Underground Railroad Education Center Sues NEH, Alleging $250,000 Grant Was Cancelled “on the Basis of Race”
A historic site dedicated to the Underground Railroad in Albany, New York, is taking its fight over federal funding to court.
The Underground Railroad Education Center (UREC) has filed a lawsuit in the US District Court for the Northern District of New York accusing the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) of cancelling a $250,000 grant “on the basis of race.” According to NBC News, the case was filed by a group of attorneys affiliated with the organization Lawyers for Good Government.
At the center of the dispute is a quarter-million-dollar award UREC planned to apply toward an interpretive center adjacent to the Myers House, the organization’s headquarters and a key historic landmark in Albany’s Arbor Hill neighborhood. The lawsuit argues that the grant’s cancellation is part of the Trump administration’s broader effort to cut support for initiatives connected to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). UREC contends the decision violated its First and Fifth Amendment rights.
UREC says it learned of the cancellation in May of last year and was told there would be no opportunity to appeal the decision.
The organization’s work is rooted in a specific place and a specific history. UREC was founded in 2003 by Paul and Mary Elizabeth Stewart and is based in a red brick Greek Revival townhouse associated with Stephen Myers, a formerly enslaved man who became a prominent abolitionist in the mid-19th century. Myers and his wife, Harriet, lived in the house and used it as a meeting point for Underground Railroad activity in the region for decades.
Local reporting has described the proposed interpretive center as a major next step for the institution, intended to expand how visitors encounter the site’s history and the broader networks of resistance and mutual aid that shaped the Underground Railroad. The Times-Union reported that the NEH grant was slated to support construction of that adjacent facility.
Paul Stewart told the Times-Union that the project is ready to begin if the remaining financing comes together. “We’ve done all the things that one might need to do to get this project shovel-ready,” he said. “If the balance of funds we needed dropped out of the sky, we’d start tomorrow.”
The lawsuit adds to a growing set of legal and political disputes over how federal agencies evaluate and fund cultural and educational projects, particularly those that explicitly address race, civil rights history, and the legacy of slavery. For institutions like UREC, the outcome could shape not only a single building project, but also the practical limits of public support for interpreting American history in the years ahead.
