Prof. Walter E. Williams: Slavery Reparations

Walter E. Williams, a libertarian economist, offers a candid response to Ta-Nehisi Coates’ “The Case for Reparations”. 

"First off, let me say that I agree with reparations advocates that slavery was a horrible, despicable violation of basic human rights. The gross discrimination that followed emancipation made a mockery of the guarantees of the U.S. Constitution. I also agree that slave owners and slave traders should make reparations to those whom they enslaved. The problem, of course, is that slaves, slave owners and slave traders are all dead. Thus, punishing perpetrators and compensating victims is out of the hands of the living. Punishing perpetrators and compensating victims is not what reparations advocates want.

They want government to compensate today's blacks for the bondage suffered by our ancestors. But there’s a problem. Government has no resources of its very own. The only way for government to give one American a dollar is to first -- through intimidation, threats and coercion -- confiscate that dollar from some other American. Therefore, if anybody cares, a moral question arises. What moral principle justifies punishing a white of today to compensate a black of today for what a white of yesterday did to a black of yesterday?

Read complete article here.

Jonathan Blanks - Some Thoughts on Ta-Nehisi's 'Reparations' Essay

Some Thoughts on Ta-Nehisi's 'Reparations' Essay I read TNC's reparations essay in The Atlantic last night. The following is a slightly edited and modified version of my thoughts on first reading. I plan to read it again one or more times.

1. The piece should be read without reference to the headline. I think the greatest power of the piece is in its history and its ability to frame public policy in a milieu that is seldom discussed or addressed in educational or policy settings.

2. The history he recounts is only a fraction of the horrors the government and the American people inflicted upon black people for generations.

 The reason I think this is important is that ideologues, of all stripes, neglect what our government and our country looked like for the vast majority of its history. As I talk about in my upcoming essays for Libertarianism.org, there is a vast chasm between what we think should or will happen given our policy 'druthers and what experience and history tell us has happened. This is a lesson for conservatives, progressives, and libertarians alike.

Read more: http://blanksslate.blogspot.com/2014/05/my-initial-thoughts-on-ta-nehisis.html

Walter E. Williams on Libertarians and Liberty

How To Deal With 'Unwanted' Cops

Don't be bullied. Stand up for your rights!

 The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. - The Fourth Amendment (Amendment IV) to the United States Constitution 

 

Declining Empires are Desperate Empires

Bryant Jackson-Green - Why are regulators so out of touch?

Why are regulators so out of touch? At a Chicago City Council committee hearing on ride-sharing services last week, taxi-industry lobbyist Matthew Daus, president of the International Association of Transportation Regulators, reportedly said that “millennials” were responsible for the rise of companies such as Lyft and Uber because they care more about “cost” than about the public interest.

 But what’s wrong with caring about costs? Everyone prefers to pay less money for better service if they can. Millennials in particular can hardly be blamed for being cost-conscious in an economy where they face a high unemployment rate and relatively poor job prospects.

See more at: http://www.illinoispolicy.org/why-are-regulators-so-out-of-touch/#sthash.n5Wv49co.dpuf