The Clark Tract

Newport's founder left slaves at least $1.7M in today's dollars. Can descendants collect?

Generations of Northern Kentucky residents have grown up on land that legally belonged to people enslaved by Newport's founder.

In a rare ruling for the 19th century, the highest court in Kentucky ruled former slaves were entitled to land near present-day Claryville, according to an Enquirer review of court records, maps and old newspaper clippings dating back to 1848.

Gen. James Taylor V, who founded the city of Newport , willed more than 1,500 acres to the roughly 50 slaves on his estate, which included most of Campbell County.

A local court denied their inheritance. But decades later, Kentucky's highest court ruled the former slaves were entitled to the land or its monetary equivalent.

They never got either, according to local historians.

As a result, Taylor's last wishes were unfulfilled and the people he enslaved were robbed of an opportunity to build generational wealth.

Legally, little can be done to recoup the lost wealth directly from Taylor's estate or his heirs. But to some, the case and others like it serve as arguments for reparations for slavery, or restitution payments to the descendants of slaves for the injustices done to their ancestors.

The will written by Taylor and ultimately upheld by the court is "an implicit argument for reparations being made by the enslavers," said Giuliana Perrone, an associate professor at the University of California-Santa Barbara.

Taylor's will started decades-long legal battle

At the time of his death in 1848, Taylor owned around 40,000 acres in Northern Kentucky and was worth an estimated $4 million when he died – at least $150 million today. His Belle Vue estate still stands in Newport's East Row Historic District and was listed for $2.49 million last year [2024].

Taylor's will divided up his sprawling property between his four children and also named several enslaved people who would inherit plots of land, livestock and building materials. Enslaved men, once they were 30, were to be given at least 25 acres in or around the Clark tract, a roughly 1,000-acre tract of land near Claryville. Women would each inherit $25 at age 28.

Taylor also set aside money for schooling for enslaved children. Though the general owned dozens of slaves until his death, his will showed his desire for them to inherit part of his vast estate.

Taylor's son went against his wishes

Taylor's son, Col. James Taylor VI and the executor of his estate, had different ideas.

Nearly a decade after his father's death, Col. Taylor contested the will in Campbell County Circuit Court after two former slaves, Burwell and Susan Lumpkins, tried to collect their 50-acre inheritance.

In 1857, the court ruled the couple had no rights in Kentucky to take possession of the land and livestock they were promised.

Col. Taylor also tried to stop his three sisters from inheriting their land, said Shirlene Jensen, a board member at the Campbell County Historical and Genealogical Society in Alexandria.

“Taylor Jr. was so tight-fisted, he didn't want them to get anything,” Jensen said. “He was a real scoundrel.”

Kentucky appeals court sides with former slaves

Nearly three decades after the Civil War ended, the Lumpkins' sons − George, William and Washington − appealed the lower court's ruling to the Kentucky appeals court.

The appeals court, which was the highest court in Kentucky from 1792 to 1975, made front-page news in 1891 when it sided with the Lumpkins and ruled they were entitled to the land or its monetary equivalent.

The Weekly Courier-Journal, which was the weekly edition of the Louisville Courier-Journal from 1874 to 1917, reported that Taylor's estate owed all the former slaves an estimated total of $50,000, about $1.7 million today.

But the Lumpkins, and others enslaved by Taylor who followed suit, never received their inheritance, said Jensen, who has researched the Lumpkins' case for the Campbell County Historical and Genealogical Society.

In his will, Taylor promised his former slaves land in the Clark tract, but he also said they were entitled to other land if the Clark tract was no longer available. Taylor owned most of Campbell County, which, until 1840 , also included present-day Kenton County.

The median home price in Claryville is around $315,000 today [2024], according to Realtor.com .

If Taylor's former slaves had received land in other parts of Campbell County, it could have been even more valuable.

Newport, for example, has experienced tremendous growth in recent years, including ongoing construction of the $1 billion Ovation development . The redevelopment of Newport on the Levee attracts thousands of visitors and their dollars to the city each year.

Appeals court decision defied national norms

The Kentucky appeals court decision was handed down during the Jim Crow era , in which state and local courts continued to enforce racial segregation even after the Civil War had ended and slavery was abolished in 1865.

The U.S. Supreme Court also established racial segregation as the law of the land in such landmark decisions as Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896 , which created the doctrine of “separate but equal” and laid the foundation for racial discrimination in the U.S. for the next 50 years.

However, state courts in pre-Civil War free states and border states, such as Kentucky, were often more progressive, said William Darity Jr. , a professor of African and African American studies at Duke University.

Unlike the Supreme Court, lower courts “were not as full of outright white supremacists,” Darity told The Enquirer. “There was more diversity in lower courts in terms of opinions and attitudes.”

“That’s why I’m not surprised by the success of the (Lumpkins') appeal,” he added. “The problem is, of course, who’s going to carry out the decision.”

Is there a legal case for reparations? At least one expert thinks so
Jeffery Blankenship, a Northern Kentucky attorney who specializes in wills and trusts, thinks there is a legal basis for a lawsuit because the Campbell County Circuit Court wrongfully denied the former slaves' inheritance.

However, he said the case is so old the statute of limitations on inheritance claims has expired.

Even if descendants sued, their lawsuit would have to be filed against Gen. Taylor's estate, which “no longer exists or has any assets against which to collect,” Blankenship told The Enquirer.

Also, none of Gen. Taylor's living heirs would be liable for the debt under Kentucky law.

Other slaveowners had wills like Taylor's

Although the descendants of Taylor's slaves are unlikely to receive their inheritance now, the case may be part of the national argument for reparations, said Perrone, the reparations researcher.

Perrone has compiled more than a half-dozen cases, including Taylor's, where slaveowners freed and left money or land to their slaves. These wills show slaveowners believed reparations were due and were willing to pay them, she wrote in her research paper "Rehearsals for Reparations."

“If you start to understand the scope of this practice, you can make a better argument in the present for reparations,” she said.

By Victoria Moorwood and Randy Tucker, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 3, 2025