Posted on 02/19/2021 7:49:50 AM PST by ProgressingAmerica
So now they're going to conduct a reparations commission in congress. Where is everybody pointing out that Britain's Empire was the one who brought the slaves here?
The Founders didn't ignore their role across the ocean. Why do we? Shouldn't we do what our Founders did? That's all.
You are being extremely disingenuous. Yes, the British occupation of Newport destroyed the slave trade there during the Revolutionary War. (Isn’t your premise that British are to blame for American slavery?)
Slavery persisted in Rhode Island until 1840 and perhaps later. So even though the British destroyed Newport’s slave trade, Rhode Island still had legal slavery for another 60+ years. Who is responsible for that? The British?
Thomas Sowell has written quite extensively to my knowledge (which is quite brilliant) that only the West has even challenged slavery.
It’s still legal in the Middle East (or at least parts of it)
Still legal in the East, and even China has over a million people in its detention camps right now as we type.
Slavery is also still legal in Africa as well. (or at least parts of it)
I’m going to put this a different way.
Prior to 1776, slavery was the British Empire’s ships, carrying the British Empire’s cargo, leaving one of the Empire’s ports or controlled areas, and ending the journey in another of the Empire’s ports or controlled areas.
Under no circumstances should America be paying for this.
None. America didn’t do this. The Founders stood against this and deserve credit for it, not derision.
“England ended the institution of slavery in 1772.”
This is not a fact and you should stop saying it.
England ended the institution of slavery in England in 1772. And the hypocrisy of it royally pissed Benjamin Franklin off.
Looks like the full text of this is needed.
https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-19-02-0128
The Sommersett Case and the Slave Trade, 18–20 June 1772
Printed in The London Chronicle, June 18–20, 1772, by Benjamin Franklin
It is said that some generous humane persons subscribed to the expence of obtaining liberty by law for Somerset the Negro.2 It is to be wished that the same humanity may extend itself among numbers; if not to the procuring liberty for those that remain in our Colonies, at least to obtain a law for abolishing the African commerce in Slaves, and declaring the children of present Slaves free after they become of age.
By a late computation made in America, it appears that there are now eight hundred and fifty thousand Negroes in the English Islands and Colonies; and that the yearly importation is about one hundred thousand, of which number about one third perish by the gaol distemper on the passage, and in the sickness called the seasoning before they are set to labour. The remnant makes up the deficiencies continually occurring among the main body of those unhappy people, through the distempers occasioned by excessive labour, bad nourishment, uncomfortable accommodation, and broken spirits.3 Can sweetening our tea, &c. with sugar, be a circumstance of such absolute necessity? Can the petty pleasure thence arising to the taste, compensate for so much misery produced among our fellow creatures, and such a constant butchery of the human species by this pestilential detestable traffic in the bodies and souls of men? Pharisaical Britain! to pride thyself in setting free a single Slave that happens to land on thy coasts, while thy Merchants in all thy ports are encouraged by thy laws to continue a commerce whereby so many hundreds of thousands are dragged into a slavery that can scarce be said to end with their lives, since it is entailed on their posterity!
Jefferson tried to blame the slave trade on George III, but it didn't work. The others took that part out of the Declaration, and slaveowner Jefferson really wasn't in a position to blame anyone else.
Prior to 1776, slavery was the British Empire’s ships, carrying the British Empire’s cargo, leaving one of the Empire’s ports or controlled areas, and ending the journey in another of the Empire’s ports or controlled areas.
Leaving a cargo of human flesh, that the folks in the Colonies were quite willing to pay a very high price to own.
Bull,
You miss the mark.
The point wasn’t which was better free man in one’s country vs. Slave in a foreign land.... really? Let’s not be daft.
The point was now/ since they are here(perhaps I need to remind you that they have been free for multiple generations and are still here) how much better are their lives, compared to being those back in the original country?
The ways in which this country provides opportunities is unmatched on the rest of the planet.
That’s the short and simple.
Honestly, all I have to say is, England did their part to end Slavery, whether it was actually done well or not, and America did our part. I’m not really interested in doing a pointing fingers game between us on who was responsible for slavery being in America or, heck, anywhere else. Plus, the whole thing was a huge mess to sort out anyways. Even the Founding Fathers, AFTER removing the Brits, could not remove slavery overnight (in fact, I think the founding fathers even indicated it would take nearly a century before they could fully eradicate slavery from their own borders, with Jefferson clearly not helping with his three-fifths compromise). I’m doubtful the Brits really had that capability even at their peak. So I’m not going to speak ill of or condemn them for not ending the slave trade overnight.
Besides, if we really ought to blame ANYONE for the institution of slavery being in full effect, it ought to be the Muslims as well as various African tribes who literally sold us the slaves during their conquests. Funny how that gets left out of the equation when blaming any form of Western Civilization. Whether it be the Brits or the Americans, heck, even the French, Spanish, or Dutch for that matter, at least Western Civilization actually made an actual attempt to end it altogether.
I commend ProgressingAmerica for defending America from having to do reparations, but demanding Great Britain pay Reparations is being just as disingenuous as well, or any other European nation for that matter.
Heck, most of the Enlightenment philosophers, many of whom actually DID influence American thought, DID give tacit approval of Slavery as well, such as David Hume, and that lover of free thought Voltaire had absolutely no problem with his name literally being used on a slaving ship, so if anything I’d argue the Enlightenment philosophies were even MORE to blame for slavery being a continued menace during that time than either the British government at the time OR the American government (or any European government for that matter). Well, blame to more for anyone save for African tribes and the Muslims, anyhow.
Had Britain not interfered, Anglo-America would not EXIST. You can't ride histories boxcars hobo-style to your desired destination.
The British had started to use the issue of slavery to drive a wedge into the politics of the rebellion, fomenting resentment against colonial whites and engendering loyalty among potential freemen, very early in the campaign. British policies suppressing the rebellion included efforts to curb slave-trading and slave-holding. Loyalist leadership in the military campaign employed a policy of liberation in-theater very similar to that of Union military decades later.
Since you like to use overly simplistic false binaries littered with hyperbolic declaratives, let me give you a dose of your own medicine: 'If you had really hated slavery, you would have rooted for the British!'
You keep trying to pass that cup because you believe it to be full of wrath, but the only wrath in that cup was put there by the modern progressive.
In 1775, when fighting broke out, the colonists banned British slave ships. So no new slaves came in after then and even after 1783 it was very sparse. Washington and Adams each signed legislation making it more difficult and Jefferson withdrew the US from the slave trade altogether.
And yet we kept slaves for nearly 100 years after that. We half knew it was wrong but just couldn’t cross the line. Like somebody in their 30s that’s keeps doing crappy stuff and blames their parents. They know it’s crappy, they know it should stop, but they keep doing it anyway. Cause they’re not good people.
In all fairness, the issues of economics as well as the overall controversial nature of abolishing slavery among the populace would have posed a lot of problems as well, so the founding fathers were being pragmatic to ensure the survival of their republic, lest they just decide to emulate France and reduce it to a game of Purge.
Doing the wrong thing for pragatism is still doing the wrong thing.
What would you have preferred, that Washington demand the elimination of class enemies and go all Robespierre to end slavery, even after making it illegal, and by extension become an even WORSE tyrant than George III?
Wal-Mart
That they had done the right thing. The western world was already turning against slavery. The problems were known and obvious. They were shaking the etch-a-sketch, they had an opportunity. They were willing to risk their lives to get that opportunity. But they chickened out on the big one. That’s the fact.
You mean punish those who started slavery?
I suppose we could go out and step on every ant we see.
“That they had done the right thing. The western world was already turning against slavery. The problems were known and obvious. They were shaking the etch-a-sketch, they had an opportunity. They were willing to risk their lives to get that opportunity. But they chickened out on the big one. That’s the fact.”
Yeah, and when France had an opportunity to end the slave trade, they did so by deciding to reduce the country into something only the likes of the Joker from Batman would find loveable, led to a lot of mass death and destruction, many times killing each other for completely pointless reasons outside of quenching bloodlust under that psycho Robespierre and Grignon’s orders, and the “moderates” were barely much better, even with their promotion of universal free rights. And Kant if anything fell in LOVE with that crap. All to push their radical views of equality, which based on your comments on here as of late, you would have deeply loved due to it matching your leftist views.
That would have been even WORSE for America if they went that route instead of keeping Slavery. Given the options, this would have ultimately been the best they could do at the time, unless you WANTED America to become a Jacobin 2.0 as well.
It has long been said that the City of London’s wealth was founded on the India trade-and the slave trade.
We could have done the right thing. We didn’t. Plenty of countries got rid of slavery without idiocy. We chickened out. We put an expiration date on it, then ignored it. We KNOWINGLY DID THE WRONG THING.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.