At no time, I am sure, did ANYONE tell my ancestors that their progeny would be held accountable, financially or criminally, for the actions of the Founding Fathers.
We’re not talking about fine print, here… we’re talking about NO print.
We’re ALL here now, and we’ve got to do what’s right, by people who have been wronged. That is why I advocated holding ALL slaveholders responsible for their sins (even though it wasn’t illegal when they did it.) You find me a former slaveholder, and I will PERSONALLY relieve him of his belongings and give them to a former slave, whom it is also your responsibility to find.
Whew; sorry–I was told it was “come to bed, or sleep on the couch.”
Okay, let’s drag this one out in the open. The real problem, and the only reason we’re discussing the idea of repartations over 130 years after the problem of slavery ended is that it DIDN"T END THEN. Except for a small period (Reconstruction), the problem just didn’t go away. Sure, it was hidden better, but if you combine the sharecropping system with the laws known as the Black Codes that came into effect in the late nineteenth century, African-Americans weren’t in that different a situation than they were prior to the Civil War. I’m sure we could find a few surviving sharecroppers.
In fact, African-Americans weren’t allowed to vote in most of the south prior to the enactment of the 1965 voting rights bill (and the decision by the federal government to enforce the laws of the land even in Mississippi). Think we could find anyone alive who’s civil rights were violated by this one?
The entire concept of racism itself pretty much developed as a justification for the slave trade to begin with, so the difficulties that we as a nation still experience in this area could be layed at the feet of the institution, and since the federal government was responsible for the legality of slavery in this country, the federal government is culpable for these actions.
As far as whether or not reparations are a good idea, I personally don’t think so, although I have mixed emotions. I personally thought the best practical way to correct the mistakes of the past was Affirmative Action, but it looks like most people think thirty years of saying, “oops, sorry, after you” is quite enough to make up for three hundred and fifty years of oppression.
It is my duty as a doper and Washington & Lee University alum to correct the previous statement.
Robert E. Lee was the president of Washington College from 1865-1869, and the school did not add Lee’s name until the founding of the law school, wherein the school gained a graduate program, becoming a university, necessitating a name change. “& Lee” was added at that time to honor his contributions to the college during his tenure.
R.E. Lee also founded the School of Journalism at Washington College, which I believe was the first programof it’s kind in the U.S.
