I have really enjoyed the back and forth on reparations. This discussion actually pushed me over the edge in regards to a book I’m going to write on the profitability of slavery and the devastating economic impact that the Jim Crow era and all of the different race riots (whites attacking blacks especially from 1915 – 1922 & beyond) – has had on the ability of African Americans to build wealth since 1865.

My goal is to actually come up with solid peer reviewed numbers. The problem with the reparations debate is that there are no firm numbers to discuss. Everyone understands there is a price to be paid but no one (to my knowledge) has calculated that price.

If anyone –Del, Ryan, Sokari or anyone else – has links they would like to send me or books they would recommend for me to read for this project – please send the information to john.kamoche@us.army.mil or hit me up at my cell at 212-879-4521. Thank you.

“It’s another denial of black people’s humanity-”raw emotion vs. western, empirical reason and evidence”.”

Actually, I think it’s a matter of balance. Human beings need both a head and a heart

All reason and no emotion and you get a bunch of people who can send 6 million Jews to their deaths. All emotion and no reason and you get Rwandan-style genocide.

Thanks for the information and references. When I get some time I’ll have a go at it. I don’t deny that some American and British people (and therefore the cities they lived in) benefitted from slavery and became very rich. I just doubt the magnitude of your assessment. There is never just “one thing” which makes or breaks a system — except for maybe a meteor strike 65 million years ago.

Regarding facts and reason. If a world court is ever going to preside over calls for (financial) reparations it is going to need to see some numbers. Apologies and acknowledgements are another thing altogether; I think the British government has already taking steps in this direction.

“The deep, rich corporate pockets are lined with blood, sweat and tears and if any type of economic reparation were to take place, MANY American corporations, thus cities and related industries would topple over like dominoes!”

I think GWB can occomplish this all without your help

@Black Looks

I think that it’s because… people are born opportunists

I agree with you regarding looking at the past and at present-day Sudan not being a binary choice. To some extent though focussing on one drowns out the other — the media is very very flighty.

Perhaps some reparations from one nation will cause the other nations who took part in the slave trade to do some introspection. There’ll probably be little deterrant value though. Look at how effectively the Nuremburg trials prevented the genocide in Bosnia, Rwanda, and Sudan (and, and, and…)

If I have been overly focussed on the “Eastern Slave Trade” it is because a few months ago in a bookshop I paged through a book on that trade and was horrified by the violence and brutality suffered by slaves destined for the middle east. That the last slaves were shipped off to harems (and the brutality that went with that) as late as the early 1900s is just horrific.

Anyway, we’re probably talking past each other a bit, so I’ll let you end of this thread now. I really am open minded (and if I am not I aim to be) so I feel I have benefitted from this exchange (more so with all Del’s links), so…

Adios

It’s another denial of black people’s humanity-”raw emotion vs. western, empirical reason and evidence”.

And many times there is this need to play the contrarian, borne of privilege and arrogance, what can they do, because, let’s face it, this stuff hits you square between the eyes.

Arundhati Roy talks extensively about this “foxhole” approach and a reliance on scientific evidence, charts and graphs when there’s no where else to go in the face of “people’s history” which is based on those who’ve witnessed and lived the tragedy.

1) So where shall we start, how about the genteel South? The slave labor cotton, rice, tobacco industry BUILT Atlanta, Richmond, the Carolinas and following the eastern coastline, we can name the port cities built on that wealth. This is grade school American history that no scholar needs to write about. But instead of “research papers”, none of which you’ll find on the internet and since “your” evidence is coming from Wikipedia, search “John Hope Franklin” and read his continually updated book from, Slavery to Freedom. And he’s no lightweight, angry black man simply ranting about reparation and oppression.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Hope_Franklin
or Howard Zinn’s masterpiece, A People’s History of the United States, part 1 and 2.

To even question if Charleston, South Carolina, Annapolis, Maryland, Providence Rhode Island, Jamestown, Virginia, all notable U.S. slave port cities, didn’t grow extremely wealthy, locally and regionally, is either pure denial or an unwillingness to face the stark, horrible reality of how far the tentacles of this human suffering actually stretched.

2) And New England is even more interesting; you’ve heard of Aetna Insurance Company, where millions of Americans are insured, including me, wrote policies on slaves for slave masters?! Here’s a nice apology from the Chairman from the Aetna website, not offering any reparations but stating how hard Aetna is working to remove barriers to healthcare and you know where black folks stand on those numbers.
http://www.aetna.com/news/2002/slavery_reparations_issue.html
Hartford (Aetna’s headquarters for more than a century) was a major a prosperous US city (it attracted Mark Twain!) based on its relationship with (and close proximity) with Providence where the Brown Brothers worked their magic as THE premiere shipping magnets specifically in the triangle slave trade. Again, to question if American cities did not benefit from this multi-nation business model is silly.

Refer to the scholarly book” The New England slave trade after the Revolution” by Elizabeth Donnan. She provides one hell of a document on how wealthy Providence, Newport and Boston really became as a result of the TA slave trade.

And then there’s the institutional wealth that evolved, the Brown Brothers, founded Brown University and Cornell University’s relationship with Cecil Rhodes, and we don’t have to go into what he was up to in South Africa, do you require facts on his record…………
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_Rhodes

Looking for “factual” evidence and “reason” are futile and not to see the “unjust enrichment”, as its been coined now, linked to the riches of American cities is just plain blindness. And what has given the reparations fight more steam is the “evidence” uncovering the role of corporations. Here’s a 2003 Nation article:
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20030310/friedman

Recently investment bank JP Morgan Chase admitted that two of its companies accepted slaves as “collateral” for loans between 1831 and 1865.

The deep, rich corporate pockets are lined with blood, sweat and tears and if any type of economic reparation were to take place, MANY American corporations, thus cities and related industries would topple over like dominoes!

True, mentioning Arabs and present-day slavery is sidestepping the issue a bit. Still valid points though. The point about African complicity is just as valid although a bit devious in that slave drivers to some extent took advantage of the tribalism they found when they arrived on African shores.

My point was that societies like England’s who readily admit their part in slavery (and their part in ending it; great links on your site Hathor) might be unfairly targeted exactly because they do admit to feeling guilt over it. On the other hand there is the Arab world which has (to my knowledge) remained silent on the issue even though they (in my understanding) where part of the slave trade long before England started exploring the new world and were by all accounts much crueller slave-drivers than their western counterparts. They (from what I have read) carried on with slavery well after England abolished it and started enforcing anti-slavery laws where it had jurisdiction. No childish “but they did it first” excuses from me. Just a question as to why the most successful and democratic (now) societies are targeted.

As far as reparations go. Who would pay and who would receive the reparations? Instead of seeking out reparations why don’t agrieved Africans demand that Britain (and the rest of Europe) actually do something about the slaughter in Sudan instead of just waiting to fund the inevitable “Hotel Rwanda” type motion pictures that will come out /after/ the slaughter is finished.

Sure, by all means demand reparations but do so once there is no longer any slaughter and slavery going on in Africa. Priorities…

@Del @Sokari

I’ll bite. I’d really like you to point to research papers which show exactly how much Europe and America benefitted from slavery. My beliefs *will* follow the evidence. I am open to reason and evidence.

Some links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_slave_trade
http://www.raceandhistory.com/historicalviews/2252001.htm