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[Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com>]

On Apr 28, 2008, at 6:42 PM, Clansgian AT wmconnect.com wrote:

> In Thomas Jefferson's gardening and farm journals, he records the  
> goings on
> of his "hands" as he invariably called them.  They had a quota of  
> work, in
> exchange for which they were provided with rations, clothes,  
> housing, blankets,
> etc.  When their quota was fulfilled, they were paid in cash for any  
> work done
> beyond that.

Sounds humane, eh? The primary moral crime I see is that free human  
beings in a foreign continent were captured and hauled by ship to  
America where they were sold to the highest bidder. Stripped of their  
homeland, their freedom, their personal integrity. No matter how well  
eventual owners treated them, the entire operation was criminal by my  
standards.