African Americans Receive Reparations For America's History Of Slavery

Introduction

The discovery of America by Christopher Columbus in 1492 and the subsequent conquest of the continent at the hands of Spanish and Portuguese repercussions from the sixteenth century in another region of the planet, somewhat removed from the events of Conquest: try Africa .

Although the two continents separated by the Atlantic Ocean, with historical, social and economic completely different from the XVI century there is a rapprochement between America and Africa. The cause of this approach is that the conquest of America, all natural and prospects development offered to its conquerors required for complementation of labor necessary for the appropriation of such wealth and obtain advantages in economic exploitation of such vast areas.

Discussion and Analysis

According to the Advancement Project (Re-Enfranchisement, 2002) in the U.S., eight states (Alabama, Florida, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, Nevada, Virginia, and Wyoming) permanently disenfranchised all felons and ex-felons; and five states (Arizona, Delaware, Maryland, Tennessee, and Washington) permanently disenfranchised some felons, but not all. Thirty-six states allowed persons with felony convictions to have their voting rights restored automatically at some point after they were released from incarceration, while two states (Maine and Vermont) allow persons in prison to vote. Thirteen states disenfranchised some or all felons and ex-felons for life (Meacham, 156).

The U.S. is the only modern democratic country that bars some or all ex offenders from voting for life, and has a significant percentage of its citizens who cannot vote because of felony convictions. The Sentencing Project, Washington, D.C., reports that there are collateral effects and consequences of felon disenfranchisement that disproportionately affects people of color and their communities. While African Americans comprise 13% of the total U.S. population, African Americans represent 37% of the U.S. felon population. Felon disenfranchisement is not only an extra-legal practice and punishment, but also subject's people to these laws by happenstance of geographic location. These laws deny African American felons and African American communities the right to participate fully in the electoral process for no other reasons than punishment and race.

The slave trade

Exploring the coast of Africa, the discovery of America in the fifteenth century and their colonization in the next three centuries, considerably boosted the slave trade.

The Spanish and Portuguese conquerors, at first the Indians used to cultivate large plantations and work in the mines, but over time these "inexhaustible wealth" ended up running out due to harsh working conditions, the miserable food, poor hygiene, the grueling punishment, lack of immunity to European diseases, in a word, the harsh living conditions they were subjected. The collapse of indigenous populations (total and partial in the West Indies in the Americas) caused the increase in the number of slaves, was directly proportional relationship: the more slaves died, more were needed. As millions of natives died from the harshness of the work, we chose to matter to the Spanish and Portuguese colonies, from the sixteenth century, African slaves, believing they could better endure the hard labor: and again, mistaken assumption disastrous for the men ...