I think plenty of groups have suffered historical injustices. The list is vast, women, children, people of all types of religion, race etc etc. I think racial discrimination is wrong. Do I think we should go back and compensate every group of people for every discrimination they suffered throughout history? No.
Special Order No. 15, which William T. Sherman decided he was just going to do, is some pretty thin gruel to assert the federal government "promised" anyone anything.
Two groups of ethnicities got the biggest **** ends of the stick in America, Natives and Blacks. That is a near universally agreed upon sentiment outside the confederate apologist types who tell about how the Irish were more oppressed in America because of *indentured servitude ". Yes other groups of people have been wronged. Here is a very simple question for you: Why today does the median white family have 1000% more wealth than the median black family?
And? Do you deny the multiple decade history of land theft in the South from Black property owners in the first half of the 20th century?
And all these folks were “injusticed” by the US government? What religious groups? Catholics? Mormons? Do you believe they were all equally injusticed or some more than others? I don’t believe in reparations. But you conservatives don’t even believe in investing in communities, so what to do with groups that have been historically under invested?
Not to recently freed slaves who were promised the land. I don't think soldiers removed from command were able to stay in command and say that the special order was pretty thin gruel. I don't think the soldiers that served the Union because of U.S. army thought the special order was thin gruel. https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/war-department-general-order-143 Why do you consider the one order about giving people freed from slavery land more thin than the others?[/quote]
I don't think a, "Special Order" - which could be rescinded by a higher authority based on their sole determination, is a very strong promise or a promise that anyone should rely upon for property rights. There was no act of Congress. It was simply a determination that Sherman made, which, clearly, was subject to those in higher authority assenting to, and they didn't.
Also, Special Field Orders, No. 15 (series 1865) were military orders issued during the American Civil War, on January 16, 1865, by General William Tecumseh Sherman, commander of the Military Division of the Mississippi of the United States Army.[1] They provided for the confiscation of 400,000 acres (1,600 km2) of land along the Atlantic coast of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida and the dividing of it into parcels of not more than 40 acres (0.16 km2),[2] on which were to be settled approximately 18,000 formerly enslaved families and other black people then living in the area. Special Field Order No. 15 didn't promise 40,000 acres to every slave... just another fact check for everyone.
What is your point? That slavery didn't negatively affect property and wealth accumulation opposites for Black Americans?
I think slavery has existed in most every society in human history and people of every race, national origin and religion have suffered enslavement at one time or the other. I suspect every time, if not the vast majority of the time freedom ever came for those people, they didn't receive a damn thing.
Name a ethnic group in the closed system of the United States that were enslaved for 200+ years and had children passed down as property for about 8 generations that has lasting effects on their modern wealth accumulation? Name a ethnic group in America where their slave labor was as vital as modern oil and gas to run an economic system for half an entire nation?
But the US was one of the last countries to give up slavery…. The US South then implemented Jim Crow which only ended a couple of generations ago with many still living. Why can’t conservatives at least invest in these communities instead of holding them back? You think it’s a coincidence that some communities get invested in and some passed over?
My point is the representation that every slave was promised to 40 acres and a mule by the Federal government isn't true or is an intentional misrepresentation of what occured. 1. Special Order No. 15 is of dubious authority. There was no act of congress promising former slaves anything. DId Sherman have the authority to even make such a promise? 2. A mule is never mentioned in Special Order No. 15. 3. Not every slave in the United States is contemplated by Special Order No. 15 - only 18,000 families - or somewhere in the range of 100,000 former slaves - of more then 3 million slaves.
You are literally harping on one comment in one post about the federal government promising land just so you can ignore the overall discussion on where modern black families deserve reparations