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Samizdata quote of the day – Slavery reparations is a grift, no ifs, no buts Britain did not benefit from (slave) labour anyway. We did not then have a state controlled economy, we do not now have a state controlled economy. Britain didn’t own the slaves so it’s not Britain that – even if you can prove that there should be reparations – which should pay for owning the slaves it didn’t.
This does then rather leave the reparations argument being that Barbados – or whoever – needs to go around suing, individually, the estates of those who owned slaves. Good luck with that one.
– Tim Worstall
With the small proviso that in more than a few ways, the UK does indeed now have a fairly state controlled economy, I agree with Tim as usual.
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A difficulty is that while Tim Worstall’s logic is impeccable, the current Labour administration is in thrall to post-colonial guilt psychology. Exhibit A: the foreign secretary, David Lammy. He’s a buffoon, but he’s also dangerous. The Chagos Islands deal has shown the U.K. government is stupid
By the way, I bet China has some involvement in stirring up hate towards the U.K. on this.
I wouldn’t even dignify it with that label!
In spite of the fact that I agree with his underlying sentiment completely, I can see a logic problem.
“The state”, in this scenario, is simply the common funds-collecting mechanism for all of those “things we want to do together.” (Yes, this is BS, but the system is BS.)
So a dollar – oops, pound – paid by your government as reparations is simply a dollar kicked in by each and every taxpayer.
A better idea – sell pretty helium balloons with “thank you for your service” printed on them, for a hundred pounds each, as a reparations fundraiser.
Everyone eager to help can then simply buy the balloon.
Presently the Credit Money system is being used for all sorts of things – for example, via certain bodies and organisations, it is funding a 150 Million Dollar smear campaign against Ted Cruz in Texas. 150 Million Dollars for just one Senate seat election.
But why not use the money in this way – no one had to WORK for the money, it is created from nothing (it is not gold or silver or any commodity).
So why not use it to pay these absurd “Reparations” – but NOT via the banks and other financial entities, no creating the money (from nothing) lending it out and borrowing it back again (at a higher rate of interest) – and then spending it.
No – just create the Trillions of Pounds (or whatever) and spend it on these “Reparations” – directly (without financial institutions getting to wet-their-beak in the corrupt create-from-nothing-lend-it-out-and-borrow-it-back-again-at-a-higher-rate-of-interest way they do).
And give me, Paul Marks, a few Trillion Pounds as well – I have got just as much right to “Reparations” as the people presently demanding them.
“But the money will be worthless”.
The money is going to be worthless anyway – because it is not just the race-baiting “Reparations” that are a nonsense, so is the monetary and financial system.
I say again – give me, Paul Marks, these vast amounts of money.
I have just as much right to this money as the people demanding “Reparations”.
If they are going to get free money (created from nothing) I want it as well.
“good luck with that one” about suing in the courts.
I suspect that Mr Worstall has a rather out of date view of the courts.
Modern courts are very much into “Diversity” – uniformity, “Inclusion” – exclusion, and “Social Justice” – injustice.
We have NOT quite reached the stage where the courts decide that, as a white-straight-man, Mr Worstall should have his organs removed (whilst he is still alive and conscious – why waste anesthetic) and sold, to fund “Reparations” (yes the leftist establishment could just create even more money from nothing – but they might prefer ripping out organs) – but we may not be far from it.
After all if, as the schools, universities, and media claim, white-straight-men are responsible for all the pain in the world – should they not be made to suffer?
For example, they spread “false claims” about a “Syrian refugee” (who is himself a white-straight-man – but let us not be hung up on details, not when “Social Justice” is at stake).
Turing to history – English courts repeatedly (from the early 1100s onwards – yes almost a thousand years ago) ruled that buying and selling human beings was unlawful – yet it was incredibly difficult to get any judgement to generally “stick” – the courts might free a single individual, but it was hardly practical for each individual slave to sue for their freedom through the courts.
It was not till the Mansfield judgement of 1772 that a judgement managed to get generally applied, and even then only on this island – even though Common Law was supposed to apply to the colonies.
It is not quite the same in France – where the judgement of King Louis the Tenth (back in the Middle Ages) that slavery was unlawful was couched in such harsh language (Louis was known for his temper) that it was impossible for the lawyers to “interpret” it away.
All the shysters (and the word is justified) could do is say “Louis the Tenth never mentioned French colonies” – nor did he, as there were no French colonies in his lifetime.
The idea that French law (based on natural law – as Christian legal thinkers held that natural law overrides state edicts – Roman legal thinkers, who admitted that slavery was against natural law, took the opposite point of view) did NOT apply to French colonies was, of course, absurd – but this absurdity was upheld to justify slavery in French colonies.
Slavery would have difficulty surviving without such state support – as it would be the old criminal offenses of unlawful imprisonment and assault.
It would be interesting to know how many of Lammy’s ancestors were slave masters. Probably more than most people in this country.
Anyway, if it can be established that we owe the Barbadians for this, no doubt the money – and more – can be recovered from the French since William the B@st@rd came over and installed his mates as feudal overlords. (Note that ‘serf’ means much the same as ‘slave’).
“It would be interesting to know how many of Lammy’s ancestors were slave masters.”
Which former president has slave owners in his family ancestry, the 44th or the 45th? Hint: it’s not the latter.
I recall watching a US genealogy show once where an African American family in (I think it was South Carolina) wanted to know if the story handed down that they were descended from free blacks was actually true. The genealogist (an African American) was able to confirm that their ancestors were indeed already freemen while South Carolina was still a British colony. Then she showed them a census from the early 19th century that showed not only their free ancestors but also – all the slaves they owned. The family was gobsmacked. As the genealogist explained, they were freemen and under the law perfectly entitled to own slaves. And so they did.
“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there…“
Coming out of Reconstruction (post-Civil War period of fixing things), Blacks were seemingly on a good path in relation to joining society.
Then the Democrats got hold of them as guilt props for campaigning purposes, and Black economic progress stalled and they regressed in their attainment of social acceptance. The D’s have been holding them back now for over 100 years.
So I’d charge any reparations specifically to the Democrat party, and to serious Democrats.
Paul:
As you say, the money for “reparations” could indeed just be created at the flick of a switch at the Bank of England. Money now is backed by nothing physical and can be created at will. But that will not happen because the establishment hardly wants people to realise that “money” is backed by nothing and can be created at will. Why is the government crushing us with taxes if it can just create the money? I think it is to maintain the illusion that “money” is worth something. It would let the cat out of the bag if they admitted they could create just as much of it as they wanted, at any time.
Barbados would have a stronger case if it sought reparations from Ghana, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and the Congo, the modern-day incarnations of countries which systematically captured, enslaved and sold their African neighbours – which was at least preferable to being slaughtered or sacrificed. In addition their role in the process was unquestionably state-driven as opposed to the mercantile Europeans.
However, to paraphrase the inveterate bank robber, thats not where the money is.
My great grandfather was in the RN south sea fleet hunting down slavers for his whole navy career. Does that absolve me from paying reparations?
Daniel Hannan recently penned a thorough repudiation of reparations. Excellently argued.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/10/19/reparations-are-wrong-on-every-level-we-must-reject/
(Behind the paywall, but I could upload a pdf version if one of the Samizdata team could let me know how.)
I’d echo Johnathan Pearce’s observation that the current lot in office (I decline to refer to them as a government except as a term of contempt) are way too ignorant and ideological to be anything but “in thrall to post-colonial guilt psychology”.
Item: a fair number of free colored persons “owned” immediate family members, who were thereby protected from being seized and enslaved by others.
Item: there are reliable records of slave ownership, income from slave-worked plantations, and compensatory payments to slave owners. This wealth was passed down to heirs and their descendants; the process was recorded in court records and wills. Thus it is possibile to trace, quite definitely, wealth possessed today to slave exploitation. Some wealth: the proceeds of slavery have been commingled with the the profits of the industrial revolution and more recent capitalism, and have also been substantially taxed. Even so, Worstall’s proposal of suing individual inheritors is not absurd.
If it could be proven today that some article of value was stolen in 1830, would the heirs of the 1830 owner have a legitimate claim against the present possessor of the article?
Could i have a few millions myself, while we are at it?
Pretty please?
That is just 0,0001% of what Paul will be getting.
(I might be off by a zero either way, but who is counting?)
A few remarks on the substance.
All what follows is based on my possibly wrong understanding of history.
* Portuguese slave traders carried about half of all African slaves carried across the Atlantic. As much as i love Portugal, fair is fair: if nations (as opposed to individuals) have to pay reparations, then Portugal must pay half of them.
(And then we have to talk about the trans-Sahara slave trade.)
* My understanding is that the British State was indeed responsible for slavery, to some extent, by enforcing it in the colonies.
But that benefited a few capitalists to the cost of the vast majority of taxpayers. Descendants of those taxpayers are entitled to reparations.
Further, all British taxpayers payed for the British Navy to enforce a global ban on the slave trade. All descendants of British taxpayers should be compensated for it.
* This quote from Worstall’s essay strikes me as particularly insightful (meaning, i doubt that it would have occurred to me):
(to be continued. Maybe.)
I’d be in favour of reparations in the form of a one way ticket to the African country of their choice. Once claimed UK citizenship is revoked along with all rights and benefits.
How many of the grifters would take that, anyone?
For the recovery of the item itself, perhaps. But if the item is sold and then the money is passed down to heirs, commingled with other wealth, for generations, I don’t think the descendants of the victim can recover the value of the stolen item from the descendants of the robber. Even more so if the supposed “robber” actually bought the item legally from someone else, who may or may not have been the actual robber.
JohnK.
Good point Sir.
Yes – now you point it out (for I was too dim to grasp it) I see there is a point to their lunatic create-the-money-from-nothing-lend-it-out-borrow-it-back-again-at-a-higher-rate-of-interest-and-only-then-spend-it.
If they just created the money from nothing and spent it – then the legalised fraud would be obvious, by making things complicated they obscure what is going on – they pull the wool over the eyes of the public.
Otherwise everyone would know that the monetary and financial system has become a sick farce – held up by nothing more than Moon beams and magic pixie dust, and, of course, Paul Krugman’s “men with guns”.
The “Nobel Prize winning” (Alfred Nobel did NOT create a prize for economics) Paul Krugman has no problem at all with an economic order based on “men with guns” (his own words) rather than materials that people voluntarily choose to value, with an economic order based on force-and-fear rather than productive work.
In fact this is what the international establishment likes.
Paul:
I was watching Farage on GB News last night (I must be a fascist I suppose). A guest was Liam Halligan, the economist. A question posed to him was where the £30bn that the government plans to borrow comes from? Halligan gave the usual answer, pension funds, international investors etc. But are there really pools of billions sitting around to “invest” in government bonds? Where is it all? Sitting in bank accounts waiting to be lent out at a few per cent interest to a bankrupt welfare state? I find it hard to believe.
I think your view is by far the more plausible, But as I say, the process has to be dressed up as if “real” money, money which has been earned by people and saved in pension funds, is being lent to the government. That way the fiction that fiat money is real money can be maintained.
JohnK
Why economists such as Liam Halligan say these things is hard to understand.
They pretend that there is massive Real Savings (the actual sacrifice of consumption) to fund this borrowing – but that just is not so.
In reality the money is created, from nothing, by the government central bank – lent out and borrowed back again, at higher rates of interest.
Perhaps Mr Halligan does not want to admit that the Western monetary and financial system is a vast fraud.
There was always fraud at the margin – even before 1914, but now the fraud (legalised fraud) is not at the margin of the system – the fraud is the system.
The international monetary and financial system is a vast fraud (a “fiction” as you rightly say Sir) – and it is indeed going to collapse.
I believe it will collapse in 2025 – and that Harris/Walz must no be office when it does collapse.
For if such people are in office – they will be used to create an even worse international system.
Full totalitarianism – tyranny, total and absolute.
In 1606 Scottish coal miners and salt pan workers were enslaved by Act of the Scottish Parliament.
This law was not repealed till 1775.
Why are there no demands for “Reparations” for the descendants of these Scottish slaves?