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Why Blacks in the United States Should Be Paid Reparations

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Why Blacks in the United States Should Be Paid Reparations HONORING THEIR SERVICES: WHY BLACKS IN THE UNITED STATES SHOULD BE PAID REPARATIONS Carolyn Y. Council A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate College of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctorate of Philosophy July 2010 Committee: Louis I. Katzner, PhD, Advisor Andrew Schocket, PhD Graduate Faculty Representative Christopher Morris, PhD Sara Worley, PhD © 2010 Carolyn Y. Council All Rights Reserved iii ABSTRACT Dr. Louis I. Katzner, Advisor In 1862, President Lincoln proposed a joint resolution to congress on compensated emancipation. Lincoln preferred a gradual rather than an immediate emancipation so that the process would be less taxing to the slave holding states. Lincoln indicated that compensation should be paid to the states for the problems that such emancipation might cause. From localities to where slaves were owned to localities where property might be lost due to actions on the part of the United States government in freeing the slaves, Lincoln expected the government to compensate the slaveholders, not the slaves. There was no mention of recompense for the slaves themselves. This paper argues for compensatory relief for the former slaves and their descendants. The methodology explored several dimensions of the arguments for and against the payment of reparations for slavery by defining what reparations is and using different concepts of justice to determine which theory was applicable to arguments for compensation. The following arguments were posited: (1) blacks in the United States are owed reparations based on moral and legal grounds; (2) that the concept of collective responsibility was applicable to this issue; (3) that the descendants of slaves should be paid reparations for the unjustified forced and uncompensated labor and loss of freedom of their ancestors. An analysis of the problem included an exploration of the development of racial slavery, the slave system established to perpetuate it as the basis for the moral argument that reparations iv should be paid to the descendents of former slaves. Defining different concepts of justice indicated that compensatory and rectificatory justice is applicable in reference to the forced and free labor that slaves in the United States provided. The forced service of those slaves to the economic, social, and political development of a supposedly liberal democratic state under the most adverse conditions can only be corrected through the payment of reparations for slavery. An analysis of American history will show that the United States, when it became a nation, set about the deliberate task of instituting a racial system of slavery and justifying its practice legitimately through its constitution. The historical assessment shows how the United States as an established legal and political entity existing over time and as a core-institution defining entity is a collective and can be held legally responsible for paying reparations. v DEDICATION This study is dedicated to the approximately 90 million Africans who lost their lives during the Atlantic slave trade and to their descendents who are owed reparations. May they rest in freedom. vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I wish to thank Dr. Lou Katzner, my major professor, for his academic guidance and patience in helping and encouraging me in the completion of this dissertation. I would also like to thank my committee members, Dr. Christopher Morris and Dr. James Child (posthumously) for their valuable assistance in helping me set the parameters for this work and for their helpful advice and recommendations. I would also like to acknowledge Dr. Sara Worley who so graciously replaced Dr. Child on my dissertation committee and Dr. Andrew Schocket (History) for serving as the outside committee member. I also wish to thank Dr. Ralph Turner, Dr. David Felder, and Dr. Derek Williams of Florida A&M University in Tallahassee, Florida for their academic guidance and support. I would also like to express my appreciation to Rosemary Hadley, Shardé Goodloe, Michael Williams and Temidayo Ogedengbe for their encouragement, conversations and research support. Finally I would like to thank Dr. Gail Ogawa for her support and encouragement and for never allowing me to give up, also my children, Carol, Stephanie, Sharon, and David (also TT and CJ) for letting me go. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT...……………………..……………………………………………………………..iii CHAPTER I. HISTORICAL OVERVIEW OF SLAVERY IN NORTH AMERICA......……….1 Introduction……………………………………………………………………………..…1 Historical Perspectives…….……………………………………………………………... 1 The Triangular Trade…..………...………………………………………………………..9 Right-of-Search Laws……………………………………………………………………12 The Moral Acceptance of Slavery...……………………………………………………..14 The Importance of History...……………………………………………………………..16 CHAPTER II. JUSTICE AND THE DEMAND FOR REPARATIONS …………………….23 Introduction..…………………………………………………….……………………….23 Defining Justice....……………...…………………………………..................................29 Aristotle….……………………………………………………………………….31 Rawls….………………………………………………………………………….35 Different Concepts of Justice…………………………………………………………….37 Distributive Justice.………………………………………………………………38 Compensatory Justice……………………………………………………………41 Rectificatory Justice.……………………………………………………………..43 CHAPTER III. DEFINING REPARATIONS AND COMPENSATION………………………49 Introduction………………………………………………………………………………49 Reparations and Compensation…………………………………………………………..51 viii CHAPTER IV. COLLECTIVE RESPONSIBILITY......……………………………………….63 Introduction…………...………………………………………………………………….63 Collective Responsibility...………………………………………………………………68 Shared Responsibility...………………………………………………………………….77 The United States as a Collective...……………………………………………………...78 Critical Opposition..………………..…………………………………………………….87 Entitlement Theory………………………………………………………………93 CHAPTER V. CONCLUSION …………………………………………………………..……100 BIBLIOGRAPHY ………………………………………………………………………...……103 APPENDIX A. BLACK MANIFESTO..………………………………………………………101 APPENDIX B. HOUSE RESOLUTION FORTY: REPARATIONS TO AFRICAN AMERICANS ………………………………………………………………………...116 APPENDIX C. SHERMAN‘S FIELD ORDER NUMBER FIFTEEN...………………………118 APPENDIX D. THE THIRTEENTH, FOURTEENTH, AND FIFTEENTH AMENDMENTS TO THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES………...…………………...122 APPENDIX E. HOROWITZ‘S NEWSPAPER ADVERTISEMENT……………………...….125 APPENDIX F. ROSEWOOD VICTIMS VS STATE OF FLORIDA: SPECIAL MASTER‘S FINAL REPORT.……………………………………………………………………....143 1 CHAPTER ONE: A HISTORICAL OVERVIEW OF SLAVERY IN NORTH AMERICA Introduction Most Americans, no matter what hyphenation they use to define their ethnic or cultural identity, are aware of the role and the history of the enslavement of blacks in the United States. Awareness of the oppression of blacks as slaves and the on-going discrimination against them in America may be neglected and limited in historical accounts, so that when the demand for reparations is voiced, a significant number of citizens, both black and white, turn a tone-deaf ear to this claim. This chapter examines the problems inherent in any claim for recompense for the enslavement of blacks in the United States. I will argue that there is a historical claim for paying reparations to blacks based on the historical role of the American government in the importation and exploitation of African slave laborers and the subsequent establishment of laws that were important in the development of the slave system. Historical Perspectives Even though there is a forceful historical claim for the payment of reparations, opponents will argue that nothing should be paid to blacks because nothing is owed. This claim is usually articulated by acknowledging that historically, blacks were treated unfairly, but so were other groups. Consequently, blacks are no more deserving of reparations than any other minority group. Therefore, in order to justify a claim for reparations for African-Americans in the United States today, it is important to look beyond the very limited historical accounts analyzing the value of the unfree and forced labor of blacks under chattel slavery in America. It is important to 2 make a deeper, more meaningful assessment of the reality of chattel slavery and the legacy that it has left. Americans are still forced to contend with that legacy today. The history of blacks in the Americas did not begin with the arrival of those few Africans from the Dutch ship at Jamestown in 1619. Historians acknowledge the presence of blacks among the crews of Columbus‘s three ships on his voyages to the Americas. There were also blacks among the crews and soldiers of the Spanish conquistadors. These blacks among the crews of Columbus‘s ships and among the Spanish explorers would not have seemed extraordinary, for at that time, blacks had resided in Spain for hundreds of years. They were there, not only as slaves, but also as conquerors of the Iberian Peninsula. The Moors (black Africans) conquered Spain in 711. They ruled Spain until 1492 when Isabella of Castile finally and completely pushed them out of the Iberian Peninsula. Isabella and Ferdinand financed Columbus‘s voyages. By the time of Columbus‘s voyages, Spain already had a significant black population, some of whom were slaves, but many others who were not. They were soldiers, servants, and artisans. These blacks were among the crewmembers on Columbus‘s first voyage to the ―new world‖ in 1492. These blacks did not come to the Americas as slaves. John Hope Franklin writes that even if Pedro Alonso Nino [the navigator] was not a Negro as has been claimed,
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