MattTheSkywalker said:
Must not read your own posts Broseph. lol
On a real note: the idea of compensating blacks in some manner post slavery was discussed by our 16th President, who said "Their reparations are the blood of the Union soldiers who died for their freedom".
Lincoln's true feelings about the condition of the black man are quite revealing. I post the following not to be provocative but to hopefully remind folks that things are often not as they seem nor jive with what is taught in school. ( BTW - He ultimately sought the repatriation of the freed slaves back to Africa and had he not been killed that would have been a major part of "Reconstruction".)
Linclons words:
_______________________
"I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the White and Black races--that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of Negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with White people, and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the White and Black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the White race. . . I give. . . the most solemn pledge that I will to the very last, stand by the law of the State, which forbids the marrying of white people with negroes." - Abraham Lincoln (Fourth Debate with Stephen Douglas at Charleston, Illinois on September 18, 1858, Vol. III, p. 145-146 of The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln).
Lincoln also stated that, "I agree with Judge Douglas that he [a black] is not my equal in many respects, certainly not in color — perhaps not in intellectual and moral endowments; but in the right to eat the bread without leave of anybody else which his own hand earns, he is my equal and the equal of Judge Douglas, and the equal of every other man."
"Now I say to you, my fellow citizen, that in my opinion, the signers of the Declaration of Independence had no reference to the Negro whatever. One great evidence is to be found in the fact that at the time every one of the thirteen colonies was a slaveholding colony, every signer of the Declaration representing a slaveholding constituency, and not one of them emancipated his slaves, much less offered citizenship to them when they signed the Declaration. If they intended to declare the Negro was equal of the white man, they were bound that day and hour to have put the Negroes on an equality with themselves." - Abraham Lincoln, during the October 16, 1858 debate in Peoria, IL with Douglas. "I can conceive of no greater calamity than the assimilation of the Negro into our social and political life as our equal. . . We can never attain the ideal union our fathers dreamed, with millions of an alien, inferior race among us, whose assimilation is neither possible nor desirable." - Abraham Lincoln, AFTER signing the Emancipation Proclamation
Please Scroll Down to See Forums Below 
