https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-resources/teaching-resource/historical-context-was-slavery-engine-american-economic-growth
tl;dr Slavery was not the primary economic engine for the industrial revolution in England/Europe, but it was an indispensable driver of American economic growth in both the south and the north.
Further support from Forbes (hardly a left-wing publication) The Clear Connection Between Slavery And American Capitalism
What might those steps towards a more perfect union be in 2021 and thereafter? Thatâs really the question, isnât it?
âWhataboutismâ for those countries you mention shifts/misses the point of this discussion: what about the United States of America? For example, âwhat aboutâ the attempts to curtail voting rights in 2021, as we all clearly acknowledge? âWhat aboutâ the need for the Electoral College? The âwhat aboutsâ regarding the US are the point, not Mauritania.
Asking about âwhat aboutâ America are we doing to make this a more perfect union today, tomorrow, and forever should be the focus, not what the ancient Greeks et al. did.
I can not speak for other African-Americans, but I can share how slavery has affected my family and continues to do so. I have talked about the fact that I am a descendent of slaves from both sides of my family and that my great-grandparents were in the 1st or 2nd generation to be born free into sharecropping families in Mississippi. My familyâs ancestors farmed the land that they were slaves or sharecroppers on for generations before eventually becoming owners of the land in my Great-Grandfatherâs generation and my Grandfather and Father were born on that land while my maternal grandfather was born on sharecropped land that his family never owned.
My Grandparents generation eventually left for large urban areas despite little education opportunities growing up in Mississippi and many systematic horrors (Jim Crow in the south and Redlining policies once they moved into cities that limited housing opportunities).
My parents were the 1st generation to complete high school (my father completed college) and were raised in the Civil Rights era (still dealt with Redlining polices). I grew up in a large inner city without the everyday presence of my father in a community with aggressive policing policies. I was in 6th grade before I attended a school with a student who was not Black. It is now 2021 and my kids generation are the 1st generation in my family to be raised in a multicultural environment, and without many of the handicaps (but there are still more subtle handicaps).
But more than the financial (no generation has ever passed any wealth down besides that Mississippi land) and education handicaps that I have seen throughout my lifetime, it continues to be the mental handicaps that have been the most devastating amongst some of my family members. The absolute lack of trust in most systems/organizations (government, police, health care, stock markets etc.), the instinct to distrust and to stay away and âfearâ White people, and the cycle of passing that âcurseâ on to the next generation is a continuous aftereffect of slavery and Jim Crow policies.
Thank you for sharing that. Very moving.
@mynameiswhatever, my response was a specific answer to a prior post stating the scale and duration of slavery in the US was unique compared to our (then) economic rivals. Sadly, it was not. At least not by much.
No surprise that some attempt to downplay slavery by effectively saying âyeah, but other countries had slavery too.â No surprise that those who offer that as a counterpoint fail to consider the context of the OPâs post: the 4th of July. No other country is relevant in this context.
There is no escaping the reality of slavery and the ramifications of that institution which continue today. No counterpoint diminishes the truth of @ChangeTheGame âs words. Saying we should celebrate Americaâs greatness on the 4th and leave the inconvenient truth for other days is exactly why BLM is necessary. Itâs not enough that Derek Chauvin is in jail.
I canât pretend to understand what life is like for any person of color. I can acknowledge that our holiday of July 4th should not just be about celebrating the greatness of the country. It should also be a day when we can think about how it could be better.
Brilliantly stated. Right on.
Why on earth would you think I was downplaying slavery? If anything, I was trying to make the point that it was occurring on a far vaster and more global scale than commonly believed. Why are you hostile to that acknowledgment?
Changethegame your families narrative and honest words are in many ways heart breaking and unfortunately similar I suspect to those of many multi generational American black families. They are impactful and meaningful to someone such as myself from a different background.
I think the dissonance expressed by some (or reluctance to fully acknowledge the impact of institutional racism) is in significant part a function of the experiences of many non black Americans.
The survey I attached details that a significant number of white Americans are 3rd generation or less. Meaning their grandparents were the first members of their families to have been born in the US (compared to 75% of black families have been in America 3+ generations).
The family narratives that these white ârecently arrivedâ families pass down over generations likely include fleeing another country because of economic hardship or oppression. Typically these families faced some degree of discrimination upon arrival in the US but have been able to assimilate and thrive. As a result these families tend to take great pride in being defined as a (insert background) American. To those that have experienced this version of the American experience the country has embraced them and provided their families with economic and social opportunity.
Given their experience and timeline these Americans never in their minds participated in or benefited from slavery or oppression. For many in the 1950s and 60s this same group (or parents) were the most outspoken white people in demanding civil rights and equality having recently experienced discrimination themselves. It is extremely hard for this class of Americans to come to terms with both the continued impact of discrimination on black Americans and or the lasting economic benefits accrued to the country as a whole from slavery.
I am not excusing or validating this perspective but instead trying to provide some potential context to why these conversations among seemingly well intentioned people often go poorly.
Once again thank you for enlightening me by sharing and âmakingâ me hear you! I embrace the opportunity to learn, not just once a year on the 4th of July.
I would say this is also a theme with Asian American families like mine who immigrated in the late sixties and seventies.
Same here. Thank you, @ChangeTheGame , for sharing your perspective . Itâs important to keep having these conversations.
Thanks for the reminder that we are still striving for âa more perfect unionâ. NPR played part of that speech with James Earl Jones doing the reading. Wow. I could not believe I had never heard it before. Itâs such a powerful speech. "What to the Slave Is the 4th of July?": James Earl Jones Reads Frederick Douglass's Historic Speech - YouTube
A bit tangential, but also very interesting was an interview we heard last night with Akhil Reed Amar ( Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science at Yale University and author of The Words that made Us) about the Constitution. He emphasized that it turned out as well as it did because of the power of newspapers and sharing ideas across the colonies. He also felt that while some sort of compromise on slavery was probably inevitable, they could have come up with something better, such as gradually phasing slavery out. If you want to read the transcript or listen it is here: 'The Words That Made Us': Scholar Akhil Reed Amar On How To Better Understand The Constitution | On Point
Wow, great article by Amar. All these articles are excellent.
THIS is the kind of conversation we should have on July 4th. Not just rah rah America, but rather, letâs remember why we are all here. Letâs keep working to make it better.
This describes us. My parents entered this country in the 1970s and we consider ourselves extremely fortunate to be here in this Land of Opportunity (I am going to use all caps for emphasis for a few terms; it has no specific meaning beyond that). And for a long time I wondered why so many people who were born here did not see the same opportunity. I think I have a better understanding of it now, and will try to explain my thoughts.
I am going to simplify a great deal, but slaveryâs most visible effect was what I will call the Destruction of Freedom. Strictly speaking that ended with the Civil War, but for a full 100+ years after that, there was still a Destruction of Opportunity with both overt discrimination in hiring and restricting opportunities for financial wealth, such as redlining.
What I could not understand for quite a long time is that, given that civil rights progress has largely removed the Destruction of Opportunity, why is there still a large gap among those that were born afterwards? Why were immigrants who came to this country at that time able to succeed, despite usually coming here with little money, and in many cases, poorer English and a limited understanding of American social norms? No doubt a large part of that reason is because it is a self-selected group of high achievers. But given they could go elsewhere, why was America the overwhelming destination of choice for so many? That is because they believed it to be the Land of Opportunity, where their merit could allow them to advance. They were right.
My hypothesis of why an economic gap still persists is what I now call the Destruction of Hope. It is only after I became a parent of grown children that I appreciated the full impact that a supportive environment has on a person being able to achieve their potential. My take is that the multi-generational Destruction of Opportunity led Black people to believe that the deck continues to be fundamentally stacked against them.
Unlike the Destruction of Freedom or the Destruction of Opportunity, the Destruction of Hope is an invisible effect. Because of this, most others do not see or understand it. I certainly did not for a long time.
Not just self selected as motivated people, but also often selected as educated high achievers by US immigration rules that favor skilled workers and graduate students.
Note that the inheritances of the Destruction of Opportunity that you mention affect the present day and future situation (beyond Destruction of Hope). The immigrants (including from Africa) you mentioned came highly educated, while African American people were being educationally suppressed. Because parent education is a very strong factor in their kidsâ educational achievement, the inequality of the past continues for generations, even if institutions are equal now (which they still are not, even if some of the most blatant inequalities have been removed).
One of the main components of the Destruction of Opportunity was that the GI Bill created a booming, educated white middle class after WW2, but African American GIâs did not accrue the benefits on the same scale because of structural barriers.
Thanks for posting this. My black son is being raised in a white family and largely white school. Hearing that you learned this in history class at an HBCU is particularly interesting to me. My son does not believe he would fit in at a HBCU because he is not âblack enoughâ but these are the exact type of topics that he cannot stand how they are covered at his high school. 4th of July is not a celebration for us either.
Frederick Douglas was an amazing orator. He wrote this some 8 years before the Civil War. His voice was one of many leading our country to the repudiation of what many understood to be our national wrong. I sympathize with what he writes. I can understand the hypocrisy and injustice to the slave in our government, laws and celebrations. I will also say that we fought and hundreds of thousands died to over come that horror of our history. The job isnât done but perhaps some day all citizens can celebrate that we the people are working towards that âmore perfect unionâ. Until then the work continues. I continue to celebrate this creation called the United States. I believe that it is our recognition of the rights of the individual which will make us a place that all people can have life and liberty and pursue happiness.
Too little attention, praise or thanks is given in history to the hundreds of thousands of Union soldiers who gave their lives in support of an end to slavery and to preserve the Union. And the hundreds of thousands more of their widows and orphans who also suffered when they were killed or severely injured. They were white men too (for the most part). An ancestor of mine, a Union soldier, lies in an unmarked grave. His widow and two children were in poverty after his death. Another ancestress received (finally in 1890) a widowâs pension from the government for herself and her four children of $16 a month. These people were recent German immigrants who had only been Americans for a few years, yet they joined up.
So on the 4th of July, I think about them.
In addition at the time of the civil war about 25% of southern families owned slaves. Yes, any number was certainly too many and a tragedy but it wasnât an entire nation by a long stretch. Even some free blacks owned slaves. Slavery was a stain on our countries past and also on the past of many other nations. As stated above, many died to right this wrong. Many others had nothing to do with the atrocities of the time. And as also stated above many came long after slavery was over an hold zero responsibility for itâs existence. I donât know what it will actually take to make things right. It seems in the last 10 years weâve moved farther apart as opposed to becoming closer as a nation.
There is no reason for anyone living today to feel responsible or guilty for the history of slavery. We are only responsible for what we as individuals do or have done. Not what some ancestor, long dead, did or didnât do. Not what the country we were born into did or didnât do. The sooner we start seeing each other as individuals, the better off we will be.