I'm Black And I Think … Clearly – From My Vault

The following is from my vault. It is a syndicated column written 4/6/04:

“Taking a stand for what is right has put me at odds with the civil-rights establishment. I have endured all kinds of name-calling and intimidation tactics … But I understand that I am fighting against evil. Those names mean nothing to me. They are the pitiful words of cowards who do not have right on their side. By letting them pass, I am able to continue standing up for what is right … It is now time for white Americans to realize they are part of the same battle.”

One of the first series of questions I am most often asked is: “Where are you from? Where did you grow up? Where were you raised?” As if my answering those questions will somehow answer the unasked question – that being, “How can you, a black man, think the way you do?”

And just how do I think?

I think a man deserves what he earns. I think and believe that while the field of opportunity is level (contrary to popular myth), not all will achieve the same.

I think that the hate-filled cretin from Rhode Island who wrote me spewing bile and venom is a racist who happens to be white. And I’m certain he is not the only one. But I am also aware that there are Louis Farrakhans and Cynthia McKinney’s.

I think slavery was wrong and immoral, but it was not illegal. I agree in principle with Robert E. Lee, who in a letter to his wife Mary Custis Lee, called slavery “a moral and political evil,” while concluding that black slaves were immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, socially and physically. Except, I believe it was God Himself providing for a people who would later curse His name and praise the false god of the very people who originally enslaved them.

I think the reparationists must be challenged to acknowledge the truth – that being “that … free blacks disproportionately became slave masters” right here in America (“Dixie’s censored subject – black slaveowners” by Robert M. Grooms).

Antoinette Harrell-Miller, a claimant in the multi-billion dollar action against Lloyd’s of London is quoted as saying, “Like every other ethnic group living in America, I have a right to know who I am.” Not to be rude or deliberately acerbic, but I would say, “She is Antoinette Miller, a race huckster and profiteer.” But I digress.

I find it interesting that these hate-filled extortionists claim “Lloyd’s of London and others must repair the damage they caused.” Interesting because they leave out African and Muslim accountability. They omit the truth of black participation in the Civil War. Scott K. Williams in his “Black Confederates Fact Page” writes that 65,000 plus Southern blacks fought in the Confederate ranks. He also writes that they were compensated for their efforts in land and money, some blacks earning more than officers.

I challenge these necrophagous ghouls who seek to make gain through immiseration to tell the truth. How many Americans are aware that in New Orleans over 3,000 freed slaves owned slaves? The fact is large numbers of free Negroes owned black slaves.

How many are aware successful businessman and cotton farmer William Ellison derived a major source of his income from being a “slave breeder” – a practice that was looked down upon throughout the South? Yet Ellison, a successful black businessman and slaveowner, secretly practiced it.

It would seem reasonable that if the reparation harlots were interested in truth, they would have these facts available as part of their suit. It is easy to bastardize and label as evil whites. But where is the vilification of the thousands of blacks who also practiced slavery?

The liberal media is quick to point to race-baiters as leaders in the black community. Therein I believe lies a major part of the problem: The black community is not a community unto itself, it is part of America.

Blacks do not need leaders defined by the media. They have them. At present they are President Bush and his administration. They have 535 total representatives being divided as prescribed state by state as do we all. They have governors and lobbyists, as do we all.

I think it is time for Americans who happen to be black to divest themselves of the “African hyphen American” foolishness. In truth, blacks today are no more African than I am mezzo-soprano. Teresa Heinz-Kerry is more authentic African-American than Jesse Jackson, she having been born in Mozambique.

I’ll take the petty name-calling, because I am right. And it will only be when all of America realizes the truth of this that we will truly have a “United” States.