1. america is rich for 3 main reasons land stolen from the native Americans, slavery and the money from the British empire (which was gained from invading and conquering other peoples land eg Africa, china, India, Australia, Brazil, the west indies and so on).
2. yes there were many white activists who helped bring about abolition but those numbers were not substantial. You seem to be saying slaves just sat and waited to be freed and that simply is not true, there were 200 recorded rebellions between 1600 and 1860 add to this the unrecorded and its more that just a few. the morals of white america many have changed but not enough and not soon enough. Lincoln freed slaves in states where rebellion was taking place not in places it wasn't or bordering states, if morals change they change completely which Lincoln showed through this act. The north was more morally forward than the south but during the civil war this was not to save or free slaves but create armies of black freed men under white control. A slave was the perfect solider angry as what had been done to them, physically fit due to hard work and willing to do as told for the protection the union army was willing to give.
3. times were changing and slave owners were unable to keep up, slavery couldn't be upgraded and didn't fit with the changing times. Not for moral responsibility but for potential to make money. With war outbreak, rebellions and passing of Lincolns half hearted law slave owners had no choice and even than most slave owners refused to give up on the people they paid hard cold cash for resulting in slave owners being paid for loss of earnings. The worst thing america did was teach slaves to read freedom through education, freedom through religion as times changed slaves became wise to what was happening around them and began to fight back.
Fogels studies into slavery have been provided time and again to be unfounded and his research sloppy. He claimed the south would always find profit from slavery but based this idea on one study of one plantation. He himself agreed that his field of study for this claim wasn't well built or executed. In many instances he studied the wrong information for the wrong reason.
Genovese was a very intelligent man even though i disagree with his ideology on slavery not just because i morally disagree but i believe they are fabricated. for example slaves contributed to there own slavery, slaves are better as slaves and not free men and the parentalism between slave owner and slave. He should have gone into politics because he could talk his way out a nuclear disaster.
I'm confused as to your stand point on this issue your previous post seem to contradict the reply posted to me.
Replies 0
You are apparently serious and well-menaing, but I'm afraid you're operating with a number of misconceptions.
1. You seem wholly to discount the labor of tens of millions of European immigrants.
2. There were only 3 uprisings involving more than a handful of slaves in the US, as noted. The reasons are various, but that's the fact. Genovese has a good chapter on this is "Roll Jordan Roll".
3. You merely reassert your position, which is countered by all economic and historical analysis of slavery since the 1950s. It's not sufficient to look at Wikipedia and say that Fogel has been shown to be "unfounded". Fogel's data sources were manifold, which you would know if you'd actually read his books. And none of the views which you attribute to Genovese bear any relation to his actual views. No one who'd actually read "The Political Economy of Slavery" or "Roll Jordan Roll", for example, could so misconstrue him.
You owe it to yourself to read the scholarship before you make these sorts of statements.
