Those who gained their freedom from being enslaved as prisoner of war or of empire had horrible laws restricting their rights, but those rights were not denied a s matter of birth. Place, maybe, but it was all temporary. They did not have laws as the USA enacted to make sure that being born Black = Slave.
In reading through the 13th and 14th Amendments entries at Wikipedia, the corporations of the plantation system have had a long, evil impact on this nation. The 3/5th clause and Dred Scott decision were all within the framework of American law.
After centuries of struggle, we have the
SCOTUS ruling for corporations against the people and Paul Ryan calling for repeal of the 14th, and all it implies. The section of the 14th that grants corporate personhood is not his issue. The other clauses and sections are his issue. The GOP has a practical plan, turning the states red enough to get enough state legislatures to do it and it will be legal. This is how Amendments are made and repealed, not by national vote.
The repeal of geographical section of the VRA, ignores the reactionary push to end the rights of all minorities. The only thing good that could come out of it, is a law with a national system of regulation over all the states, which the GOP don't want, as a matter of principle. They don't want a democracy, they want a theocracy, all the states divided up into fiefdoms ruled by the richest citizens, their utopia.
A large part, if not all, of the overturn of DOMA was due to the 14th Amendment which extended the Bill of Rights. They would repeal the amendment creating the IRS and women's sufferage.
I'm tired of the faux oppressed yelling about enslavement when compared to the real, hands-on enslavement in the slave trade, and what is happening to the poor and women in the flesh, right now. They don't know what it's like and want to play victim. Huh, uh.
Denied human rights. We must remember all of this history and rise up against those who see those days as romantic, and cry about 'the rights of freedmen.' But forget about those who were now free in those glorious days of yesterday.
Thanks for posting this. I hope there will be a follow up of Obama's visit. It will make Faux and Ditto heads explode. Their worst nightmare come true, a president who represents the poor and unpopular. Who I support, because I've been there and seen the land through those eyes.
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