Slavery cannot be defended by the most brilliant, eloquent person even though many have tried. Aristotle said that “nature” gave stronger bodies and less under-standing to those born to serve while free men have less physical force and greater understanding. He also said that “just as some are by nature free, so there are by nature slaves, and for these latter the condition of slavery is both beneficial and just.” Aristotle was wrong! Slavery can never be justified.

Most Americans have a romantic and skewed impression of slavery that they have received from a flawed public school system and the media moguls. They have been inculcated with the lie (spoken loudly and at length) that white Christians are somehow responsible for slavery! The fact is we did not start slavery. We ended it!

Most Americans still don’t know that historians confronted Haley with his inaccurate screed, and he admitted, “I tried to give my people a myth to live by.”

We watched Alex Haley’s Roots on our television sets, being sold that it was a “historic novel.” We saw a handsome black man walking through his idyllic African jungle home when he was accosted by vicious white men, subdued after valiant effort of resistance, chained and taken to America where he lived and died a slave on a Southern plantation. That myth has been perpetuated by black preachers (who should be more dedicated to truth) when they tell their people that their ancestors were black royalty who were dragged from their homes by white Americans. Sorry, but it didn’t happen that way.

Most Americans still don’t know that historians confronted Haley with his inaccurate screed, and he admitted, “I tried to give my people a myth to live by.” I believe thinking Blacks would rather live by the truth rather than a myth. The truth is that Haley pirated from The African, and accused of plagiarism he settled with the author for $650,000.00.

Some have used the Bible to justify slavery but without success. Exodus 21:16 clearly forbids slavery: “And he that stealeth a man, and selleth him…shall surely be put to death.” So God prescribed the death penalty for those who deal in human flesh! And the death penalty was for both buyer and seller! But what about the Bible supporting slavery in other places? It doesn’t. The Mosaic Law did not establish slavery. The Old Testament recognized slavery as a reality and sought to mitigate it since it was a fact of life throughout the world. (The taking of captivities in war is another matter, but has been a factor in slavery since the beginning of time.)

In I Timothy 1:10, the Apostle Paul condemned “menstealers” affirming that such a sin was why the Law of Moses was given.  The epistle of Philemon does not endorse slavery as some suggest. Onesimus was a run-away indentured servant who owed a debt to Philemon, and Paul recommended that Philemon release him when he returned to him. Paul promised to pay any debt Onesimus owned to Philemon.  In Christ there is neither bond nor free. All are equal in Christ.

When slavery is discussed it usually focuses on Southern slavery with more heat than light. Slavery has been a reality since Joseph was sold into slavery in the early days of civilization as recorded in Genesis. Far more Whites have been slaves than Blacks, and it has always been wrong.

Black slaves were first taken to Europe in the late 1400s and to the New World in 1502. Between 1500 and 1860 it is estimated that over nine million blacks were taken from Africa to the New World, but less than three percent were sold in America during the 350 years preceding the Civil War. Brazil was the biggest market by far.

Black slaves usually fell into one of three categories: (1) captives taken in war or those kidnapped by black chiefs (2) convicted criminals such as killers, thieves, etc.) (3) those born into slavery.

It is suggested by some that white men introduced slavery to the African continent; however, that is a fairy story. Slavery was known throughout Africa for centuries before white traders sailed into African ports. Slaves were used as money to pay taxes, to purchase a wife, cattle or, crops. 

Some have tried to defend slavery because the enslaved Blacks were taken to “enlightened” countries where they heard the Gospel of Christ. Sorry, but that dog won’t hunt! While Christianity is the answer to paganism, the residual effects of slavery do not justify the buying or selling of humans.
   
The degrading, dastardly, despicable practice of slavery has gone on since the beginning of time in all nations of the earth, but my focus will be North America.
                                        
Laborers were essential to all the colonies outside New England. Their econ-omies would have collapsed if sufficient workers could not be found to do the backbreaking labor especially in Maryland and Virginia. There were few laborers in the colonies since a man could buy his own land or set himself up in the trapping business for a small amount of money. The few workers available were paid, (except when and where wages were regulated), two to three times what a similar worker received in England.
                                       
The answer to the problem was indentured servants—a system where a person (male or female) would contract to work for a specified time (from one to seven years) for passage to the New World. This was an adaptation of the ancient and honored system of apprenticeship where a boy or girl lived with a family for seven years to learn a trade. A servant could be bought or sold except in New York and Pennsylvania where the courts had to approve the sale. Their contract could be used to pay off gambling debts or they could be rented out for various periods of time.

No servant could follow a trade yet he could own property. He had the legal right to sue or to be sued, but of course, he could not vote. He could be whipped, yet his master might lose him if the whipping should be judged unreasonable. No servant could marry without approval of his master and fornication was punished by whippings and or extra years of service added to the contract. If a master fathered a child of a maid, she was sold to another and he was punished for adultery. If a white maid gave birth to a mulatto child, she could be whipped and receive seven extra years of servitude.
             
According to Murray Rothvard in his Conceived in Liberty the servants “were branded like cattle with their initials and the date of purchase so as to assure their rapid identification in case of flight.”  If a servant ran away, he received extra time to his contract and sometimes lost his ears! The time added to his contract varied from state to state, but for every day he was absent, extra days or weeks or months were added to his service. Pennsylvania provided a five-to-one penalty while Maryland provided ten-to-one. South Carolina authorized a fifty-two-to one ratio for running away! If a servant was absent for one week, he had one year added to his time of service.
              
Since the indentured servant was obligated to serve a few years, his master often tried to get as much work out of him as possible. However, this was not generally true in Virginia as the black slaves were integrated into the work force. The white servants seemed to have a higher status and were given less arduous work than Blacks were given.
             
When a servant’s contract expired, the master was obligated to award “freedom dues” so the ex-servant could get started in his new life. This usually consisted of a couple of suits of clothes and a few dollars. Some colonies also provided tools to the servant and others provided land. South Carolina gave fifty acres of land for a newly released servant.
             
Some servants did very well while others became “poor white trash” in the cities. Charles Thomson, an indentured servant, became Secretary of the Continental Congress while Matthew Thornton became a physician and signer of the Declaration of Independence. So, in every age you have people who sit around waiting for their “ship to come in” while others swim out to meet the boat. It all depends on the character of each person.
             
Indentured servants proved to be valuable sources of labor in the colonies and permitted thousands of poor Whites to start a new life in the New World. However, the buying and selling of slaves was a reprehensible period in America and the world. Of course, down through the ages men have taken captives in war and made slaves of them or sold them to others to do back-breaking work. This is true of all races of people. There have been white slaves, black slaves, etc. But, during the 1600s slavery became a trade and a valuable commercial venture. The early Puritans thought slavery was justified if the captives were taken in a “just war,” and even Roger Williams condoned slavery for a time!
              
I would be unfair and inaccurate if I implied that Blacks were without some guilt in this whole wretched business of slavery. Richard Hufstadter wrote in America at 1750: “Africa had a system or systems of slavery long before white men came to the Guinea Coast, and had regularly enslaved war captives and criminals … Other persons sold themselves or their families for food during famine, or were kidnapped by native gangs. Many native kings ran profitable slave businesses, and responded eagerly to opportunities for greater profits. The slave trade became a recognized and entirely legal form of business in Africa.”
              
In different parts of Africa slavery became a major source of income for the authorities. The river ports became an efficient way to move the slaves from the main-land to the New World. Whites and Blacks cooperated in this nefarious business of selling human beings.
              
One local black king said in response to England’s demand for a stop to slavery—”We think that this trade must go on,” he exclaimed. The king continued: “That also is the verdict of our oracle and the priests. They say that your country however great, can never stop a trade ordained by God himself” And the trade went on until it seemed as if some countries would be emptied of its strongest people. Notice that the black king appealed to religion to justify what he was doing to his own people. Of course, men have used religion to justify their wickedness for centuries.
              
Some countries protested but the trading in human lives went on—and grew, aided and promoted by local black chiefs. One former slave wrote: I must own … that I was first kidnapped and betrayed by (those of) my own complexion (color) who were the first cause of my exile and slavery But if there were no buyers, there would be no sellers.” And there were plenty of buyers—French, English, and Dutch. Historian John A. Garraty wrote: “The local king dictated the rules of trade and filled a slave ship in his own good time. The Europeans’ power lay in the insidious luxuries which became necessities: liquor and firearms.” So whites used liquor and guns to convince black kings and chiefs to attack their own villages at night and carry away in chains their own people to be sold at auction in the markets of the West Indies, Latin America, and Jamestown.
             
The slaves were sold for two ounces of gold in some ports while in other ports, a healthy, strong male brought 115 gallons of rum to his owner. Women sold for ninety-five gallons of rum. Some slavers were convinced that the Blacks didn’t have souls so that made slavery all right! However the Portuguese believed they had souls and could be redeemed like anyone else. They convinced themselves that slavery was not wrong because they would be taken to Christian lands where they would be exposed to the gospel. Many thousands of black slaves were sprinkled (called baptism by some church leaders) before the ships sailed out of the harbors of the Congo and Angola.
             
Some have estimated that from ten to twenty million blacks were sold into slavery yet many never reached land and were buried at sea. They were kept below decks “in two rows, one above  the other like hooks on a shelf” One ex-slave said, “The stench of the hold (beneath the ship’s deck) while we were on the coast was intolerably loathsome but now that the whole ship‘s cargo were confined there together it became absolutely pestilential. The closeness of the place and the heat of the climate, added to the number in the ship, was (sic) … aggravated by the galling of the chains.” The air was so foul below decks a candle would not burn. Many blacks committed suicide rather than endure such conditions while others simply stopped breathing, dying of suffo-cation.
             
Those who lived were sold on auction blocks in Latin America and North America destined to be worked, beaten, and sometimes killed by their owners. Twenty Blacks arrived in Jamestown on a Dutch ship in 1619 and were sold to tobacco planters. The tobacco planters had large tracts of land that had to be worked and they had now found their workers.
           
There were large profits in tobacco, more than six times as much as in grain. And as years passed, most of the original indentured servants gained their freedom leaving a void. The black slaves began replacing those white servants.
           
Hufstadter wrote about slavery at its peak: “Nearly 60 percent of all Negroes worked in the two tobacco colonies, Virginia and Maryland, and nearly 30 percent in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. Virginia, with 140,000 Negroes, led all the colonies in absolute numbers, followed by South Carolina and Maryland. In the proportion of blacks to whites, however, South Carolina, being 60 percent black, was the only province with a Negro majority; Virginia followed with 41 percent. Georgia and North Carolina were slightly more than one-third black, Maryland slightly less.” Obviously, the slave system was a major building block of the economies especially in the tobacco colonies. However, less than three percent of all the Blacks sold into slavery in the Western Hemisphere came to America. Most of them were sold in Central and South America and the Caribbean area. They were treated worse, worked harder, and had a higher death rate in those areas than in America.
           
Slaves were not only working on the tobacco plantations in the south but they were also laboring in every colony in the north. The northern masters were just as cruel as those in the south and penalties were just as harsh for unacceptable activity. 

There were comparatively few slaves in New England (usually one or two slaves per family, if any), but New York had many slaves. Slavery was not very productive in New York because the slaves had to be fed and cared for all year yet the growing season was short. The New Yorkers were very afraid of the Negro slaves and had a constant fear of a slave uprising when all Whites would be slaughtered in their sleep. There were few massive uprisings but many small plots, fights, and flights after a master or over-seer was slain. So in the early l700s slaves were beaten if three or more congregated in one place (unless they were working). That would keep down con-spiracies, but if a slave killed a white person, he was tortured and executed. 

There was a slave uprising in New York City in 1712 in which nine whites were killed, and the authorities hanged 13 slaves, burned four alive, one over a slow fire. The authorities broke one on the wheel, and left one to starve to death in chains. So much for the sanctified, self-justification of the northern hypocrite.
           
Now, to answer the sanctified, self-justification of the southern hypocrite. The southern planter sits on his porch, chewing tobacco and drinking a cool glass of rum, and says, “Well, the southern slave is much better off than he was living in miserable squalor and superstition in darkest Africa.” No doubt his living conditions were better and his eating was more on schedule in slavery, but I remind you that Africa was home and he had been forced from his home. In Africa he was with his family, in lifetime surroundings, among friends, speaking his own language, and around his own culture. In American slavery he was not his own man. Often he was separated from his wife and children. He was the property of others. Even if he had been given a condominium on Virginia Beach, it was still wrong for him to be enslaved.
            
It is also true that slavery was wrong even when the slave owner was kind, thoughtful and benevolent. All slave owners were not hatful, sadistic tyrants. Most of them were average businessmen who needed workers. It was not good business to mistreat a worker. Dead slaves don’t work! In fact, some slave owners were thoughtful and kind.
            
Some slave owners saw the wisdom in taking care of their slaves even encouraging marriage to the extent of giving them a house, a plot of ground, and household goods. A slave with a family, home, garden and some farm animals would be less inclined to rebel than others. Slaves were not worked from daybreak to sundown. The January 1979 issue of Natural History reported that “Slaves spent their hours away from the field doing household chores, making handicrafts, hunting, and fishing, cultivating their own food, and entertaining themselves with dancing.” Archeological research at slave cabins in Georgia and Florida reveal that some slaves even had firearms!
          
Black leftists would have us believe that all slaves were worked to death and were practically starved to death. However, that only happened when the owner was a sadist or an idiot! Two liberal (very liberal) professors tell us in their book, Time On The Cross: The Economics Of American Negro Slavery that some planters instituted profit sharing for their slaves. They also tell us that “the average pecuniary income actually received by a prime field hand was roughly fifteen per cent greater than the income he would have received for his labor as a free agricultural worker.” Wonder why public school books never mention that?
         
On some plantations the best workers were given tobacco, whiskey, cash, and holidays and trips to town on the weekend. Rather substantial year-end bonuses were sometime awarded.  
            
We are told that the slaves were docile and contented but that is not true especially in earlier years. There was a natural tendency for second-generation slaves to be less belligerent and more contented, but that was not true of the first generation slaves. The facts debunk the “contented” theory. When the slaves arrived at the ports the slaves were examined and branded with the mark of the new owner then marched to the beach. Those Blacks brought from the interior were terrified of the pounding surf, the swaying slave ship and the white traders. Some of the Blacks thought the white men were cannibals and would devour them on the beach.  It was not uncommon for the captives to claw at the sand and attempt suicide rather than be crammed into the waiting ships. That doesn’t sound as if they meekly accepted their slavery.
            
One sea captain wrote: “The negroes (sic) are so wilful (sic) and loth (sic) to leave their country, that they have often leaped out of the canoes, boat and ship, into the sea, and kept under water till they were drowned, to avoid being taken up and saved by our boats….” Suicide was very common especially upon leaving the African Coast. There are numerous incidents of slaves jumping into the sea, cutting their throats, self-strangling, and self-starvation. Upon arrival in their new land, those incidents drastically decreased, however they did not give up the thought of freedom.
           
There were many slave rebellions, although not massive, that resulted in many executions of the leaders. Any slave who reported a rebellion was rewarded with his freedom, so most “uprisings” did not result in freedom for many slaves. It is natural that the more vicious the owner the greater would be the desire for freedom of his slaves, however not all slave owners were cruel and sadistic men. Many seemed to care for their slaves and were interested in improving their living and working conditions. Of course, those owners were still wrong. Those owners would not have wanted to be slaves so it was wrong for them to enslave others. Jesus taught that truth when He said in Matthew 7:12, “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them….”  That verse, if obeyed, would have wiped out slavery and all other injustices to men.
          
 Slavery cannot be justified, however it is easy for us to criticize the early Americans from our present advantage of enlightenment and abundance. What would you have done if you had lived in Jamestown in the 1600s with farms to be worked, no white laborers to hire, and starvation facing you and your family? It is never right to do wrong but it is easy for us to sit in judgment from a comfortable distance of 400 years. While we can never condone slavery, let us at least be aware of the conditions that prompted it and be determined to never again enslave humans of any color for any reason.  
             
The massive injustice done to Blacks during the days of slavery has been haunting America since that time and it may get worse! There are black opportunists (called “civil rights leaders” by the uninformed) who are using slavery to demand that all Blacks be awarded massive payments to “atone” for slavery of more than 150 years ago! This on-rushing band-wagon (full of explosives!) may cause more racial strife than forced busing for school integration! Radical black leaders are demanding that U.S. taxpayers pay the descendents of slaves a suggested $100,000 each! And yes, I am serious, but it gets worse because black leaders are serious.
            
Hundreds of people attended the National Reparations Convention in Chicago on February 2-4 where “Brother Howshua” proposed that blacks should receive free education, free medical care, free legal advice, and free financial aid with no taxes and if they wish to emigrate to Africa, they would each receive a million dollars!  Of reparations, The Washington Post admitted, “The subject is scalding hot, untouchable as public policy. Even the brave run from it.” Yes, it is “scalding hot” but no, I am not running from this illegal, immoral, and incredible shakedown. And, make no mistake, it is just that: a shakedown, a scam of major proportions.
   
Let’s establish some facts as a foundation for this discussion. Slavery has been a reality since the early days of civilization for a simple reason: Men are inherently wicked. Theologians call it sin that came down to us through our parents from Adam and Eve. Although far more Whites have been enslaved than Blacks, that makes little difference except for the record.
   
It is also a fact that black African chiefs enslaved their own people, marched them to the west coast of Africa and sold them to Arab, Portuguese, English, and American traders. When the white slavers refused to pay the black slave traders’ asking price, the chiefs simply refused to sell. They knew how to get their price. It’s called “waiting.” The white slavers pouted in their ships just off shore as their food and water dissipated. Eventually, they capitulated and paid the asking price. The slaves were then distributed all over the world, not only in America.
           
I also want to make clear that no slaves are alive today in America. If there were, I would agree that they be compensated. When I wrote AIDS: Silent Killer in 1987 I dealt with the now infamous Tuskegee study where black men were used and abused in medical experiments for many years by the U.S. Government. On numerous talk shows I advocated the prosecution of all responsible U. S. officials still alive and reparations for the few still-living black men. But no slaves are alive today and it is insane to suggest any kind of payment after 150 years.
           
There are other problems: Who funds the scam and who profits from the scam? Since the money would come from the general U.S. Treasury then all taxpayers would be paying. That means Blacks would be paying for their own reparations! It also means that recent immigrants would be paying as well as descendents of those who arrived in America since the Civil War who had no connection to slavery. Furthermore, Northerners would be paying reparations when their distant relatives fought and died “to free the slaves”! By what logic can that be justified? There were 7 million whites in the South and 6.5 million of them did not own slaves so why should their descendents pay for slavery perpetrated by others? Should American Indians pay reparations since they were here before Whites or slaves? Of course, some Indians owned black slaves and even ate them during bad times!
   
Then there is the task of determining who gets paid. If one could justify reparations for Blacks who are descendant from slave families how do we know which Blacks are descendents of slaves? Many present-day Blacks are descendents of free Blacks!  Some living Blacks would be receiving money for mistreatment that did not involve them or their relatives. That is dishonest.
   
There is another problem that is unknown by most Americans: Out of 250,000 free Blacks in the South, about 3000 of those Blacks owned slaves so how do we differentiate between those who had ancestors who were slaves and those whose ancestors were not slaves but were in fact, slaveholders?  By paying money (ripped from hard working taxpayers of all races) to Blacks whose ancestors owned slaves, we would be rewarding slavery!
            
But it gets worse! And more complicated. Many Blacks, slave and free, volun-tarily fought for the Confederacy such as the 3,000 Blacks who served with Stonewall Jackson in Maryland! So do we pay their present-day ancestors reparations? Isn’t it very inconsistent to pay reparations to Blacks whose ancestors fought “against freeing the slaves”?
   
The argument is made that many of us are taxed for public schools when we don’t have school-age children or our kids are in Christian schools. But we pay taxes because, well, because we must pay taxes. However, because that injustice is done does not make an argument for further injustice.

How will it set with poor white Americans who are struggling to live when they are taxed to pay reparations to wealthy Blacks such as Jesse Jackson, Johnnie Cochran, Oprah Winfrey, Vernon Jordan, Michael Jackson, Michael Jordan, etc.? Talk about racial strife! I suggest that reparations will do more to divide the races than forced busing ever did. Furthermore, I believe that millions of Americans will simply refuse to pay taxes if such an unfair, unreasonable, and unworkable policy is implemented.
   
Also, American Blacks had and have  incredible opportunities to be successful in our nation. It is also a fact that the poorest Black in the roughest ghetto is many times better off than those Blacks living in totalitarian “nations” in Africa. In fact, if I were a Black, I believe I would thank God that my ancestors were brought here so I would have the privilege to live in such a  free country where I had the opportunity  to hear the gospel of Christ instead of living in constant fear of false pagan gods, tribal wars, starvation, cannibals, etc. While the slave trade was horrific and all connected to it were incredible criminals, there have been residual effects for which I would be thankful if I were black.
    
If reparations (for long-past crimes) could be justified, then why shouldn’t Jews demand payment from Egyptians who kept them in slavery for hundreds of years? Some black extremists tell us that Egyptians were black so that makes a whole “black” civilization slaveholders! How far back do we go to really be “fair”?
   
The allegation is made that present day America has benefited greatly from the slavery of 150 years ago, and consequently it is only reasonable that we should pay the descendents of those who “built this nation.” Hold it. If that is true, then how can one say that only white Americans have benefited? Haven’t Blacks also benefited? After all, American Blacks, as a group, have more money than many of the nations of the world! Their income is more than twenty times what they would have if their ancestors had never been sold into slavery. So if present day Whites have benefited from slavery, so have present day Blacks.
   
The whining black reverends tell us that reparations were paid to the Jews for their treatment during WW II and to the Japanese for their internment during the war, so why no payment for Blacks? Simple! The above payments went to the actual people who suffered and so they deserved reparations. 

The request (demand?) from Blacks for reparations says to Blacks, Asians and others that Blacks simply can’t make it on their own. They want permanent “victim- hood” status. They are incapable of making it on their own. Others must push them up the ladder. Many of the “others” are people who have more baggage than the aggrieved Blacks. After all, immigrants from totalitarian countries came here from a totally different culture, not speaking English and often quickly surpassed American Blacks who don’t have the  handicaps that Asian newcomers have! Anyone want to explain that to me?

I suggest that black leaders stop “using” the race card to enlarge their bank accounts, enlist more followers and expand their egos. They should spend their time helping build the black family structure and help cement black/white relations. (Some of those black reverends might even do some preaching since they are supposed to be “preachers.”) They would do well to be honest and admit that the many problems in the black community have not evolved from slavery or mistreatment by “whitey” but by the personal failures in black society.

If slavery were the main cause of black problems, then why would those problems have been less dramatic 40 years ago than they are today? Forty years ago there were not the problems among Blacks as there are in our day. There is 70% black illegitimacy in inner cities!  In 1960, “only” 23% of kids were born to female-headed homes but today it is 62%! And there, I believe, is the major cause of black problems: Black males, who make up 6% of the population commit 40% of violent crime; black gangs (there are 31,000 gangs in the U.S. with about 1 million members and 80% are Blacks); the high school dropout rate; juvenile crime, (60% of the juvenile murder defendants in criminal court are black males; 72% of the rape defendants, 78% of the robbery defendants, 61% of the assault defendants and 65% of defendants charged with other types of violent crime are also black males.) [Source: Juvenile Offenders and Victims: 1999 National Report.] So, if black problems were a legacy of slavery why would the numbers have been better 40 years ago? Could it be a problem of choices, values, and character? Put the normal, Biblical family back together and we will see a major change in white and black households.

I suggest black politicians and black reverends have much work to do before they try to lay guilt at the feet of Whites. In fact, let me be very clear: Here is one white Christian male who is guilt-free. I have never done any harm to any Black, and I treat all people as people. I am embarrassed at the white involvement in the slave trade (as Blacks should be of black involvement) but I harbor no guilt. None, zero, zilch.  

Many conservatives will suggest that there are no negative residual effects from slavery but that is fallacious thinking. Of course there are. During slavery, it was illegal to teach slaves to read. Later, their schools were inferior as was the education. There were Jim Crow laws that prohibited Blacks from riding in the front of a bus, requiring them to drink from “Colored” water fountains, etc. There were lynchings by bigoted, vicious Whites who often tried to justify their crimes with the Bible. I refuse to be identified with that crowd, but I believe that too much time has passed, too much money has been funneled into the black culture, and there is too much risk for a racial explosion to consider any more reparations.

A Jamaican attorney by the name of Lord Anthony Gifford delivered a 1993 paper titled, “The legal basis for the claim for reparations.” It was very interesting and extensive although not convincing. In the lengthy treatise he never dealt with the black chiefs who were responsible for selling the slaves! After all, you can’t have a buyer unless you have a seller. In this case they were black. Gifford tried to put all Whites on a guilt trip, but without success. 
   
He made a really dumb statement when he said: “What figure can be placed on the psychological damage inflicted by a system which is still deeply racist?” Sorry counselor, it was not about race but about people enslaving people. Blacks owned Blacks and Whites as slaves! Whites owned Blacks and Whites. Slaves of all races were taken in war for thousands of years. Slavery was a matter of being conquered and sold. In Rome there were more slaves than Romans!

While there is racism in America and England (evidenced by affirmative action laws!) institutional racism is a thing of the past unless you happen to be white, Christian, home schooler, creationist, gun owner, or male. Then racism is permitted, even encouraged, by many elements of society.

Attorney Gifford asked, “Can it be proved that the slave system destroyed old and flourishing African civilisations, (British spelling) and if so, how is their value to be measured?” Gifford is assuming that removing the slaves resulted in Africa being a “dark continent.” He is suggesting that Africa would be a flourishing continent had it not been for slavery. However, what had Blacks done during the previous five hundred years before the major slave trade? (That question will identify me as a bigot in the eyes of non-thinking bigots.)

And what could the good attorney be referring to when he spoke of “flourishing African civilisations”? Assuming Egyptians qualify as Blacks, name one other flourish-ing black civilization, counselor. Africa was called “the dark continent” because the lights were out. White colonists came and built highways, hospitals, schools, churches, farms, etc., and eliminated some diseases that had lashed the face of Africa for centuries. They built great cities and established order and real civilization and yes, got rich doing it. A big bunch of Blacks also got rich.

Then the colonialists went home a few years ago and the cities are now decaying, decadent, and deadly places to live, the jungles are overtaking the villages, modern machinery is rusting on overgrown farms, elevators don’t function, people are starving by the millions with others killed by strange, vicious diseases. These “nations” are ruled by black opportunists with huge foreign bank accounts and a large appetite for luxury that would make a Byzantine emperor blush with shame. Whites are being raped and murdered and their farms confiscated while black politicians and preachers in America are as silent as the Sphinx. They are silent because they are sanctimonious hypocrites, and it is bad enough to be a hypocrite but to be a sanctimonious hypocrite is appalling.

Let me remind black extremists that white Englishmen and Americans abolished the slave trade that had been going on for thousands of years among all races. To be more accurate, it was white Christians who led the charge in abolishing slavery in England and the U.S. That’s not a racist statement but a fact that all educated people know but are too timid to admit in “polite” company.

It is not unreasonable to remind all interested parties that “reparations” were attempted during Reconstruction and have already been paid during our day in the form of welfare!  Remember the “war on poverty”? American taxpayers have spent trillions of dollars in welfare payments with an inappropriate percentage going to Blacks. (I’m critical of welfare to whomever: Blacks, Whites, corporate, international, etc.)  Over 41% of welfare (Aid to Dependent Children, housing, etc.) recipients are black and they only paid about 6% of the total welfare budget and they only make up 12% of the nation. Then you must add to all the government money the fellowships, grants, loans, etc., to promote black advancement in our nation. Reparations have already been paid so keep your hand out of my pocket!  

Get prepared for a major political battle. Congressman John Conyers of Michigan has annually introduced reparation legislation since 1989 to set up a commission to study whether reparations should be paid, and he recently received support from the Congressional Black Caucus to do just that. A column in the Chicago Tribune (at one time a great conservative paper) commented on reparations: “The tide may have turned on this issue, and the country will be much better for it.” Only an opportunistic black leader or white guilt-ridden bigot would come to such a conclusion.         

Cities such as Dallas, Detroit, Cleveland, Chicago, etc., have passed ordinances supporting the study of reparations. Their conclusion is pre-determined. The November issue of Harper’s did a story entitled, “Making the case for racial reparations” and gave 14 pages to the issue with four attorneys who have been involved in large class-action suits. Those attorneys are going to file a class action suit to require racial reparations. (And those attorneys will receive up to half of any awards!)

Add to all that, some black Harvard intellectuals are acting as cheerleaders for this massive shakedown. Randall Robinson’s The Debt is being used as the “bible” to justify the scam. Other attorneys are preparing litigation against large businesses that allegedly made a fortune on slavery. I suppose that means ship manufacturers since slaves were brought here on ships, manufacturers of handcuffs and manacles since slaves were chained together, whip makers since whips were used on the slaves, and on and on it goes. And where it stops, nobody knows. I say, “It should stop here.” Americans will not stand for it, plus there is not enough money to satisfy the “victims.”

Honest, decent Americans of all races should tell politicians and preachers to keep their hands in their own pockets and stop picking ours. There is a principle I used in one of my books dealing with welfare: Anytime I get money I did not earn then someone earned money he or she did not get and that is thievery.” Reparations are undisguised thievery, a scam by the unscrupulous.

Tags: blacks, racial problems, racism, reparations