The Race Card

In the course of any election season there are any number of tactics/gimmicks that a political candidate uses to help establish that he/she is just like you, despite the fact that they clearly are not, and that they have the same cares and concerns that you have, though again that certainly is not the case. Perhaps the most despicable among these is called "The Race Card," why politics borrows from sports references all the time is beyond me, though I suspect it's to try to spice up what is ordinarily an extremely dry topic. In any event the issue of race has been about as divisive an issue as there is ever likely to be and in this current foray into the democratic process we have seen it being pulled again and again to in defense of the Democrat candidate, Senator Barack Hussein Obama. Despite having virtually nothing in the way of qualifications besides his judgment, which I also have serious problems and questions about, he has risen to be the standard bearer of the Democrat party. But this post is not about Senator Obama, it's about race, politics and the history of both in America.. and for that we inevitably end up at one dark point in American history, Slavery. Though perhaps it wasn't quite as dark as some people might think.

3/5 a Person?:
One of the great supposed contradictions in American history is the clear difference in the language and spirit of the Declaration of Independence and the allowance of slavery to continue in the new union. People often point to the 3/5 compromise in the Constitution which a slave was counted as 3/5 a person for the purposes of taxation and representation in congress and the electoral college. Was it morally wrong to allow slavery to continue? Yes. Was it morally wrong to count a man as 3/5 a person. Yes, but i'd have you consider the circumstances under which these actions were taken and the nuances that bring redemption to a dark time in American history.

Let me set the scene, it's 1787, the Revolutionary War ended 4 years ago and the nacient nation is struggling to find stablity and cohesion under the loose confederacy that has thus far united the disparate states. The delegates gather in Philidelphia to participate in what would later be known as the Constitutional Convention and would end up being the blueprint of almost all western civilizations in the coming centuries. All of them know that the Articles of Confederation aren't working and need to be fixed and most gathered in order to amend not to abandon them, though that certainly wouldn't be the result. Once the debate began and the establishment of a stronger federal goverment under a new Constitution became certain, there were still many problems to be addressed not the least of which were representation in the legislature, taxation of citizens, and property rights.

Not surprisingly slavery was the common thread that binded those three issues. Northern States generally wanted to abolish slavery and southern states wanted to propogate it. In order to unite as a nation there were concessions made to limit the influence and power that the southern states held while still allowing slavery to continue. The point of contention was whether slaves should be counted for representation in Congress or in taxation or both. The 3/5th's Compromise eventually laid that problem to rest and in case you're curious:

Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.

But what was really important was that 10 of the 13 States had already outlawed slavery and many delegates were boldly and vocally opposing slavery at the Convention. Unfortunatly three states, threatned not only to leave the convention but potentially leave the union if slavery was outlawed. Thus the delegates deffered the issue till later putting the ratification and formation of this new goverment as paramount while still putting limits on slavery by stipulating that Congress would have power to ban the slave trade after 20 years. Later when Georgia would secced from the union, they would put it like this:

The party of Lincoln, called the Republican party, under its present name and organization, is of recent origin. It is admitted to be an anti-slavery party. While it attracts to itself by its creed the scattered advocates of exploded political heresies, of condemned theories in political economy, the advocates of commercial restrictions, of protection, of special privileges, of waste and corruption in the administration of Government, anti-slavery is its mission and its purpose.

Now some of you may ask where i'm going with all of this, which is a fair enough question considering the fact that i'm painting with a broad brush a set of events that was serious and grevious enough to send many thousands of men to their death; but I point all of this out to give a backdrop on race, slavery and oppression in America so that you may better understand an issue that has largely been offuscated with time. To try to make my points a bit more clear this format might help..

1. Many of the founders knew that slavery was wrong, and worked to put an end to it as best they could while still ensuring the strength of the union.

2. In fact they put specifically put limitiations on slavery to ensure it's eventual demise in the hopes of avoiding what would eventually become a civil war.

3. Knowledge of history is of the utmost importance because the context upon which events occured is paramount to understanding the truth of the situation.

Believe me there's much more to go through on this issue, and to be honest it's something deserving the attention of a doctoral thesis rather than a one shot blog entry; but the fact remains that for a long time now Americans have simply been scratching the surface when it comes to the truth about race in our country. The irony is not lost on me that the party that literally was willing to go to war over the freedom of those that were enslaved is now viewed as evil by those same people they fought to free, even so much as to vote for and later pass civil rights legislation in the 60's, but I suppose thats a discussion for another day. There are many myths and misconceptions when it comes to the American political landscape, and it is my hope to do my small part to dispel such misinformation and replace it with some perspective and truth in this the greatest nation on God's green Earth.

Random Thoughts:
Bittersweet, you're gonna be the death of me..
I don't want you, but I need you,
I love you and I hate you at the very same time..

See what I want so much, should never hurt this bad,
Never did this before, that's what the virgin said ,
We've been generally warned, that's what the surgeon says..
God talk to me now this is an emergency..

Quote of the Entry: "Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free."
- Ronald Reagan (1911 - 2004) 40th president of US