Ben Shapiro Shapiro is a second-year political science student. E-mail him at frumfiddle@aol.com. Click Here for more articles by Ben Shapiro
Blame everyone else. Shirk responsibility. These are the themes
of the slavery reparations movement, which seeks to suck money from
industry in a wrongful shakedown.
By defaming companies for their involvement in the slave trade centuries ago, liberal black leaders attempt to deflect attention from their own failures – failures in stopping single motherhood, in decreasing poverty, and in fostering trust in the American meritocracy.
Our overworked legal system is once again being burdened with baseless lawsuits concerning the issue of slavery reparations. On March 26, three federal lawsuits were filed on behalf of the 35 million descendants of African slaves. The defendants include Aetna Insurance Corp., railroad company CSX, and FleetBoston Financial Corp.
The class action complaint states that these companies, as well as others, “conspired with slave traders, with each other and other entities and institutions ... to commit and/or knowingly facilitate crimes against humanity, and to further illicitly profit from slave labor.” The complaint blames slavery for all of the problems in black “literacy, life expectancy, income and education.” The legal claim states that FleetBoston profited from lending capital to slave merchants, and therefore profited from slavery; that Aetna’s predecessor gave life insurance to slaveholders to protect against monetary loss from death of their slaves; and that CSX (a railroading company) benefits now from railroads built by slave labor in the mid-1800s.
Not only is this lawsuit without merit, it is also economically harmful for shareholders and employees. It is yet another convenient excuse for what really ails the black community – leaders who won’t lead.
The claim against FleetBoston neglects basic principles of capital lending. Banks attempt to make profit by loaning money to whatever business ventures are legal. To sue a bank for lending capital to a slave shipping company at a time when, unfortunately, the slave trade was legal, is to condemn the bank for the age in which it existed.
The claim against Aetna is specious for similar reasons. At the time of slavery, blacks were seen as property. But we can only hold corporations accountable for the laws of their time. Why should Aetna not insure what was at that time legally property? If in the future tobacco were banned, would Aetna be liable at that time for insuring tobacco companies now?
The claim against CSX is the most ridiculous of all. CSX was not even involved in slave labor in any way – it was only established in 1980.
In the end, this lawsuit hurts everyone, including the black community. Economically, any fiscal loss incurred by these companies will probably be taken either out of the paychecks of employees or shareholders, many of whom are black. In essence then, black Americans would shoulder at least part of the cost of slavery reparations.
The lawsuit is also an excuse for bad policy promoted by black leaders. It tears the country along racial lines, and engenders resentment against blacks. The lawsuit claims that all evils in the black community stem from “subjugation by the white man.” The lawsuit itself contains a narrative of black history in America. This narrative skips the entire Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s, an omission which only shows the unwillingness of the liberal black community to acknowledge civil rights progress. Civil rights progress has led to the burgeoning black middle class and the success of blacks in American culture.
So it is not some mysterious institutional racism stemming from slavery, as the lawsuit claims, that continues to “keep the black man down.” Rather, it is the race baiting and the victim mentality promoted by black leaders like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson that have led to underachievement in the black community. Instead of promoting hard work, personal responsibility, marital responsibility and education, blacks are taught by the Sharptons and Jacksons of the world that they will never succeed because America is built to keep them down. Not only that – they say that blacks are entitled to compensation because of their previous and present victimization. After a lifetime of hearing such propaganda, it becomes difficult not to believe it.
Slavery reparations, like all race baiting and scare tactics used by liberal black leaders, are just a smoke screen to prevent blacks from seeing the failure of those leaders. To maintain their power, leftist black leaders deflect attention from the true problems of the black community. The black community is already waking up to this problem, and soon their leadership will be held accountable.