U.s. Slavery Reparations

America has gone through a terrible past. It has once decided to own people as property and deprive African Americans of their liberties and enslaved them. Since then, the United States has attempted to repair this mistake through reparations. The legal reparations of the United States have unsuccessfully redressed individual and social injustices by failing to alleviate the pain caused to the African American community. The Harm caused by Slavery still continues to be suffered by the community through this day.

Reparation is a term defined as “the making of amends for a wrong one has done, by paying money to or otherwise helping those who have been wronged.” How does this exactly apply when we’re talking about discrimination and segregation? Ta-Nehisi Coates presents “The Case for Reparations” to illustrate the need of a reparation to African- American citizens. Coates explains three major concepts in his paper. He emphasizes how African- American citizens have helped create wealth, displays how the government has actually restricted African- American citizens from owning homes in history, and presents a series of compelling stories from people still suffering discrimination and segregation today. In this paper, I will defend “The Case for Reparations” in agreement with Ta-Nahisi Coates.

The United States government should pay reparations to African Americans as a means of admitting their wrong-doing and making amends. The damages African Americans have sustained from White America’s policy of slavery have been agonizing and inhumane. Therefore, I am in favor of reparations for African Americans. The effect of slavery has been an enduring issue within the African American community. Many of us are cognizant of the harm racism brought to the African American race, conveyed through slavery, racial segregation and discrimination. African Americans suffered many atrocities, but the greatest damage done to them was the destruction of they’re original identity. African

In Charles P. Henry’s ethnography, Long Overdue: The Politics of Racial Reparation, the author attempts to provide a detailed description of how America failed to compensate African Americans for the damages and injustices of slavery. Henry delivers a summary of the racial compensations and challenges the idea of why reparations are being rejected. Charles P. Henry examines the reluctance of confronting the political, social, and historical debate over compensation concerning race in America. Henry provides a current political outlook of political efforts to implement reparation to the African American communities as well as comparison of other races. Henry discusses the effective apology that the U.S government ought too make for the slavery

"If you are the son of a man who had a wealthy estate and you inherit your father's estate, you have to pay off the debts that your father incurred before he died. The only reason that the present generation of white Americans are in a position of economic strength...is because their fathers worked our fathers for over 400 years with no pay...We were sold from plantation to plantation like you sell a horse, or a cow, or a chicken, or a bushel of wheat...All that money...is what gives the present generation of American whites the ability to walk around the earth with their chest out...like they have some kind of economic ingenuity. Your father isn't here to pay. My father isn't

Reparations for slavery have been a topic among scholars and regular people for years now. During the Reconstruction Era after the Civil War many freed slaves were promised 40 acres of land, as a form of reparations.(Staff www.The Root.com) However, this became an empty promise and nothing was enforced to help African Americans become socially, economically, or politically leveled with white Americans since. African Americans were enslaved to work for big corporations and never received any form of wages after the abolishment of slavery. Businesses that thrived off slave labor continued to succeed after the Slavery Abolition Act, while freed slaves were stuck without any assets to properly function in society. To

To better understand why the issue of reparations being paid to freed slaves or their descendants, one would have to understand a few very important facts such as slavery made America wealthy, and racist policies since have blocked African American wealth-building, the other is many indentured slaves and their families spent their entire lives as enslaved property and now freed into a society still going through changes and still in formation stages.

I agree with Ta-Nehisi Coates on the Argument for Reparations, the black people of today necessitate a form of Reparations that includes the full realization and respect of the extent of damages waged against African Americans all across America. So many problems stem from the fact that the struggles of African Americans in this country are trivialized, debased, and mocked. People need and must understand the extent of slavery in this country and how it is at the base of everything American. Simultaneously, the concept white guilt must be excised out of the society, there is nothing to be guilty of you are playing an active role on disassembling the power system at play destroying so many black lives instead of profiting from it.

For many years the United States has committed atrocious and discriminatory acts against African Americans. In a seemingly more “equal” society today many are wondering what debt is owed to the descendants of African Americans. According to Alfred Brophy of University of North Carolina, reparations are defined as, “programs that are justified on the basis of past harm and that are also designated to assess and correct that harm and improve the lives of victims in the future.” Throughout this paper I will be discussing whether reparations should be paid to African Americans. I will evaluate the question through legal, moral, and political lenses. I will evaluate the start of the movement of reparations while also taking into consideration how reparations have been given in the past. I will also explore new forms/types of reparations that can be given to African Americans. I will also determine the short and long term impacts the implementation of reparations would have on African American society and the society in its entirety.

In “The Case for Reparations” by Ta-Nehisi Coates, the author begins his article with this quote to ensure that his audience has a different perspective about the case for African American reparations. There is no denying that since the inception of the United States of America, African Americans have faced serious discrimination and injustice, which may in fact entitle them to reparations. Some African American communities of the present are still experiencing the negative effects of slavery, Reconstruction and post-Reconstruction racism. These negative effects are evident in Chicago’s North Lawndale, where the almost all-black community still suffers from the injustices committed by contract sellers when African Americans would try to purchase a home (Coates). In his article, Coates claims that African Americans deserve reparations because they inherit an “ecologically different” type of poverty compared to whites as members and are haunted by their history of impoverished ancestors (“The Case for Reparations”). The author’s premise is flawed because poverty is disadvantageous to all groups it affects, not just African Americans. Thus, one cannot justify reparations because African Americans have a different type of inherited poverty. There are

America owes a debt to slavery that can never be repaid. That's not to say it shouldn't be. At the very least, it should be acknowledged, validated, and honored with the respect that it deserves.

In the Atlantic article by Ta-Nehisi Coates titled “The Case for Reparations, Coates argues that the reason why the United States was able to grow and acquire most of its wealth can be directly tied to the enormous losses people of the African-American community have suffered since the use of slave labor in America. Historically, African-Americans have always been discriminated against. Even today, African-Americans continue to be excluded from the system, while the nation, primarily non-blacks, continues to reap the benefits. Moreover, Coates affirms that the nation needs to acknowledge these truths and should provide reparations for the African-American people. Merriam-Webster defines reparations as “the act of making amends, offering expiation,

The article, “The Case for Reparations”, presents itself with a commendable representation on how the need for reparations is essential when combined with the brutal history of slavery and progression of blacks in American Society after slavery. Ta- Nehisi Coates argues that the relationship between racial identity and reparations is based upon America’s debt to blacks for the countless years of injustice. With this he demonstrates how white supremacy has ultimately used impractical measures to maintain what they consider social stability for those who were not African American.

Slavery has been entwined with American history ever since Dutch traders brought twenty captive Africans to Jamestown, Virginia in 1619. Slavery in America is a subject with minimal truths and stories rarely told. The public school system excludes the fact that eight of the first twelve American presidents were major slaveholders. Emancipation brought freedom, but not approximation. The civil rights movement killed Jim Crow, but shadows remained. Affirmative Action created opportunities, but racism continues.

In the article, “The case for Reparations” by Ta-Nehisi Coates, the author examined African American history as it relates to slavery and oppression. The article discussed slavery experiences, unjust laws, current issues, and reparation ideas. Coates (2014) examined past events that occurred to prevent African Americans from being equal to whites. According to Coates (2014) African Americans were vulnerable because they did not have protection from law. The article discussed how African Americans suffered many loses due to whites such as voting rights, taxes, and property lost. African Americans were still at a disadvantage when certain laws were put into place in their favor. Coates (2014) gives great insight of the unfairness and hardships. The article also gives great examples of current issues that African Americans encounter in today’s society, such as health care and employment. Coates (2014) main purpose is to encourage readers that African Americans deserve compensation for years of oppression. The author also believes that reparation is necessary and would be very beneficial.