Some years back, screwball feminists came up with an idea called “comparable worth.” The premises was that “women’s work” was underpaid and that this constituted sex discrimination. To remedy this inequity—secretaries getting paid less than (say) mechanics—a huge bureaucratic system was proposed, to assess each job in terms of the educational requirements, the amount of responsibility it entailed, etc., and to set wages accordingly. In other words, replace the free market with governmental mandate.

One wag referred to this proposal as “the looniest idea since looney tunes,” an accurate description. Now, though, the forces of Political Correctness have spawned an even crazier idea.

“Reparations” for slavery.

As boneheaded ideas go, this one pretty much takes the cake.

A person injured by the wrongful conduct of another certainly deserves recompense. But not one person alive today was born an American slave, or served a single day laboring in chains. Not one living person suffered under the lash; not a single slave master survives. Almost 140 years have elapsed since the Emancipation Proclamation; only a few less since the 13th Amendment. To the extent that anyone was ever owed “reparations,” they’re long dead, as are the people who wronged them.

Too, this country paid a terrible price to extirpate slavery. It is now generally accepted that the Civil War was fought on precisely this issue. Hundreds of thousands of American soldiers gave their lives that slavery might be abolished. How can one measure their sacrifice and offset it against any asserted debt to former slaves?

That slavery ran directly counter to the ideals expressed at the American founding cannot be gainsaid. With the equally horrible institution of abortion, it is the greatest moral stain this country has ever borne, or is ever likely to bear. But not one living American owes a nickel to another on its account; all those who profited, and all those who suffered, long ago squared up their accounts before a higher court than exists on Earth.

Simply put, if dollars are to be transferred today, they must come from somewhere. And they must go somewhere. If governmental, they must come from present, living, breathing, hard working, over-burdened taxpayers. If private, they must come from the pockets of investors and workers. And they will flow…where? To people who can demonstrate absolutely no concrete injury whatsoever. At best, their argument would be that someone else’s great grandfather grievously wounded their great great grandfather, but for which injury they would have been differently situated. These “what if” games make entertaining historic fiction, but they cannot be the proper subject or either litigation or legislation. They’re simply too speculative.

But, if one wishes to speculate, perhaps it would be fun to do so. The assertion offered is that slaves performed unpaid labor—a given—for which their descendants are entitled to recompense. But what if those slaves had not been dragged to the United States in chains?

But, if the British had not been such harsh taskmasters as to drive my ancestors out of Ireland, I might still be there. Don’t get me wrong; Ireland is probably a wonderful place, maybe worth a visit. But there is no place, in the history of the world, better to live than in the present United States. No place freer, no place fairer, no place more prosperous. If my ancestors had to endure starvation, privation, discrimination, humiliation, etc., in order to give me the chance to live here, that is a price I am overjoyed that they paid. The benefits to me and my family justify their sacrifice.

And, if slaves had to endure the ignominy of shackles, the horror of depersonalization, the humiliation which attended such existence, to enable their descendants to live in America, those descendants should thank the Lord every night that such price was paid. Anyone who does not believe that living in America is a magnificent privilege is, of course, free to leave. In many places throughout the world, that simple statement—free to leave—still does not obtain.

By modern standards, virtually all immigrants were horribly mistreated; the mistreatment differed only in degree. To use another example, many eastern European immigrants went into the garment trade in New York. Hundreds of young women died in just one disaster: the Triangle Shirt Waist Company fire. Is there even the slightest doubt that anyone complaining about this exploitation, or even of the death of one of their ancestors, would be properly laughed out of a modern court if they filed suit?

Neither litigation nor legislation can right historic wrongs. All it serves to do is to perpetuate historic, and in this case, racial grudges. Not a single American need feel guilty about slavery; our ancestors did all the penance history requires. And not a single American possesses the slightest right to be angry; whatever the wrongs committed, the perpetrators are long dead, as are their victims. The idea of collective, or blood, guilt, is wholly foreign to our system of government. Any right to compensation died with those who earned it.

These efforts are so patently silly as to call into question the true motivation of those fomenting them. It seems that they are motivated more by a desire to nurse racial anger and separatism than to do justice (justice is, after all, a personal concept, applicable only to individuals, not to groups). Neither the Courts nor the Legislature have any business entertaining such nonsense.

Anger at slavery is no more justifiable than anger at the Potato Famine, and nothing can be done for the victims of either, on this earthly plane. Historic injuries are just that: history. They have no place in a modern courtroom.

May 2, 2002