The Myth of the Happy "Slaves"

The Florida Department of Education released some curriculum guides recently that discussed how teachers should deal with the topics of African American History, civics, government, economics, and American history in general. Heather Cox Richardson discussed them at length in her July 22, 2023 post. She mentions the rising criticism that these standards brought out from the public.

Vice President Kamala Harris just spoke out strongly in Florida against this standard, claiming the authorities are trying to replace history with lies. Governor DeSantis claimed he did not create these standards, and that she was demagoging the issue. (You can't have it both ways, Gov; it is your State Department of Education!)

One phrase, in particular, was criticized. It tried to describe the lives of enslaved people as "having a positive benefit since many learned skills they had not possessed before their enslavement." They seem to omit the facts that "these people" could not freely move around and sell these newly found skills to others in the marketplace, but were constrained by all means possible to work for a single so-called master. It is true that on occasion, an owner might hire a skilled man out to use carpentry or other skills, but that was not freely chosen labor as suggested by the Florida standards. That man and his services were owned by the "master" or landowner who would receive any payment for work by his laborer.

 

The concept of "owning people" is a tough one, especially for Americans who are taught in school that our governing documents state we accept that all men (and women) are created equal. We fought a bloody and costly Civil War (not apparently mentioned by these standards) to put an end to enslavement in this country. Slavery did not end solely because of the work of abolitionists, as is suggested by the document, nor did it end only because Constitutional Amendments were adopted. After the slave owing states failed in their attempts to secede from the Union, the acts of reconstruction tried to institute a new and unified country. They elected black people to office in some areas while a few set up businesses. But many newly freed people had no education, little money, and no land. Remember, it was forbidden to teach enslaved people to learn to read or write. So, some turned to the skills they had and became sharecropper or people who farmed on land owned by others.

Soon, White supremacists in many forms, such as the Ku-Klux-Klan, acted against Black freed men and women. Sometimes, they drove them from office and out of towns. And even though the Constitution now allowed them full citizenship and voting rights in law, in reality, this was not the case. These rights, even today, are under fire in some areas as Republican legislatures set up onerous voting guidelines fighting fictitious voter fraud issues.

 

The guidelines continue and suggest that the American Slave trading enterprises were much the same as in other markets across the world during those times, ignoring the facts that these practices were condemned in many countries decades before this movement happened in America. Yes, African tribes fought with each other and captured people who were held as slave. This is not the same as the commercial enterprises that enslaved over 10 million people to work in the American South, South America, and across the Caribbean. They estimated another two million were casualties in the crossing of ships from Africa to the Americas. For over 300 years, from 1550 to 1860, the ships kept coming; the majority were owned by British and American citizens. Estimates are that about 400,000 of those captured were sent to America. These business owners stripped people naked and exhibited them in "slave markets" such as in Charleston, South Carolina, or Boston, Massachusetts, where buyers would bid on them like cattle in today's cattle markets. The suddenly enslaved, had no rights in our constitution and could not protest their fate. Few understood the languages spoken around them, fewer still understood why they were there or that they no longer had any say in their lives. Were they to escape, they would be beaten and punished in other ways if caught; some were treated with extreme cruelly. States passed escaped secondary laws that allowed bounty hunters to pursue escapees across state lines, even into states designated as free states. While, sometimes, an owner would free his slaves when he died, they often had trouble living as free men in a society that might not accept their new status.

The authors of this document try to muddy the waters of discussion by comparing the unlawful capturing and selling of people and families with the practice of indentured servitude commonly used to pay off a debt or realize freedom after a certain agreed-upon time. The enslaved person had no end date on their services. They could not even keep their children without permission; families were often cruelly separated. Far too many women were raped or used as desired by owners. (Perhaps this information is too harsh to teach to young children, but older teens could understand; popular music is more graphic.) Some of these facts seem too stark to teach to Florida's children if one reads this document. How can anyone teach children that there are wrongs to be righted, if they do not mention the misdeeds of history? How do history teachers in Florida teach about the Holocaust and Hitler's camps in World War II? Or the atrocities across historical eras, such as with medieval barbarians, with the Crusades, or the plundering and killings of the Incas in South America by the Spanish? Or do they no longer teach these histories in schools today?

I understand children may find it difficult to realize that people are inhumane in today's age where society cries out when an animal is mistreated or people rescue injured birds with compassion. But there was a time in our history when humans were treated badly, worse than we allow animals to be treated now. I think children can understand that. As a white person, I think all children can learn these truths and vow, as I did, to try to prevent acts of humanity in their lives.

If children are saddened to think that some people acted terribly centuries ago, that should not make them feel bad about themselves, it should strengthen their resolve to keep such things from happening again.

Inequity exists, racism exists, and inequality exists. There are those who have and those who have not.

We can, as a society, make these issues better, if we try. We cannot do it if we forget about the past and do not learn from it. We cannot do it if we allow those who do not believe in democracy to continue to divide us for their wishes. DeSantis and others claim they are trying to create a Christian Democracy. First, what they are doing is neither following Christianity nor democracy. Second, America is a nation of many people from many lands and with many religions; it is not a theocracy and hopefully never will be.

Those who continue to undermine the principles upon which this country was founded are unqualified for office in any form.

Word is out that DJT has received yet another notice that he is a target of another Federal Grand Jury, this one investigating the January 6^th insurrection. I await an indictment soon. (PLEASE!)

‘Til next week -Peace!