Presidential Hopeful ...

[norepi]

There is renewed scrutiny on the relationship between Barack Obama and Chicago government housing landlord Antoin Rezko. The Chicago Sun-Times reports that while tenants in government housing administered by Rezko endured 5 weeks of a brutal Chicago winter without heat in 1997 — Rezko was able to come up with a $1,000 contribution to Obama's state senate campaign. Obama worked at a law firm that helped Rezko's company get more than $43 million in government funding to rehab 30 apartment buildings. But Rezko has been sued at least a dozen times for failing to heat those buildings. Obama and Rezko have also been involved in two personal real estate deals — including one that Obama has apologized for and called a mistake.

Obama would be wise to explain, fully and quickly, the prelude to a real estate deal and subsequent transactions related to his acquisition of a $1.65 million home on Chicago's South Side. If Obama doesn't shine his own spotlight on his real estate relationship with indicted political fundraiser Antoin "Tony" Rezko, he'll be fielding questions about Rezko in two years and in 20.

First among those questions with staying power: Why would Obama allow himself any connection to Rezko? The developer notoriously attaches himself to political figures, often parlaying friendships into business dealings that have attracted official suspicions for several years. An article in Wednesday's Tribune explained how Obama bought his house in June 2005 for some $300,000 less than the asking price. The same day, Rezko's wife bought the adjoining lot, paying the full $625,000 asking price. The Rezko involvement invited a second question for Obama: whether Rezko's wife in effect subsidized Obama's purchase of the opulent home and also provided an abutting private preserve that adds to its ambience. The article reported that the lot isn't accessible from the public street but can be reached from Obama's property.

Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs unequivocally denies that the Rezkos subsidized Obama's purchase. He portrays the real estate dealings as ordinary and entirely aboveboard. As the Tribune article noted, there's nothing illegal or untoward about an aggressive developer buying hot property next door to a rising political star. But these are not normal times for Rezko or Obama, longtime friends whose fortunes have taken sharp turns in opposite directions. Smoke was rising from Tony Rezko long before his wife bought a lot next to Obama's. Federal prosecutors accuse him of scheming to extort money from companies seeking business with state government. Rezko pleads innocence.

Friends can be friends. But during this ethically challenged time for so many pols, why would Obama put himself in business proximity to Tony Rezko? Obama always has seemed to be above the gritty scrum of wheelers and dealers who perpetuate the Illinois culture of political sleaze. The more Obama cleaves himself from that scrum, the more genuine he appears. Remember, it was Obama who essentially invited heightened scrutiny by letting his party exploit his high profile in January. At a time when political scandals dogged Republicans, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid christened Obama the Democrats' point man on ethics proposals in Congress. That unusual elevation of a first-term senator to a pedestal proved more opportunistic for national Democrats than it has for Obama: Now the senator's real estate tie to Rezko threatens to leave Obama hoisted by his ethics petard.

[rudelaw]

Have you noticed how active the @ # ! * i n g female dog ass n-word female private part -- Obama's wife Michelle -- has been lately?

[rich dad, dumb kid]

At Punahou (high school) obama tried drugs and let his grades slip in his final years of high school. Teachers and fellow students at Punahou say that Obama wasn't a straight-A student, but they had high expectations for him. One of his teachers, Kusunoki, who has taught at Punahou for 33 years, adds that "[he] was very gifted, and I knew he'd do great things. But this well? On this stage? I never expected that."

How can someone who has not been at the top of his class in high school go ahead and become president of harvard law review? Anyone?!

Law school is nothing like high school.

[amygdala]

Obama is a clear case of blacks in corporate America getting whiteboyed-slammed in often subtle ways by behavior whose effect -- if not purpose -- is racial subordination.

[Cory]

That is exactly what rudelaw says, amygdala. Obama has been white man\'s female dog throughout his entire life, he is a @ # ! * i n g female dog-ass n-word female private part literally.

[byproxy]

That is exactly what rudelaw says, amygdala. Obama has been white man's female dog throughout his entire life, he is a @ # ! * i n g female dog-ass n-word female private part literally.

cory, correct me if I'm wrong, but is it not that rudelaw said it's Obama's wife that is a "@ # ! * i n g female dog ass n-word female private part"?

[k k]

Law school is nothing like high school.

[mapother]

It's not that we must, in telling history, accuse, judge, condemn Columbus in absentia. It is too late for that; it would be a useless scholarly exercise in morality. But the easy acceptance of atrocities as a deplorable but necessary price to pay for progress (Hiroshima and Vietnam, to save Western civilization; Kronstadt and Hungary, to save socialism; nuclear proliferation, to save us all) -- that is still with us. One reason these atrocities are still with us is that we have learned to bury them in a mass of other facts, as radioactive wastes are buried in containers in the earth.

A Dutch slave trader exchanged his cargo of Africans for food in 1619. The Africans became indentured servants, similar in legal position to many poor Englishmen who traded several years labor in exchange for passage to America. The popular conception of a racial-based slave system did not develop until the 1680, however. Although the number of African American slaves grew slowly at first, by the 1680s they had become essential to the economy of Virginia. During the 17th and 18th centuries, African American slaves lived in all of England's North American colonies. Before Great Britain prohibited its subjects from participating in the slave trade, between 600,000 and 650,000 Africans had been forcibly transported to North America.

In 1638 the price tag for an African male was around $27, while the salary of a European laborer was about $.70 per day. In 1641 Massachusetts colony legalized slavery. In 1660 slavery spread quickly in the American colonies. At first the legal status of Africans in America was poorly defined, and some, like European indentured servants, managed to become free after several years of service. From the 1660s, however, the colonies began enacting laws that defined and regulated slave relations. Central to these laws was the provision that black slaves, and the children of slave women, would serve for life. This premise, combined with the natural population growth among the slaves, meant that slavery could survive and grow. The continuing demand for African slaves' labor arose from the development of plantation agriculture, the long-term rise in prices and consumption of sugar, and the demand for miners. Not only did Africans represent skilled laborers, but they were also experts in tropical agriculture. Consequently, they were well-suited for plantation agriculture. The high immunity of Africans to malaria and yellow fever compared with Europeans and the indigenous peoples made them more suitable for tropical labor. While white and red labor were used initially, Africans were the final solution to the acute labor problem in the New World.

Slaves were mostly for sugar plantations, diamond mines in Brazil, house servants, on tobacco farms in Virginia, in gold mines in Hispaniola and later the cotton industry in the Southern States of the USA. Slavery in the United States was governed by an extensive body of law developed from the 1660s to the 1860s. Every slave state had its own slave code and body of court decisions. All slave codes made slavery a permanent condition, inherited through the mother, and defined slaves as property, usually in the same terms as those applied to real estate. Slaves, being property, could not own property or be a party to a contract. Since marriage is a form of a contract, no slave marriage had any legal standing. All codes also had sections regulating free blacks, who were still subject to controls on their movements and employment and were often required to leave the state after emancipation.

One characteristic which set American slavery apart was its racial basis. In America, with only a few early and insignificant exceptions, all slaves were Africans, and almost all Africans were slaves. This placed the label of inferiority on black skin and on African culture. In other societies, it had been possible for a slave who obtained his freedom to take his place in his society with relative ease. In America, however, when a slave became free, he was still obviously an African. The taint of inferiority clung to him. Not only did white America become convinced of white superiority and black inferiority, but it strove to impose these racial beliefs on the Africans themselves. Slave masters gave a great deal of attention to the education and training of the ideal slave, In general, there were five steps in molding the character of such a slave: strict discipline, a sense of his own inferiority, belief in the master's superior power, acceptance of the master's standards, and, finally, a deep sense of his own helplessness and dependence. At every point this education was built on the belief in white superiority and black inferiority. Besides teaching the slave to despise his own history and culture, the master strove to inculcate his own value system into the African's outlook. The white man's belief in the African's inferiority paralleled African self hate.

Between the years 1650 and 1900, historians estimate that at least 28 million Africans were forcibly removed from central and western Africa as slaves (but the numbers involved are controversial). A human catastrophe for Africa, the world African Slave Trade was truly a "Holocaust."

[mapother]

In 1715 Maryland State Constitution enforced slavery. In 1717 Maryland passed a law declaring "that if any free Negro or mulatto intermarry with any white woman, or if any white man shall intermarry with any Negro or mulatto woman, such Negro or mulatto shall become a slave during life, excepting mulattos born of white women, who, for such intermarriage, shall only become servants for 7 years, to be disposed of as the justices of the county court, where such marriage so happens, shall think fit; to be applied by them towards the support of a public school within the said county. And any white man or white woman who shall intermarry as aforesaid, with any Negro or mulatto, such white man or white woman shall become servants during the term of seven years, and shall be disposed of by the justices as aforesaid, and be applied to the uses aforesaid." the other colonial law to which we refer was passed by Massachusetts in 1705. It is entitled "An act for the better preventing of a spurious and mixed issue," and it provides, that "if any Negro or mulatto shall presume to smite or strike any person of the English or other Christian nation, such Negro or mulatto shall be severely whipped, at the discretion of the justices before whom the offender shall be convicted. 

In 1740 he Slavery system in colonial America was fully developed. A Virginia law in that year declared slaves to be "chattel personal in the hands of their owners and possessors for all intents, construction, and purpose whatsoever." In 1750 the English Colonies' slaves population reaches 236,400 with over 206,000 of the total living south of Pennsylvania. Slaves comprise about 20% of colonies' population, over 40% of Virginia's. In 1752 after the death of his half-brother, George Washington purchased his sister-in-laws share in the Mount Vernon estate including 18 slaves. The ledgers and account books which he kept show that he bought slaves whenever possible to replenish the original 18. In the account books of Washington, the entries show that in 1754 he bought two make and a female; in 1756, two males, two females and a child, etc. In 1759, the year in which he was married, his wife Martha, brought him thirty –nine "dower-Negroes." He kept separate records of these Negroes all his life and mentions them as a separate unit in his will. Washington purchased his slaves in Alexandria from Mr. Piper and perhaps in the District in 1770 "went over to Colo. Thos. Moore's Sale and purchased two Negroes.

In 1755 after the passage of the Transportation Act in 1718, 50,000 convicts were sentenced to foreign exile in the American colonies. The bulk were transported to Maryland and Virginia for sale as servants. By 1755, convicts formed 10% of all adult white males in four of Maryland's most populous counties. Although colonists agonized about the presence of such persons in their midst, they neither worked to cease transportation nor returned convicts to England unpurchased. Socially, convicts occupied a position just above black slaves and just below indentured servants. For the most part, they were ill-treated and exploited. As free, white, and British, the convicts deeply resented their lot as servile laborers in the American colonies.

In 1759 Martha married George Washington. The marriage changed George from an ordinary planter to a substantially wealthy landowner. He had resigned his commission in the militia and so, George, Martha, Jacky (4), and Patsy (2) moved into the enlarged and remodeled Mt. Vernon. George Washington, having gained 17,000 acres of farmland and 286 slaves from his new wife, Martha Dandridge Custis (these added to his own 30 slaves), harvests his first tobacco crop. The British market is unimpressed with its quality, and by 1761, Washington is deeply in debt. In 1766 Virginia planter-miller George Washington ships an unruly slave off to the West Indies to be exchanged for a hogshead of rum and other commodities. Though in death Washington willed that his slaves would be freed upon the death of Martha. The will provided that a special fund, be set up for the support of the aged and infirm. No evidence was found that the executors set up a trust fund as specified in the will.

In 1780 Pennsylvania became the first state to abolish slavery. Yet, during 1780-1810 almost as many slaves are brought into the Unites States as had been brought in over the previous 160 years. By 1790 American Revolution, 20% of the overall population in the 13 colonies was of African descent. The legalized practice of enslaving blacks occurred in every colony. The economic realities of the southern colonies, however, perpetuated the institution, which was first legalized in Massachusetts in 1641. During the Revolutionary era, more than half of all African-Americans lived in Virginia and Maryland. Most of these blacks lived in the Chesapeake region, where they made up more than 50 to 60% of the overall population. The majority, but not all, of these African-Americans were slaves.

In 1793 the Fugitive Slave Act becomes a federal law. Allows slaveowners, their agents or attorneys to seize fugitive slaves in free states and territories. In 1808 slave importation was outlawed but some 250,000 slaves were illegally imported from 1808-60. In 1830 the Virginia Census shows the holdings of the Armfield and Franklin slave pen. Their inventory of consisted of predominantly of children and teenagers who would be taken from Virginia and surrounding States and sold to work the Cotton Plantations.

Sex and Age
1 male under 10
50 males 10-24
20 males 24—36
4 females under 10
50 females 10-24
20 females 24-36

[mapother]

In 1833 slavery was abolished in Canada. In 1837 Congress enacts a gag law to suppress debate on the slavery issue. In 1862 slavery was abolished in the District of Columbia by Congress. One million dollars was appropriated to compensate owners of freed slaves, and $100,000 was set aside to pay district slaves who wished to emigrate to Haiti, Liberia or any other country outside the United States. President Abraham Lincoln signed a bill ending slavery in the District of Columbia. Passage of this act came 9 months before President Lincoln issued his Emancipation Proclamation. The act brought to conclusion decades of agitation aimed at ending what antislavery advocates called "the national shame" of slavery in the nation's capital.

The law provided for immediate emancipation, compensation of up to $300 for each slave to loyal Unionist masters, voluntary colonization of former slaves to colonies outside the United States, and payments of up to $100 to each person choosing emigration. Over the next 9 months, the federal government paid almost $1 million for the freedom of approximately 3,100 former slaves. The District of Columbia Emancipation Act is the only example of compensated emancipation in the United States. Though its three-way approach of immediate emancipation, compensation, and colonization did not serve as a model for the future, it was an early signal of slavery's death. Emancipation was greeted with great jubilation by the District's African-American community. For many years afterward, black Washingtonians celebrated Emancipation Day on April 16 with parades and festivals.

In 1866 Congress overrode President Johnson's veto on April 9 and passed the Civil Rights Act, conferring citizenship upon black Americans and guaranteeing equal rights with whites. In 1868 the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified granting citizenship to any person born or naturalized in the United States. In 1869 the Fifteenth Amendment was approved guaranteeing black Americans the right to vote.