wcaleb’s avatarwcaleb’s Twitter Archive—№ 17,705

    1. 1. This argument implies that no one called for reparations in the immediate aftermath of slavery. But many formerly enslaved people did, including Henrietta Wood, the subject of my forthcoming book. @Jeff_Jacoby/1112370344780800001
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    2. But those 19c efforts were blocked by a white supremacist counter-revolution against emancipation and Reconstruction. Lynching, violence, and eventually disfranchisement not only compounded the damages of slavery, but prevented most "living victims" from winning redress.
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      3. Now, argue @Jeff_Jacoby & other opponents of reparations, the "statute of limitations" on reparations has run out. But when did the clock start? Presumably when the injustices came to an end. The argument for reparations today begins by noting that they never fully ended.
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        4. White Americans in the 1870s & 1880s were already saying, in essence, that the "statue of limitations" had run out on slavery. There's never been a time, not even immediately after the Civil War, when advocates of reparations have not been told by critics, "it's too late."
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          5. Robert Westley said it best: "If we then ask the post-emancipation question of when was the proper time to seek reparations for slavery, the resounding response that comes down through ages of resistance to racial oppression is not yet, perhaps never." papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2523060
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            6. You can argue about reparations, but don't rest those arguments on the flawed historical assumptions that (a) it would have been easier to win reparations closer to the age of slavery; it wouldn't have been; and (b) no "living victims" asked at the time; they did.
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              7. For more on all this, see @analuciaraujo_ book on Reparations, and also @arielagross's article, "When is the Time of Slavery? The History of Slavery in Contemporary Legal and Political Argument." scholarship.law.berkeley.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1190&context=californialawreview
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