...the basic human rights. In order to evaluate the American system of slavery this paper will analyze and compare two primary sources, Thomas Jefferson's, “ Note on the State of Virginia”, and "The Trials of Girlhood and The Jealous Mistress" in “Incidents In The Life Of A Slave Girl,” by Harriet Ann Jacobs. While Thomas Jefferson proposes his idea to emancipate freed African American slavery, he was willing to reconsider the relationship between slaves and their owners. Harriet presents real situation of degraded relationships between white and slaves in her early slave life. However, both two disagree that slavery in the United States would divide human races into even more conflicts with social, cultural, economic, and political impacts. In “Note on the state of Virginia,” Jefferson discussed his proposal for the emancipation and removal of Virginia's slaves. In his not he explained why freeing black slaveries could not remain longer in the future. Jefferson argued that “deep-rooted prejudices entertained by the whites; ten thousand recollections, by the blacks, of the injuries they have sustained; new provocations; the real distinctions which nature has made; and many other circumstances, will divide us into parties, and produce convulsions which will probably never end but in the extermination of the one or the other race.” (Jefferson, 119) He also argued that blacks were inferior to whites in reason and imagination,...
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...To what extent has modern liberalism departed from the ideas of classical liberalism? The further development of industrialisation led to social and economic inequality. This led to a revision of classical liberal ideas to prevent the spread of ignorance and poverty. It is suggested that modern liberals have betrayed classical liberal ideas as they embrace collectivism and diverge from classical liberalism on issues such as freedom. However, it can be argued that modern liberals have simply built on classical liberal ideas such as its commitment to the individual. One area in which it is suggested that modern liberalism has departed from classical liberalism is individualism. Classical liberals believe in egoism, that individuals are rational self-interested creatures who have a pronounced capacity for self-reliance. Thus, they are influenced by Jeremy Bentham and utilitarianism which is the idea that individuals take decisions and moral action based on self-interest; that which maximises the individuals pleasure and minimises pain. He argued that ‘it is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong’. They view society as atomistic, the idea that it is simply a composition of largely self-sufficient individuals. Thus, they disagree with paternalistic conservatism strongly as each individual can perceive their interests and its consequence. In practise, Classical liberals have supported a free market with minimum government intervention...
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...Economic freedom is the key to our prosperity as a nation. Thomas Jefferson observed that “a wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement.” Economic freedom, or the ability to profit from our own ideas and labor, to work, produce, consume, own, trade, and invest according to our own choices, has been a debate for many years. There are many statistics on both sides of the argument. I would argue that history has proven, time and time again, that a country with more economic freedom and less government intervention is more prosperous than one that is highly regulated by the government. Advocates of an expanded government argue that free markets cause income inequality, crises, and monopolies. They believe that more government control of the economy avoids these problems. Since President Obama has been at the helm of the United States, our economic freedom has declined. Eight of the past nine years the U.S has lost economic freedoms and went from being the 6th freest economy in the world to 11th. In 2013, Obama said, “We need to set aside the belief that government cannot do anything about reducing inequality." Technically, he might be right but the way for the government to help reduce income equality is to get out of the way of the American citizens. A 2014 study in an issue of Contemporary Economic Policy done by economist Oguzhan Dincer,...
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...Confronting Inequality Response Paul Krugman in “Confronting Inequality” tries to explain how bad inequality is and the things that can bring inequality up or down. He gives reasons of why he and Americans should care about the rising inequality. Krugman says, “One reason to care about inequality is the straight forward matter of living standards. The lack of clear economic progress for lower and middle income families is in itself an important reason to seek a more equal distribution of income” (322). Krugman also uses many quotes from people who have had a big impact on America to help argue his point about inequality. Quote that stuck out on its own was the one Thomas Jefferson said, “The small landowners are the most precious part of a state” (323). This quote is stating that middle class is very important to a state. “High Inequality…Nation much weakened middle class, has a corrosive effect on social relations and politics…America has moved deeper into a new Gilded Age” (323). Krugman says, “One of the best arguments I’ve ever seen for the social costs of inequality came from a movement conservative trying to argue the opposite” (323). He then quotes the conservative Kristol “We shouldn’t worry about income inequality, because whatever the numbers say, class distinctions are, in reality, all but gone” (323). Although he doesn’t agree with this quote he uses it to better show the controversy between your average liberals and conservatives...
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...Paul Krugman begins this article by asking the audience why rising inequality matters. This positions him to lead into the reasons why it is important to lower and middle class American’s. Coupled with his examples of importance, he suggests policy reform to help fix these issues. Krugman believes the middle class is disintegrating; he uses a simple quote from Thomas Jefferson to bring forward the idea that men who believed the middle class to be the most important part of the nation founded our country. He addresses the opposition that economic inequality is now balanced by social equality. Moving forward he breaks down the argument with the fact that middle class parents are willing to indebt themselves more than ever before in order to...
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...and do overlap. In moral domains, we are not concerned to give a mathematical, experimentally based theory of ethics or justice, but we are concerned with the general order of nature and how human life is nestled in and depends on that order. For example, life (& its preservation) depends on observing the necessities and limitations of nature, how we are dependent on food, shelter, parents and a community and the satisfying of other natural needs for life to exist, continue and prosper. The most prominent philosophers & political thinkers in this line of thought include the following: ancient - Plato, Aristotle, & later Cicero & other Roman statesmen; medieval - St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas & other thinkers in the Judeo-Christian tradition; modern - John Locke, & of course Thomas Jefferson & the “founding fathers” of the American republic. According to almost all of these authors, the natural order ultimately depends upon a first ordering principle that established the relation between man and nature. That first principle is commonly referred to as God or Creator, as indicated, for example, in the opening of Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence. One line of reasoning introduced by Plato is based on the law of the Division of Labor. This law holds that given our natural needs, it is most efficient, effective & conducive to our flourishing for each of us to specialize by developing our skills & talents, and exchange the product of our labors with one another for the...
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...and do overlap. In moral domains, we are not concerned to give a mathematical, experimentally based theory of ethics or justice, but we are concerned with the general order of nature and how human life is nestled in and depends on that order. For example, life (& its preservation) depends on observing the necessities and limitations of nature, how we are dependent on food, shelter, parents and a community and the satisfying of other natural needs for life to exist, continue and prosper. The most prominent philosophers & political thinkers in this line of thought include the following: ancient - Plato, Aristotle, & later Cicero & other Roman statesmen; medieval - St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas & other thinkers in the Judeo-Christian tradition; modern - John Locke, & of course Thomas Jefferson & the “founding fathers” of the American republic. According to almost all of these authors, the natural order ultimately depends upon a first ordering principle that established the relation between man and nature. That first principle is commonly referred to as God or Creator, as indicated, for example, in the opening of Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence. One line of reasoning introduced by Plato is based on the law of the Division of Labor. This law holds that given our natural needs, it is most efficient, effective & conducive to our flourishing for each of us to specialize by developing our skills & talents, and exchange the product of our labors with one another for the...
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...and do overlap. In moral domains, we are not concerned to give a mathematical, experimentally based theory of ethics or justice, but we are concerned with the general order of nature and how human life is nestled in and depends on that order. For example, life (& its preservation) depends on observing the necessities and limitations of nature, how we are dependent on food, shelter, parents and a community and the satisfying of other natural needs for life to exist, continue and prosper. The most prominent philosophers & political thinkers in this line of thought include the following: ancient - Plato, Aristotle, & later Cicero & other Roman statesmen; medieval - St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas & other thinkers in the Judeo-Christian tradition; modern - John Locke, & of course Thomas Jefferson & the “founding fathers” of the American republic. According to almost all of these authors, the natural order ultimately depends upon a first ordering principle that established the relation between man and nature. That first principle is commonly referred to as God or Creator, as indicated, for example, in the opening of Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence. One line of reasoning introduced by Plato is based on the law of the Division of Labor. This law holds that given our natural needs, it is most efficient, effective & conducive to our flourishing for each of us to specialize by developing our skills & talents, and exchange the product of our labors with one another for the...
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...CHAPTER 5 The American Revolution, 1763-1783 Chapter Study Outline I. The crisis begins A. Pre-1763 consolidation of imperial authority B. Emerging split over British-colonial relations 1. British perspective a. Subordinate position of colonies b. Obligation of colonies to share in cost of empire c. "Virtual representation" 2. American perspective a. Equality of colonies and mother country b. No taxation without representation C. Initial skirmishes 1. Writs of assistance against smuggling 2. Proclamation of 1763 3. Sugar Act 4. Revenue Act 5. Currency Act D. Stamp Act crisis 1. Provisions of Stamp Act 2. Indignation in colonies 3. Taxation and representation; increasing opposition a. Virginia resolutions b. Stamp Act Congress c. Boycott of British goods d. Public demonstrations e. Committees of Correspondence f. Sons of Liberty g. Crowd actions 4. Breadth of opposition a. Colonial elites b. Middling ranks c. Laboring classes 5. Repeal of Stamp Act; passage of Declaratory Act E. Internal colonial disputes 1. Tenant uprising in Hudson Valley 2. Tenant uprising in Green Mountains 3. Regulators in South Carolina 4. Regulators in North Carolina II. The road to revolution A. Townshend crisis 1. Provisions of Townshend duties 2. Colonial response, home-spun virtue a. Revival of boycott on British goods b. American-made goods as symbol of resistance c. Reawakening of popular protest B. Boston Massacre 1. Stationing of troops in Boston 2...
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...George Washington was elected two times and this was due to the Federalist, John Adams, and the Democratic-Republican vice-president, Thomas Jefferson. Once Jefferson ran against Aaron Burr and won the presidency in 1800, the start of a Democratic-Republican rule began. The easy change of presidential power during the election proved that the American Republic was a working democracy. Democracy in the United States began to open up more with the emergence of women’s suffrage. White American women were granted the right to vote when the nineteenth amendment was ratified on August 18, 1920. “At the time the U.S was founded, its female citizens did not share all of the same rights as men including the right to vote” (Lenz,...
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...Keeping the Dream Alive The perennial conviction that those who work hard and play by the rules will be rewarded with a more comfortable present and a stronger future for their children faces assault from just about every direction. That great enemy of democratic capitalism, economic inequality, is real and growing. The unemployment rate is dispiritingly high. The nation's long-term fiscal health is at risk, and the American political system, the engine of what Thomas Jefferson called "the world's best hope," shows no sign of reaching solutions commensurate with the problems of the day. It has not always been this way. On Friday, May 1, 1931, James Truslow Adams, a popular historian, was putting the final touches on the preface to his latest book. It was a curious time in the life of the nation. Though the Crash of 1929 had signaled the beginning of the Great Depression that was to endure for years to come, there was also a spirit of progress, of possibility. On the day Adams was finishing his manuscript, President Herbert Hoover pressed a button in Washington to turn on the lights of the newly opened Empire State Building at 34th Street and Fifth Avenue, which, at 1,250 ft., was to be the tallest building in Manhattan until the construction of the World Trade Center four decades later. High hopes amid hard times: the moment matched Adams' thesis in his book, The Epic of America, a history of the nation that was to popularize a term not yet in the general vernacular in those...
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...It’s Time Obamacare begins its main act The Prince, an excellent writing by Niccolò Machiavelli, who was born on May 3, 1469, in Florence, Italy; illustrates a practical guide for ruling. The Prince is dedicated to Lorenzo de’ Medici, the ruler of Florence. Machiavelli abstract tackles the way autocracy regimes rule, rather than republic. Base on The Prince, this essay is attempt to answer a critical question: how the tension between individual liberty and the common good is resolved in contemporary society? A great Prince (ruler) is whom can merge the gap between common goods without violating individual liberty; as Machiavelli would argue: the theme that obtaining the goodwill of the populace is the best way to maintain power. Goodwill is the crucial term to understand Machiavelli definition of a great ruler. Machiavelli introduction of The Prince is about the way Lorenzo should govern with absolute power, as military power is dominant. He proposed the advantage and disadvantage to attend various routes to power. The most important theme in his book is how a Prince should avoid hatred from his populace. This can directly relate to contemporary society. As Machiavelli suggested, it is not necessary for a Prince to be love, but hatred is the downfall of a ruler. His realist’s argument point out that fears is the best alternative to sustain power; however, in modern society context, it doesn’t work anymore. How is his argument related to today context? The latest issue...
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...History of the United States I AMH 1010 CRN 10800, December 1, 2014 Wood, Gordon. The Radicalism of the American Revolution. Vintage Books, a Division of Random House, Inc., New York, 1991 Gordon Wood describes the American Revolution as a journey from paternal colonialism to an egalitarian democracy. His contention is that the American Revolution does not seem to have the same kinds of causes that Revolutions usually display. There were no big social wrongs, no class conflict, no severe poverty, or gross inequitable distribution of wealth. Wood claims our revolution was not about independence as most history books claim but about the radical transformation of the American society. Monarchy In this section the author describes the structure of colonial America in the 1750s and 1760s. In colonial society, authority and liberty flowed from the structure of personal relationships. Society was held together by networks of personal loyalties, obligations and dependencies. In this hierarchical society, the elite or aristocrats ruled. The aristocrats (also called gentlemen) used their wealth and their hereditary advantages to keep the common people as dependents. The aristocrats lived a life of leisure which meant that they were not expected to labor. Their income was supposed to come from their landed estates. They used these landed estates to control the issuance of government offices and created laws that would keep their estates in the family. Most estates were passed on to...
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...transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security”- Declaration of Independence. Look at what some of these revolutionaries of the time said: “Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.”- Thomas Paine. “I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical.”- Thomas Jefferson. Misinterpretations I wanted to tackle some of the ridiculous views on anarchy. So, here we go. Many people have obscure or wrong views on anarchy. This is because of the government, the media and other such things. Example(s): According to wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn anarchy means a state of lawlessness and disorder (usually resulting from a failure of government). According to the same website anarchic means without law or control; "the system is economically inefficient and politically anarchic". Google has these up on their define page of anarchy and anarchic. I have multiple problems with this. First off, anarchy, given reasonable...
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...throughout the years, has grown to encompass historians, students, and anyone who has studied the civil rights era. The purpose behind this letter is not only a reaction to the written statement by the clergymen or the imprisonment of King, but his cause of the imprisonment. He was imprisoned for peaceful protest under direct action. He writes in the second paragraph that he is serving as president for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and of eighty-five affiliated organizations; one of them being stationed in Alabama. The Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights called for King’s assistance in Birmingham to act in nonviolent protest if negotiations weren’t met. After promises were broken by the leaders of Birmingham’s economic community and delaying the protest for various reasons concerning the election of the mayor, they began their protests. Martin Luther King Jr. is asked, “Why direct action?” and he replies quite simply that direct action creates a tension that will lead to negotiation and bring to the forefront the problems that have been ignored. He uses an analogy, comparing the tension created with direct action to the tension that Socrates said one must create in the mind for progression. He is defining “tension” in his own terms. A word he admits is usually associated with violence, but he defines it as, “constructive, nonviolent tension, which is necessary for growth.” Throughout the letter, Martin Luther King Jr. redefines...
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