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Woman Probes Presidential Links

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The Washington Post

Published: August 25, 2008

It's been four years since Bettye Kearse set out to prove a story that has been handed down through generations of her family: that she, an African-American, is a direct descendant of founding father James Madison.

After a prolonged attempt to arrange DNA testing with Madison family descendants in the United States, the two sides have been unable to agree on how to do it.

According to stories told by Kearse's family, Madison fathered a child named Jim with her great-great-great-great-grandmother, a slave cook named Coreen. Kearse, 65, has no documentation to bolster the claim, so in 2004, she enlisted the help of geneticist Bruce Jackson to investigate.

Jackson, co-director of the Roots Project at the University of Massachusetts in Lowell, which helps blacks trace their genetic histories, said the Madison family has been uncooperative with Kearse's efforts, imposing undue preconditions before they would allow a test. He likened the situation to the now-infamous controversy surrounding Thomas Jefferson and his slave, Sally Hemings, in which Jefferson's white descendants resisted claims that they were related to Hemings' family.

Kearse, a Massachusetts pediatrician who is trying to publish a book on her family history, said she is not angry at the family, just disappointed, and can even empathize with their position.

The case illustrates the tensions that can develop over issues of ancestry, especially when a prominent figure's reputation is at stake. In the case of Jefferson, rumors of his affair with Hemings swirled even during his lifetime. Despite genetic evidence that has linked Hemings' line to Jefferson's family, and documentary evidence that historians say points to Jefferson as the father, there are still some who deny the link.

Kearse's story is not supported by any known historical evidence, Madisonian scholars said. Unlike Jefferson, no rumors of infidelity plagued Madison. There are also no records of slaves at Montpelier with the names Mandy or Coreen in published census data, although the more common name, James, does appear, said Philip Bigler, director of the James Madison Center at James Madison University.

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