[detbuch]

Originally Posted by spence

I read your post. It took a while. Here's a summary.

• Slavery came out of left field
  
  Wrong. Baseball hadn't been invented yet. Slavery existed in cotton fields and cabbage patches, and in the manor's kitchen, and in the driver's seat of fancy carriages, and in various parts of Europe, and Africa, and Asia, and what we call South America, and . . . oh yeah . . . throughout the whole known world.
  
  and surprised the process built by slave owning Founders.
  
  Gee . . . you got that from reading my post. No wonder it took you so long. It takes time to find stuff that doesn't exist. Well, no, it wasn't a surprise to slave owning Founders. It was a well established institution passed down through many centuries of human existence, and, like Obama's troubles, it was . . . . oh, what is that word he so often repeats? Oh yeah . . . it was INHERITED. And practiced by many others beside slave owning Founders--including black slave-owners. An owner of one of the largest number of slaves was black. There were actually free manumitted blacks in the South and free blacks in the North who were business men and others of various productive talents. And many of the Founders didn't own slaves and were morally opposed to slavery and tried to bargain it out of the Constitution. And even some of those who did own slaves, if not most of them, knew it was wrong on philosophical grounds, but thought, like you apparently do, that blacks would be at a loss if freed to be on their own. And there was that obstacle of getting the Southern States to agree to stay in the union. There was, however, a compromise that importation of slaves would not under the new Constitution be allowed after 1808 unless, of course it was amended to change that. There was actually no mention of the word "slave" in the Constitution. Slavery was neither expressly allowed nor expressly prohibited. But the intention of most of the Founders was that it would eventually be eradicated.
  
• They tried to fix it all up with the Civil War but the slaves and libs wanted even more.
  
  "They" did "fix it all up" with the Civil War, and the freed slaves were happy with that, not demanding more than to be left unmolested to flourish on their own. There were some notions of reparations discussed. The forty acres and a mule thing got nowhere. My point was that the experience of an all powerful Federal government as existed during the Civil war, that many consider unconstitutional, and the governments power to tax incomes to support the war, certainly implanted a seed in the psyche of post war progressives that such governance could solve all the perceived inequities. The original bad seed was slavery. The perceived necessity of unearthing that seed spawned further seeds that were as much a poison, or more, to the Constitution as was slavery
  
• Had we just let the black community to themselves, they would have built gleaming cities and slowly -- and in a Constitutionally acceptable manner -- blended into the American fabric...perhaps as early as the 23rd century.
  
  They actually did build some cities that gleamed far better for them than many of our present day cities such as Detroit. Whether they gleamed or not was not the point. The point is, constitutionally, they were free to do so. What transpired to sabotage those efforts was not "Constitutionally acceptable." Nor is a great deal of the crap that destroys black communities today a result of the Constitution. Rather it is a result of progressive governmental intrusion. And, unless that is reversed, and we revert back to the self governing responsibility inherent in the Constitution, those blacks who have surrendered their personal responsibilities to progressive government may not "blend into the American fabric," even by the 23d century.
  
• But a bunch of racists (i.e. anti-Jim Crow zealots) rushed the process via social engineering.

No, they didn't rush the process, they transformed it from personal responsibility to government dependence.

Considering how far our society has moved in terms of race and more recently gay acceptance I'd say that those holding what the majority feels are bigoted positions are certainly less free.

"Majority opinions" may well have moved faster in terms of race had minorities been left to flourish without either unconstitutional government "help" or corrupt unconstitutional government hindrance. Opinions about race and gender change organically if they evolve naturally. That sort of change, in my opinion would change generationally without government force if people are constitutionally left free to live their lives as they see fit. There is a natural coalescence among free people, and a resistance to change and acceptance among people who are divided into opposing camps. Equality before the law engenders that evolution. Laws that divide people, that view them as haves and have-nots, and redistributes from one to another, favors one over another, just further delays true acceptance and love.

Well done Government, well done.


Progressive jurisprudence isn't an open book,

You'll have to clarify that . . . I don't know what you mean.

like I said, everything has to be evaluated on its merit.

Ditto . . . what are you talking about?

Just because you can change doesn't mean you must change.

Where are we going with these platitudes?

With the inverse conservatives would never be able to evolve either...

-spence

Well . . . OK . . . I guess . . .

I'll say this: so-called conservatives have been guilty of planting bad seeds in the constitutional construct as well. Federally defining marriage, for instance, or even legislating Federal privileges for marriage which is the seed for the growth of "gay marriage" and who knows what other types of "marriage" yet to come--where in the Constitution is there found a Federal power to do so? Constant tampering with it, even if it's an attempt to "fix" past tampering and destruction, if not done constitutionally, just leads to further planting of bad seeds. A poorly husbanded garden leads to a briar patch, or worse.