Posted on 09/07/2001 5:46:53 AM PDT by meandog
September 7, 2001
Jackson to make reparations a priority
By Steve Miller
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The Rev. Jesse Jackson will make reparations for the past enslavement of blacks his No. 1 issue this fall, an aide to the civil rights leader promised yesterday.
The 59-year-old Mr. Jackson will hold a press conference at the Rainbow/PUSH headquarters in Chicago this morning to announce details of his new campaign.
"It is something new, a new priority," said Nizam Arain, acting press secretary for Mr. Jackson, who is scheduled to return tonight from the U.N. World Conference Against Racism. "It was raised and discussed at our annual convention [in August]. There are a variety of angles he intends to use, and I know that legislation is one, maybe even the top angle."
Mr. Jackson stepped up his rhetoric on reparations to American blacks for slavery at the conference this week, telling a news service that "we must make crooked ways straight."
"We have fewer services and less education. We are disproportionately jailed and killed by the state. We have shorter life spans. We have less access to capital," Mr. Jackson told Reuters during the event, which ended yesterday.
Only one African nation, Nigeria, stated during the conference that reparations were not necessary.
Mr. Jackson has had considerable success in his advocacy efforts over the years, from eliciting promises and money from corporate America to enhancing diversity programs, to getting out the black vote in record numbers.
Reparations has never been a top priority for Mr. Jackson, although he has broached the subject over the years. In 1997, he and other civil rights leaders met with President Clinton in the hopes of extracting an official apology for the existence of slavery in the United States.
"An apology is in order," said Mr. Jackson. "But you must not only apologize with your lips. Repent, repair and remedy go together."
In 1993, Mr. Jackson called on Western nations to pay reparations to Africa. Yet he did not mention that the reparations scheme would apply to U.S. blacks.
But emboldened by the acrimonious climate at the conference in South Africa this week, Mr. Jackson began making explicit references to the black community's growing push for reparations.
"In many ways, Africa subsidized America and Europe's development," he told BBC Radio 4's Today program. "If you don't feel apologetic for slavery, if you don't feel apologetic for colonialism, if you feel proud of it, then say that."
Mr. Jackson said that the limited U.S. involvement at the U.N. conference was due to the fear of addressing the issue of reparations. The United States withdrew its participation from the conference following numerous criticisms of Israel's role in the conflict in the Middle East.
"We used the Middle East controversy as an excuse [to avoid slavery]," he said Monday.
Civil rights groups have for years advocated financial compensation for descendants of slaves. The manner of compensation has varied, from sending out sums of money to the country's 34 million blacks, to increased funding for predominantly black schools.
A powerful core of civil rights and class-action lawyers, which includes Johnnie Cochran Jr., is now preparing a lawsuit seeking reparations for American blacks descended from slaves -- the undisclosed amount being sought is said by some to be near a trillion dollars.
A date for filing the action has not been confirmed. Other movements demanding reparations have progressed slowly, gaining stature during the past decade.
One of the most prominent has been the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America, known as N'COBRA, which was formed in 1988. The following year, Rep. John Conyers Jr., Michigan Democrat, introduced a bill calling for a committee to study the effects of slavery.
The bill has foundered in committee each session since.
Mr. Conyers did not return phone calls for comment.
N'COBRA treasurer Kalonji Olusegun said yesterday that Mr. Jackson's entry into the debate could give the movement important momentum and place the issue at the forefront of American politics.
"His joining of this issue is an indication of the snowballing effect that has occurred in the past year and a half," Mr. Olusegun said. "It has been very difficult for this country to know that it is based on white supremacy."
Eleven cities have so far passed resolutions to study the impact of slavery; the wording of several of those resolutions was based on Mr. Conyers' bill.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) has called for a study on reparations since 1991. The Washington office of the NAACP has also lobbied for progress on Mr. Conyers' bill. Mr. Jackson's entry into the fray could give all reparations efforts a boost, an official said.
"Jesse Jackson has always brought a constructive light to these issues," said NAACP legislative director Hilary Shelton. "He is masterful at articulating the issues and he comes to the table with great credibility."
But when Clara Peoples, a reparations advocate from Portland, Ore., asked Mr. Jackson for help several years ago, he rejected her request.
"He didn't pay us any mind," said Miss Peoples, who heads a movement called "Reparations -- Yes." "But we're happy to have him aboard now.
Jesse: I don't feel apologetic for anything. I am proud of the advancements that Western Civilization has given the world.
Now, zip it.
LoanPalm - perhaps your excellent list of questions to ask those in favor of reparations should be sent to JJ. Would love to see them posted again.
Let the poverty pimps and their horde of welfare witches get to work and make reparations to the taxpayers.
Man, I should become a Poverty Pimp Lawyer...
Yeah, and he also knows how to make his "crook" straight--(once too often, it seems). Why doesn't he make caring for his illegitimate offspring his main priority???
Jackson knows that there almost nil support for reparations coming out of the U.S. Treasury, so the squeeze will continue to be put on companies like Toyota.
Watch for Jackson to set up a Reparations Fund", which he will use to enrich himself and his cronies.
Jackson's reputation has suffered mightily and with it, his fund-raising ability. Sharpton has almost snatched the mantle from him. Can't stand for that.
Yep, that's right. I am tired of being a poor white sharecropper, perennially indentured to the various governments of this nation.
First I have to pay 15+% of every damn dollar I make to the massas at Soc.Sec/Medicare. Then I have to pay Fed 20+% income taxes on the rest, and get this, also on half the bleeping Social Security they already took from me.
Now the massas at the FedGov are not done with me yet. I have to pay taxes on all sorts of goods imported into the US that I might choose to purchase. But a dirty little secret is that I have to pay a portion of the taxes levied on businesses here in the US too. Now we here at FR know that a tax on business is in reality a tax on the consumers of the products of that business. But the Federal Government would have the masses believe that the dirty filthy steenking rich businesses ought to pay more taxes on their ill gotten gains. Hence, I am hit yet again for another little bit of my "crop". Then there are user fees for various things the Federal Gov. "does for me". Things I already helped pay for with the other taxes.
Now the massas at the StateGov want their cut too. They want their 7% of my "crop" due because my income was so great. But, they too have their user fees. Licenses, permits, that sort of thing.
The locals also want their cut. They want property taxes, and user fees, licenses and the rest.
Now I have a bit of my "crop" left. But my massas figure I'm living a bit to high on the hog. They want another 6% for anything I care to purchase as a sales tax. But hold on, it ain't 6% on everything. I can have my food "tax free", as long as I prepare it myself and if you don't include any of the taxes passed on to me from the producers, manufacturers, distributers, you get my drift. There is a way to make up for that loss of 6% on food. They take 20+% tax on the gasoline I use, 10-20% tax on lodging as I "grow my crop" in other locales, tolls for the roads, etc. etc.
Oh for the days when only one massa was reaching into my pocket.
All that aside, what is the VERY BEST argument IN FAVOR of reparations? Is it what we have above from Jackson, that blacks have less education, more jail, more difficulties, and he sees that as a direct result of their former enslavement? Is that it?
Next year the Scumocrat party is going to have to take a stand on this issue, and if they side with the poverty pimps, I guarantee you they're going to lose a significant portion of the non-black Dumbocrat vote. Bwhah-hah-hah-hah.......
Poverty pimps like Jesse Jackson and Johnny Cochran are going to soon find they woke a sleeping giant on this absurd, divisive issue. These self-serving sleazeballs and their supporters will eventually rue the day they decided to push for the ultimate screwing of all Americans who aren't black. We are not going to roll over quietly on this one--enough is enough.
At least when the colonial powers took resources from Africa and elsewhere, they used those produces to improve and advance civilizations.
You could give these people everything you own and in a few years, they would have left it in ruins.
Jesse sees money in this pitch that will add to the untaxed money he has extorted from American and now Japanese industries.
The spineless jokes in the Justice Department will never go after him and he knows it.
Of course, even White people who came to this country after the Civil War should pay reparations, since many of the businesses where they got jobs had benefitted from the slave trade, so we shouldn't let them off the hook.
BTW, even a Northern state like Rhode Island had an economy propelled by the slave trade, so it's not correct to regard slavery as entirely a Southern institution.
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