The TRUTH about slavery in the U.S.A.

[Seawytch]

OMG...most of our founding fathers didn't believe blacks were fully HUMAN.

Were they racist? Yeah, but it stemmed from ignorance. There's no excuse today...

Nearly 20 percent of Trump’s supporters say freeing the slaves was a bad idea

 

[Flopper]

OMG...most of our founding fathers didn't believe blacks were fully HUMAN.

Were they racist? Yeah, but it stemmed from ignorance. There's no excuse today...

Nearly 20 percent of Trump’s supporters say freeing the slaves was a bad idea

That's about it but it doesn't mean our founders approved of slavery but rather saw it as an economic and political necessity. It's interesting to examine Jefferson's thoughts on slavery and race.

"Jefferson’s belief in the necessity of abolition was intertwined with his racial beliefs. He thought that white Americans and enslaved blacks constituted two “separate nations” who could not live together peacefully in the same country. Jefferson’s belief that blacks were racially inferior and “as incapable as children,” coupled with slaves’ presumed resentment of their former owners, made their removal from the United States an integral part of Jefferson’s emancipation scheme."

Racism has always been deeply rooted in America as in many other countries. IMHO, the only way to destroy racism is to destroy race; that is the gradual integration of the races which is a long slow process.
Thomas Jefferson and Slavery | Thomas Jefferson's Monticello

 

[Picaro]

OMG...most of our founding fathers didn't believe blacks were fully HUMAN.

Were they racist? Yeah, but it stemmed from ignorance. There's no excuse today...

Nearly 20 percent of Trump’s supporters say freeing the slaves was a bad idea

That's about it but it doesn't mean our founders approved of slavery but rather saw it as an economic and political necessity. It's interesting to examine Jefferson's thoughts on slavery and race.

"Jefferson’s belief in the necessity of abolition was intertwined with his racial beliefs. He thought that white Americans and enslaved blacks constituted two “separate nations” who could not live together peacefully in the same country. Jefferson’s belief that blacks were racially inferior and “as incapable as children,” coupled with slaves’ presumed resentment of their former owners, made their removal from the United States an integral part of Jefferson’s emancipation scheme."

Racism has always been deeply rooted in America as in many other countries. IMHO, the only way to destroy racism is to destroy race; that is the gradual integration of the races which is a long slow process.
Thomas Jefferson and Slavery | Thomas Jefferson's Monticello

Hate to break this to you but nobody knows what Jefferson actually thought about anything. He was a politician, and whatever he said or wrote in any given time has to do with whatever was going on politically at the time he wrote it; that's why it's so easy to find something he said somewhere to make any point one wants to. He burned most of his letters as he was nearing the end of his life, even the letters from his wife, so no one will ever know what his real views were. He was known as 'The Sphinx' in his own day.

 

[Flopper]

OMG...most of our founding fathers didn't believe blacks were fully HUMAN.

Were they racist? Yeah, but it stemmed from ignorance. There's no excuse today...

Nearly 20 percent of Trump’s supporters say freeing the slaves was a bad idea

That's about it but it doesn't mean our founders approved of slavery but rather saw it as an economic and political necessity. It's interesting to examine Jefferson's thoughts on slavery and race.

"Jefferson’s belief in the necessity of abolition was intertwined with his racial beliefs. He thought that white Americans and enslaved blacks constituted two “separate nations” who could not live together peacefully in the same country. Jefferson’s belief that blacks were racially inferior and “as incapable as children,” coupled with slaves’ presumed resentment of their former owners, made their removal from the United States an integral part of Jefferson’s emancipation scheme."

Racism has always been deeply rooted in America as in many other countries. IMHO, the only way to destroy racism is to destroy race; that is the gradual integration of the races which is a long slow process.
Thomas Jefferson and Slavery | Thomas Jefferson's Monticello

Hate to break this to you but nobody knows what Jefferson actually thought about anything. He was a politician, and whatever he said or wrote in any given time has to do with whatever was going on politically at the time he wrote it; that's why it's so easy to find something he said somewhere to make any point one wants to. He burned most of his letters as he was nearing the end of his life, even the letters from his wife, so no one will ever know what his real views were. He was known as 'The Sphinx' in his own day.

If we disregard what the founders said and wrote, we wouldn't know what they thought about anything. Jefferson's beliefs in the paragraph I quoted is documented in a letter he wrote in 1814 and his Notes on Virginia published in 1832.

Jefferson to Edward Coles, August 25, 1814, in PTJ:RS, 7:604. Transcription available at Founders Online.

Notes on the state of Virginia.

 

[Picaro]

OMG...most of our founding fathers didn't believe blacks were fully HUMAN.

Were they racist? Yeah, but it stemmed from ignorance. There's no excuse today...

Nearly 20 percent of Trump’s supporters say freeing the slaves was a bad idea

That's about it but it doesn't mean our founders approved of slavery but rather saw it as an economic and political necessity. It's interesting to examine Jefferson's thoughts on slavery and race.

"Jefferson’s belief in the necessity of abolition was intertwined with his racial beliefs. He thought that white Americans and enslaved blacks constituted two “separate nations” who could not live together peacefully in the same country. Jefferson’s belief that blacks were racially inferior and “as incapable as children,” coupled with slaves’ presumed resentment of their former owners, made their removal from the United States an integral part of Jefferson’s emancipation scheme."

Racism has always been deeply rooted in America as in many other countries. IMHO, the only way to destroy racism is to destroy race; that is the gradual integration of the races which is a long slow process.
Thomas Jefferson and Slavery | Thomas Jefferson's Monticello

Hate to break this to you but nobody knows what Jefferson actually thought about anything. He was a politician, and whatever he said or wrote in any given time has to do with whatever was going on politically at the time he wrote it; that's why it's so easy to find something he said somewhere to make any point one wants to. He burned most of his letters as he was nearing the end of his life, even the letters from his wife, so no one will ever know what his real views were. He was known as 'The Sphinx' in his own day.

If we disregard what the founders said and wrote, we wouldn't know what they thought about anything. Jefferson's beliefs in the paragraph I quoted is documented in a letter he wrote in 1814 and his Notes on Virginia published in 1832.

Jefferson to Edward Coles, August 25, 1814, in PTJ:RS, 7:604. Transcription available at Founders Online.

Notes on the state of Virginia.

I didn't say disregard it, just to approach them with a grain of salt and context, and like I said he burned most of his letters, and cherry picked the ones he wanted to survive and add to his legacy; in view of that no one can claim to know what he really thought. Also there is the fact that they discussed philosophy and morals as form of parlor entertainment among 'gentlemen', and there is a vast gap between that and what they actually practiced, and there is more than enough evidence to demonstrate Jefferson was just as callous a slave owner as any other of his day, and highly recommended slave breeding and trading as a solid and lucrative investment, so his letter doesn't count for much in that light. His estate records survive, and they don't support the image of the troubled decent slave owner suffering over the morality of it.

This book is an excellent documentary of his slave owning practices in real life as opposed to abstract ponderings for public consumption:


https://www.amazon.com/Master-Mountain-Thomas-Jefferson-Slaves/dp/0374534020&tag=ff0d01-20

 

[Katzndogz]

what about the fact that it said only white men could vote? I suppose that wasn't racist either?

Race had little to do with that law as plenty of whites who didn't own land also could not vote while black OK landowners certainly could vote.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Anyone who tries to put a happy face on slavery should spend a year as one.

 

[Katzndogz]

Thomas Jefferson​

• Vehemently opposed slavery

• Introduced legislation in Virginia to end slavery before the U.S. even declared independence from England

• Inherited slaves from his family and was not permitted to release them by law

• Original writings prove his disdain for slavery and his deep desire to see it end

Listen from the 4:30 mark to the 8:00 minute mark for the truth about Thomas Jefferson and slavery:

Slavery and Our Founders Part I: Thomas Jefferson

I have a lot of respect for Thomas Jefferson the writer and thinker- but like many people- he was conflicted- he was personally opposed to slavery- yet at the same time bought and sold slaves- and allowed his slaves to be beaten.

Monticello does a great job of providing an honest and complete picture of Thomas Jefferson- great man and slave owner.

Slavery at Jefferson's Monticello: Paradox of Liberty | Thomas Jefferson's Monticello

At any one time, about 130 enslaved men, women, and children lived and worked at Monticello. Jefferson initially acquired most of his slaves through inheritance from his father and father-in-law. The Monticello plantation comprised 5,000 acres divided into four farms: the Monticello home farm, Shadwell, Tufton, and Lego. Farm laborers lived near the fields where they worked. House servants and artisans lived in log dwellings on the mountaintop along Mulberry Row or in rooms under the south terrace of the main house.

Israel Gillette remembered Jefferson’s death as “an affair of great moment and uncertainty to us slaves.” In 1827, Edward, Jane, nine of their children, and 12 grandchildren were sold.

After Jefferson’s death, David Hern and his 34 surviving children and grandchildren were sold.

Jefferson freed Joseph Fossett in his will, but Edith and seven of their children were sold.

Jefferson purchased George and Ursula Granger and their sons in 1773 because Ursula Granger was a “favorite housewoman” of his wife.

Jefferson purchased the Granger family. I had no idea. Many wealthy slave owning families bought the family members of personal friends. It was a way of keeping families together.

How nice of him.

 

[Katzndogz]

What we are doing is known as presentism. We are taking the values of today and imposing those values on those in the long past.

Of couse we will be victims of presentism in turn. Don't we have hispanic domestics, agricultural workers, low level unskilled workers. We eat meat. How do we treat machines and how will the AI of the future judge us?

Presentism is really dumb and we should stop.

 

[Flopper]

OMG...most of our founding fathers didn't believe blacks were fully HUMAN.

Were they racist? Yeah, but it stemmed from ignorance. There's no excuse today...

Nearly 20 percent of Trump’s supporters say freeing the slaves was a bad idea

That's about it but it doesn't mean our founders approved of slavery but rather saw it as an economic and political necessity. It's interesting to examine Jefferson's thoughts on slavery and race.

"Jefferson’s belief in the necessity of abolition was intertwined with his racial beliefs. He thought that white Americans and enslaved blacks constituted two “separate nations” who could not live together peacefully in the same country. Jefferson’s belief that blacks were racially inferior and “as incapable as children,” coupled with slaves’ presumed resentment of their former owners, made their removal from the United States an integral part of Jefferson’s emancipation scheme."

Racism has always been deeply rooted in America as in many other countries. IMHO, the only way to destroy racism is to destroy race; that is the gradual integration of the races which is a long slow process.
Thomas Jefferson and Slavery | Thomas Jefferson's Monticello

Hate to break this to you but nobody knows what Jefferson actually thought about anything. He was a politician, and whatever he said or wrote in any given time has to do with whatever was going on politically at the time he wrote it; that's why it's so easy to find something he said somewhere to make any point one wants to. He burned most of his letters as he was nearing the end of his life, even the letters from his wife, so no one will ever know what his real views were. He was known as 'The Sphinx' in his own day.

If we disregard what the founders said and wrote, we wouldn't know what they thought about anything. Jefferson's beliefs in the paragraph I quoted is documented in a letter he wrote in 1814 and his Notes on Virginia published in 1832.

Jefferson to Edward Coles, August 25, 1814, in PTJ:RS, 7:604. Transcription available at Founders Online.

Notes on the state of Virginia.

I didn't say disregard it, just to approach them with a grain of salt and context, and like I said he burned most of his letters, and cherry picked the ones he wanted to survive and add to his legacy; in view of that no one can claim to know what he really thought. Also there is the fact that they discussed philosophy and morals as form of parlor entertainment among 'gentlemen', and there is a vast gap between that and what they actually practiced, and there is more than enough evidence to demonstrate Jefferson was just as callous a slave owner as any other of his day, and highly recommended slave breeding and trading as a solid and lucrative investment, so his letter doesn't count for much in that light. His estate records survive, and they don't support the image of the troubled decent slave owner suffering over the morality of it.

This book is an excellent documentary of his slave owning practices in real life as opposed to abstract ponderings for public consumption:


https://www.amazon.com/Master-Mountain-Thomas-Jefferson-Slaves/dp/0374534020&tag=ff0d01-20

The quote I used does not contradict with the view you just expressed about Jefferson. Many slave owners believed in the abolition of slavery at some time in the future. However, they saw slavery as a necessity at the time.

Most slave owners did not own large plantations like Monticello. In fact, most slaveholders lived on farms rather than plantations, and very few plantations had thousands of acres worked by hundreds of slaves. The average slave owner owned only 5 to 10 slaves. The owners of these small farms and plantations often worked side by side with the slaves they owned. My point being that the treatment of slaves and the opinions of owners varied greatly. In some places slaves were treated horribly. In other places they were treated more like family than workers.

 

[Syriusly]

what about the fact that it said only white men could vote? I suppose that wasn't racist either?

Race had little to do with that law as plenty of whites who didn't own land also could not vote while black OK landowners certainly could vote.

No- the law allowed white male landowners to vote.

For instance- Virginia

While economic status in the form of land holdings became the central criteria for determining the franchise, other laws added restrictions based upon age, sex, race, and religion. The law excluded those under age twenty-one in 1699; that same year women also lost the vote, although it is unclear whether any had tried to vote previously as this ran counter to English custom of the time. The specific exclusion of blacks, mulattos, and Indians occurred in 1723;

 

[P@triot]

OMG...most of our founding fathers didn't believe blacks were fully HUMAN.

Another day....another wytchy lie. I filled this thread with volumes of information about our founders which includes their original writings. Each one I've posted so far proves that they abhorred slavery. Not a shred of evidence that indicates that didn't view slaves as "fully human".

 

[P@triot]

Hate to break this to you but nobody knows what Jefferson actually thought about anything. He was a politician, and whatever he said or wrote in any given time has to do with whatever was going on politically at the time he wrote it; that's why it's so easy to find something he said somewhere to make any point one wants to.

Hate to break it to you - but that is astoundingly ignorant. Even by astoundingly ignorant levels. For starters, you're trying to apply 21st Century politician standards to 18th Century individuals who weren't even politicians. They were people who simply stepped forward when their nation needed them to.

Second, we have a ton of original writings from Thomas Jefferson - many to his close friends and none of which he had any clue anyone would read hundreds of years later. Epic fail.

 

[Picaro]

Hate to break it to you - but that is astoundingly ignorant. Even by astoundingly ignorant levels.

No, actually it's ignorant to claim otherwise; most scholars, even his fans, note that he was obtuse and slippery to pin down, and his writings as body demonstrate it pretty well.

For starters, you're trying to apply 21st Century politician standards to 18th Century individuals who weren't even politicians.

No, I actually avoid that pitfall, and very consistently so, and anybody who claims Jefferson and many of the other Founders 'weren't politicians' is profoundly ignorant to the extreme, so you're just projecting here, trying to peddle some revisionist gibberish to support some of your modern ideological fantasies.

They were people who simply stepped forward when their nation needed them to.

Laughable; they were quite actively involved in the politics of their respective states, some full time, like Jefferson was for most of his early career.

Second, we have a ton of original writings from Thomas Jefferson - many to his close friends and none of which he had any clue anyone would read hundreds of years later. Epic fail.

You're a loon. You probably can't help it, as real life is probably too chaotic and messy for you to handle.

 

[P@triot]

Second, we have a ton of original writings from Thomas Jefferson - many to his close friends and none of which he had any clue anyone would read hundreds of years later. Epic fail.

You're a loon. You probably can't help it, as real life is probably too chaotic and messy for you to handle.

In the face of indisputable facts - that's the best you can come at me with? You're not only ignorant, your desperate. You can't even come up with a decent lie to dispute the facts you can't bring yourself to accept.

 

[Moonglow]

Sadly, progressive leaders on the left have managed to dupe their followers into one of the most egregious lies ever perpetrated on the world: that the U.S. Constitution is irrelevant because it was created by racist and oppressive wealthy white men.

Absolutely nothing could be further from the truth. The sad reality is the leaders on the left abhor the U.S. Constitution because it limits their power - which prevents them from imposing their will on others. In an attempt to get around that, they have created the false narrative that the document shouldn't be respected and adhered to because the document is "evil". Since a document is an inanimate object which cannot be anything, they needed to create the false narrative that it was penned by evil men.

It is sad that such great men have been so wrongfully demonized because of those with an agenda for power over others. It's particularly disturbing that our public schools are not teaching students the truth about our founders. It is time we change that. It is time the American people are educated on what actually occurred in history.

What is the public school teaching kids about the Founding Fathers?

 

[Picaro]

Second, we have a ton of original writings from Thomas Jefferson - many to his close friends and none of which he had any clue anyone would read hundreds of years later. Epic fail.

You're a loon. You probably can't help it, as real life is probably too chaotic and messy for you to handle.

In the face of indisputable facts - that's the best you can come at me with? You're not only ignorant, your desperate. You can't even come up with a decent lie to dispute the facts you can't bring yourself to accept.

You haven't produced any facts yet, just some spin that suits your biases. No point in disputing what isn't there to begin with, cowboy. Learn the difference between opinion and fact and you might make some headway.

 

[P@triot]

Second, we have a ton of original writings from Thomas Jefferson - many to his close friends and none of which he had any clue anyone would read hundreds of years later. Epic fail.

You're a loon. You probably can't help it, as real life is probably too chaotic and messy for you to handle.

In the face of indisputable facts - that's the best you can come at me with? You're not only ignorant, your desperate. You can't even come up with a decent lie to dispute the facts you can't bring yourself to accept.

You haven't produced any facts yet, just some spin that suits your biases. No point in disputing what isn't there to begin with, cowboy. Learn the difference between opinion and fact and you might make some headway.

I have one right here - we have a TON of original writings from Thomas Jefferson that friends and acquaintances kept. Sorry your fragile 'lil psyche can't deal with reality.

Another typical progressive whack-job. Ideology over reality.

 

[Moonglow]

If the Founding Fathers such as Washington and Jefferson abhorred the idea of slavery, why did they keep their slaves?

 

[Seawytch]

OMG...most of our founding fathers didn't believe blacks were fully HUMAN.

Another day....another wytchy lie. I filled this thread with volumes of information about our founders which includes their original writings. Each one I've posted so far proves that they abhorred slavery. Not a shred of evidence that indicates that didn't view slaves as "fully human".

Allow me to add to my earlier statement...the FF were absolutely racist.

What the Founders Thought of Race

Thomas Jefferson’s views were typical of his generation. Despite what he wrote in the Declaration, he did not think Blacks were equal to Whites, noting that “in general, their existence appears to participate more of sensation than reflection.”[4] He hoped slavery would be abolished some day, but “when freed, he [the Negro] is to be removed beyond the reach of mixture.”[5] Jefferson also expected whites eventually to displace all of the Indians of the New World. The United States, he wrote, was to be “the nest from which all America, North and South, is to be peopled,”[6] and the hemisphere was to be entirely European: “… nor can we contemplate with satisfaction either blot or mixture on that surface.”[7] [...]

James Madison agreed with Jefferson that the only solution to the race problem was to free the slaves and expel them: “To be consistent with existing and probably unalterable prejudices in the U.S. freed blacks ought to be permanently removed beyond the region occupied by or allotted to a White population.”[9] He proposed that the federal government buy up the entire slave population and transport it overseas. After two terms in office, he served as chief executive of the American Colonization Society, which was established to repatriate Blacks.[10]

Benjamin Franklin wrote little about race, but had a sense of racial loyalty that was typical of his time:

[T]he Number of purely white People in the World is proportionably [sic] very small… . I could wish their Numbers were increased…. But perhaps I am partial to the Complexion of my Country, for such Kind of Partiality is natural to Mankind.

Franklin therefore opposed bringing more Blacks to the United States[11]:

[W]hy increase the Sons of Africa, by Planting them in America?"

John Dickinson was a Delaware delegate to the constitutional convention and wrote so effectively in favor of independence that he is known as the “Penman of the Revolution.” As was common in his time, he believed that homogeneity, not diversity, was the new republic’s greatest strength[12]:

Where was there ever a confederacy of republics united as these states are…or, in which the people were so drawn together by religion, blood, language, manners, and customs?

Dickinson’s views were echoed in the second of The Federalist Papers, in which John Jay gave thanks that “Providence has been pleased to give this one connected country to one united people,”[13]

a people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion, attached to the same principles of government, very similar in their manners and customs."

Alexander Hamilton was suspicious even of European immigrants, writing that “the influx of foreigners must, therefore, tend to produce a heterogeneous compound; to change and corrupt the national spirit; to complicate and confound public opinion; to introduce foreign propensities.”[15] John Quincy Adams explained to a German nobleman that if Europeans were to immigrate, “they must cast off the European skin, never to resume it.”[16] Neither man would have countenanced immigration of non-Whites.

Blacks, even if free, could not be citizens of the United States until ratification of the 14th Amendment in 1868. The question of their citizenship arose during the Missouri crisis of 1820 to 1821. The Missouri constitution barred the immigration of Blacks, and some northern critics said that to prevent Blacks who were citizens of other states from moving to Missouri deprived them of protection under the privileges and immunities clause of the Constitution. The author of that clause, Charles Pinckney of South Carolina, was still alive, and denied that he, or any other Framer, intended the clause to apply to Blacks: “I perfectly knew that there did not then exist such a thing in the Union as a black or colored citizen, nor could I then have conceived it possible such a thing could have ever existed in it.”[17]

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