[virgil283]

"So let us start to set the record straight on one point at least. The archives demonstrate that the Stuart monarchs Charles II and James II systematically drew up laws to enforce and spread hereditary slavery, mimicking the Spanish practice of the day and the "divine right" absolutism of the Habsburg empire" In short the Crown instituted slavery and protected it because it brought in great wealth in taxes. Not because free enterprise needed or wanted it

[sinsofsolarempirefan]

I believe that was Thomas Jefferson’s contention when he was drawing up his list of grievances against George III. Never mind the fact that he was himself a slave-owner, whilst George III personally opposed slavery and banned sugar from his household in protest at the horrific conditions under which slaves lived in the sugar plantations in the Caribbean.

[colorado tanker]

Something else we can blame the later Stuarts for. Works for me.

[sinsofsolarempirefan]

BTW, I thought I ought to state for the record that I believe the American Revolution was on the whole one of the greatest forces for good in world history. I just think Jefferson was a bit of a rooster and George III was generally a good man who as a constitutional monarch took his lead from his Government.

[tophat9000]

Bump