Obama isn't the only one whose ancestors owned slaves (DOESN'T EVERYONE???)

Chicago Sun-Times ^ | March 4, 2007 | MARK BROWN Sun-Times Columnist

[TommyDale]

I would be proud to find Confederate soldiers in my ancestry, just as I would if I found Union soldiers. It is history, for Pete's sake!

[Chi-townChief]

That would be cool although it's the wrong side of Africa for the Atlantic slave trade; but you never know.

[AnAmericanMother]

It's history, true, but when you have a great-aunt who always referred to "The War" and everybody knew which one she meant, it might be embarassing to have a bluebelly on the famly tree. I knew my great-grandmother, and she was a child during the Civil War (or the War of Northern Aggression, if you prefer.) It really wasn't all that long ago.

On the other hand, my husband's mother is a New Jersey farm girl whose progenitors fought for the Union (at least the ones who had gotten here from Ireland already) and nobody around here holds it against him!

Actually, one of my ancestors was from New York City, and a bunch of his family stayed up north, so I probably have some cousins I don't know about who fought for the Union. I also had an Englishman ancestor who immigrated in the 1810s, to Newark NJ, with his father and brothers. A bunch of them stayed up north too. He moved to Alabama and did own slaves for a time, but sold them as he decided it was too much trouble and responsibility.

The historian Eugene Genovese said that slavery would have fallen of its own weight within a few more years, as mechanization and improved farming techniques made it completely obsolete.

[SauronOfMordor]

The historian Eugene Genovese said that slavery would have fallen of its own weight within a few more years, as mechanization and improved farming techniques made it completely obsolete.

Slavery was only economically viable as long as land was essentially free. A free man farming his own land is more productive than a slave who has to be watched, and only works hard enough to avoid punishment. He can therefore outbid a slave owner for farmland and still farm profitably

[Vn_survivor_67-68]

take a look at some of these:
http://www.google.com/search?q=kenya+slavery&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

[berdie]

Maybe in some cases, but you may want to look at the history of that statement.

[Eagles6]

"No, actually my ancestors were slaves to the British in Ireland. We demand reparations, by the way."

You can sign me up too. Just as long as they don't pay us in credits for the NHS.

[Vn_survivor_67-68]

Kenya, 1966.....Time Magazine:

Smugglers of Flesh
Friday, May. 06, 1966

Slavery is a touchy subject for Africans, who have both practiced and been victimized by it for centuries. When the United Nations made a recent survey of its members to discover the extent of slavery today, 14 African countries ignored the questions and many of the others were evasive. Though the report showed that slavery is gradually disappearing, London's 143-year-old Anti-Slavery Society claims that it still exists in many parts of Africa. Last week, in fact, Kenya and neighboring Tanzania were embroiled in one of the continent's messiest slavery scandals since the days of Stanley and Tippu Tib.*

Curse of the Kiboko. The scandal broke with the discovery that a band of Kenyan "slave masters" has been luring young boys from Kenya's remote bush district of Kisii, shipping them 400 miles away to Tanzania, then putting them to work as forced laborers in sawmills and on maize farms. Both the Tanzanian and Kenyan governments have launched investigations, arrested seven Kenyan slavers so far. By last week police had freed 48 boys between seven and 16 years old, were scouring northern Tanzania in search of 200 other youngsters who are still missing.

Ex-Slave Ongera Okeja, 16, told how a man had approached him more than three years before in Kisii and offered him $7 a month to cut timber. From the start, he had received no money at all, been given only two changes of castoff work clothes and a small daily ration of maize and soya beans. Ten-year-old Mageto was recruited when he was seven. Pointing to a raw, partially healed wound on his leg, he said: "We were always forbidden to leave camp, but I finally did and was lashed for it." Whippings in Mageto's camp were a regular daily ordeal, administered with a skin-shredding bark lash called a kiboko.

Working deep in the cold, damp rain forests on the Tanzanian slopes of Mount Kilimanjaro, the boys put in a 12-to 14-hour day, slept in crowded grass hovels, huddling together at night for a little warmth. When a boy got sick or was hurt, there was no medical treatment. Otundo, a 14-year-old who spoke with a frightened stutter, told police about a friend who was injured by a falling tree: his throat was slit because he could no longer work.

Priority Treatment. Tanzania's President Julius Nyerere has ordered "priority" treatment of the slave scandal, and Kenya's Jomo Kenyatta—appalled by these "smugglers of living flesh"—sent a Cabinet aide to Kisii to direct the investigation personally. The governments are also tightening their laws. Up to now, slave masters who did not actually sell their victims could only be prosecuted under child-labor or minimumwage laws. In Tanzania, offenders face a maximum of $280 in fines, three months in jail, and payment of back wages. Kenya's maximum sentence is a $70 fine for first offenders, $140 fine for repeaters. To those who sell their slaves outright, the courts are tougher. A slaver convicted in Kenya last month was sentenced to three years' imprisonment and twelve strokes of the lash.

* Notorious boss of the Zanzibar-based slave trade in the 1880s who, as virtual ruler of central Africa between the Congo and Lake Tanganyika, became Stanley's business partner in return for providing him with "porters."
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,901844,00.html

[Richard Kimball]

None of my ancestors owned slaves, at least as far back as I can trace them, which was their first entry into Texas in the early 1800s, although I don't know if the Cherokee part of my family tree owned slaves. It was common for some tribes to take prisoners and use them for forced labor, but I don't know that much about the Cherokees. I did have an ancestor that was a Lt. in the Confederacy, and my brother has a photo of him in uniform with his pistol and saber.

I don't really care, other than as a historical interest. The columnist is obviously suffering from LGS (liberal guilt syndrome), in which you feel obligated to feel guilty about something you didn't have anything to do with, while feeling no guilt about bad things you do.

[Chi-townChief]

Ahhhh, modern day slavery - slipped my mind. Thanks.

[dynachrome]

Ran across this on FR awhile back.

[AnAmericanMother]

The North Carolina band of Cherokees held slaves just like everybody else. In fact, free blacks held slaves.

Fish don't know they're wet, and when something is part of your local culture it's just accepted as part of the landscape.

[Mogger]

Some of my ancestors (white) were captured by Indians in Royalton, Vermont, taken to Montreal and sold to the French as slaves.

[null and void]

OTOH, I'm mostly Slavic. We gave the world the very word 'slave'...

[null and void]

Next controversy?

BOTH sides of his fambly owned slaves. It's a muslim thang, you wouldn't understand...

[Sherman Logan]

Congratulations on an excellent point.

Every person on the planet probably has both slaves and slavers in his ancestry. The only question is how far back you would have to go to find them.

[null and void]

That would be cool although it's the wrong side of Africa for the Atlantic slave trade; but you never know.

Here's your choices chum, Atlantic trade, you get to pick cotton. [muslim] Arab trade you get to be castrated and guard the harem...

[Richard Kimball]

Thanks for the posts. My Cherokee ancestors were in Texas and married into the family in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The Texas Cherokees immigrated from the east, so it's certainly possible they owned slaves. As you can imagine, there's not a whole lot of written documentation, beyond passed down verbal accounts.

[LonePalm]

I'm not sure about smoking but, at least in Obama's case, it's OK to have done cocaine.

Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)

[BnBlFlag]

"Quite a problem for Obama....".
I guess he'll have to pay reparations to himself.