Historians Accuse Hillary Clinton of Ignorance About Plantations
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- (TNN -- Tara News Network) -- New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton has caused a controversy by referring to the majority-Republican House of Representatives as a "plantation."
Senator Clinton compared the 435-member legislative body to the the large farms utilizing mass black slave labor before slavery was abolished in the United States; the word "plantation" is still an extremely emotionally loaded term.
Today, a group of professional academics and historians has joined the chorus of critics. But whereas most of the Senator's critics condemn her for playing the race card, the academics have a different complaint. In their press release, the group Historians of America for Historical Accuracy (HAHA) complained that Senator Clinton was misrepresenting the historical facts of the plantation.
HAHA spokesperson Professor I. Voree Tower summarized the historians' complaint: "Senator Clinton compared the modern-day American House of Representatives to the antebellum Southern plantation. This is a gross misrepresentation of history! Plantation slaves most certainly did not engage in any form of representative government, free elections, expensive private housing in exclusive Washington neighborhoods, or Congressional recesses for the holidays. Plantation slaves were considered property. They manifestly did not ever introduce legislation into any assembly, nor did they have an opportunity to form political parties or participate in democratic action."
Plantations in America ended in large part with the final abolition of slavery by the victory of the Union troops in the American Civil War and by the 1863 Emancipation Proclamation by Abraham Lincoln, the US's first Republican president.
Senator Clinton compared the 435-member legislative body to the the large farms utilizing mass black slave labor before slavery was abolished in the United States; the word "plantation" is still an extremely emotionally loaded term.
Today, a group of professional academics and historians has joined the chorus of critics. But whereas most of the Senator's critics condemn her for playing the race card, the academics have a different complaint. In their press release, the group Historians of America for Historical Accuracy (HAHA) complained that Senator Clinton was misrepresenting the historical facts of the plantation.
HAHA spokesperson Professor I. Voree Tower summarized the historians' complaint: "Senator Clinton compared the modern-day American House of Representatives to the antebellum Southern plantation. This is a gross misrepresentation of history! Plantation slaves most certainly did not engage in any form of representative government, free elections, expensive private housing in exclusive Washington neighborhoods, or Congressional recesses for the holidays. Plantation slaves were considered property. They manifestly did not ever introduce legislation into any assembly, nor did they have an opportunity to form political parties or participate in democratic action."
Plantations in America ended in large part with the final abolition of slavery by the victory of the Union troops in the American Civil War and by the 1863 Emancipation Proclamation by Abraham Lincoln, the US's first Republican president.
posted by Mad Minerva at 9:22 AM
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