Formal Senate Apology for Slavery and Segregation

[mjs]

I thought I would have heard of it here first. The Senate passed Resolution 26 on Thursday entitled "A concurrent resolution apologizing for the enslavement and racial segregation of African Americans". Both our Senators were co-sponsers and Senator Levin spoke on it. Sounds like a nice gesture.

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill...?bill=sc111-26
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=sc111-26
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/reco...1-s20090618-20

I couldn't find any parellel resolution in the house yet, but it could appear soon. I did find that Representative Conyers sponsors a bill entitled "Commission to Study Reparation Proposals for African-Americans Act" every year and every year it dies in committee.

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-40

[larrym]

I didn/t do anything to anybody, why do I owe anyone an apology or reparations? It ain't right.

[Bobl]

It's a start.
How long will we wait for the Christians who bought them and the Muslims who traded them to apologize?

[yaktown]

African-Americans didn't even exist back then! Political correctness run amok.

[crawford]

I think it's ridiculous, and Levin should be ashamed. None of my ancester were slaveholders. The U.S. hasn't had slavery for 150 years.
There is nobody alive who suffered directly from slavery in the U.S.

Enough already!

[DetroitDad]

I didn/t do anything to anybody, why do I owe anyone an apology or reparations? It ain't right.

You benefit [[or could benefit) from the entitlement system.

[Bearinabox]

I didn/t do anything to anybody, why do I owe anyone an apology or reparations? It ain't right.

Did anyone suggest that you, larrym, should personally apologize to anybody? No? Then I don't understand what the problem is. If it wounds your dignity that much to live in a country whose government is doing this on your behalf, you could always move to Canada. It's right across the river, you know.

[mjs]

Protestants and Catholics. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m.../?tag=rel.res5
Southern Baptists. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m...2/ai_17332136/
Disciples of Christ. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/m.../?tag=rel.res2
British Baptists. http://www.christiantoday.com/articl...logy/18892.htm

I'm only addressing the acts of Americans and those that significantly influenced its past morals and values. Ask the people of Africa, the Middle East, an African-American, or a Muslim about the rest of the world's involvement in slavery.

[mjs]

I think it's ridiculous, and Levin should be ashamed. None of my ancesters were slaveholders. The U.S. hasn't had slavery for 150 years.
There is nobody alive who suffered directly from slavery in the U.S.

Enough already!

It was also an apology for racial segregation amongst other things. Plenty of living people did suffer this and since Henry Ford used racial segregation to increase inter-labor competition, its also a Michigan thing. Just read it before commenting on it. The resolution's title is 13 words and the first link showing the entire resolution is under 1000 words, less than a page.

[Sstashmoo]

When are they going to apologize to the Native American, you know the folks they stole this land from? Shhh they don't want to talk about that.

[MrCrush1914]

I'm black and I say keep it... it doesn't change anything, it doesn't matter. It's best to just keep it moving and stop wasting money and resources on this.

[firstandten]

Its a start and only a start. When I saw this I realized the apology is worth about as much as the paper it was written on.

[[2) DISCLAIMER- Nothing in this resolution--

[[A) authorizes or supports any claim against the United States; or


[[B) serves as a settlement of any claim against the United States.



I bet you wouldn't have gotten all the support for the resolution if that disclaimer wasn't there. That's why Conyers proposal dies in committee every year because it won't have that silly disclaimer in it.

[mjs]

Did you want the House version of the Native American apology that went to committee at the end of April or the Senate version?
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=hj111-46
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=sj111-14

If you have an interest in a bill, write your reps and the folks on the committees. They respond because you threaten to undermine the entire campaign financing system. The main purpose of campaign financing is to convince those that don't read bills or track votes that up is down and down is up. In a democracy, the quality of the leadership is always related to the quality of the voters.

[firstandten]

When are they going to apologize to the Native American, you know the folks they stole this land from? Shhh they don't want to talk about that.

We already did ! We let them put casino's just about anywhere they want.

[Downtown diva]

I didn/t do anything to anybody, why do I owe anyone an apology or reparations? It ain't right.

Larry, you have benefitted from slavery, even though it was from many generations ago.

an apology is THE LEAST that you owe.

[firstandten]

I think it's ridiculous, and Levin should be ashamed. None of my ancester were slaveholders. The U.S. hasn't had slavery for 150 years.
There is nobody alive who suffered directly from slavery in the U.S.

Enough already!

"according to Thomas Shapiro's groundbreaking work on the racial wealth divide, whites in the bottom fifth of all white households [[in terms of income) have, on average seven times the net worth of similar blacks. In large part this is due to a major advantage in home ownership and thus equity, due to passed down property from parents. Indeed, as Shapiro and his colleague Melvin Oliver have found [[and chronicled in their book, Black Wealth/White Wealth), whites with incomes below $13,000 are more likely to own their own homes than blacks with incomes that are three times higher, largely due to these intergenerational transfers of wealth"


Maybe nobody is "directly suffering" today from slavery, but whites have benefited to this day, from privilege and intergenerational wealth transfers that is a direct result of the wealth that was obtained on the backs of slaves.

[ASR89]

nb4 blxsoul.

[MIRepublic]

Germany formally apologized on many levels and many decades after the fact for the Holocaust, so far as to give reparations to not only victims of the Holocaust, but to the entire state of Israel. Furthermore, to even deny the Holocaust is officailly illegal in thirteen nations which, in the least, gets you a hefty fine and in other situations can even get you imprisoned.

The Holocaust is but one example of at least partially retroactive formal apologies. Others include formal apologies by the Canadian and Australian governments for how they dealt with their native populations. Japan has formally and retroactively apologized to a whole slew of nations they brutalized during WWII.

So then, it is something more than disappointing, if even not hardly a surprise, to hear not only the misunderstanding of the issuances of retroactive and formal apologies, but the outright hosility by quite a few to these apologies which are most usually tinged with this audacious myth of the a now-oppressed majority in this nation. It's very much St*rmfr*nt ideological territory, and you're hearing it even more on the streets, these days given our new government [[read: president).

On a personal level, I don't find any personal importance in such an apology, but for those openly hostile to them as simply not understanding them, well, "The lady doth protest too much, methinks," eh? To be offended by an apology [[especially one with no monetary strings attached) says a lot about a person, no?

[MrJones]

Why doesn't the Queen of England apologize to African Americans for her direct ancestors' personal responsibility for starting slavery in America in the first place? George Washington didn't start the thing.

[firstandten]

Why doesn't the Queen of England apologize to African Americans for her direct ancestors' personal responsibility for starting slavery in America in the first place? George Washington didn't start the thing.

We aren't talking individuals, some of everybody was involved in the slave trade. The US of A directly benefitted from slavery, the apology is from the US Government

[gumby]

Why are people having a problem wit the senate issuing an apology? Christ it is the least that can be done. Admitting that America fucked up big time by enslaving an entire race of people is a good thing. If a wound is still open it will continue to fester and get worse. I wish I could say my ancestors were not slave owners but some of them were, some were also the Native Americans who the land was stolen from. Does the fact that my ancestors owned slaves a couple of hundred years ago change who I am? No it doesn't so I say apologize away. My only wish is that there was some of that wealth and priveledge left that afforded them the means to do as such.

So I am sorry that my ancestors did bad stuff to your ancestors. Now I am just waiting for my apology for having the land stolen from my other ancestors. Or should 7/8ths of me be apologizing to the other 1/8th? I am so confused.

[OLDDOG]

I can see we have a number of history buffs here>

i haven herd any one mention how horrible the slave trade was !
A truly deplorable situation !

Now that being said i haven`t herd one comment about the fact that it was america and the american navy patrolling the african coast that put a stop to slavery !
[[well slowing it dramatical) we still have slavery today and we are still fighting it.
Go back and read your history books>
slavery was a world wide problem and america did its best to bring it to an end!
I am proud that we as a nation pursued this action!
[[it would be nice to hear a thank you from some one >anyone >

[rid0617]

When are they going to apologize to the Native American, you know the folks they stole this land from? Shhh they don't want to talk about that.

My wife would like to hear that one. She's half black, half Cherokee Indian. She figures half of an apology would work for her

[crawford]

"according to Thomas Shapiro's groundbreaking work on the racial wealth divide, whites in the bottom fifth of all white households [[in terms of income) have, on average seven times the net worth of similar blacks. In large part this is due to a major advantage in home ownership and thus equity, due to passed down property from parents. Indeed, as Shapiro and his colleague Melvin Oliver have found [[and chronicled in their book, Black Wealth/White Wealth), whites with incomes below $13,000 are more likely to own their own homes than blacks with incomes that are three times higher, largely due to these intergenerational transfers of wealth"

LOL, keep telling yourself this; maybe it will make you feel better! Correlation doesn't equal causation! Maybe the poor whites own their homes because they're in rural hick towns, while blacks are renting in the ghetto.

Yeah, I'm sure that trailer in rural Arkansas is building the wealth! You do know that mobile homes are depreciating assets, don't you? They "build wealth" like a fancy car builds wealth.

And NYC, the most successful city in the U.S., also has the lowest homeownership rate. The homeownership rate in Manhattan is lower than in Detroit. Gee, those poor Manhattanites. I guess they don't get to build the wealth like Detroit homeowners get to do. How's that wealthbuilding been going these last few years? Home values down 50%, you say? Even more?

My parents came to the U.S. in the 1970's with nothing. They did jobs that no Americans [[black or white) would do, and now they live in Bloomfield Township. Don't give me crap about "intergenerational transfers".

Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Why is it that Haitian immigrants to the U.S. are more wealthy than African Americans after 10 years in this country?

"
Maybe nobody is "directly suffering" today from slavery, but whites have benefited to this day, from privilege and intergenerational wealth transfers that is a direct result of the wealth that was obtained on the backs of slaves.

No they don't benefit. What a ridiculous arguement. No "white" today in the U.S. has benefitted from slavery. Most whites came to the U.S. long after slavery was abolished anyways. They were in Sicily or County Cork at the time. How exactly do they benefit?

Using this logic, all descendants of coastal Africa [[most African Ameicans) need to apologize to the interior states of Africa, because their forefathers 400 years ago benefitted from "privilege and intergenerational wealth transfers that is a direct result of the wealth that was obtained on the backs of slaves." They had slaves there too, you know? Still have them today in East Africa.

And what about Mexican Americans? Most are Indios, and were enslaved by the Spaniards, many on what is now American land? Where's their apology?

What about Irish Americans? Enslaved by the English. What about [[Southern)Italians? Enslaved by the North Africans. What about Eastern Europeans? Enslaved by the Ottomans.

There probably are very few people on earth that did not have ancestors that were enslaved.

[313WX]

You benefit [[or could benefit) from the entitlement system.

Yes. Probably anyone with some level of Afircan-American blood in their body will also receive reparation if it were to occur [[White, Asian, Mexican, etc.)