By Antonio D. French
Filed Monday, February 12, 2007 at 6:05 AM
Freshman State Rep. Talibdin El-Amin has a knack for introducing headline-grabbing legislation that gets people talking. Labels: State_House
One month after introducing a bill to strip steroids-linked slugger Mark McGwire's name off a stretch of Interstate 70 which runs through north St. Louis, El-Amin has now sponsored a bill to have the State of Missouri formally apologize for enslaving blacks in the state for more than 140 years.
House Resolution 26 outlines the state's history of slavery, beginning in the year 1720 when "Philippe Francois Renault introduced Negro slavery to Missouri when he brought 500 Negroes with him from Santa Domingo to work the lead mines in the Des Peres River section of what is now St. Louis and Jefferson Counties".
The timing of the bill coincides with next month's 150th anniversary of the historic Dred Scott decision, in which the United States Supreme Court declared that all blacks -- slave as well as free -- were not and could never become American citizens.
"Why apologize after these 142 years? Because we haven’t apologized in 142 years," El-Amin told the AP.
El-Amin is also sponsoring or co-sponsoring legislation to repeal the death penalty, make it illegal to driving while using a cell phone, prohibits the possession or consumption of alcohol in the State Capitol or on the State Capitol grounds.
37 Comments:
It's rather hard to get a verbal apology from deceased generations.
2/12/2007 9:52 AM
Anonymous 9:52 AM said...
It's rather hard to get a verbal apology from deceased generations.
But it shouldn't be difficult for those whom have benefited from the past actions of those who participated in the slave trade to simply say "I'm sorry. The past actions of the Missouri Legislature and Missouri Courts were wrong."
2/12/2007 10:11 AM
Is this apology a top priority for him? If so, that is too bad. Maybe issues relating to all Missourians should be higher on his to do list. Who will benefit if this apology occurs? And, is it worth our tax dollars to fund his time/efforts?
2/12/2007 12:46 PM
You know, the best thing would be to just do it with no fuss. That gets it behind us and takes the wind out of the sails of those who will continue to bring this kind of stuff up. I'm white, some of my ancestors owned slaves, I'm not proud of it and have no problem apologizing on their behalf. I didn't do it so it's no skin off my back.
2/12/2007 1:40 PM
"But it shouldn't be difficult for those whom [sic] have benefited from the past actions..."
If your argument is that members of today's society have benefited from slavery, then that includes African-Americans.
2/12/2007 2:09 PM
It's no skin off my back and it's no big deal, well most likely to be true, misses the point. To say this trivializes the racial divide that plagues this city.
While I think there are bigger concerns out there, as simple as it sounds to apologize opens the doorway to guilt and with that guilt will come lawsuits just as they have had in Germany and Italy resulting from WWII. So the question becomes more than just who will apologize but who will pay.
2/12/2007 4:17 PM
Slavery in America was as complex as unjust as an institution. There were white slave owners. There were over 3500 black households with black slaves in the 1830s. Cherokee Indians owned black slaves and were the mos ruthless when going after runaway slaves. Arabs were the most notorious of slavers and slave traders, and black African chieftans sold their people for gain and begged the European nations not to abolish slavery.
On the other hand, many whites, Missouri whites and others, were against slavery and were willing to fight to end it as well. Has anyone thanked them?
Very complex, indeed! So who exactly owes whom an apology in such a dark web of conspiracies?
2/12/2007 4:27 PM
Strike 2 for El-Amin. Choosing a bill to get yourself press AGAIN instead of trying to do something about the school system. That is the biggest problem facing your constituents and you choose to ignore it.
2/12/2007 4:39 PM
I'm sorry. Now sue me if you want, but I don't have any money either.
2/12/2007 8:52 PM
You know what is interesting, his name is Muslim. The Muslims were the biggest slave traders and slavery is allowed in Islam and is still practiced today. If he is Muslim, as his name indicates, he should go after slavery practiced today in the heart of Islam.
2/12/2007 9:05 PM
Just a little comparative history so that things are placed in the proper context. Firstly, if you study the history of slaves in Islam, you would come to understand that within that system they would not be considered slaves as known in western history. The slavery that was practiced in America, involved the most egregarious, brutal, physical and mentally dehumanizing tactics ever practiced. Not to excuse any form of slavery, just to put it in perspective, and not minimize the treachery of the slavery of White America as imposed on those of African descent, I applaud Brother El-Amin for having the courage, to take on this issue to open up more dialogue on race....Because unless you deaf, dumb and blind, as Cornell West says.....Race Does Matter.
2/12/2007 9:22 PM
Everyone has been successful in attaching their struggle with the Civil Rights Struggle and have actually progressed their causes further. It's troublesome that one can speak of the atrocities of the holocaust, and Jewish people can receive an apology even from people who had no part, as they rightfully deserve. And if anyone says anything averse to the Holocaust or an apology, they're considered anti-semitic, what is when someone doesn't acknowledge slavery, or minimizes its impact. Even more troublesome is the handkerchief head house negroes who dishonor their past by discounting or allowing someone not to ackowledge the wrong imposed. The spirits of our ancestors are watching, and believe they warrant an apology.
2/12/2007 9:29 PM
Abdul Haqq, what you say, let me say this: Hada ma al haqq (that is not the truth).
I lived in dar-al-islam. History is replete with the brutality of Muslim slavery, rape, and mutilation of slaves. Go to the Sudan today. Go to Saudi Arabia and other Muslim countries today to see what they do to slaves. But in Africa, the slaves are treated worse.
La titikilim al haqq (You do not speak the truth). Allah ihekimik !
2/12/2007 10:10 PM
Well, if you ask me, the people who should apologize for slavery are long gone and dead. Yet according to one man's report here, slavery continues and especially in Africa. It's not too late to do something about slavery today.
The past is passed. Only guilty parties should have to pay or apologize for their guilt. Innocents shouldn't be forced to apologize for what people to whom they have or had no relationship with or to did.
What African American wants to apologize for the atrocities of an Idi Amin, a Papa Doc Duvalier, or a Mobutu? It's ridiculous to even think of it. Well, it's ridiculous to hold people hostage today for what others did at another time. Even further back, slavery was universal, throughout the known world and the unknown world. Even Indians practiced it.
We have enough real problems to deal with today that need our energy and attention.
2/12/2007 10:31 PM
I'm sorry that any group of people has ever had to face enslavement.
I'm sorry if I have ever contributed to the enslavement of any person. If I have, it was unintentional.
I'm sorry if I have benefited in some way from anyone's enslavement. I know there are valid arguments for why I indirectly have. If I have, it was unintentional.
I'm sorry, (and I hope I don't offend anyone) but that is as much of an apology as I can give to anyone of any race.
2/12/2007 10:37 PM
I wouldn't mind seeing some reparations. The whole housing discrimination really does not qualify. Yeah, here is some public housing, no one wants to live there, but you can't live anywhere else even though you have the financial capacity, so you take what we give you. Pretty soon all of the jobs will be gone to the suburbs and transit won't get you there. Don't even try to move out there because we make sure you can't afford it. Then we will be cutting welfare, building more prisons than community centers, and enacting three strikes laws.
2/13/2007 8:48 AM
After participating in a very open discussion about blacks and whites, I have come to realize that there are many whites who are in complete denial about slavery. Many others are in a state of such guilt that it is difficult to acknowledge they or their family's participation in the institution. The truth is, Black people WERE stolen out of their native land, brought here to work under treacherous conditions for hundreds of year for free. This free labor was multiplied by the raping of millions of black women to produce babies that would add to the free labor market. This free labor accounted for a great deal of this country's great wealth even today. This free labor built up industry and personal family wealth that was passed from generation to generation up till today. This system was justified by even the Catholic church by associating black people with the sons of Ham and also concluding erroneously that black people were not fully human! Even when the system ended, oppression of black people continued with Jim Crow till the mid sixties. With Jim Crow came advantage in terms of schools, business and economic opportunities, politics, employment etc for whites. Many of you on this blog were around during that time and if you weren't your father was. If your father paid for you to go to college or bought you a house or just got you started in life, you have benefited from the institution of organized racism. If your father or his father left an inheritance, a family home, or got you a job at his company, you have benefited from white privilege. Hell if you can trace your family name back to a village, city, or country in Europe, you have benefited because black people cannot do so. The most that blacks can do is trace back to a continent.
So, when black people take on any name, Muslim or otherwise, it is still just a shot in the dark because their entire identity and family history was stolen for profit at the hands of whites who still carry the name of the original slaveholders. Black people today still feel the pain because when we look into the mirror, we see a lighter skin that probably was the result of a rape of one of our family members. We still feel the pain, when white people sit comfortably and ask themselves, " why are those people like that?" “ We still feel the pain when a white person complains about “their taxpayer dollars being spent on this when they owe hundreds of years of back labor pay. “We still feel the pain when after 400 years and 100 million dead, you have to sit and explain why the hell you want an apology!
2/13/2007 9:05 AM
Ok, don't appologize. Let's do this the American way. Instead, just give us reparations in the form of
back labor and overtime for every slave to come into the state for every year of slavery ...and add 142 years of interest.
Damages for defamation of character.
Damages for rape of at least 80% of the black women that were here by 1865.
Damages for kidnapping, lynching, physical, mental, emotional abuse.
We could get ya for contempt of court because most of us never got 40 acres and a mule so there are some damages there.
Damages for obstruction of justice.
That should be billions and probably trillions.
Hey, lets call it even. Approve that black people ( up to those with 1 drop of black blood) will NOT have to pay taxes. Will receive a yearly tax credit, and free college education through bachelors for all black people for the next 300 years. And to assist with family reconnect, give every black person a DNA test that traces
them back to their family of origin in Africa.
How about that?
2/13/2007 9:29 AM
Because it needs to be said, "“We still feel the pain when after 400 years and 100 million dead, you have to sit and explain why the hell you want an apology!"
Fine, you want an apology. Since when do people who did nothing wrong apologize for those who did? What you want is out of the bounds od decency. Perhaps all blacks should apologize to the family of the white officer in Kirkwood who was killed. No, because all blacks did not have anything to do with the killing.
Your demand is unreasonable, and your statistics are inflated. Once again, should the descendents of the 3,500 black households that held black slaves be traced or tracked down and offer an apology too?
The freed American slaves that settled Liberia enslaved native Liberians. Why do you think there is so much hatred today between these two groups?
Once again, the demand for an apology of people unrelated to slavery or the Jim Crow laws and actions owe nothing. Most of them came in the last century.
Are you asking the Cherokee nation to apologize for their bondage of black slaves and rapes, etc?
2/13/2007 10:07 AM
Federal Policy stimulated many of our urban problems, which happens to be where the majority of African Americans live. Lets not be naive, many of these policies were outright targeted against Blacks.
Given the Japanese received money due to the World War II Internment, it seems appropriate that some redress occur. Yet, what is appropriate is not always realistic. Our Country is busy doing regime change.
2/13/2007 11:21 AM
Bill Cosby and Juan Williams blame the black leadership for many of the ills in the black community. Cosby talks about black leadership who "rejoice in your hopelessness because they have jobs mismanaging you. Their goal is not to advance people into good schools and the American middle class but to maintain a large group of poor, uneducated people who are dependent upon them."
Juan Williams says: "I want to pull the covers off of today's leaders who make money by positioning black people as victims who cannot compete. Too many black leaders sell blacks as victims to justify spending...that produce patronage jobs for their cronies but few results that actually move people out of poverty by strengthening families and schools."
Two African American voices that make more sense than some previous blabber and blubber.
2/13/2007 11:40 AM
I don't believe that black people should live as victims. Just because they don't doesn't mean that an offense wasn't done. Also, just because there are blacks that are finally succeeding, doesn't mean that there were not hundreds of years of institutionalized racism that did not happen. Black people do not need whites to make them feel better. Do you honestly think an apology would erase it? Do you think that Develin could apologize and erase the trauma inflicted on Ben and Shaun? No, but it would at least show some remorse and that may show some level of reform. You show no reform or regret.
Jewish people have a saying to never forget the holocost. Japanese people received reparations for be forced into camps.
Why is it when Black people say what they want, we are supposed to just forget about it. Boy, that would sure ease your guilt wouldn't it. If you want to ease your guilt, humble yourself and apologize.
Your arrogance about your people's acts is amazing. That same arrogance, broke up the continent of Africa for your own greed. That same arrogance oppressed even your own women. That same arrogance doesn't even acknowledge that the land you stand on was stolen from the native americans who were gracious enough to help you survive here. Then you have the nerve to celebrate Thanksgiving while still denying them their fair share. That same arrogance took over Austrailia from the native people and the people of India, South and Central America. The biggest problem that I have with many whites is that your arrogance blinds you to the havoc and destruction you have caused all over the entire planet against people of color. You have no humility about your wrongs. You stand in definance arrogantly ignoring them, denying them....Just like George W. Bush!
As far as inflating statistics, 100 kidnappings or 1 million is still wrong.
100 slaves or millions is still wrong.
Slavery, Jim Crow, and racism all were based on race. Race was the primary factor and it was implemented and enforced by government. It seems easy to say they were last century to distance yourself from it. Last century was lesa than 10 years ago.
As far as leaders living on the backs of poor blacks, lets start with the biggest organization that benefits from poor blacks. The Democratic party. Even today, blacks are still asking for equal leadership in the democratic party.
St. Louis is still divided primarily into black and white politics. Even today, there are black people who won't and don't go south of 40. There are white folks that don't hang out on the north side. Aside from politics, work,school, and business, how many blacks do you hang out with or come to eat at your house on a regular basis? All of these things have their roots in the system of slavery.
It is not my fault that you inherited the sins of your father and your fathers father.
Also Jim and Doug I appreciate your effort to understand. I realize that not all whites are as arrogance as others. I realize that there are some who are genuinely open to dealing with this ugly piece of American history as there always have been. It will take honest,open, and even painful discussions in order for any permanent healing to occur.Fear and denial only delay it.
2/13/2007 12:33 PM
Because it needs to be said, talk about "arrogance," just listen to yourself.
The Jews don't ask people who weren't responsible for the Nazi Holocaust to apologize. I have nothing to apologize for. My ancestors were abolitionists, and some died in the Civil War fighting against slavery. They didn't fight against states rights, they fought against the instituion of slavery!
My fathers did not sin against your people, and I owe you no apology, period!
Take time to study world and ancient history, and you will learn how all races went after each other and the stronger conquered. Black Africans are crying out for deliverance from black African despots and tyrants. Idi Amin ate the organs of his own people and died a peacefu death in Saudi Arabia after murdering over 300,000 Ugandans. Their blood cries out from the ground.
Pol Pot, Asian, murdered millions. It needs to be said, look at the race of mankind regardless of skin color and see if you can accuse anyone color of arrogance! I challenge you. It's your arrogance rather than humility that hurts.
Eldridge Cleaver, Black Panther, couldn't wait to get out of asylum in an African Muslim nation. He learned. Open your eyes and try to learn too. The people in that country are dying at the hands of the Muslim fundamentalists. He got out in time. I've been there and understand what he saw.
Where have you been that you're eyes have not been opened to the sinfulness of man (regardless of skin color)?
2/13/2007 1:45 PM
If whitey is so bad, why do so many of my neighbors live imprisoned behind bars in their own homes where only blacks live. They don't seem to be afraid of whitey, but they do fear the riff raff living nearby.
2/13/2007 1:53 PM
You may not want to hear this but the civil war was not originally intended to free the slaves. The war was to keep the union together. Abraham Lincoln said this himself. The reason he freed the slaves was to get more men to fight for the union so that the union could win. It was not a moral war. It was a political strategy. Slaves were just a tool to win the war.
Abraham Lincoln said in a letter to Horace Greely on Aug 22, 1962
"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union;"
2/13/2007 8:09 PM
Iknow the Civil War was not to free slaves, but some who fought fought for that reason. "My ancestors were abolitionists, and some died in the Civil War fighting against slavery. They didn't fight against states rights, they fought against the instituion of slavery!
2/13/2007 8:23 PM
And the suffragists took on the cause of abolition as well, knowing the plight of those treated as "property." Notice none of the tyrants listed are women. Hmmm.
2/13/2007 8:35 PM
That there have been atrocities committed against people is not in question. However even those you mentioned was not based on race. The belief of white supremacy is what fueled slavery and the attempt to conquer the world for your benefit. The belief that whites are superior based on Ham or the theory of evolution is what dominated the injustices throughout the world.
You demonstrate this very point when you indicate that "all races went after each other and the stronger conquered".
The others were not weak. Maybe just a little more peaceful and did not detect the deciet that awaited them because of their color.
As far as where I have been? I have traveled all over the world. This includes Asia, South, Central America, East, West, South and Central Africa, India, China, and Europe. I have talked with the natives of many lands and there is a unified concensus about whites ( as a group, not individuals) trying to conquer anyone who doesn't look like them.
If you feel you have done nothing wrong, why do you react so violently at my comments. Why does it stir so much anger? If it doesn's apply, it doesn't warrent an answer. Perhaps it is the feeling deep inside that I may be right. That may make you feel vulnerable because it means that you have to look at some ugliness that you didn't know was there. It also means that you might have to acknowledge your part more than you cared to admit .It might even point to deeper fears and insecurities that you may not be all you wanted to pretend to be. It is scary to face your shadow, isn't it. But only in dealing with your shadow can you truly be free. The lessons learned from my ancestors journey here was just that...how to be free from the inside out and still come out willing to forgive even if we never forget.
2/13/2007 8:46 PM
Just because a person was an abolishonist and fought in the civil war doesn't mean they didn't benefit from being white. Just because you love women doesn't mean you don't benefit from being a man.
2/13/2007 9:25 PM
It was not all whites. It was white men who wanted to conquer.
2/13/2007 9:29 PM
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2/13/2007 9:47 PM
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2/13/2007 9:48 PM
The belief of white supremacy is what fueled slavery and the attempt to conquer the world for your benefit.
Now, lets not say that Whites have the intrinsic tendency to conquer other peoples. That is a rather offensive stereotype similar to saying all African Americans are good at basketball, or that all Asian Americans excel in the sciences. The Mongolian, Ottoman, and Ptolemaic Empires certainly were not what would be commonly considered white.
The victors often dehumanize the loser in order to justify exploitation which is often in contradiction to their own legal or moral code.
What can be said is that the phrase "all men created equal" was in conflict with the South's economic desire for cheap labor, thus the classification of African Slaves as property instead of individuals. They had to be dehumanized otherwise that phrase would have been even more blatantly contradictory. If Slaves were not property then how could they be treated as such? The hypocrisy is even more obvious today no matter what their past rationalization might have been.
While I would love to see reparations, again the political likelihood is rather slim. What we need to focus on now is unity, especially in our divisive City, as our problems effect all regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, or creed. We all are stakeholders in the success and upward mobility of urban America, especially our African American neighbors. When one group is not merely left behind, but barred from this mobility through de facto or de jure policy, this is an indictment of our society.
2/13/2007 9:49 PM
It needs to be said, your credibility lacks something genuine. You say, "The lessons learned from my ancestors journey here was just that...how to be free from the inside out and still come out willing to forgive even if we never forget." All along you have been demanding apologies from people who are guilty of nothing--hardly fits in with "forgiveness" even though it is not needed by most today.
Africans from Nigeria, Kenya, and Zimbabwe attend my church. They don't look on whites as guilty as a race. In fact, they wonder why American blacks aren't writing about the Arab Muslims of the Sudan who are enslaving, raping, and massacring the black Dinkas and other black tribal people by the hundreds of thousands. It is definitely racial.
The Japanese massacred the Chinese (and that too was racial) even if you can't see the differences. Asians see the differences plainly.
Germans and Jews are both white, but it was the Nazis who hated the Jews.
By the way, are you forgiving the African chieftans who sold their people into slavery and who begged the European countries not to abolish slavery? What about their sons and daughters who benefited from such a lucrative commerce.
I have worked closely with people from 20 different nations, European, African, Middle Eastern, and Asian. They don't have the views you speak of.
2/13/2007 10:23 PM
A-7 and Abdul--Good for you. It is refreshing to read something from someone who does their homework and accepts the truth.
Not knowing my "point of origin" I cannot decide to appologize to. If I am English I need to appologize to a lot of folks, especially the Irish for the years of slavery/rape/etc. If I am American I guess I also need to address the Irish thing for wiping out St. Louis's own Kerry Patch to build housing for the Africans (Pruitt-Igoe). If I am Irish I need to appologize to the English for the IRA. If I'm Roman I need to appologize to a bunch of people too. If I am German I need to appogize to the Jews for the 30's and 40's. If I am Jewish I need to appogize to the Germans for what we did around 1900 thru 1920. If I am African I will need to appologize to the Italians for our invasion of their country once we learned we couldn't penetrate the Sicilan defences and rid them of their blue eyes the way we did the Italians. Throw in a few appologies for Liberia, Sudan, etc. Oh darn--I'm starting to realize that my people are every bit (if not more) guilty of racism and suppression as anybody else!
THE ONES THAT REALLY NEED TO APPOLOGIZE ARE THOSE WHO STILL PARTICIPATE IN "BLACKSPLOTATION"
2/14/2007 9:15 AM
Abdul,
Forgiveness is so much for the person that committed the offense as It frees the person whom the offense was committed. Unless of course the offender is asking for forgiveness. While that is the ultimate lesson, it doesn't mean that everyone is there yet and it doesn't mean an apology is not warrented.
There is also a difference between something being racial and something being ethinic. Ethnicity is more about people of the same race with different cultures. However, I will admit that the same cruelty exist in both forms.
The Nazi's hated Jews because they were considered impure. Jewish people originally came out of Cush (Ethiopia)and that made them impure in the eyes of Nazis. They did not see them as pure Aryans (white). So the holocost was racial.
I married an African so I do know a little something about them. You are right. Blacks should be doing more about the ongoing slave trade by Arabs of Africans. As I stated earlier, wrong is wrong.
The discusion in this case is about if a formal apology for descendants of slaves is warrented. I say it is. Why? Because a wrong was done. People suffered irreparable losses from that wrong. The wrong was committed against a whole group of people primarily based on race and was mandated by federal law.
In a court of law, the case would be clear. The real issue is that to apologize means that there may need to be financial reparations given ( as in the Japanese) and that could get expensive. That is why there has never been an apology. It is still about money and getting off cheap just as slavery itself was.
2/14/2007 4:58 PM
It needs to be said: "The Nazi's hated Jews because they were considered impure. Jewish people originally came out of Cush (Ethiopia)and that made them impure in the eyes of Nazis. They did not see them as pure Aryans (white). So the holocost was racial."
That statement is pure poppycock! The Jews did not come out of Cush. They came out of Abraham of Ur (Modern-day Iraq).
"The discusion in this case is about if a formal apology for descendants of slaves is warrented. I say it is. Why? Because a wrong was done. People suffered irreparable losses from that wrong. The wrong was committed against a whole group of people primarily based on race and was mandated by federal law."
Once again, innocent people do not have to apologize for what the guilty did! Can't you hear or read? And slavery was not mandated by federal law; it was allowed (which is different from being mandated).
You are so off base as to history. You still haven't addressed the 3,500 black households that had black slaves or the black African chieftans who sold their people into slavery or pleaded with European nations not to end slavery.
Being married to a black woman does not make you an expert on history. Back away until you have researched and studied slavery in depth. Then come back to address the issue.
"It needs to be said" isn't saying the truth. That's your problem.
2/14/2007 5:35 PM
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