us grapple with the less grand and more painful parts of our history. Both are part of a shared past that is fundamentally American. We learn from the past to inform how we can best shape our future. By providing a history with the integrity necessary to enable all Americans to be all they can possibly be, the Smithsonian is fulfilling its duty to all of us.<\/p>\n

The following organizations have signed on to this statement:<\/p>\n

American Association for Colleges of Teacher Education
\nAmerican Association of Geographers
\nAmerican Political Science Association
\nAmerican Society for Environmental History
\nAssociation for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies
\nAssociation for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies
\nAssociation for the Study of African American Life and History
\nAssociation of Research Libraries
\nCivil Rights Movement Archive
\nCollege Art Association
\nConference on Asian History
\nEducation4All
\nImmigration and Ethnic History Society
\nInstitute for Historical Study
\nKurt Vonnegut Museum and Library
\nLabor and Working Class History Association
\nLGBTQ+ History Association
\nMedieval Academy of America
\nMidwestern History Association
\nNational Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education
\nNational Council on Public History
\nNetwork of Concerned Historians
\nNew England Historical Association
\nNorth American Victorian Studies Association
\nOral History Association
\nPeace History Society
\nPEN America
\nRadical History Review
\nSociety of American Archivists
\nSociety of Architectural Historians
\nSociety for Historians of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era
\nSociety for the History of Children and Youth
\nSociety for US Intellectual History
\nSouthern Association for Women Historians
\nWestern History Association
\nWoodhull Freedom Foundation<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Updated August 15, 2025\u2014On August 12, 2025, the White House notified the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution that the administration…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":94712,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"aha-topic":[],"month":[554],"geographic-taxonomy":[56],"post-type":[10,897,591],"thematic-taxonomy":[14,18],"year":[875],"class_list":{"0":"post-94708","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"hentry","7":"month-march","8":"geographic-taxonomy-united-states","9":"post-type-advocacy","10":"post-type-federal-government","11":"post-type-museums","12":"thematic-taxonomy-african-american","13":"thematic-taxonomy-cultural","14":"year-875","22":"year-2025","23":"has-featured-image"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=94708"}],"version-history":[{"count":25,"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94708\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":103793,"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94708\/revisions\/103793"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/94712"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=94708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"aha-topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/aha-topic?post=94708"},{"taxonomy":"month","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/month?post=94708"},{"taxonomy":"geographic-taxonomy","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/geographic-taxonomy?post=94708"},{"taxonomy":"post-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post-type?post=94708"},{"taxonomy":"thematic-taxonomy","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/thematic-taxonomy?post=94708"},{"taxonomy":"year","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.historians.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/year?post=94708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}