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To: CatOwner

My first thought was “forty acres and a mule” after the Civil War. A combination of socialism and reparations. Ahead of its time in wokism.

National Farmers Union version:
on January 16, 1865, General Sherman (not an abolitionist himself) issued his Special Field Order 15, which commanded that 400,000 acres of property confiscated from Confederate landowners be redistributed to Black families in 40 acre plots. By June, the land had been allocated to 40,000 of a total of 4 million freed slaves. (Mules were not included in the order, but the Union army did give some away as part of the effort.)

But the order was short-lived. President Andrew Johnson – who had owned slaves and publicly shared his beliefs of white supremacy – overturned the order before the end of the year and returned the land to the former slaveowners.


PBS website Henry Louis Gates article:
The promise was the first systematic attempt to provide a form of reparations to newly freed slaves, and it was astonishingly radical for its time, proto-socialist in its implications. In fact, such a policy would be radical in any country today: the federal government’s massive confiscation of private property — some 400,000 acres — formerly owned by Confederate land owners, and its methodical redistribution to former black slaves. What most of us haven’t heard is that the idea really was generated by black leaders themselves.

How much would 40 acres and a mule be worth today?
$6 trillion
The value of 40 acres and a mule today is a matter of debate, but some estimates put it at over $6 trillion. This is based on the assumption that the land would be worth the same as it was in 1865, adjusted for inflation. Aug 20, 2019


7 posted on 02/21/2024 8:04:37 PM PST by frank ballenger (There's a battle outside and it's raging. It'll soon shake your windowdirecs and rattle your walls.)
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To: frank ballenger

https://www.blackfarmers.org/
$2.2B fund from Biden & co for black farmers


12 posted on 02/22/2024 2:03:14 AM PST by griswold3 (Truth, Beauty and Goodness. )
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