The Time is Right for Reparations (No, he's serious!)

For more than 45 million black Americans, there are many issues that unite or divide us. Undoubtedly, the issue of reparations for African people in general and in particular for black Americans is an issue began as a divisive topic but now receives support from a board cross-section of blacks in America.

Of course, there are some who wanted to table a national discussion of reparations in the aftermath of the election of President Barack H. Obama. Yet, there were many others who have argued that now is the most propitious time to accelerate the national dialogue about reparations because there is a "brother" in the White House.

This is a pivotal year because of the November elections. Any issue that is related to race will be used by those who oppose to President Obama. The goal of conservatives is to polarize American voters to vote their racial prejudice instead of voting their conscience about the future of the nation as an inclusive participatory democracy.

Given the recent polarization around the calls for equal justice and fairness in the Trayvon Martin killing, it would be naïve to think that race will not play a factor in the upcoming elections. The truth is race is just not a problem that crept onto the national scene accidentally. Race has been a social, economic, and political problem in America for more than 200 years. This is nothing new. What is new, however, is how the victims of racism see themselves, and how the perpetrators of racism view themselves.

Fortunately, renowned legal scholars such as Harvard's Charles Ogletree and others have articulated a rational defense for reparations, which would be therapeutic not only for black Americans, but also for all Americans.

I have consistently supported the call and the demand for reparations that go beyond whatever monetary compensation. Reparations are also about "repairing the damage" that was done to millions of African people, not just in America, but in the Caribbean, Central and South America, in Africa and throughout the rest of the world.

The United Nations is slowly working on establishing a permanent memorial to the victims of the infamous trans-Atlantic slave trade. In Washington, D.C., the construction of the African American Museum has begun. The United States Senate has issued an "apology" for slavery. And in my home state of North Carolina, Gov. Bev Perdue has just called for the state to spend $10.3 million in "reparations" to the victims of a vicious eugenics state program that sterilized thousands of people against their will. Most of those who were unjustly and savagely sterilized were black. Again, no amount of money could ever justify or rectify that awful and callous past. Still, Gov. Perdue's actions are the right steps at the right time. Healing is a long-term process. It takes time. The perpetrators of racism need a "repairing" of their minds and hearts.

It is interesting to note that even amidst a recovering of the American economy from the threshold of severe economic ruin, billions of dollars are being spent by candidates and campaigns for political office throughout the U.S. like they have unlimited money-trees to spend without reservation or limitation. The point here is so much of the "old money" and ingrained wealth of the nation came directly from the systematic economic exploitation of African people during 500 years of slavery and post-slavery institution-building. That is why it will take a tremendous calculation to determine a full accounting of the financial and human toll of the slave trade and its aftermath. Harper's magazine did a study that concluded that the U.S. owes black Americans more than $100 trillion in reparations. It is probably more than that.

This may not be the perfect time to raise this issue. Judging by the past, there is never a perfect time. Today is as good as any time. Let's work harder on the issue of reparations. We can begin by supporting the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America (NCOBRA), which will hold its national convention in Philadelphia, June 22-24. Reparations for black Americans should be supported by all Americans.

Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr. is president of the Hip-Hop Summit Action Network (HSAN) and Education Online Services Corporation and serves as the national director of Occupy the Dream. He can be reached at drbenjamin.chavis@gmail.com

Reparations for slavery?

When a black woman is one of the richest people in America?

When a black man was Secretary of State??

When a black woman was Secretary of State?

When black men have occupied — and still occupy – seats on the Supreme Court??

When a black would-be despot sits in the White House?????

When countless black men have risen to the top of the ranks of the richest in professional sports and show business?? Men like Hank Aaron. Men like Bill Cosby who... (Never mind. As we all know, Bill’s either an Uncle Tom or Oreo Cookie, depending on which black race pimp you listen to.)

And how about it’s equally goofy companion, the so-called Liberation Theology?

Liberation from WHAT? The chance to achieve and succeed in one of the few nations where, until the fellow embracing those and other tenets of Marxism moved into the White House, that opportunity exists for all men?

Give me a break!!

Minorities are some of the hardest hit when those Marxist ideas bite and take down the free-market, private property economy. As I record this, Obama’s popularity with the black community is sinking like the proverbial streamlined anvil and his panic is justified – and increasingly obvious.

Let me pause here to make the obligatory white guy, PC dictated disclaimer: I am NOT a racist. I supported Herman Cain in his run for the Senate. And I will probably support him in his run for the WH if he can get the necessary traction.

I consider Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams two of the finest economists and minds extant today. In case you don’t know them, both are black.

Sowell, Williams and Cain – among others — have spoken out against those fellow blacks who castigate and vilify America for a slavery now long in our past. And ALL thinking men and women of all races oppose the periodic calls for reparations. (When he ran, I supported Alan Keyes. I even spoke in his stead on the RTKABA at a Capitol rally and was asked to fill in for him on his radio show at the time. Sadly, while I still consider Dr. Keyes a good man, I have had to rethink my support since he came out FOR reparations.)

The fact is that the modern descendants of slaves brought here in chains in admittedly miserable, soul-gutting conditions now calling for reparations need to remember something:

They should not only be glad to be in America, they should be glad to be ANYWHERE!

Had their ancestors NOT been brought OUT of Africa – many by Muslim slave raiders —the blood of those ancestors would have run into the earth over there several centuries ago, victims of the OTHER black tribes that captured them in one of the interminable tribal conflicts STILL ravaging that sad continent and these modern day would-be “plaintiffs” would not even exist.

And I would remind you that slavery is STILL practiced in Asia and parts of Africa as you watch this (mainly by – American BLACK muslims LISTEN UP!! — MUSLIMS) and Asia today. How ironic that disgruntled American blacks are embracing a political/economic/legal system – ISLAM — mightily responsible for their initial bondage – and would, if Islam takes root here, probably put any who cling to their Christianity back INTO BONDAGE – or to the sword.

95% of the African slaves who were transported across the Atlantic went to South and Central America, mainly to Portuguese, Spanish and French possessions, and that less than 5% of the slaves who crossed the Atlantic came to the United States. Am I the only one who finds it remarkable that the vast majority of academic research, films, books and articles concerning the slave trade concentrate only on the American involvement, as though slavery was a uniquely American aberration?

QUESTION: Should the great-great-great grandchildren of SLAVE OWNING BLACKS also be subject to PAYING these reparations? If so, how do we find THEM?

And I have traced MY family back to the SLAVS. Although the term looks to be related to “slave,” depending on your source, it either means “glory” or “worshipper.” But my family research indicates that many of my ancestors – and yours as well — LIVED lives of virtual slavery to some despot or other. Do I qualify for reparations? From whom?? And it begs a question: Are most of us now living here headed into a modern form of that servitude? But that’s a topic for another discussion.

That said, we acknowledge that, just as today, deranged and mentally ill people existed in early America and some slaves WERE mistreated by their overseers and others. Just as a modern-day farmer would be mad to senselessly abuse his expensive farm equipment, I suspect few slave-owning farmers would senselessly abuse their revenue producing farmhands for whom they had exchanged often considerable sums of money. And if you believe abuse is exclusive to enslavement of the sort we discuss here, spend some time in the violence of a modern American prison.

As I just mentioned, SOME of those slave-owning farmers were, themselves, BLACK!

The official US Census of 1830 lists 3,775 free blacks who owned 12,740 black slaves. Furthermore, the facts of the history of slavery here record that the first slave owner, the Father of American slavery, if you will, was Mr. Anthony Johnson, of Northampton, Virginia. His slave was John Casor, the first slave for life. Both were black Africans. The story is very readable, and outlines cases of free black women owning their husbands, free black parents selling their children into slavery to white owners, and absentee free black slave owners, who leased their slaves to plantation owners.
Check it out for yourself in “Selling Poor Steven”, American Heritage Magazine, Feb/Mar 1993 (Vol. 441) p 90 . Their archives are on the web.

Of course, a full telling of Black History would not be complete without a recitation of the origin of slavery in the Virginia colony:
Virginia, Guide to The Old Dominion, WPA Writers’ Program, Oxford University Press, NY, 1940, p. 378

A few more salient points on the subject:
Until the US declared independence, the Colonies were REQUIRED by the King of England to embrace slavery.
The Northwest Ordinance (1789) prohibited slavery in federal territories.
A law prohibiting the importation of slaves into the US became effective in 1808.
Beginning in 1820, the Democratic Congress started passing laws allowing and encouraging slavery.

It was only after the Republican Party (many of whom were southern Blacks) was formed some 40 years later that the anti-slavery movement was able to go forward.

And the holier-than-thou Northern liberals are strangely silent on recent archeological evidence from NEW YORK CITY clearly tracing the financing of the slave trade to NORTHERN BUSINESSMEN!!

At the height of his remarkable boxing career, Muhammad Ali (born Cassius Clay), once declared, “I’m glad my great-grandpa got on that boat.”

And speaking of ancestors, my paternal grandmother’s daddy joined with the 80th Ohio Volunteer Infantry early in the War Between the States (re-upped twice) and fought on the Union side at Chickamauga, Vicksburg, Jackson then joined up with Sherman for that infamous march to the sea through Georgia. My wife’s great-great grandpappy ALSO fought for the Union. While we revere the memories of our ancestors, inasmuch as that conflict was less about slavery than it was the economic exploitation and abuse of the South by the North, I fear they MAY have been on the wrong side.

Author Robert Hitt Neill tells of attending a Tennessee Mountain Writer’s Conference years ago with several other authors. Among them was Alex Hailey, celebrated author of “Roots.” Watching a TV news show, a group of them viewed a demonstration in a Southern state against the “Rebel” flag incorporated into that state’s flag. The very next report covered a famine in Africa. Graphic images showed dead bodies, starving children with distended tummies and runny noses and dying people covered with flies, too weak to brush them away.

Mr. Hailey intoned in a low, serious voice, “Every time an American black sees a story like that, they should find a Confederate flag and kiss it.” He then pointed to the TV screen and continued, “Because these would be me and my descendants, except for American slavery. I thank God that my family and I are here instead of there.”

Next problem!

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