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To: discostu
They put the high ideal out there and FAILED it from day 1. They said all men created equal thrn let some be property.

Makes them sound kinda stupid, doesn't it? Here's another theory. Maybe when they wrote that they intended that it apply to themselves, and they didn't give a thought to the idea that it might apply to the slaves? (Except for Jefferson, who made it clear this was his intent all along.)

Their intent was to justify their own separation from England, they had no intention on starting a discussion about slavery with the Declaration of Independence.

That it should apply to slaves was a later day realization, but it wasn't the intent or thought of the Representatives that signed the document July 4,1776.

166 posted on 04/08/2024 9:04:36 AM PDT by DiogenesLamp ("of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.")
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To: DiogenesLamp

That doesn’t make them sound any brighter.

They didn’t really start a discussion about slavery. Abolition was already gaining traction in Europe. Admittedly Europe didn’t start banning slavery until the early 1800s. But the discussion was already rolling. And we know some of that was happening here. So I wouldn’t say they were unaware. They might not have connected all the dots from those sentences to the ongoing discussions, but the dots were there. And we know they had lots of discussions while working the Constitution and SHOULD have connected them then. But failed. And thus moved us from where we could have been a leader in that to behind the curve.


168 posted on 04/08/2024 9:12:13 AM PDT by discostu (like a dog being shown a card trick)
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To: DiogenesLamp; discostu; x; Bull Snipe
DiogenesLamp: "Makes them sound kinda stupid, doesn't it?
Here's another theory.
Maybe when they wrote that they intended that it apply to themselves, and they didn't give a thought to the idea that it might apply to the slaves? (Except for Jefferson, who made it clear this was his intent all along.)
Their intent was to justify their own separation from England, they had no intention on starting a discussion about slavery with the Declaration of Independence."

Naw, sadly, DiogenesLamp is again twisting logic pretzel-like to avoid having to admit the perfectly well-known truth of this particular matter.
It's this: before the early 1800s, nearly every American politician professed opposition to slavery, at least in theory and in the long term.

This includes every Founding Father from Virginia north, and even among Founders from South Carolina and Georgia, we can still find expressions of opposition to slavery in principle.
Further, in several states during the Revolutionary War period, including North Carolina and Maryland, freed-black property owners were permitted to vote.
So, the issue of freedom for African Americans was neither alien nor necessarily opposed by any of our Founders.

That's why our Founders had no particular problems with Thomas Jefferson's Declaration words of:

Of course, none of this fits the pro-Confederate narrative DiogenesLamp is here to sell us, but is true nonetheless.

I think this quote from Virginia's Patrick Henry pretty well expresses the views of every other Founding Father regarding slavery:


172 posted on 04/09/2024 5:35:20 AM PDT by BroJoeK (future DDG 134 -- we remember)
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