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View Full Version : Was limited voting rights the reason we had slavery?




Madison320
08-08-2018, 12:00 PM
In another thread another member here is claiming that the reason we had slavery was due to limited voting rights. For example in some states only property owners could vote. I thought slavery occurred well before limited voting rights. Plus slavery ended before voting rights became expanded.


Any thoughts?

brushfire
08-08-2018, 12:21 PM
Perhaps from the perspective of indigenous tribes in Africa, who would sell slaves to western countries... If only they had voting rights...well, more civil voting rights. The kind of voting rights that dont involve spears and violence.

Did the European slaves obtain voting rights prior to their being freed?

PierzStyx
08-08-2018, 12:21 PM
I suppose there is some logic to this. After all you can't maintain slavery by letting slaves vote, so you must limit voting rights by not letting them vote. Which means that in that sense, yes, limited voting rights did help contribute to slavery. But this seems more like a result than a cause. Limited voting rights didn't make people slave, rather slaves aren't allowed to vote.

That said, your claim that slavery ended before voting rights expanded isn't completely true. The ending of property qualifications for white men to vote began to disappear in 1792 and completely disappeared by 1856. While this was only the precursor to expanding voting rights to black men, Native Americans, and women, it is a significant step in the direction of expanding the voting pool. And expanding the voting pool did empower a lot more people who might have been free soilers or the much rarer abolitionist and gave them more effect on national politics.

Still, it seems more likely to me that one could argue that a lack of voting rights helped maintain slavery once it existed not that it caused it.

TheTexan
08-08-2018, 12:26 PM
Abraham Lincoln typically gets the credit for freeing the slaves but really it was the right to vote that freed the slaves, because after all it was voting that elected Lincoln to begin with.

brushfire
08-08-2018, 12:27 PM
I've got myself thinking now - and I know there have been studies. How does such a substantial number of controlled/oppressed people, remain controlled and oppressed? I mean, its not to the same extent, but some might argue this oppression is happening at this very minute, here in the "land of the free". Here, we have so called voting rights - what is it about man that permits him to be submissive to others? I betcha the lobsters have some evolutionary answer (Dr Peterson reference).

timosman
08-08-2018, 12:30 PM
Abraham Lincoln typically gets the credit for freeing the slaves but really it was the right to vote that freed the slaves, because after all it was voting that elected Lincoln to begin with.

Did you notice your attempts at humor mostly fall flat? Do you know why that is? :confused:

timosman
08-08-2018, 12:32 PM
We should probably bring Barbary slave trade into discussion to have a better picture - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbary_slave_trade


Perpetrated largely on European Christians, and within in-land routes to indigenous Christian inhabitants. These peoples due to being non-Muslims in a Muslim majority society were systematically preyed upon and turned into slaves, acquired by Barbary pirates and Muslim in general during slave raids on ships and by raids on coastal towns from Italy to the Netherlands, as far north as Iceland and in the eastern shores of the Mediterranean.
The Ottoman eastern Mediterranean was the scene of intense piracy. As late as the 18th century, piracy continued to be a "consistent threat to maritime traffic in the Aegean".
For centuries, large vessels on the Mediterranean relied on galley slaves supplied by North African and Ottoman slave traders.

AuH20
08-08-2018, 12:35 PM
White indentured servants couldn't vote either.

TheTexan
08-08-2018, 12:54 PM
Did you notice your attempts at humor mostly fall flat? Do you know why that is? :confused:

https://media1.giphy.com/media/L9LZC1QjDqlJ6/giphy.gif

Swordsmyth
08-08-2018, 02:09 PM
The two had little or nothing to do with eachother, the political and cultural trends that led to the election of Lincoln and the Republicans would have brought about the same result with little variation in timing or details without the changes to voting rights.

Madison320
08-08-2018, 03:36 PM
The two had little or nothing to do with eachother, the political and cultural trends that led to the election of Lincoln and the Republicans would have brought about the same result with little variation in timing or details without the changes to voting rights.

I agree. His point was that limited voting rights was a failed experiment because it led to slavery in the US. I view limited voting rights as a success and I point to the US as an example.

Plus I don't think the "owning property" criteria is the best way to limit the pool of voters. I think some sort of taxpayer/non welfare system is by far the best way that I've heard of.

A Republic, Not a Democracy by Ron Paul


Last week marked the conclusion of the grand taxpayer funded spectacles known as the national party conventions. It is perhaps very telling that while $18 million in tax dollars was granted to each party for these lavish ordeals, an additional $50 million each was needed for security in anticipation of the inevitable protests at each event. This amounts to a total of $136 million in taxpayer funds for strictly partisan activities – a drop in the bucket relative to our disastrous fiscal situation, but disgraceful nonetheless. Parties should fund their own parties, not the taxpayer.


At these conventions, leaders determined, or pretended to determine, who they wished to govern the nation for the next four years amidst inevitable, endless exaltations of democracy. Yet we are not a democracy. In fact, the founding fathers found the concept of democracy very dangerous.


Democracy is majority rule at the expense of the minority. Our system has certain democratic elements, but the founders never mentioned democracy in the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, or the Declaration of Independence. In fact, our most important protections are decidedly undemocratic. For example, the First Amendment protects free speech. It doesn't – or shouldn't – matter if that speech is abhorrent to 51% or even 99% of the people. Speech is not subject to majority approval. Under our republican form of government, the individual, the smallest of minorities, is protected from the mob.


Sadly, the constitution and its protections are respected less and less as we have quietly allowed our constitutional republic to devolve into a militarist, corporatist social democracy. Laws are broken, quietly changed and ignored when inconvenient to those in power, while others in positions to check and balance do nothing. The protections the founders put in place are more and more just an illusion.




This is why increasing importance is placed on the beliefs and views of the president. The very narrow limitations on government power are clearly laid out in Article 1 Section 8 of the Constitution. Nowhere is there any reference to being able to force Americans to buy health insurance or face a tax/penalty, for example. Yet this power has been claimed by the executive and astonishingly affirmed by Congress and the Supreme Court. Because we are a constitutional republic, the mere popularity of a policy should not matter. If it is in clear violation of the limits of government and the people still want it, a Constitutional amendment is the only appropriate way to proceed. However, rather than going through this arduous process, the Constitution was in effect, ignored and the insurance mandate was allowed anyway.


This demonstrates how there is now a great deal of unhindered flexibility in the Oval Office to impose personal views and preferences on the country, so long as 51% of the people can be convinced to vote a certain way. The other 49% on the other hand have much to be angry about and protest under this system.


We should not tolerate the fact that we have become a nation ruled by men, their whims and the mood of the day, and not laws. It cannot be emphasized enough that we are a republic, not a democracy and, as such, we should insist that the framework of the Constitution be respected and boundaries set by law are not crossed by our leaders. These legal limitations on government assure that other men do not impose their will over the individual, rather, the individual is able to govern himself. When government is restrained, liberty thrives.

Swordsmyth
08-08-2018, 03:46 PM
I agree. His point was that limited voting rights was a failed experiment because it led to slavery in the US. I view limited voting rights as a success and I point to the US as an example.

Plus I don't think the "owning property" criteria is the best way to limit the pool of voters. I think some sort of taxpayer/non welfare system is by far the best way that I've heard of.

There are a few other restrictions that are needed as well, the voting age shouldn't have been lowered to 18 for instance, the draft should have been done away with or if not it should have had its minimum age raised to 21, literacy in English is another, if you can't speak and read English you will not be able to be properly informed about the issues and candidates.

oyarde
08-08-2018, 04:03 PM
I am going with not .In my kingdom I do not allow voting or slavery so we avoid all these nasty problems .