Old City, Philadelphia October 18, 2025 Aeron Alde
Scholars in Philadelphia was a wonderful experience where I learned a lot about the ideals of the U.S. Constitution whilst exploring the city that once served as our capital. Our tour guide first led us to the remnants of George Washington’s house when he was still president and showed us the cellar where he kept enslaved people. He emphasized how Washington used a loophole to rotate slaves in and out of Pennsylvania every few months so they wouldn’t be emancipated through the state’s slavery laws. This demonstrated a drastic contradiction in the Constitution, as a founding commitment to liberty somehow coexisted with legal and social systems that permitted slavery.
From there we walked over to the liberty bell and learned about the history on how it was cast, how it cracked, and how it was eventually put on public display as a symbol of independence. Just across the street stood Congress Hall, Independence Hall, and Old City Hall—the buildings where the Continental Congress met, major debates unfolded, and the early Supreme Court convened. The next building we visited was the second bank of the United States, in which the tour guide mentioned how it was inspired by Greek architecture and its involvement in a political clash during Andrew Jackson’s presidency.
We continued on to several more buildings like Carpenters’ Hall, Ben Franklin’s house (couldn’t enter due to government shutdown), and the Betsy Ross House, and then briefly stood outside the Arch Street Meeting house. The guide described the building as the largest Quaker meeting house in the world, and mentioned William Penn’s story and how his commitment to religious freedom helped shape the Constitution. To conclude, we stopped at Ben Franklin’s grave, which people left pennies on for good luck.
Overall, the tour guide’s main points were very convincing. I was moved by the powerful symbols he presented such as the Liberty Bell and the Quaker meeting house, representing independence and freedom of religion. His claims also aligned with my understanding of U.S. history and were presented in such a way which integrated nuance and rhetorical contrast. One of his strongest, but also most jarring points was at the start of the tour, where he mentioned how slaves owners such as George Washington would exploit a loophole which allowed them to keep slaves in Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania Gradual Abolition Act of 1780 prohibited the importation of slaves into the state, as well as freeing any slave that lived inside the state for more than six months. As stated by the tour guide, Washington would get around this provision by moving his enslaved people to Virginia and back before six months have passed in order to prevent their emancipation, which is historically accurate. He also boldly claimed that the Arch Street Meeting house was not just the largest Quaker meeting house in America, but in the entire world, and with a simple Google search, he definitely was not wrong.
After the tour, I walked over to the Reading Terminal Market and spent an outrageous amount of money on a Philly cheesesteak which was probably around 18 inches in length. After barely eating half of it, I walked another eight blocks to get to the Franklin Institute, where I saw several cool exhibits, including an experimental flying boat, a real-sized steam engine, and a robot who could draw pictures and write poems. To finish my day, I went into the museum’s planetarium to view an art show called “Pandemonium” by Michelle Lopez, which was an interesting video which highlighted how misinformation and climate change are contributing to a global collapse.
From the Franklin Institute: