Slavery

During slavery, slaves were not allowed to read, and can be seen today as many African Americans still have lower test grades, and a more difficult ability to succeed. During the 1900's, African Americans could not vote, own much, have good jobs, or much of anythign else. This can also be seen today as African Americans are some of the poorest people in the country. Native Americans were forced onto land, slaughtered, and given very little. This is also seen still today as Native Americans live on small plots of land, their numbers dwindling down, their education poor, and the poverty level incredible. Some may own casinos, but the majority are still poor.

Dune wrote: During slavery, slaves were not allowed to read, and can be seen today as many African Americans still have lower test grades, and a more difficult ability to succeed. During the 1900's, African Americans could not vote, own much, have good jobs, or much of anythign else. This can also be seen today as African Americans are some of the poorest people in the country. Native Americans were forced onto land, slaughtered, and given very little. This is also seen still today as Native Americans live on small plots of land, their numbers dwindling down, their education poor, and the poverty level incredible. Some may own casinos, but the majority are still poor.

education is relatively free (taxes) and everyone has the opportunity to go to school and if an african american person chooses to drop out of high school, get into drugs, gangs, or bad things that the stereotypes lay out, then why are the white people to blame?  I still dont see this.  I can see how some people would'nt be able to read because of what happend during the 50's and 60's but there is no excuse for not being able to read if you live during this generation or the previous one.  No excuse for making it bad in a job or dropping out of school.  But if its a bad neighborhood or bad school district, then theres another story.

Honest analysis, but a bit too simple.

WGP guy wrote: "If slavery was abruptly stopped during the founding of the country, a few things would have happened. First, a severe amount of currency would have stopped circulating because much of what the money was used on (crops, clothing, ect.) would not be made anymore because the ones who produced them would not have to anymore. This would severely cripple the economy, causing inflation.

This point contradicts your third point.  The realistic result would be exactly what DID happen when slavery was abolished - the slaves went right back to work for their former slave masters, except for pay now.  There is no reason to believe that the end to slavery would or did cause harm to the Southern agricultural industry.  The world did not change so much from 1776 to 1865.  No reason to believe that the economic impact would be so much different.

In addition, you would have added millions of former slaves as self-interested members of society.  If you believe capitalist theory, free men are more productive than slaves, since they have more to gain.  Arguably, slavery was holding back the economy, not advancing it.

18th and 19th century America was in desparate need of more people.  And instead of allowing slaves to reap their full potential, we held them back by not providing self-interested motivation.

Your point number one is only correct if capitalism is completely false, since it completely contradicts teh very fundamentals of capitalism.  You are essentially arguing that a totalitarian regime is better for the economy than a free market capitalist system.  I think history has shown that this is false.

Second, there would be an absence of some foods that were farmed by generally the slave population. This would have caused food supply to shorten in the short term until people could be paid to farm. The food shortage might have caused weakness or death for some of the working population and farmers which relied on their crops to survive which could also hurt the economy because of decreased production of goods causing further inflation.

Again, you are assuming that the former slaves would simply stop working.  When the slaves were freed in 1865 they did not stop working - why would you think that they would stop in 1776?

America in 1776 was a land filled with raw materials.  Lots of agriculture potential, lots of mining potential, lots of industry potential.  It is likely that some of the former slaves would not go back to work on the plantation, but then they would simply go farm someplace else - like Kansas or Nebraska.  There was plenty of land to be had.

Third, there would be hundreds of thousands of freed slaves with nothing except their clothes across the country. This would cause a dramatic increase in demand for things that were now severely decreasing in quantity. This would cause people not being able to get things essential to survive causing death for many, possibly including the United States of America."

There were hundreds of thousands of immigrants coming in every year with nothing except their clothes.  They managed just fine.  In fact, they drove the growth of the country.  Why would freed slaves be any different?

Your entire 3-part argument is based on the premise that freed slaves would go from high productivity to low (or no) productivity.  I don't see why or how you can make that claim.  If anything, the opposite would be true.

Separately, of course, you have to consider the long-term effect of slavery.  The aftershocks of slavery remain one of the largest - and most expensive - problems facing this country today.  How much better would we not all be off economically without racial tension?  Slavery continues to hold us back to this day.

No, they don't do it themselves. Those kids don't have much of a choice where they go to school, and who lives in your neighborhood.

Come on, don't play that I had it rough card with me. You've claimed multiple times that your family has a lot of money. People who grow up poor understand how impossible it is to move. Whether you want to admit it or not, our country and it's people are still effected by the appalling things we did to them years ago.

Dune wrote: No, they don't do it themselves. Those kids don't have much of a choice where they go to school, and who lives in your neighborhood. Come on, don't play that I had it rough card with me. You've claimed multiple times that your family has a lot of money. People who grow up poor understand how impossible it is to move. Whether you want to admit it or not, our country and it's people are still effected by the appalling things we did to them years ago.

Just give up Dune, Dbib lives in lala zany cartoon world where America can do no wrong.

If he knows he is wrong, he plays the apathetic card. Ala in the Police thread saying he didnt care, and now in this one saying he dosent care.

Unless you won the lottery, you didn't rise out of the level of poverty that the majority of these people are in.

Whale's right, it's pure blindness and an unwillingness to admit faults.