Democratic Party Should Pay Reparations

[TU Curmudgeon]

It was never the law - it was the justification for America's very existence. America then went on to wholeheartedly embrace pretty much the most egregious and perverse violations of that justification imaginable, not only endorsing intergenerational chattel slavery but enforcing, expanding and perpetuating it for decades beyond its abolition in the British Empire from which it had seceded.

At the time of the founding of the United States of America, slavery (even inter-generational slavery) was perfectly normal and quite socially acceptable.

"The Slavery Abolition Act (1833)" came into effect on August 1, 1834. The Emancipation Proclamation was issued on January 1, 1863, so technically you are correct in your "for decades" bit. However, "The Slavery Abolition Act (1833)" did not abolish ALL slavery in the British Empire.

It was a scale of evil easily comparable to Nazi Germany, and as long as that's something which America decides should be simply shrugged off as an understandable misstep of the kind that all nations have made, its purported justification for its own existence is just meaningless hot air - America should not exist, at least by its own terms.

Thank you for such a fine demonstration of "Presentism".

Now, since the Roman Empire was based on slavery, does that mean that the Italians of today have to pay reparations to those who were enslaved (and to their descendants as well)? And since the Hebrews practiced slavery, does that mean that today's Jews have to pay reparations to those who were enslaved (and to their descendants as well)?

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

Nonsense; in Christianity it was often allowed or tacitly endorsed in compromise with 'worldly' power and influence beginning from the Roman Empire - occasionally it was even encouraged - but was never considered perfectly natural. St. Paul stopped short of ordering Philemon to set his slave free but strongly urged him to do so (Phil. 1:16), and told Christians generally "You were bought at a price; do not become the slaves of men" (1 Cor. 7:23). Correspondingly if Christians were to "do unto others as you'd have them do to you" and "love your neighbour as you love yourself," they were fairly unequivocally forbidden by their own Scripture from enslaving anyone. They therefore had to come up with various theological compromises to accommodate both the rich slave owners who'd become 'Christians' in droves in the 4th and 5th centuries CE, and the explicit endorsement of slavery in their 'Old Testament' which (while superceded in their theology) still had to be reconciled as commands of a holy God: Compromises such as drawing a distinction between reducing someone to slavery and merely purchasing or inheriting slaves; a distinction between the "first intention" of nature as Aquinas put it in which slavery would not exist, and the fallen sinful "second intention" in which it was a necessary punishment for some people; and hence perhaps most importantly between non-Christian slaves and Christian slaves, since it was unthinkable that a Christian could be a "slave by nature" whereas that was a pretext which could be held for non-Christians.* And even then after all that theological tap-dancing there was even some strong (if brief) resistance to pro-slavery inclinations of the rich and powerful colonizers such as the 1537 Papal Bull Sublimis Deus "which forbids the enslavement of the indigenous peoples of the Americas" despite not yet being Christians, and "all other people who could be discovered later." The Christian relationship to slavery was always one of expediency and uncomfortable compromise at best, and while some signatories to the Declaration of Independence undoubtedly told themselves that "all men" didn't include Negroes, there's no question that they understood chattel slavery to be a complete and absolute annulment of the rights to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness... not some kind of natural and perfectly acceptable state that you're perversely trying to make it out to be.

Naturally the "Christian Ruling Class" was opposed to the idea that "Christians" could legitimately be enslaved.

BTW, that "Papal Bull" didn't stop the "Good Catholic" Spaniards and Portuguese from enslaving (or killing) the indigenous people if those indigenous people "refused to see the light" and become "good Christians". Oh yes, and did you happen to notice that that Papal Bull was utterly silent on the question of enslaving "Africans"? You don't suppose that that was because those "Good Catholic" Spaniards and Portuguese were eagerly enslaving "Africans" and using them to generate wealth in the New World and that they were then contributing bundles of that newly created wealth to the coffers of "The Roman Catholic Church INC." do you?

* That distinction incidentally probably become one of the main reasons for the invention of 'White' and 'Black' as racial categories - rather than the ethnic categories of English, Scottish, Ghanian, Malian etc. - since transported slaves often eventually converted to the Christianity of their new unwilling home,

Actually it wasn't the "transported slaves" but rather it was the "domestically bred slaves" that "converted to Christianity. That conversion, by the way, was opposed by most slave owners until it dawned on them that religion could be used as an "opiate" to stifle dissent on the part of "the masses".

By the time of the American Civil War the majority of slaves in the United States of America were "domestically bred slaves".

so instead of the religious pretext of enslaving non-Christians it became expedient to promote the social pretext of enslaving Negroes.

When you REALLY want to do something that you know deep in your heart you shouldn't do, you will almost always find SOME rationalization which says that it's OK to do it (even if that rationalization makes no logical sense whatsoever).

 

[Cope]

It is the Democratic Party of the United States that should be paying reparations for supporting slavery after they became the party representing slave owners and then became the party after the civil war that tried to stop the reforms that would have allowed black folks in the United States to be on an equal footing with others in the nation.

You want evidence, right?

John C. Breckinridge | Biography, Facts, & Party

John C. Breckinridge, 14th vice president of the U.S. and Confederate officer during the American Civil War.

www.britannica.com

History of the Democratic Party (United States) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Note that timestamp given --- "until the Great Depression". That is a lot of years of blocking calls for civil rights for black folks in the United States. Maybe five decades the Democratic party was of the mind that black folks weren't supposed to use the same facilities as the white folks, or others (if "others" can apply here). But we sure as heck know that black folks got the raw end of the deal at the hands of the Democratic Party, so how about some discussion of the Democratic Party in the United States paying some form of reparations?

Now now, no need to be so unspecific.

I think any slave holder should pay reparations.

Hear Hear! If you have ever owned slaves, in your lifetime, you are hereby given notice that you owe any person who has been a slave a $ amount (that you find sufficient)

 

[Lethargic Aptitude]

It is the Democratic Party of the United States that should be paying reparations for supporting slavery after they became the party representing slave owners and then became the party after the civil war that tried to stop the reforms that would have allowed black folks in the United States to be on an equal footing with others in the nation.

You want evidence, right?

John C. Breckinridge | Biography, Facts, & Party

John C. Breckinridge, 14th vice president of the U.S. and Confederate officer during the American Civil War.

www.britannica.com

History of the Democratic Party (United States) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Note that timestamp given --- "until the Great Depression". That is a lot of years of blocking calls for civil rights for black folks in the United States. Maybe five decades the Democratic party was of the mind that black folks weren't supposed to use the same facilities as the white folks, or others (if "others" can apply here). But we sure as heck know that black folks got the raw end of the deal at the hands of the Democratic Party, so how about some discussion of the Democratic Party in the United States paying some form of reparations?

It is almost like you have no clue that today's political parties have little to do with what they were in the past.

For example, today's Republican party is not the same party that elected Reagan.

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

It is almost like you have no clue that today's political parties have little to do with what they were in the past.

For example, today's Republican party is not the same party that elected Reagan.

Considering that the sole requirement for a person to belong to the "Republican Party" is for that person to say "I am a Republican" and that the sole requirement for a person to belong to the "Democratic Party" is for that person to say "I am a Democrat" the concept of blaming a political party of today for actions taken by people who claimed to belong to a political party of the same name more than 150 years ago is rather silly.

 

[Lethargic Aptitude]

Considering that the sole requirement for a person to belong to the "Republican Party" is for that person to say "I am a Republican" and that the sole requirement for a person to belong to the "Democratic Party" is for that person to say "I am a Democrat" the concept of blaming a political party of today for actions taken by people who claimed to belong to a political party of the same name more than 150 years ago is rather silly.

Obvisously.

 

[Mithrae]

Now, since the Roman Empire was based on slavery, does that mean that the Italians of today have to pay reparations to those who were enslaved (and to their descendants as well)? And since the Hebrews practiced slavery, does that mean that today's Jews have to pay reparations to those who were enslaved (and to their descendants as well)?

Is there a legal person identifiable as the Roman Empire still around to be held accountable for its own misdeeds? I recognized from post #423 that you weren't interested in serious discussion, but it seems that you're not even interested in honest discussion either. But that's how it usually goes in these discussions; as far as I've found there is only one honest and logically consistent argument against reparations and that's just to come out and declare that you would have been opposed to reparations even in 1866, and before now only one person I've discussed the topic with has even come close to acknowledging that. I suppose with your efforts to normalize the 19th century practice of slavery, your downplaying of legitimacy to America's founding document, and your opposition to 'retroactive' rules or compensation you are treading very close to it also: Is that your view, that there should have been no reparations for slavery even in 1866?

 

[Nickyjo]

Is there a legal person identifiable as the Roman Empire still around to be held accountable for its own misdeeds? I recognized from post #423 that you weren't interested in serious discussion, but it seems that you're not even interested in honest discussion either. But that's how it usually goes in these discussions; as far as I've found there is only one honest and logically consistent argument against reparations and that's just to come out and declare that you would have been opposed to reparations even in 1866, and before now only one person I've discussed the topic with has even come close to acknowledging that. I suppose with your efforts to normalize the 19th century practice of slavery, your downplaying of legitimacy to America's founding document, and your opposition to 'retroactive' rules or compensation you are treading very close to it also: Is that your view, that there should have been no reparations for slavery even in 1866?

I write not knowing proposals as to how reparations could work financially or logistically, but it seems that the current tactics of affirmative action can offer redress for the sins of our history, some of which are not that far removed. Example: I read that the GI Bill, one of the engines of post WWII US prosperity, was discriminatory in its administration.

 

[Mithrae]

I write not knowing proposals as to how reparations could work financially or logistically, but it seems that the current tactics of affirmative action can offer redress for the sins of our history, some of which are not that far removed. Example: I read that the GI Bill, one of the engines of post WWII US prosperity, was discriminatory in its administration.

One of the simplest metrics for racial discrimination is the black-white wealth gap, and that gap has not changed at all in the past 40+ years (and scarcely even over the past 70+ years). Executive Order 10925 in March 1961 required government contractors to take "affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed and... treated during employment without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin," which is great - stop discriminating - and because of the extent of disadvantage against some groups eventually evolved into the likes of quotas or targeted goals. But that's still just offsetting discrimination and even that - having the surface appearance of preferential treatment to anyone who doesn't consider the background disadvantages - has provided plenty of easy fuel for 'reverse racism' white grievance nonsense, despite not meaningfully changing the black-white wealth gap at all. Even if affirmative action were escalated to the level of actual reverse racism as a form of reparations - and even if that had any hope in hell of getting past the Supreme Court - there aren't enough government jobs to really make much of a dent in that gap in anything short of centuries; compelling private institutions to also participate would be yet another impossible task, and short of escalating white unemployment well into double digits would still take a few generations to close the gap, during which resentment would fester like nothing seen to date and all those measures could easily be repealed.

Seems to me that a one-and-done reparations program budgeted over 4-10 years is the 'most' feasible approach: Although as we're seeing from even many liberal posters responding to this thread refusing to hold the legal person of the Democratic Party accountable for its own platforms and actions in the past, the even bigger task of asking all Americans to hold the US Government accountable for its actions - even its greatest and most visible domestic crime - seems pretty hopeless in any format.

 

[Glitch]

Sorry for the brevity, got to get to work, but as above, there was never any legal liability for slavery even on the part of slave-owners themselves because slavery was legally protected and legally enforced: Those who want to confine their opinions to the letter of the law would have been just as deeply opposed to reparations in 1866 as they are today.


Of course they don't need to. Cities don't need to remove monuments to Confederate leaders either. But they should.

Slavery became illegal in the US on December 6, 1865, upon the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment.

Furthermore, Republican US House Representative Thaddeus Stevens sponsored a reparation bill that passed a Republican-controlled Congress in 1865 and was promptly vetoed by impeached Democrat President Andrew Johnson, just before he gave all the Democrat Confederate traitors a blanket pardon on Christmas Day 1865.

Everyone of those Confederate monuments were put into place by Democrats, and they most certainly should be removed. We have no business memorializing traitors, even pardoned ones.

 

[Glitch]

Griping about it for years and years and years does NOT extend the statutory period allowed for commencing legal action.

Actually, the Article I, Section 9, Clause 3 of the US Constitution specifically prohibits retroactive laws. Which makes California's attempts at reparation unconstitutional. You cannot retroactively criminalize what was once legal.

If it was already illegal, and they committed the act anyway, that is another story. Like FDR violating the due process rights when he placed 120,000+ Americans illegally into concentration camps from 1942 until 1945. That atrocity is something we can, and did, pay reparations for in 1988. However, slavery was legal prior to December 6, 1865, and it cannot be criminalized after-the-fact.

Indeed, there is a legal presumption against the validity of retroactive legislation.

Indeed, Article I, Section 9, Clause 3 of the US Constitution: "No bill of attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed."

The American Declaration of Independence was NEVER the law in the United States of America and, in any event, would have been superceded by the Constitution of the United States of America.

The Declaration of Independence is the founding principle upon which the US is based. It was enacted by the Continental Congress under the Articles of Confederation on July 4, 1776, which was superseded by the US Constitution on June 21, 1788.

The founding principle of the US can be summed up with just one sentence from the Declaration of Independence: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of happiness."

Even though the original US Constitution did not embody that principle, it has been a goal we have been striving towards for the last 235 years. Which explains why there are currently 27 Amendments to the US Constitution. It is an ever evolving document.

That is how it has been viewed for the past (roughly) 150 years. Prior to that "slavery" was a perfectly "natural" condition and one which was endorsed by all three of the Abrahamic Religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam).

Not just the Abrahamic Religions either. It was world-wide. Native Americans enslaved other native Americans. Africans enslaved other Africans. Asians enslaved other Asians. It was common practice world-wide for the stronger societies to enslave its neighboring weaker societies. It has only been in recent times, since we gained the ability for extra-continental travel, that Europeans began enslaving Africans, and visa versa.

England has to be given credit for being the first nation for not only eliminating slavery in their own country, but actively prohibiting the practice globally. England was instrumental in bringing an end to the slave trade across the Atlantic.

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

Is there a legal person identifiable as the Roman Empire still around to be held accountable for its own misdeeds?

The Roman Empire was succeeded by several governments that inherited the resources and obligations of the Roman Empire, so "Yes" there is a legal person identifiable as RESPONSIBLE for the acts of the Roman Empire.

Equally, the government of the United States of America was the legal entity which made slavery legal and, as such, it is the government of the United States of America that should be RESPONSIBLE for the institution and legalization of slavery.

I recognized from post #423 that you weren't interested in serious discussion, but it seems that you're not even interested in honest discussion either. But that's how it usually goes in these discussions; as far as I've found there is only one honest and logically consistent argument against reparations and that's just to come out and declare that you would have been opposed to reparations even in 1866, and before now only one person I've discussed the topic with has even come close to acknowledging that.

Unfortunately your "only one honest and logically consistent argument" is neither the "only one" nor is it "honest" nor is it logically consistent:.

I suppose with your efforts to normalize the 19th century practice of slavery,

In the 19th century the practice of slavery WAS "normal".

your downplaying of legitimacy to America's founding document,

There is absolutely nothing "illegitimate" about "America's founding document" - unfortunately the (American) Declaration of Independence is NOT that document. America's founding document was "The Articles of Confederation". That founding document was superseded by The Constitution of the United States of America. The American Declaration of Independence did NOT establish anything - what it did was give the reasons why the Founding Fathers were rebelling against the legal government.

and your opposition to 'retroactive' rules or compensation

There is a general legal/constitutional prohibition AGAINST "retroactive" anything (except pardons).

you are treading very close to it also: Is that your view, that there should have been no reparations for slavery even in 1866?

No. The Freedmen should have been assisted to establish themselves socially and economically. If that meant that the persons who had formerly been slave owners had to have property confiscated and sold to pay for that assistance, then that is what should have been done then - NOT now. If that required that the former slave owners be compensated for the loss of their legally acquired property, then that is what should have been done then - NOT now.

The entire handling of the termination of slavery was botched and that was the "fault" of both the Republican Party and the Democratic Party.

However, the greatest steps taken to reverse that botched job were those instituted by President Lyndon Johnson. Do you happen to recall which political party he belonged to? And the greatest resistance to the steps that President Johnson instituted came from the _[fill in the blank]_ party - do you know which political party that was?

However, let's say that "reparations" WERE to be paid. Did you realize that (according to one set of calculations [adjusted for inflation from the day those calculations were done]) just to meet the "40 acres and a mule" cost would run in the neighbourhood of $8.3833 TRILLION dollars in today's money?

Another way of looking at it is that the 1865 cost of "40 acres and a mule" would have been in the neighbourhood of $200 at the time. So if that $200 is considered a debt that accrues interest at the rate of 3.5% p.a. that would mean that every "reparation eligible" person would be entitled to around $860,200. Given that there are around 47,320,000 "Blacks" in the US today, that works out to around $40,704,664,000,000 (assuming that every "Black" is entitled to the same amount in "reparations". That is approximately six times the total US annual budget.

Of course, another way of dealing with the issue is to give "preferential funding" to "Black schools" and to give "preferential hiring" to "Blacks" for the next 150 years - but I don't think that the American "conservatives" are quite prepared to do that - are you?

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

I write not knowing proposals as to how reparations could work financially or logistically, but it seems that the current tactics of affirmative action can offer redress for the sins of our history, some of which are not that far removed. Example: I read that the GI Bill, one of the engines of post WWII US prosperity, was discriminatory in its administration.

Indeed, the "GI Bill" was administered in a discriminatory manner. The "GI Bill" itself was "racially neutral".

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

Slavery became illegal in the US on December 6, 1865, upon the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment.

Furthermore, Republican US House Representative Thaddeus Stevens sponsored a reparation bill that passed a Republican-controlled Congress in 1865 and was promptly vetoed by impeached Democrat President Andrew Johnson, just before he gave all the Democrat Confederate traitors a blanket pardon on Christmas Day 1865.

Indeed, and Congress promptly overrode that veto - didn't it?

BTW, when was President Andrew Johnson CONVICTED on the impeachment? You do know the difference between "being alleged to have" and "being judge culpable of" - don't you?

Everyone of those Confederate monuments were put into place by Democrats, and they most certainly should be removed. We have no business memorializing traitors, even pardoned ones.

And, then, of course, all of those monuments to those evil slave owners have to go next - right?

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

Actually, the Article I, Section 9, Clause 3 of the US Constitution specifically prohibits retroactive laws. Which makes California's attempts at reparation unconstitutional. You cannot retroactively criminalize what was once legal.

Very good. Except for one really minor point - California is not "criminalizing" anything with its reparations proposal (which I expect to fall flatter than a souffle in an earthquake).

If it was already illegal, and they committed the act anyway, that is another story. Like FDR violating the due process rights when he placed 120,000+ Americans illegally into concentration camps from 1942 until 1945. That atrocity is something we can, and did, pay reparations for in 1988. However, slavery was legal prior to December 6, 1865, and it cannot be criminalized after-the-fact.

See above.

Indeed, Article I, Section 9, Clause 3 of the US Constitution: "No bill of attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed."

See above.

The Declaration of Independence is the founding principle upon which the US is based.

Indeed - a "statement of principles" and NOT "legislation"

It was enacted by the Continental Congress under the Articles of Confederation on July 4, 1776,

On that date the United States of America had no legal existence.

which was superseded by the US Constitution on June 21, 1788.

It was the Articles of Confederation which were superseded by the US Constitution.

Well, either that or it is no longer a "founding principle upon which the US is based.

The founding principle of the US can be summed up with just one sentence from the Declaration of Independence: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of happiness."

Which, unfortunately, never seems to have been enacted into the laws of the United States of America.

Even though the original US Constitution did not embody that principle, it has been a goal we have been striving towards for the last 235 years. Which explains why there are currently 27 Amendments to the US Constitution. It is an ever evolving document.

Ohhhh - you said "evolving document"! Turn in your "Conservative Card" immediately.

Not just the Abrahamic Religions either. It was world-wide. Native Americans enslaved other native Americans. Africans enslaved other Africans. Asians enslaved other Asians. It was common practice world-wide for the stronger societies to enslave its neighboring weaker societies. It has only been in recent times, since we gained the ability for extra-continental travel, that Europeans began enslaving Africans, and visa versa.

Actually the Romans were enslaving Africans long before "recent times" and the Moors were enslaving Europeans long before "recent times" as well.

England has to be given credit for being the first nation for not only eliminating slavery in their own country, but actively prohibiting the practice globally. England was instrumental in bringing an end to the slave trade across the Atlantic.

NOVEMBER SIERRA SIERRA.

However that runs contrary to the officially approved myth that it was the United States of America that abolished slavery.

 

[Mithrae]

In the 19th century the practice of slavery WAS "normal".

No, it was normalized by the tiny fraction of people (~6% even among white Confederates) who owned slaves. Then as now most people simply went along with the status quo established by the rich and powerful, even though they didn't benefit from and if anything as wage labourers likely were disadvantaged by all that 'free' labour; it's much easier to side with the oppressors than the oppressed. Meanwhile both religiously and even moreso politically there were overwhelming condemnations of all forms of oppression readily available, and far more than six percent of people (starting with the slaves themselves) accurately recognized that slavery was one of if not the most vicious, greedy and unnatural oppression of all.

There is absolutely nothing "illegitimate" about "America's founding document" - unfortunately the (American) Declaration of Independence is NOT that document. America's founding document was "The Articles of Confederation". That founding document was superseded by The Constitution of the United States of America. The American Declaration of Independence did NOT establish anything - what it did was give the reasons why the Founding Fathers were rebelling against the legal government.

There would be no Constitution without the prior Declaration of Independence. If you want to draw a semantic distinction between it being the founding document versus the very reason and justification for its existence, fair enough, but it doesn't change the point: America should not exist (at least by its own formally-stated terms) if its government is one which treats Nazi-level oppression and brutality as just a minor misstep to be easily brushed aside.

There is a general legal/constitutional prohibition AGAINST "retroactive" anything (except pardons).

No. The Freedmen should have been assisted to establish themselves socially and economically. If that meant that the persons who had formerly been slave owners had to have property confiscated and sold to pay for that assistance, then that is what should have been done then - NOT now. If that required that the former slave owners be compensated for the loss of their legally acquired property, then that is what should have been done then - NOT now.

You're all over the place here. You're opposed to retroactive punishment, but you think slave owners' property should have been confiscated to "assist" former slaves. You then conscientiously add that maybe the slave owners would have deserved reparations for the loss of their property to "assist" slaves (and of course the loss of their legally acquired slaves themselves)... so the government should have given out a bunch of wealth to a bunch of people, perhaps taken from Northerners, or stolen from Indians, or just pulled out of thin air?

And after all of that, you seem to think that these government obligations after eighty years of slavery which were never met must have somehow magically disappeared at some point during the additional oppression and discrimination which followed? Because stealing from people even more is a valid substitute for paying back what was originally stolen, I suppose...?

However, the greatest steps taken to reverse that botched job were those instituted by President Lyndon Johnson.

From your own link below, in 1865 black people owned 0.5% of wealth in America and by 1990 they owned 1% of wealth in America while being well over ten percent of the population, with the wealth gap remaining unchanged since 1970. Exactly what "great steps" did Lyndon Johnson accomplish?

However, let's say that "reparations" WERE to be paid. Did you realize that (according to one set of calculations [adjusted for inflation from the day those calculations were done]) just to meet the "40 acres and a mule" cost would run in the neighbourhood of $8.3833 TRILLION dollars in today's money?

Yes, and? Some estimates are lower, but that sounds reasonable enough since the ~$12 trillion black-white wealth gap serves as a pretty clear metric for the material consequences of all discrimination in America and the government is responsible for less than 100% of that. Over a ten year payment plan that would be about twelve percent of the federal budget, about the same as America spends on its military; steep but very feasible, and every dollar distributed in poor black communities would ultimately result in much more than a dollar of GDP growth; genuinely a rising tide lifting all boats if it starts (for the most part) from the bottom.

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

No, it was normalized by the tiny fraction of people (~6% even among white Confederates) who owned slaves. Then as now most people simply went along with the status quo established by the rich and powerful, even though they didn't benefit from and if anything as wage labourers likely were disadvantaged by all that 'free' labour; it's much easier to side with the oppressors than the oppressed. Meanwhile both religiously and even moreso politically there were overwhelming condemnations of all forms of oppression readily available, and far more than six percent of people (starting with the slaves themselves) accurately recognized that slavery was one of if not the most vicious, greedy and unnatural oppression of all.

For something to be "normalized" it has to have been "non-normal" and "outside the pale". That does not apply to slavery. If slavery was ever "normalized" it was "normalized" several thousand years previously.

There would be no Constitution without the prior Declaration of Independence. If you want to draw a semantic distinction between it being the founding document versus the very reason and justification for its existence, fair enough, but it doesn't change the point:

The point is that the American Declaration of Independence is not now, nor has it ever been, a part of the LAWS that FOUNDED the United States of America.

America should not exist (at least by its own formally-stated terms) if its government is one which treats Nazi-level oppression and brutality as just a minor misstep to be easily brushed aside.

Hyperbole will get you nowhere in a logical discussion.

You're all over the place here. You're opposed to retroactive punishment, but you think slave owners' property should have been confiscated to "assist" former slaves.

Yep, if their property had been confiscated at the time, that would NOT have been "retroactive" in the least.on of slavery.

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

You then conscientiously add that maybe the slave owners would have deserved reparations for the loss of their slaves (and the loss of their property to "assist" slaves), so the government should have given out a bunch of wealth to a bunch of people, perhaps taken from Northerners, or stolen from Indians, or just pulled out to thin air?

When the government confiscates property it has the duty to pay full compensation - it says so in the Constitution of the United States of America.

And after all of that, you seem to think that these government obligations after eighty years of slavery

Slavery existed long before the American Revolution (in which the new government accepted the obligations towards the people of the old government).

which were never met must have somehow magically disappeared at some point during the additional oppression and discrimination which followed?

Yep. But it isn't "magical" it's what is known as a "statutory limitation". Mind you, those "disappeared" obligations were replaced by NEW obligations arising from the actions AFTER slavery was abolished.

Because stealing from people even more is a valid substitute for paying back what was originally stolen, I suppose...?

Only if you don't understand the law.

From your own link below, in 1865 black people owned 0.5% of wealth in America and by 1990 they owned 1% of wealth in America, with the wealth gap remaining unchanged since 1970. Exactly what "great steps" did Lyndon Johnson accomplish?

Ahhh, I see, in your mind "Dollars = Rights" - OK.

Yes, and? Some estimates are lower, but that sounds reasonable enough since the ~$12 trillion black-white wealth gap serves as a pretty clear metric for the material consequences of all discrimination in America and the government is responsible for less than 100% of that. Over a ten year payment plan that would be about twelve percent of the federal budget, about the same as America spends on its military; steep but very feasible, and every dollar spent in poor black communities would ultimately result in much more than a dollar of GDP growth, genuinely a rising tide lifting all boats if it starts from the bottom.

Ahhh, but you were talking about "reparations" and that means actually handing out the cash to individuals. Now you are talking about paternalistic decision making by "those who know best" that will direct the lives of "those who aren't capable of participating in society properly".

Strangely enough, that is one of the lines that the wheelers and dealers in the Confederate states used to justify the continuation of slavery.

 

[Mithrae]

For something to be "normalized" it has to have been "non-normal" and "outside the pale".

The legitimacy of slavery was always opposed by (at the very least) a significant minority of any societies it occurred in, most obviously among the slaves themselves. Being a slave-owner was always the exception for the wealthy few, never the norm. Christians enslaving their fellow Christians was never the norm. And most commentators I've seen seem to agree that the racial animus involved in a white society enslaving black people along with the supposed "curse of Ham" and "slaves by nature" pretexts used to justify the practice made the Atlantic slave trade particularly brutal even compared to other slave societies - again, not the norm. And all of that is even before getting into the American Declaration that all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights such as life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.

Defending and normalizing slavery was definitely a challenge in 19th century America, which is part of the reason why (in the areas it was most thoroughly normalized) it became not merely normal but a central cultural institution, such that various states seceded from the union and precipitated the reunification war not because Abraham Lincoln was actually going to abolish slavery - the Republican platform explicitly stated the opposite, and IIRC one of the negotiation offers early in the secession process was a constitutional amendment to permanently guarantee the right to slavery in states where it already existed - but on the mere fear that one day it might happen. Or at least that was the main pretext for secession, which also illustrates how culturally entrenched it had become.

The point is that the American Declaration of Independence is not now, nor has it ever been, a part of the LAWS that FOUNDED the United States of America.

Yes, that's what I said; slavery didn't violate mere laws, it violated far more fundamental human rights which "these united states" had formally declared were the very basis for governance and laws. It wasn't a crime against a government, it was a crime against humanity.

America should not exist (at least by its own formally-stated terms) if its government is one which treats Nazi-level oppression and brutality as just a minor misstep to be easily brushed aside.

Hyperbole will get you nowhere in a logical discussion.

The DoI states that it not merely a right but a duty for such a government to be overthrown. Explicitly racist policies supporting the brutal enslavement of four generations of black Americans up to 4 million at a time (and a nationalistic vision to aggressively expand its lebensraum across the whole breadth of the continent) provide a remarkably close comparison against the scale of Nazi atrocities. And despite a hundred and fifty years of rhetoric and hand-wringing (by some citizens and politicians), in practical terms those crimes against humanity have indeed merely been brushed aside as not warranting any restitution or accountability by the government which perpetrated them. If a murderer had never atoned for her crime we'd say that they should not be free, should be consigned to the same status as when they committed that crime; similarly America (at least by the formally-stated terms of its own justification for existence) should not exist and there is not only a right but a duty to overthrow its government, unless and until there is at the bare minimum some real and practical accountability for its greatest domestic crime. If there's any hyperbole there it's in the rhetoric with which these united states aimed to justify their secession from their legal government.

Yep, if their property had been confiscated at the time, that would NOT have been "retroactive" in the least.

Of course it would have been, not only retroactive but individual retroactive punishment against slave-owners for their 'legal' actions. Unless (as happened in DC, and as you apparently wish had happened more broadly) the slave-owners received reparations for the loss of their slaves while the former slaves received nothing more than a paternalistic helping hand to get on their feet, presumably all paid for by stealing more land off the Indians.

By contrast there's really nothing retroactive about the United States itself being held accountable for crimes which it perpetrated which were so grossly contrary to its own formal justification for existence.

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

The legitimacy of slavery was always opposed by (at the very least) a significant minority of any societies it occurred in, most obviously among the slaves themselves. Being a slave-owner was always the exception for the wealthy few, never the norm. Christians enslaving their fellow Christians was never the norm. And most commentators I've seen seem to agree that the racial animus involved in a white society enslaving black people along with the supposed "curse of Ham" and "slaves by nature" pretexts used to justify the practice made the Atlantic slave trade particularly brutal even compared to other slave societies - again, not the norm. And all of that is even before getting into the American Declaration that all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights such as life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.

Defending and normalizing slavery was definitely a challenge in 19th century America, which is part of the reason why (in the areas it was most thoroughly normalized) it became not merely normal but a central cultural institution, such that various states seceded from the union and precipitated the reunification war not because Abraham Lincoln was actually going to abolish slavery - the Republican platform explicitly stated the opposite, and IIRC one of the negotiation offers early in the secession process was a constitutional amendment to permanently guarantee the right to slavery in states where it already existed - but on the mere fear that one day it might happen. Or at least that was the main pretext for secession, which also illustrates how culturally entrenched it had become.

Indeed, the social and economic basis of the Southern states was the existence of an "underclass" (the slaves). That that economic basis was not the most effective use of the available "human capital" in order to produce profit was NOT something that the movers and shakers of the Southern states gave serious consideration to. In short, the fight was not "to defend slavery" but rather (in a more nuanced view) "to defend our way of life (which is dependent on the continuation of slavery [regardless of whether slavery is 'right' or 'wrong' {despite the obvious fact that slavery is going to disappear regardless of what we do}])".

Yes, that's what I said; slavery didn't violate mere laws, it violated far more fundamental human rights which "these united states" had formally declared were the very basis for governance and laws. It wasn't a crime against a government, it was a crime against humanity.

That, unfortunately, is NOT how the Founding Fathers viewed it.

The DoI states that it not merely a right but a duty for such a government to be overthrown. Explicitly racist policies supporting the brutal enslavement of four generations of black Americans up to 4 million at a time (and a nationalistic vision to aggressively expand its lebensraum across the whole breadth of the continent) provide a remarkably close comparison against the scale of Nazi atrocities.

Indeed, those slaves were all marched off to "The Camps" and murdered.

And despite a hundred and fifty years of rhetoric and hand-wringing (by some citizens and politicians), in practical terms those crimes against humanity have indeed merely been brushed aside as not warranting any restitution or accountability by the government which perpetrated them.

And by a citizenry that - in the main - simply didn't care.

If a murderer had never atoned for her crime we'd say that they should not be free, should be consigned to the same status as when they committed that crime; similarly America (at least by the formally-stated terms of its own justification for existence) should not exist and there is not only a right but a duty to overthrow its government, unless and until there is at the bare minimum some real and practical accountability for its greatest domestic crime. If there's any hyperbole there it's in the rhetoric with which these united states aimed to justify their secession from their legal government.

So, it appears that you are in agreement that any "atonement" that is to be made is a "national atonement" and not simply one made by the successors of the name of a political party. Am I correct?

 

[TU Curmudgeon]

Of course it would have been, not only retroactive but individual retroactive punishment against slave-owners for their 'legal' actions.

What you don't appear to realize is that "tort law" concerns matters that are not necessarily covered by "statute law" and that "damages" are something that is covered by "tort law".

Unless (as happened in DC, and as you apparently wish had happened more broadly) the slave-owners received reparations for the loss of their slaves

That was the price of their support for the terminating of slavery.

while the former slaves received nothing more than a paternalistic helping hand to get on their feet,

Which is what those who advocate for "The Government will provide the required things to redress the grievances in such manner and amount as The Government thinks appropriate and through the mechanism of the civil services of The Government."

presumably all paid for by stealing more land off the Indians.

Ultimately the entirety of the United States of America came from "stealing land off the Indians" didn't it?

By contrast there's really nothing retroactive about the United States itself being held accountable for crimes which it perpetrated which were so grossly contrary to its own formal justification for existence.

Unless, of course, those acts were NOT "crimes" as defined by the laws of the United States of America at the time.

PS - If you believe the political rhetoric spouted to justify any change of government that is intended primarily to "take the power away from THEIR elite and transfer it to OUR elite while, at best, throwing a sop to those who are actually going to be doing the fighting while WE stay home and make money" you should really reexamine your belief filters. Was the propaganda used to indicate high ideals and noble intent something that should not be worked toward? Of course not. Was the propaganda used to justify revolution something that the Founding Fathers actually intended to apply to all people for all time starting immediately? Of course not.

 

[poweRob]

Yes, but I am used to speaking with people that are educated enough to know about the party switch back in the 60s.

So spare me the "democrats are the party of slavery and the GOP is the party of Lincoln bullshit. Who do you see waving confederate flags these days? Oh, yeah, it's the right wing of the GOP.