If the Constitution said that water was not water, water would still be water.
In the eyes of the law of the land; in the eyes of the men who created the law of the land, black men were not men. At most they were considered 3/5 of a person. Black men were not people. The Dred Scott decision reaffirmed this. The 14th Amendment removed that distinction.
Certainly our rights are God-given, but we were viewed differently prior to the Emancipation. No amount of declaration can change that. In the eyes of America, we were not people at that time. Where our rights were granted was immaterial at the time.
There is a distinct difference between man's law and moral law. Morally, we always have been men with God-given rights. Legally, this was simply not so.
There is a distinct difference between man's law and moral law. Morally, (black men) always have been men with God-given rights. Legally, this was simply not so.
# 151 by mhking
Men are men, no matter their race, and all men have rights, even if those rights are being infringed upon.
If you're a slave being beaten, you have the right to kill to defend yourself, even though a corrupt government will execute you for asserting that right.
Government can't take your rights away, but they can make asserting your rights downright hazardous to your health.
The purpose of the Founding Fathers was to protect all free men from the power of government.
Everyone realized, even then, that slaves were men. The problem was that slaves were not FREE men. Slaves were considered to be "in bondage," so just as a man in prison was not free, so a slave was not free.
All men, by virtue of being men, should be free.
Even in the United States no man, regardless of race, is safe from the threat of slavery without a Constitutional protection against slavery.
What we need is a Constitutional Amendment outlawing the practice of slavery.