“Cowed as they are, whites will still draw the line at paying reparations for slavery.”
By Jared Taylor (pictured)
It’s been a brisk season for official apologies. On February 24th, Virginia led the pack into the confessional when the state legislature unanimously passed a bill expressing “profound contrition” for slavery. Since then, the Maryland Senate, the North Carolina Senate, and the Alabama legislature have all voted to beat their breasts over slavery. Even the board of the University of Virginia marked the birthday of the university’s founder—Thomas Jefferson—by apologizing because UVA once used slave labor. There are similar apologies brewing in the Georgia and Missouri legislatures.
Now that four states of the former Confederacy have eaten crow, it will look bad if the rest don’t. Expect a torrent.
What’s going on? The black sponsors of statehouse apologies say they want reconciliation. “Some of us can’t move into reconciliation until we have an apology,” says Hank Sanders, who backed the Alabama resolution. The Virginia vote was “part of a healing process,” explains Delegate A. Donald McEachin. The chairman of the Legislative Black Caucus of Maryland says the same thing: “The first step for healing to take place is for there to be an acknowledgment,” says state senator Nathaniel Exum. (‘Regret’ Over Md. Role in Slavery| State Senate Resolution Follows Similar Action in Virginia, By Ovetta Wiggins, Washington Post March 17, 2007)
We’re all for healing—who isn’t?— but everyone knows that has nothing to do with it. Even the white legislators who obediently hung their heads over something they never did tried to be careful to draft resolutions that would avoid raids on the treasury. “Profound regret,” and “profound contrition” were the favorite formulations that stop short of an outright apology that might lead to demands for reparations.
http://www.vdare.com/taylor/070508_slavery.htm