Philadelphia Apartment Building Claimed as Sovereign “Moorish” Territory on 30th Anniversary of MOVE Bombing

A new Black nationalist micronation in Philadelphia?

The city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, has never healed from the horrific events of May 1985, when police helicopters bombed an urban compound rented by the radical Black nationalist organization MOVE and the mayor ordered firefighters to stand aside while 65 homes burned to the ground, after a siege followed police attempts to evict the group.  MOVE, a (heavily armed) communitarian, back-to-nature movement, had been branded a terrorist organization linked to the killing of a police officer seven years earlier, though in the 1985 eviction case had done little more than torment neighbors with political diatribes delivered through bullhorns.  Last month, media and activists revisited the MOVE siege on its thirtieth anniversary, which came amid a new civil-rights movement across the United States focusing on police brutality against African-Americans.

How Philadelphia police handled an eviction complaint in 1985.

It was in this climate that four African-American activists facing eviction from another Philadelphia apartment building invoked Black nationalism last week and tried to turn a minor court hearing into an international incident.  They say the entire building is a sovereign territory, not part of the United States.

A tenant in the latest dispute being arrested last month

At the June 2nd hearing addressing defiance of an eviction order by the landlord, Francine Beyer, the four tenants of the apartment at 13th and Hamilton identified themselves as “Aboriginal Indigenous Moorish Americans,” refusing to recognize the court’s right to call them or its authority over the building, which they regard as “theirs by birthright,” according to the Philadelphia Daily News, and not subject to U.S., state, or municipal law.

Location of the apartment building on 13th and Hamilton in Philadelphia being claimed as a separate nation.

“Are you aware that the people who you have falsely called defendants,” one defendant, Nanye Amil El (a.k.a. 45-year-old Dante Morris), wearing a maroon fez cap, asked Judge David C. Shuter, “are actually heirs to this land?”  Another defendant, 65-year-old Delilah Passe, waved what the press described as a Moorish flag but was asked to put it away lest it be used as a weapon.  (If a reader can tell me which flag was used, I would be grateful.)

This (in center) may or may not be an example of the type of Moorish flag
displayed by defendants in court last week in Philadelphia.

At this point, students of the history of Black nationalism and readers of this blog will recognize the names and terminology of the tenants as indications that they are part of the Moorish Science Temple movement.  This precursor to modern Black nationalism emerged in the ferment of religious and political ideas in 1920s and ’30s Detroit, Michigan, where Islam, Freemasonry, offbeat anthropological theorizing, and an infatuation with all things Egyptian and occultic gave rise to Marcus Garvey as well as the Nation of Islam’s founder, Elijah Muhammad, among others.  Many Moorish activists claim that African-Americans are actually African-featured “Israelites.”  This is known as the “Paleo-Negroid” hypothesis, which holds, against all evidence, that the Americas were peopled by ancient Africans who are responsible for the monumental architecture of the Midwestern mound-building cultures and others.

Historic photo of Moorish Science Temple of America members

Other offshoots of the group that have been reported on in this blog include the Washitaw Nation in Oklahoma and elsewhere (see an article from this blog) (whose crown is currently claimed by a Trenton, New Jersey, eccentric calling himself “Crown Prince Emperor El Bey Bigbay Bagby-Badger” (see article), the Nuwaubian Nation of Moors (whose 500-acre compound Tama-Re, in Georgia, was demolished by authorities in 2005), and a new splinter group called the United Nuwaupian Nation (see article). Yet another group, the Moorish Divine and National Movement of the World, includes among its followers Pilar Sanders, the estranged wife of the retired football star Deion Sanders, who in court last month tried to void a prenuptial agreement which would cost her millions by saying that she now calls herself Pilar Biggers Sanders Love El-Dey and answers only to the laws of the “Moroccan Empire.”

Moorish Science follower Pilar Sanders as depicted in a graphic by the celebrity gossip website TMZ

One reporter contacted Brother A. Kinard-Bey, of the largest and oldest Moorish group, the Moorish Science Temple of America, Inc., in Washington, D.C., who called the four Philadelphia tenants “impostors” and said his group is the only real Moorish Temple in the U.S.  He added, “We’re seeing a number of people claiming to be of our temple who want to know how to naturalize or how to gain to their sovereignty.  Those are not lessons that the Moorish Science Temple of America teaches.”

Noble Drew Ali, founder of the Moorish Science Temple movement

Indeed, while Moorish Science traditionally is communal and leftish in its orientation, new offshoots like the Washitaw Nation are borrowing concepts and legal strategies from the “individual sovereignty” movement more popular among alienated right-wing white American males.  One of the tenant activists in Philadelphia this month, 38-year-old Rebecca Lyn Harmon, who asked to be referred to as R. Lynn Hatshepsut Ma’atKare El, is also an attorney (under yet a third name, Rhashea Lynn Harmon), who has talked of running for mayor of Philadelphia on the Republican Party ticket.

R. Lynn Hatshepsut Ma’atKare El (a.k.a. Rebecca Harmon),
a defendant in the current eviction case

A formal arraignment will be held for the four tenants on June 23rd.

American and Moroccan flags on display at a charity event hosted by a separate Moorish group in Philadelphia recently.  Note the 48-star flag.

[You can read more about many of these and other separatist and new-nation movements, both famous and obscure, in my new book, a sort of encyclopedic atlas just published by Litwin Books under the title Let’s Split! A Complete Guide to Separatist Movements and Aspirant Nations, from Abkhazia to Zanzibar.  The book, which contains 46 maps and 554 flags (or, more accurately, 554 flag images), is available for order now on Amazon.  Meanwhile, please “like” the book (even if you haven’t read it yet) on Facebook and see this special announcement for more information on the book.]

“Emperor” of Black-Nationalist “Washitaw Nation” Claims Individual Sovereignty in New Jersey Gun Case

(from The Trentonian)

A man claiming to be the newly crowned emperor of a Black-nationalist group called the Washitaw Nation argued before a judge in Trenton, New Jersey, on September 9th that a defendant in a gun-possession case was immune from prosecution because he was a “sovereign citizen.”

An example of a “Washitaw Nation” yard sign, for sale at Café Press

The “emperor,” known as El Bey, presents himself as monarch of what is also known by its longer name, the Official Empire Washitaw de Dugdahmoundyah.  [See the bottom of this page for an article comment from El Bey himself, clarifying, “I never proclaimed to be the Emperor of the Washitaw Nation or Empire Washitaw de Dugdahmoundyah.  Visit www.empirewashitaw.org to see my actual position within the Empire Washitaw de Dugdahmoundyah and Washitaw Nation.”]  The group draws inspiration from the Islamic- and Masonic-tinged “Moorish Temple” strain of Black-nationalist activism which dates to northern urban African-American communities in the 1910s and ’20s and from the purported ancestry of its founder, Verdiacee Hampton-Goston, with Louisiana’s Ouachita Indian tribe.  “Empress” Hampton-Goston, who died earlier this year (as reported at the time in this blog), subscribed to the “Paleo-Negroid” hypothesis, which holds, against all evidence, that the Americas were peopled by ancient Africans who are responsible for the monumental architecture of the Midwestern mound-building cultures and others.  She claimed to be Empress of the entire territory of the Louisiana Purchase, though she really only governed a few scraps of land in Oklahoma.  Actual Ouachitas, who are mostly enrolled with the Caddo Nation, do not seem to want much to do with the Moorish “Washitaws.”  (See that original article on this blog for a full discussion of the Washitaw movement.  [See also comments by El Bey at the bottom of this article.])

The late empress, Verdiacee Hampton-Goston

El Bey, a 42-year-old who appeared in court in full Plains Indian regalia, including a headdress, is, according to the Trentonian newspaper, “best known in Trenton for once asserting his status as a so-called ‘sovereign’ nation allowed to keep a horse in the back yard of his row house in the Wilbur section” (two horses, actually, named Princess and Pop, and it was actually only half of a duplex.)  And El Bey told the paper that “he and allies will ride their horses through Trenton next week to make a political point.  He said he has legal papers exempting him from U.S. and local law.”  At other times, El Bey has claimed to be prince of the Abannaki Aboriginal Nation, named for an unrelated tribal group in New England but in this case another incarnation of a Moorish Science style fringe group (as identified by the Alabama-based hate-group-monitoring organization the Southern Poverty Law Center).

“Emperor” El Bey of the “Washitaw Nation.”
(Contents of peace pipe unknown, but one wonders.)

(Wikimedia Commons photo.)

The first Moorish Science Temple was founded in New Jersey in 1913 by Noble Drew Ali, who mixed Islam, Masonry, ancient Egyptian traditions, and crackpot anthropology to assert that, because the real Indians were “paleo-Negroids” from Africa, the descendants of African-American slaves were somehow the true owners of the North American continent.

A map of the ancient world from a Moorish Science Temple of America website not
affiliated with the Washitaw Nation.
(Trenton, New Jersey, not shown.)

El Bey is a well-known eccentric in Trenton.  Also known as Crown Prince Emperor El Bey Bigbay Bagby, but apparently born as William McRae, he tried in February to assert authority over a defunct Powhatan Renape Nation reservation in southern New Jersey, earning him from the Philadelphia Inquirer the nickname “Prince Alarming.”  (An actual Powhatan leader, Obie Batchelor, has said of El Bey, “We don’t know where he came from.  We don’t know anything about him.  He just popped up out of the woodwork.  You can’t just pop up and claim yourself chief.”)  McRae has also tried to convince the singer Kanye West to join his tribe, and in 2009 he expressed his crush on the lovely young director of the Trenton Free Public Library by arriving at her workplace on horseback to beseech her to gallop away with him and become his bride.  The library director, Kimberly Matthews, called the police instead.

Kimberly Matthews, the librarian who could have been an empress.
Ah, the road not taken.

(from The Trentonian)

What is not clear is whether the followers of the original, late “empress” acknowledge El Bey—or anyone—as her successor, or what role the defendant in the Trenton gun case, one Abdul Aziz, plays in the organization.  But El Bey’s invocation of the “sovereign citizen” movement shows affinities with Empress Verdiacee’s Oklahoma branch of the movement, which used that libertarian concept as a crude legal tool—betraying more ideological affinities with radical right-wing anarchists, Tea Party activists, and all-white militias than with the more collectivist, community-based strains of mainstream Black Islam and Black Nationalism.

Emperor El Bey, with Princess and Pop.  If nothing else, they are on his side.

(from The Trentonian)

[For those who are wondering, yes, this blog is tied in with my forthcoming book, a sort of encyclopedic atlas to be published by Litwin Books under the title Let’s Split! A Complete Guide to Separatist Movements and Aspirant Nations, from Abkhazia to Zanzibar.  (That is shorter than the previous working title.)  The book, which contains 46 maps and 554 flags (or, more accurately, 554 flag images), will be on shelves and available on Amazon on March 1, 2015.  I will be keeping readers posted of further publication news.  Meanwhile, please “like” the book (even though you haven’t read it yet) on Facebook and see this special announcement for more information on the book.]

Empress of Moorish “Washitaw Nation” Dies in California, Age 87

A Louisiana woman who founded a Native American–inspired “empire” with elements of both 1960s-style Black nationalism and the modern “sovereign citizens” movement died on April 26th at her home in California at the age of 87.

Flag of the Washitaw Nation

Verdiacee Hampton-Goston, as she was legally known, was an African-American from Louisiana who also claimed ancestry in the local Ouachita tribal group and preferred to be known as Verdiacee Washington-Turner Goston El-Bey, Empress of the Washitaw Nation—though the federally recognized Caddo Nation of Louisiana and Oklahoma, which represents most Ouachitas, had no formal connection with her.

“Moorish Science” religions date to the 1920s.

The Washitaw Nation (in full, it is called the Official Empire Washitaw de Dugdahmoundyah) is in many ways an offshoot of the “Moorish Science” movement, a precursor to modern Black nationalism which emerged in the ferment of religious and political ideas in 1920s and ’30s Detroit, Michigan, where Islam, Freemasonry, offbeat anthropological theorizing, and an infatuation with all things Egyptian and occultic gave rise to Marcus Garvey and the Nation of Islam’s founder, Elijah Muhammad, among others.  Hampton-Goston believed that her Washitaw ancestors were actually African-featured “Israelites” (this is known as the “Paleo-Negroid” hypothesis) and that she was their rightful empress and thus sovereign of traditional territories that she felt were illegitimately transferred from Napoleon Bonaparte to Thomas Jefferson in 1803 in the Louisiana Purchase.  She spent most of her imperial career living in Oklahoma and was even for a while mayor of Richwood, Oklahoma.

The Empress’s territorial claims were not particularly modest,
but she didn’t press them.

Hampton-Goston claimed to be rightful empress of the entire territory of the Louisiana Purchase, which includes four U.S. states, parts of nine others, and even a decent slice of Canada.  She claimed this right through “matriarchal descent.”  (Most of the indigenous nations in the Louisiana Purchase territory have always, unlike the Ouachita and Caddo, practiced patrilineal, not matrilineal, descent, but, listen, this was hardly the most serious vulnerability in her arguments.)

Looks official—but don’t try using it as I.D.

The number of those who counted themselves Hampton-Goston’s imperial subjects is unknown, but they certainly included a large extended family.  In later years, the Washitaws adopted legal strategies that borrowed heavily from the “sovereign citizens” movement, a vaguely anarcho-libertarian tax-protest phenomenon which otherwise mainly attracts disaffected conservative rural whites.  But—unlike a more high-profile Moorish Science splinter group, the Nuwaubian Nation of Moors, which was shut down by authorities in Georgia in 2005—Hampton-Goston stayed clear of troubles with the authorities.  She was once investigated for tax evasion, but the charges were dropped.  (She claimed identity theft caused the misunderstanding.)  She was also once arrested for shooting two pigs in Monroe, Oklahoma.  But charges were brought instead against the animals’ owner, for keeping them within city limits.

How to get pulled over in rural Oklahoma

The Empress was also the author of a book called Return of the Ancient Ones, which encapsulated many of her ideas.

The idea of “indigenous” “Black Israelites” appeals to many politically disaffected
African-Americans in places like Atlanta.

A long-time friend, Vicki Williams, said of Hampton-Goston, “She had her strong beliefs that everybody was supposed to be treated equal no matter what their color, what their race was or what they believed in or what kind of valuable they had.”  Another friend, Umar Bey, of Los Angeles, was quoted as saying, “She was a very spiritual woman.  She had a direct connection to God.  She could think about something and go to sleep and wake up with the information she needed.”  Hampton-Goston niece, Zelia Logan-Smith, age 66, said her aunt’s ashes would be returned to Monroe and scattered in a private ceremony.  Logan-Smith added, “She was one step from a genius.  She would say, ‘When you walk through the jungle, you have to be as harmless as a dove, but as wise as a serpent.’”

[You can read more about the Washitaw Nation, the Nuwaubians, and many other separatist and new-nation movements, both famous and obscure, in my new book, a sort of encyclopedic atlas just published by Litwin Books under the title Let’s Split! A Complete Guide to Separatist Movements and Aspirant Nations, from Abkhazia to Zanzibar.  The book, which contains 46 maps and 554 flags (or, more accurately, 554 flag images), is available for order now on Amazon.  Meanwhile, please “like” the book (even if you haven’t read it yet) on Facebook and see this interview for more information on the book.]

Her anthropological theories were a tad wonky,
but the woman knew how to accessorize.