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meatcleaver -> RE: The 2nd Amendment (6/28/2008 2:43:46 AM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Alumbrado
quote:
ORIGINAL: meatcleaver
Isn't there a clause in the constitution that says a black man is only worth two fifths of a white man? If the constitution is regarded as an act of faith, many Americans wouldn't have as many rights as they have now.
Really...is there a clause that says that? Because I'm sure you wouldn't 'accidentally' pretend that is says 'worth', when it is only talking about totalling up votes... or overlook the fact that it nowhere specified 'blacks', but applied to white indentured servants as well?
You wouldn't hold people in such contempt as to play those sorts of disingenuous debate games with their real worth would you? [8|]
The real 3/5ths compromise was well known to be an anti-slavery clause that prevented many slave owners from voting their slave's proxy, and hasn't existed for a century and a half, so why exactly do you have a problem with it?
Article 1, Section 2, Paragraph 3 of the United States Constitution:
"Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons
You missed the fundemental point I was making. The constitution was framed to protect the opulent minority from the great unwashed. If you look at the background of the founding fathers and the first American presidents, they are no better than the tyranny they claim to have fought against in the revolution and they created a country that became an empire in the likeness of the one they claimed to abore. The elevation of the US constitution to that of religious text through constant propaganda has denied many Americans of rights by enshrining the power of the affluent minority over the majority.
http://cyberjournal.org/authors/fresia/#c1
Feel free to criticize Britain, Europe or any other country but start a new thread, I will join you in that criticism but this thread is about the 2nd Amendment and the point that was made that I was answering to was the poster that said he thought the 2nd Amendment was for the individual to pretect himself from the power of the state. My point was, that notion goes against the grain of the constitution, that of enshrining the rights of the governing and opulent minority against the majority. If you look at the social and wealth divide in America and the fact that social mobility in America is less than any other developed country in the world according to the OCED, it has succeeded. One of the main points of the constitution was defending the rights of the individual. It was seen in that time as a way of protecting the powerful individual, not a way of protecting the weak individual and constant propaganda appears to have had the effect of most Americans believing the constitution was written to protect them. This is why the American mentality of being poor is the fault of the poor has took where in most developed countries, poverty is accepted as being caused through social and economic inequality that is inherent in the capitalist system and hence the need for regulation and social reform and wealth redistribution.
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