Posted on 03/26/2002 1:55:27 AM PST by kattracks
(CNSNews.com) - Should the descendants of black slaves be paid reparations by companies that may have profited from the slave trade? Yes, according to a New York activist who is poised to file a lawsuit in federal district court on Tuesday.
The class action lawsuit by plaintiff Deadria Farmer-Paellman will reportedly allege that Aetna, Inc., CSX Transportation and Fleet Bank were "unjustly enriched" by "a system that enslaved, tortured, starved and exploited human beings."
Two years ago, Farmer-Paellman exposed Aetna's financial ties to the institution of slavery, resulting in a public apology from the insurance giant. Aetna, founded in 1853, had insured Southern slave owners against the death of their slaves.
Farmer-Paellman is not alone in her crusade for reparations. A number of prominent black activists, legislators and lawyers have called for such payments in order to make up for alleged disparities in employment, health care, income and education. Among those supporting the idea is Johnnie Cochran, O.J. Simpson's defense attorney; Harvard law professor Charles Ogletree and Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.), the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee.
Aetna and CSX downplayed the chances of a reparations lawsuit succeeding and defended their respective outreach efforts to black Americans.
"We do not believe a court would permit a lawsuit over events which, however regrettable, occurred hundreds of years ago," said Fred Laberge, Aetna assistant vice president of public relations. "These issues in no way reflect Aetna today.
"Over the past 20 years," Laberge continued, "Aetna has invested more than $36 million in the African American community. Our company has embraced diversity, and we are proud of our record of employing a diverse workforce and supporting diverse causes."
CSX Transportation issued a blunt reply to the pending lawsuit.
"The lawsuit to be filed in federal court in New York City against CSX and other corporations demanding financial reparations is wholly without merit and should be dismissed," read a written statement issued by the company.
"The claimants named CSX because slave labor was used to construct portions of some U.S. rail lines under the political and legal system in place more than a century before CSX was formed in 1990," the company complained. "Courtrooms are the wrong setting for this issue."
Reparations critics have said the movement is based more on politics and monetary greed than on legitimate legal claims. Washington, D.C. legal scholar Mark Behrens said the lawsuit is unlikely to succeed as a legal claim.
"What standing do the current plaintiffs have to sue for damages that allegedly may have occurred 150 years ago?" asked Behrens, who is a partner in the law firm Hook Hardy & Bacon.
In a class action lawsuit, Behrens explained, plaintiffs must show they have been injured, that they have suffered common injuries, and that they are representative of the people on whose behalf they are suing.
"For the people who may be alive today and are descendents [of slaves], there just seems to be a lot of threshold questions they may have to meet," said Behrens. "Despite the obvious inhumanities of slavery, ... I think one of the problems will be challenging a system that was wrong but at the time was legal."
Plaintiffs will face other challenges in bringing their case, said Behrens, including statutes of limitation (long since passed) and the difficulty of showing a common injury suffered by slave descendants.
"Whatever claims they are alleging, are too remote or attenuated from the direct conduct of slavery to be able to have a legal claim," said Behrens, who predicted the suit would be dismissed or, perhaps, settled out of court.
Supporters of black reparations have been buoyed by the successful effort of Holocaust survivors and their heirs to get reparations from companies that benefited from the forced labor of Jews in the 1930s and '40s.
The black reparations movement itself has had a few non-financial success stories so far. In addition to Aetna's 2000 apology, a few state legislatures have passed resolutions calling for reparations, as has the United Nations conference on racism, which was held in South Africa in September 2001. Conyers has introduced reparations legislation during the past decade, but Congress has never voted on the bill.
See Earlier Stories:
Slavery Reparations a Main Topic at CBC Conference
Slavery Discussions Hit a Snag at Racism Conference
Paying for Slavery: How Could it be Done?
Paying for Slavery: Why Now?
E-mail a news tip to Christine Hall.
Send a Letter to the Editor about this article.
The same should apply to other state, local and federal employees. Either be doing the job you were hired for or elected to or be fired. You wanna "moonlight"? Work on "our time"? Well, you can't! That's theft! You are fired!
As a taxpayer, I don't want a penny of the money I pay in going to people that I employ so they can around and sue "me".
I am already tired of being blamed for things I did not do. I'll be DAMNED if I'm going to pay for it too.
This is exactly what I've been thinking. Most Americans don't have a clue about the reparations movement. As far as I'm concerned, the harder these greedy SOBs push their case the better.
Although we have seen this happen several times in the past ten years, I doubt it will happen again this time. There is no legal standing for the parties who bring these suits. Slavery was legal at the time and I don't believe they can get anywhere with this "white companies profited from slavery and blacks are continually harmed by the lingering affects of slavery" argument. How some one is "harmed" by something that happened hundreds of years ago is subjective at best, but in reality actually very specious. There is absolutely no legal concept that allows for such a "recovery", if one can call it that.
Now wait a minute. What insurance company would take such
a risk, what with the beatings and lynchings and all.
Now, who pays? Well... The majority of slaves were sold to Europeans by African Chieftans. Africans were not hunted or rounded up like animals, they were captured by warring tribes, and sold as servants and slaves. Why did they practice this? Well for one, Africa really didn't have any other exports of value. If you look at Africa today, it was largely developed by White European settlers who are today being run off their farms and murdered. So in all honesty, left to their own devices, Could Africa have developed on it's own? Without European settlers, Africa would be exactly the way it was some 300 years ago. More undeveloped, less civilized, more tribal wars, and no-exports save for slaves or wild animals. Africa is a toilet because that's what they know.
Africans have never developed, even today when a natural disaster strikes, who do they turn to? The United States, that's who. They send their people here to be educated. Their leaders come here to learn, only to return to their respective homelands as future oppressors. If there are reparations to be paid, it should be to Americans for paying for their education. We should be compensated for all the money the IMF, the World Bank, The United States Treasury, the missionairies we sent, the money and resources we have shipped to Africa that has been totally wasted as all Africans seem to do is rape each other, and spew children into the world because they are either incapable or unwilling to help themselves.
The above statement excludes South Africa, as they were European Settled, and have NOT needed anyone's help, although they could probably use some real moral support.
It's amazing to me how people in America think that since their ancestors suffered that they deserve something for nothing. I'm 1/8 Cherokee Indian and the rest is European. Should I be granted reparations for all of the Europeans who came here and plundered the land, all in the name of Manifest Destiny? Hmmm An interesting thought, since there were many Native Americans who sold their brothers out to the settlers. Not to mention, didn't the average slave get an Ox or mule and 40 acres of land as a reparation settlement? You see, that's a heck of a lot more than what my ancestors got. Of course you don't see Native Americans going after major corporations for a payoff now do you? You see Native Americans getting educations, and taking care of their own.
I had a German Grandfather, and you know of all the people I wish I had gotten to know better, he was a better American than any of these money seeking con-men who are perpetrating the biggets lie in history. If this goes through, I will leave America today. I will move all of my assets out of this country, and leave it behind. Sure it's a nice place, but the lies and treachery are too much for me anymore. This is not the America that I grew up thinking existed. Now that I'm an adult, in my 30's I have seen more lies, deceit, treachery, and TREASON in this country in the last 10 years than I have read about in History.
I'd invite Jesse Jackson to have a debate with me in person some day. As a White Male, in my 30's who's also 1/8 Cherokee Indian, I'd like to ask him where his race is so special, that they deserve something my ancestors who lived here first weren't worthy to receive? Who are the black race to judge anyone on their content of character? Jesse Jackson of all people should ask himself this question as he knows he sold out Martin Luther King to an assassin. Who is he to tell me that I owe his people something when his own people in Africa STILL practice slavery? Where has he and his so called Rainbow Push Coalition been when the people of Africa suffer in poverty? Where has Jesse Been when it comes to taking care of his own personal affairs? Who is he to think himself the moral authority when he himself cannot speak an honest word to his own wife?
Who are the black race to tell others how they are owed, when their own kind betrayed them in their own homeland? When you have good answers Jesse Jackson, you e-mail me. Let me know why it is that I must pay for your own people's treachery?
Ageed. There is something peculiar about the institution of slavery. How many times have we heard that slaves were miserably treated, when the opposite was probably true. Afterall, what property owner would abuse his means of prodution? It just doens't make any economic sense. Slaves were not cheap, and not many were able to afford them. If I were a slave owner, I would make sure that my slaves were healthy and well treated, and would do whatever was necessary to safeguard my investment in them.
But I believe Keyes, Sowell and Williams would oppose calls for reparations.
The modern descendants of slaves brought here in chains in admittedly miserable, soul-gutting conditions who are now calling for reparations need to remember a few things:
They should not only be glad to be in America, they should be glad to be ANYWHERE !
Had that NOT happened, the blood of their ancestors would have run into the earth over there several centuries ago and these modern day would-be "plaintiffs" would not even exist.
And should the great-great-great grandchildren of the approximately 3,000 SLAVE OWNING BLACK plantation owners in this country also be subject to PAYING these reparations?
If so, how do we find THEM?
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 watched 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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