Checking those ties to slavery

This wasn't supposed to happen here

[Reprinted from Issues & Views May 31, 2004]

The extortion continues. Groups of blacks are busy all across the land tailoring their reparations schemes to the specific political framework of cities and towns. In Detroit, on May 6, ten Wayne County Commissioners passed the "Slavery Era Disclosure" ordinance, which they then tacked onto the county's existing business procurement ordinance.

The newest ordinance will force current corporations to open their books as far back as they go, so that they may be investigated for "possible ties to slavery." Any company that refuses to comply will not be eligible to compete for county contracts worth $20,000 or more. Declares Commissioner Kwame Kenyatta to the Michigan Citizen newspaper, "We will never get along or move along until we look at where we've been."

The campaign that resulted in the new ordinance is part of a movement by advocates for black reparations to get the issue of slavery on the agenda of every city council throughout the country. This is considered a first step in a game plan that is expected to be long and arduous, but ultimately successful. In Detroit, according to the Michigan Citizen, the ordinance was applauded by blacks who claim that it is the "duty" of leaders to compel corporations to "come clean" about their past involvement in slavery, since black reparations should be given "the same prominence as the Holocaust."

Claiming greater productivity on the part of blacks than any other Americans, Detroit City Council member JoAnn Watson cites the Louisiana territory as having been purchased "exclusively from slave profits." Reparations advocates also estimate that this country owes blacks five to ten trillion dollars. This is a figure purportedly cited in the anthology, Should America Pay? (No mention is made of decades of welfare, food stamps, subsidized rent and dozens of city, state, and federal programs paid for by American taxpayers. Will these costs be deducted from those trillions?)

Paul Lee, described as "a noted Malcolm X scholar," praised the Detroit ordinance, explaining, "For the first time, there is a systematic assessment of what it means to be in this country and treated as property."

And now, onward to mischief making in the next city.

See section on Reparations: Lining the Pockets of Elites

Copyright © 2010 Issues & Views