A Public Service Announcement regarding
slavery: it doesn’t require chains, locks, and keys.
The following excerpts from three books
on slavery have, I believe, many connections to income taxation as well as to other
institutions or policies which are unfriendly to human rights. We have much to learn about freedom when we study its opposite.
The first book is a biography of Harriet
Tubman. The second book was written by
William Still, who interviewed fugitive slaves as they were just escaping from
slavery. The third book is what the recent
movie Amazing Grace is based upon (a
movie that’s on my must-see list).
Take some time, dear reader, to ponder
the connections between then and now, the connections between that "peculiar institution" and some of the other institutions we live under today. I
think it will be time well spent.
From Bound
For the Promised Land: Harriet Tubman, by Kate Clifford Larson. Ballantine Books, 2005
Earning your own living not a right for a slave: “Harriet
hired out her time quite regularly during the 1840s, paying Brodess [her
master] a yearly fee [$50-$60] for the privilege of hiring herself out to
temporary masters of her own choosing…”
Escaping
the system: “The system of slavery could
work only if those enslaved believed the costs of escape would be too great and
the chances of successfully getting away too remote.”
Necessity
of earning a living: “For the
thousands of refugees who fled north for a chance at a free life, daily struggle
did not end when they left the South.
Liberty did not guarantee food, clothing, and housing. The daily work of
survival continued… ”
Importance
of being self-supporting: “On June 5
[1863] Montgomery led his regiment down the coast to capture Darien,
Georgia. Tubman stayed behind to help
the newly arrived freedmen from the Combahee raid. ‘Most of those coming from the mainland are
very destitute, almost naked…I am trying to find places for those able to work,
and provide for them as best I can, so as to lighten the burden on the Government
as much as possible, while at the same time they learn to respect themselves by
earning their own living.’”
Notice that rather than laying the burden of these newly freed slaves on the government (as would most likely happen today), Ms. Tubman advocated assistance from the private sector instead. She also avoided creating a generation that crippled itself with dependency upon government services. It was a self-respect issue.
Notice that rather than laying the burden of these newly freed slaves on the government (as would most likely happen today), Ms. Tubman advocated assistance from the private sector instead. She also avoided creating a generation that crippled itself with dependency upon government services. It was a self-respect issue.
From The
Underground Railroad, by William Still.
Dover, 2007
The
desire of slaves to be self-supporting, Cordelia
Loney, 1859: “As many creature comforts and religious privileges as she
had been the recipient of under her ‘kind mistress,’ still she ‘wanted to be
free,’ and ‘was bound to leave’…She was willing to take the entire
responsibility of taking care of herself.”
The
desire of slaves to be self-supporting, Barnaby
Grigby, 1855: “He was prompted to escape because he ‘wanted to live by
the sweat of his own brow,’ believing that all men ought so to live. This was the only reason he gave for fleeing.”
Contentment
with slavery is learned, Charles Thompson, 1857:
Vigilance Committee of Philadelphia: “Suppose
your master was to appear before you, and offer you the privilege of returning
to Slavery or death on the spot, which would be your choice?”
Charles Thompson: “Die right there. I made up
my mind before I started.”
VC: “Do you think that many of the
slaves are anxious about their Freedom?”
CT: “The third part of them ain’t
anxious about it, because the white people have blinded them, telling about the North – they can’t live here; telling them that the people are worse off than
they are there; they say that the ‘niggers’ in the North have no houses to live
in, stand about freezing, dirty, no clothes to wear. They all would be very glad to get their
time, but want to stay where they are.”
Remember, without an income tax, we'd all be standing around dirty, naked and freezing, and wondering where all the roads and schools went. Keep preaching that to anyone who speaks against it.
Remember, without an income tax, we'd all be standing around dirty, naked and freezing, and wondering where all the roads and schools went. Keep preaching that to anyone who speaks against it.
The injustice
of slavery in being forced to support others, Benjamin Ross,
1854: “Benjamin was twenty-eight years of age, chestnut color, medium
size, and shrewd. He was the so-called
property of Eliza Ann Brodins, who lived near Buckstown, in Maryland. Ben did not hesitate to say, in unqualified
terms, that his mistress was ‘very devilish.’
He considered his charges, proved by the fact that three slaves (himself
one of them) were required to work hard and fare meagerly, to support his
mistress’ family in idleness and luxury.”
Earning your own living not a right for a slave, John Judah,
1855: “John was a mulatto, of genteel address, well clothed, and
looked as if he had been ‘well fed.’
Miss Eliza Lambert had the honor of owning John, and was gracious enough
to allow him to hire his time for one hundred and ten dollars per annum. After this sum was punctually paid, John
could do what he pleased with any surplus earnings…John accused his mistress of
being hard in money matters, not caring how the servants fared, so she got ‘plenty
of money out of them.’”
Hating
even mild forms of slavery, Richard Bradley,
1855: “He was sufficiently intelligent to look at Slavery in all its
bearings, and to smart keenly under even ordinarily mild treatment.”
Hating
even mild forms of slavery, six slaves who
escaped the Honorable L. McLane, 1857: “Although this party was of the class said to
be well fed, well clothed, and not over-worked, yet to those who heard them
declare their utter detestation of slavery and their determination to use their
instruments of death [they were all armed when they escaped] even to the taking
of life, rather than again be subjected to the yoke, it was evident that even
the mildest form of slavery was abhorrent.”
It's so easy for us to tolerate the income tax - it's just a little taken out each month. Not a big deal. My master hardly ever whips me, and when he does, he has a light touch.
It's so easy for us to tolerate the income tax - it's just a little taken out each month. Not a big deal. My master hardly ever whips me, and when he does, he has a light touch.
Hating
even mild forms of slavery, Mary Frances Melvin,
1858: “Mary Frances hailed from Norfolk; she had been in servitude under Mrs.
Chapman, a widow lady, against whom she had no complaint to make; indeed, she
testified that her mistress was very kind, although fully allied to
slavery. She said that she left, not on
account of bad treatment, but simply because she wanted her freedom.”
She simply wanted her freedom, though she risked losing her life in pursuing it.
She simply wanted her freedom, though she risked losing her life in pursuing it.
From Bury
the Chains, by Adam Hochschild. Mariner
Books edition, 2006
Ending
slavery has economic costs: “For fifty
years, activists in England worked to end slavery in the British Empire. None of them gained a penny by doing so, and
their eventual success meant a huge loss to the imperial economy. Scholars estimate that abolishing the slave
trade and then slavery cost the British people 1.8 percent of their annual
national income over more than half a century, many times the percentage most
wealthy countries today give in foreign aid.”
How often do I hear the economic argument when I'm speaking of human rights? The income tax is a human rights issue before it is an economic issue. This is where we have been blinded.
How often do I hear the economic argument when I'm speaking of human rights? The income tax is a human rights issue before it is an economic issue. This is where we have been blinded.
Society
scoffs at ending institutions they take for granted: “If, early that year [1787], you had stood on a London street corner and
insisted that slavery was morally wrong and should be stopped, nine out of ten
listeners would have laughed you off as a crackpot. The tenth might have agreed with you in
principle, but assured you that ending slavery was wildly impractical: the
British Empire’s economy would collapse.
The parliamentarian Edmund Burke, for example, opposed slavery but
thought that the prospect of ending even just the Atlantic slave trade was ‘chimerical.’ Within a few short years, however, the issue
of slavery had moved to center stage in British political life.”
Acceptance
of slavery closes people to thinking of alternatives: “Slavery in the British Empire seemed as entrenched as ever [in
1783]. If pressed, some Britons might
have conceded that the institution was unpleasant – but where else would sugar
for your tea come from? Where would
Royal Navy sailors get their rum? The slave
trade ‘was not an amiable trade,’ as a member of Parliament once commented, ‘but
neither was the trade of a butcher an amiable trade, and yet a mutton chop was,
nevertheless, a very good thing.’”
And so I always hear: But without the income tax, how would we pay for roads and schools?
And so I always hear: But without the income tax, how would we pay for roads and schools?
Change
comes through the solution-oriented, not the problem-oriented: “We can only imagine how the [anti-slavery] committee members felt
as they dispersed to their homes that night [after their first meeting]. The task they had taken on was so monumental
as to have seemed to anyone else impossible.
They had to ignite their crusade in a country where the great majority
of people, from farmhands to bishops, accepted slavery as completely
normal. It was also a country where profits
from West Indian plantations gave a large boost to the economy, where customs
duties on slave-grown sugar were an important source of government revenue, and
where the livelihoods of tens of thousands of seamen, merchants, and
shipbuilders depended on the slave trade.
The trade itself had increased to almost unparalleled levels, bringing
prosperity to key ports, including London itself. How even to begin the massive job of changing
public opinion?”
A
reason for hope: “Britons’ confidence in
their rights ran proud and deep. Without
it, the abolitionists could never have persuaded them that slaves had rights as
well.”
Be
careful what you fight for: “I would
fain know what the soldier hath fought for all this while? He hath fought to enslave himself, to give
power to men of riches, men of estates, to make him a perpetual slave.” –Colonel
Thomas Rainborough, the Putney Debates of 1647
Why
Antigua was thought to be safe from a slave uprising: Partly because there were “missionaries to the slaves ‘whose Preachers
constantly recommend in the strongest terms the Necessity and Duty of
Subordination and passive Obedience to their Masters.’”
Reminds me of the old hymn: "Trust and obey, for there's no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey." This message brought to you by the status quo.
Reminds me of the old hymn: "Trust and obey, for there's no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey." This message brought to you by the status quo.