Again? Still? RCOB
And so the whitewash continues unabated.
Someday they will just teach kids “SHUT UP”.Hmm,looks like our regulars took the day off from this one Drew.
Slackers.Really? You commented. Twice And you’re as regular as a triple dose of Ex-lax.
I did not read the essay, but am curious as to why you think it was not a bad thing.
I don’t really have an opinion because I don’t have enough information one way or the other. I’d just like to hear your take on this.Posted by irish19
03/01/2013 at 08:20 PM
I’m much surprised that the thunder faces shown here have the ability to even read.
And what’s with this? And his general apology?
It was, he has since said, a clumsy and regrettable mistake.
Jeesh ... Drew, I fear our country is as doomed (eventually) as they are here.
I read the essay. I believe I understood his point. As for his critics among the faculty, I’d be willing to bet that many are simply getting in tight with the kids and have no personal thoughts in the negative.
And these block heads are the future?
Heaven help us.
I read it. It made sense, and I don’t get what is racist about it. Fire the lot and start over. When you change things at a school, you aren’t making a difference or making anything better, you’re just fucking everything up for the people who come after you. Students are temporary. The School is permanent.
Irish, go read the damn article. Go read some history. Stop being a lazy. There is no excuse.
However, because it is always my wish to wear my fingertips off typing out 1300 word essays for people who really should know better (ahem) ...
Emory’s president wrote an essay about how our method of government can allow compromise between even diametrically opposed sides. This is one of the basic lessons that children used to be taught in a class called Civics. It was still taught when that class became Social Studies, but this fundamental and beautiful concept of what America is all about - “towards a more perfect union” - seems to have been lost along the way, perhaps when the focus of teaching history changed abruptly from the 3 Cheers method to the Black Armband method, when the focus of studies went from the accomplishments of Dead White Men to what were the peasants wearing that year? and the Big Ticket items were thrown out with the bathwater.
The 3/5 Representation that is part of the Constitution - and a dead inglenook, to boot - was a deal cut between the North and the South. It got the South to ratify the new Constitution and join the new Federal Republic after the Articles of Confederation experiment failed.
The North did not really want slavery; it had in fact been banned in at least one of the colonies (Vermont) since the earliest days of the Revolution. Slavery did not really work in the North; it was a poor capital investment. The South did want slavery, mostly because the kind of crops they were growing the time (rice, sugar cane) are labor intensive to plant and harvest. Slavery was actually declining in those early years, and would not take off again until the invention of the cotton gin and the advent of King Cotton a good 20 years after the ratification.
But the beauty of the thing, the most basic point, the “towards a more perfect union” aspect was that a blight on human freedom was allowed to continue in order to create a stronger whole. THIS IS THE KEY POINT. Compromise now, and the “tin can” we “kick down the road” today will rust away by “tomorrow”.
Without the 3/5 Compromise, the southern colonies would NEVER have ratified the nascent Constitution, and there never would have been a new federal republic of the United States of America. At best there would have been the North End and the South End. Being split in half, both sides would be weakened, and easy prey to any European power. Look up the War of 1812, and the little war we had with France before that one.
And in the South End, slavery would be entirely legal. There would be NO VOICES CRYING OUT AGAINST IT, EVER. It is quite possible that slavery would exist there today. So: No Compromise = No United States.
Well, how about a smaller or larger Compromise? And what’s being Compromised, anyway?
Your shoes do not vote. They are possessions, not citizens. Your shoes do not have Representatives in Government. Your shoes do not pay taxes.
Your cattle do not vote. They are possessions, not citizens. Your cattle do not have Representatives in Government. Your cattle do not pay taxes.
Your slaves do not vote. They are possessions, not citizens. Your slaves do not have Representatives in Government. Your slaves do not pay taxes.Legislative Representation - Congressmen - are appointed based on a State’s human population. (This was supposed to mean their number of citizens. See the rub? See the weasel-like behavior of proto-Democrats? See how the rules are getting bent even before the new nation’s Contract is ratified?)
If some Southern colony had, hypothetically, 100,000 citizens, they’d get 4 Congressmen. Since slaves are property, it doesn’t matter how many there are in that colony, so we won’t count them any more than we’d count the chickens. But if they had 100,000 citizens and 1,000,000 slaves, AND slaves counted as full citizens, EVEN THOUGH THEY WERE PROPERTY AND HAD NO REPRESENTATION AT ALL, then that colony would be given 44 Congressmen and have ELEVEN times the power in the House.
And this is where the Compromise comes from. Now go work out the numbers, and you will see the truth:
0/5 - No Compromise; slaves garner a colony no additional Representatives. Result: that colony WILL NOT join the USA. However, slavery will continue in the Southern colonies.
1/5 - Slight Compromise. Result: that colony MIGHT ratify and join the USA, but since there were more anti-slavery states in those days than pro-slavery states, AND the pro-slavery states had less human population of all kinds, the very small advantage given by a 1/5 Compromise would soon see slavery voted out of existence. The Southern colonies could see this writing on the wall, and would not join at this “exchange rate”.
2/5 - Small Compromise. Result: Same as the 1/5 Compromise, but it gives the Southern colonies a few years extra time to either settle the matter themselves or to bolster their position. More colonies would be willing to sign up at this rate than at lesser ones, but some would still remain aloof. This gives you a smaller, weaker nation. In the colonies that refused to Ratify, slavery remains legal. FOREVER.
3/5 - Medium Large Compromise. The North is meeting the South MORE THAN HALFWAY. Result: the Southern colonies can keep their slaves for at least the next 3 generations, and they control significant power in the Legislature, giving them the ability to win pro-slavery bills at least half the time. Obviously, this was the tipping point, and all the slave embracing colonies signed up at that Compromise rate. And slavery continued another 77 years, which is pretty close to 3 generations. However, had it not been for Eli Whitney’s cotton gin, King Cotton never would have been crowned, and it is quite possible that slavery would have petered out by the 1830s. If some business practice isn’t making you money, you stop doing it. Period. Farmers can realize that, and so can Industrialists.
4/5 - Strong Compromise. Now we’re looking at things from the other end of the spyglass. The Northern colonies would be strongly limited in their power with this kind of a give away to the South, especially when the South could just go buy another 100 shiploads of slaves and thus boost their population whenever they felt like it. Under a 4/5 Compromise, slavery would have endured AT LEAST another 6 generations, which means natural manumission may not have come until the early 20th Century. Which means another 70 years of slavery past the point that a war ended it.
5/5 - Full Compromise. Not only would the Northern colonies never have stood for this, and thus no new United States ever formed, had they been so desperate and done it anyway, then slavery would probably still exist coast to coast below the Mason Dixon Line. Possibly above it; giving in fully like this also means no Missouri Compromise, no Bloody Kansas, no Mason Dixon Line ... it’s nearly a guarantee that slavery would still exist in every state in the nation. EVERY STATE. And thus, the Noble Experiment would have failed, and been nothing more than GREECE II, a second Athenian effort. Which would probably have fallen apart by now as well.So there you have it:
0/5 to 2/5: We don’t have a United States, but the South has slavery forever
3/5: We have a United States with slavery for the short term in the South
4/5 to 5/5: We have a United States, but the pro-slavery legislature is so strong that slavery lasts forever and eventually encompasses the entire nation. Freedom is something that only white people have.And that’s the bottom line, Irish: the 3/5 Compromise was the ONLY way to ever bring the colonies together into a strong nation AND limit the lifespan of slavery at the same time. Which is why proper grade school education has ALWAYS made this the prime Civics lesson, showing how Compromise works TOWARDS A MORE PERFECT UNION. And thus Emory’s President Wagner was 100% correct. And his students and his professors are fuck-witted morons.
Sorry about the laziness and thanks for the explanation (explication?). I sort of thought it might be something like that.
Hope your fingertips grow back.Posted by irish19
03/02/2013 at 06:02 PM
03/02/2013 at 09:40 AM
