Myths of American Slavery

by Walter Kennedy

  CHAPTER 9

  On the State of

  Slavery in Virginia

  I was born in Mississippi, but raised in a Northern State; associations there led me to regard the Southern white man as dire foes to the Negroes, but receiving such cordial and unprejudiced association upon this floor [Mississippi House of Representatives] by the entire Democratic party here these tebidus [sic] suspicions have been eliminated from the bosoms of'this feeble six and for them 1 am authorized to speak. You are our best friends.... This has been termed the Jeff Davis Legislature possibly because the Republicans voted for your Confederate Monument Bill..... In tendering you this, we tender a grateful hand to every Democratic member, for you have shown to be our friends, not our

  Rep. Phillip Moore in (Jackson, MS) Daily Clarion-Ledger February 23, 1890

  One of the chief myths about life in the United States is that the North, unlike the South, was a place that offered freedom and justice for the African-American. In this chapter we will again look at how the African-American was viewed by Northerners prior to the War for Southern Independence and what life was like for the African-American after Yankee-induced freedom. Also, we will examine the contrast between the life of modern-day African- Americans, the descendants of slaves, and the life of modern-day Africans. In this manner, we may be able to determine whether the claims of the leftist race-pimps (Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, et al), who are always assuring Americans that the African-American has been harmed by the actions of bygone slaveholders, are valid.

  An English observer of the American political scene noted, "The federal constitution is silent about race or color ... [but] American lawgivers arrive at the conclusion, that the United States are the property of whites.... There seems, in short, to be a fixed notion throughout the whole of the states, whether slave or free, that the colored is by nature a subordinate race; and that in no circumstances, can it be considered equal to the Note that this English observer stated that this low opinion of the "colored" race was held by people in both slave and free states. The degraded condition of the free people of color in the North was characterized by Rep. Charles Pinckney of South Carolina as nothing less that an attempt by Northerners to rid themselves of their African- American population. In order to accomplish this goal, Pinckney stated that Northerners were "treating them [African-Americans], on every occasion with the most marked contempt."3 Senator John Holmes of Maine recoiled at the thought of free men of color being allowed to vote and perhaps being elected to Congress. After considering the possibility of Negroes being elected to various offices, Senator Holmes stated, "Gentlemen, with all their humanity, to be obliged to sit in this Senate by a black man, would consider their rights invaded."4 Senator Holmes's true feelings for the free people of color is displayed in his characterization of them as "a troublesome or dangerous population." In his famous debate with Daniel Webster, Sen. Robert Y. Hayne of South Carolina described the condition of life for the free people of color in the North:

  Sir, there does not exist on the face of the earth, a population so poor, so wretched, so vile, so loathsome, so utterly destitute of all the comforts, conveniences, and decencies of life, as the unfortunate blacks of Philadelphia, and New York, and Boston. Liberty has been to them the greatest of calamities, the heaviest of curses.... Go home, and emancipate your free Negroes. When you do that, we will listen to you with more patience.5

  Although the South has been tarred with the stigma of white supremacy, this philosophy was a strongly held belief among some of the most noted opponents of slavery in America; men such as David Wilmot of Pennsylvania. Most Americans will remember Representative Wilmot for his famous Wilmot Proviso which attempted to prevent the movement of Southern slave property into the newly won territories from Mexico. Promoted as a great friend of the downtrodden slave, Wilmot exhibited little real concern for the well-being of the slaves. In promoting the Wilmot Proviso he was careful to note that he had "no squeamish sensitiveness upon the subject of slavery, no morbid sympathy for the slave.... I plead the cause and the rights of white freemen.... I would preserve to the free white labor a fair country, a rich inheritance, where the sons of toil, of my own race and own color, can live without disgrace which association with negro slavery brings upon free labor.",

  New York representative Henry C. Murphy even requested strong laws to punish anyone who would bring free people of color from the South into New York. These laws would be applied "against any who shall bring the wretched beings to our Free States, there to taint the blood of the whites, or to destroy their own race by vicious courses."7 The preceding statements were made by elected officials both of the North and the South. Thus we see that even those who were representing the so-called free states had rather strong desires to keep their society free from the influence of African-Americans. As these citations were made before the War, the next question to be answered is how African-Americans were treated after freedom.

  The disenfranchisement of many white Southerners after the War and the concomitant enfranchisement of former slaves was motivated more by a desire to promote Republican control of the South and of Congress than by any deep-seated desire to promote real political equality for African-Americans. It will be remembered that while the North was enforcing suffrage for African-Americans in the South, it was at the same time excluding them not just from the ballot boxes in the North but from the Northern states themselves." During Reconstruction most of the South, both black and white, was reduced to a serf-like condition of sharecropping. The freed slaves had been uprooted and removed from the only homes and families they had known by a government that had not taken the time to prepare them for freedom. The only relationship that they had known with white people was one in which they were at least valued for their abilities. That relationship was totally destroyed by the invaders of the South and replaced with a relationship in which African-Americans were viewed as pawns by the conquering Yankees. Also, the same Congress that had pushed Reconstruction on the South had established segregated schools in Washington, D.C. By 1898, the United States Supreme Court handed down a decision in Plessey v. Ferguson that established the so-called separate but equal provision which made segregation the law of the land. Throughout the United States the freed slaves, unprepared as they were, began their struggle toward the American goal of equality before the law. With all its faults, it was still America that held the greatest hope for achieving the goal of equal rights for all.

  From the time of the elimination of slavery to the present, African-Americans have lived and worked in a nation that once only knew them as slaves. It is from this background of hardship and discrimination that many liberals now contend that reparations are owed to the descendants of former slaves. Yet, is there evidence that the descendants of America's slave population have suffered irreparable harm because of the experiences of their ancestors? What would the lifestyle of the average African-American be like if his ancestors had not been taken out of Africa? How does the lifestyle of the average Sub-Saharan African compare with the lifestyle of an African-American living in Mississippi, one of the poorest states in the Union? By answering these questions, we will have a better understanding of the conditions of life for all Africans and he able to more correctly determine whether irreparable harm has been done to the descendants of America's slave population.

  A casual examination of any major daily newspaper will provide a shocking account of life in Sub-Saharan (i.e., black) Africa. By contrasting these conditions with conditions of life in the United States, we will have a basis for determining whether the descendants of America's slave population are suffering detrimental effects because of slavery or whether the results of the enslavement of their ancestors are favorably affecting their lives. Here are just a few examples of the living conditions in Africa today:

  Burundi: Dysentery, cholera, and other public health diseases keep the death rate high; life expectancy at birth as of 1998 was forty-two years.

  Ivory Coast: Due to
political violence (in July 1999), police are empowered to shoot anyone on the streets after 6 P.m.

  Rwanda: Within the past five years, thousands have died in ethnic, black-on-black civil war.

  Sierra Leone: Civil war has plagued this nation for more than eight years. A common punishment for prisoners of war is to have their arms and legs hacked off. Sierra Leone holds the world's record for the shortest life expectancy-26.5 years.

  Somalia: Nothing needs to be said here; the name alone conjures up memories of starving women and children who are subject to abuse by various black warlords.

  South Africa: With more than sixty-four thousand reported rapes per year, South Africa holds the record as the rape capital of the world.

  Sudan: Civil war between the Muslim North and Christian and animist South has resulted in death, starvation, and the reintroduction of chattel slavery by the Muslims.

  Tanzania: Elderly women are subject to being executed as witches. Some of these killings are a result of the "skin trade" with Zambia. It is a belief on the part of some Africans that human skins provide protection from evil spirits and demons.

  Zimbabwe: Twenty-five percent of this country's population is HIV positive. Africa has the distinction of having two-thirds of the world's HIV cases.

  Not one nation in Sub-Saharan Africa can boast of a stable democratic government or a lifestyle anywhere close to that enjoyed by the average African-American. For example, the life expectancy at birth for the average citizen of Sub-Saharan Africa is fifty years, and the average per capita Gross National Product in 1999 was five hundred dollars per year. An African-American in Mississippi has both a longer life expectancy and a higher yearly income than his "brothers and sisters" in Africa.

  Rather than looking at Sub-Saharan Africa as a whole, let us look at the following nations for life expectancy, per capita income, adult illiteracy, and infant mortality. By so doing, perhaps we can determine whether the descendants of America's slave population have suffered irreparable harm because of the legacy of slavery (a legacy their brothers and sisters in the following African nations cannot claim).

  *The preceding values were taken from the World Development Indicators database, World Bank, 8/2/2000. The values for life expectancy were for the year 1998; GNP per capita income, 1999; illiteracy rates, 1999. Some of the values mentioned prior to this table will vary slightly from those given in this table due to circumstances and different dates for extracting said information. Regardless of the exact numbers, the general trend remains constant year after year in Sub-Saharan Africa.

  **These figures were taken from the United Nations Development Program, Human Development Program Report, 2000.

  As revealing as the above-cited information may be, it can hardly provide a genuine firsthand experience of what life is like for most Africans today. In his book, Out of America: A Black Man Confronts Africa, Keith B. Richburg gives a graphic account of his tour of that continent as a correspondent for the Washington I'ost. After witnessing the depth of misery that was a daily reality in Africa, after seeing for himself Africans killing and mutilating other Africans, and after learning that this is Africa, the Africa that by the grace of God and a slave ship he had escaped, Richburg thanked God that his ancestors had made it "out of Africa" and had thus given him the title of "American."`' By no means did Richburg glory in the inhumanity of slavery. Nevertheless, he understood that because his people were strong enough to overcome the turmoil of enslavement, he was given a birthright that the descendants of those who remained in Africa do not enjoy. More to the point, he found nothing in Africa to induce him to surrender his American citizenship for African citizenship. Like so many of his fellow African- Americans, he too did not believe the gruesome stories about the murder and mayhem that was being reported as commonplace in Africa. Once in Africa, however, it did not take long for Richburg to realize that the mythical "Motherland," as described by so many African-American activists, did not exist. It was the contrast between the myth and the reality regarding Africa that forced Richburg to face the fact that he was an American and not an African. The unspoken message of this African myth that Richburg had to refute is that African-Americans were torn from their idyllic African home and denied the happiness of their African Valhalla by evil American slavers. But has the removal of African-Americans from the poverty, the sickness, the incessant tribal warfare, and the illiteracy that is modern-day Africa actually caused them harm?

  To get a better picture of life in America as opposed to life in Africa, let us compare the preceding African statistics with those of the state of Mississippi. Since Mississippi is one of the poorest states in the Union, this will give us a minimal contrast between life in the United States for African-Americans and life in Africa. In 1991 the average life expectancy of a non-white person in Mississippi at birth was 69.6 years or almost twenty years longer than if that non-white person had been born in Sub-Saharan Africa, where the average life expectancy is approximately fifty years. In the year 1929, a non-white person in Mississippi had a life expectancy of 51.3 years. In other words, in order to find a time when the life expectancy of an African-American in Mississippi was close to that of the average African of today, one would have to go back in time more than seventy years. Of the twenty-seven SubSaharan nations in the table above, the lowest infant mortality rate listed is 30 per 1,000 live births in Tanzania. The "low" of 30 is offset by a high of 170 deaths per 1,000 live births in Sierra Leone. Contrast those statistics with Mississippi's infant mortality rate of 14.5 per 1,000 live births. African-American per capita income for Mississippi stands at $11,625.10 The highest per capita income recorded in Sub-Saharan Africa is $3,240, and a low per capita income in Ethiopia of $100. The illiteracy rate for non-whites in Mississippi is below 5 percent, whereas in Sub-Saharan Africa illiteracy rates range from a low of 12 percent in Zimbabwe, to a high of 85 percent in Niger. When Africans are compared with AfricanAmerican residents of Mississippi, one of the poorest states in the Union, they fall far behind black Mississippians on every quality of life indicator. What is true about Africans living in Africa is equally true of descendants of African slaves in any nation in the world other than the United States of America. The legacy of slavery in America has presented African-Americans with a lifestyle and an opportunity for material advancement that makes them the envy of every nonAmerican African in the world. How African-Americans of today can justify demanding reparation for slavery is beyond the comprehension of anyone with an ounce of common sense.

  SUMMARY

  Without a doubt, every new "minority" that immigrates to the United States, whether Irish, Italian, Polish, or Chinese, will face various amounts of social and political discrimination. The more dissimilar the minority is from the standard American norm of the day, the more difficult their assimilation into mainstream American culture will be. With the African-American being glaringly dissimilar in physical appearance as well as in cultural and historic background, is it any wonder that such a tortuous and protracted path had to be blazed to reach the much sought after position of equality before the law? Although many leftists find great delight in pointing out the difficulties placed before the AfricanAmerican during his climb from slave to second-class citizen to the status of full citizenship, it must be remembered that it was in this country more than any other nation on earth that the dream of full citizenship and prosperity was realized by the descendants of former slaves-not Cuba, Haiti, or Brazil. Yes, the road to equality before the law was rough and difficult. But the nation that made this success possible should be celebrated for its victories and not condemned for its perceived failures. To one degree or another, every minority that has fought its way from second-class citizenship to the place of equality before the law has increased the net amount of freedom for all. Upon obtaining full citizenship, other minorities have been content to stand shoulder to shoulder with their fellow citizens. Unfortunately, because of the myth of slavery and its attending hoax, the liberal establishment has c
onvinced many African-Americans that they should stand on the shoulder or neck of their fellow citizens. But let it be known that not all people of color have allowed themselves to become intoxicated on the liberals' opium of black self-pity. Men such as Ken "The Black Avenger" Hamblin inform us about the other black community in America of which they are a part. Hamblin states, "When the disgruntled hyphenated black Americans and their booster club of white liberals bemoan the racism, the poverty, the low-paying jobs-all their excuses for failure-I issue a simple challenge: Pick a better country."'' In his book by that title (i.e., Pick a Better Country), Hamblin tells of his struggles as a black man and as an American. But more to the point, he tells about the country where he achieved his success. Like Richburg, Hamblin makes no demand for reparations; rather, he challenges all Americans to use the freedoms at hand to better their life and not to be possessed with false notions of a mythical African Utopia.

  MYTH: After the Civil War, Southern states passed "Black Codes" to prevent African-Americans from exercising their new freedoms.

  REALITY: Indeed, most Southern states did pass some form of law to regulate the new relationship between the races. By doing so, these Southern states were doing nothing more than what most Northern states had done immediately after freeing their slaves. Also, it should be remembered that at the same time the Southern states were passing these laws, many Northern states were barring African-Americans from voting and segregating black and white school children. Although most of the "Black Codes" were overturned, in 1898 the United States Supreme Court in the Plessey v. Ferguson decision made segregation the law of the land. Thereafter, more than twenty-six states adopted some form of separate public accommodations. These laws, both in the North and in the South, were in response to rapid social change. This is why many early abolitionists, including many leading Southern abolitionists, desired a period of time to train and prepare the slaves for freedom.