Free Republic

Lawmaker Proposes Holiday Rather Than Apology for Slavery By Payton Hoegh CNSNews.com Correspondent January 29, 2007 (CNSNews.com) - A Virginia delegate introduced legislation this week proposing a holiday to celebrate the end of slavery as an alternative to an official apology that he refuses to support. Seventy-nine-year-old Republican Frank Hargrove drew criticism nationwide when he said that "black citizens should just get over it," when speaking out against a bill that proposed an official apology from the Commonwealth of Virginia for its part in slavery. "Slavery's over with. It was a horrible institution," Hargrove said. "There's nobody living today that...

Del. Frank D. Hargrove Sr., who recently disparaged blacks and Jews with comments about apologizing for slavery, had a great-grandfather who owned a slave. The Hanover Republican yesterday gained unanimous approval to introduce a resolution in the House commemorating the end of slavery in America. The measure would acknowledge Juneteenth, the nationally recognized commemoration of the end of slavery in the United States. A search by librarians at The Times-Dispatch and the Library of Virginia shows that Hargrove's great-grandfather owned a slave. An 1850 slave schedule lists Nathan D. Hargrove, a 22-year-old Henrico County resident, as owning a 60-year-old female...

After two black legislators denounced his comments yesterday on a proposed state apology for slavery, a Hanover County delegate told a Jewish lawmaker who also was upset that his skin was too thin. Del. David L. Englin, D-Alexandria, who is Jewish, took Del. Frank D. Hargrove Sr., R-Hanover, to task for "inflammatory" comments Hargrove made to the Charlottesville Daily Progress. Hargrove was quoted as saying that asking the state to apologize for slavery would be akin to asking Jews to apologize for killing Christ.