Search the Lounge

Categories

« Revolutionary War Trivia Question | Main | Suffolk Law Dean Camille Nelson Stepping Down »

October 10, 2014

Comments

Feed You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.

Ray Campbell

"His book Liberty and Slavery was based on the idea that the state should restrain the liberty of those not fit for freedom."

A rather ignorant question here: Was the influence of Bledsoe's work limited to slavery, or did it bleed over to other issues, such as treatment of the mentally handicapped or incarceration policies? Put differently, did the rationalizing of slavery exist mainly in a separate sphere, or did it interact with and cross pollinate discussion of other power driven social issues?

Alfred L. Brophy

That's a really interesting question, Ray -- Bledsoe's primary concern (as well as that of just about everyone else) was slavery. Though what he said about hierarchy had a lot of implications for marriage, too. The 1840s and 1850s saw a dramatic rise in incarceration (and also in hospitals for mentally ill), but I don't know how related Bledsoe's theory is to that -- I think the rise of the penitentiary is related more to the general spirit of reform movements than to Bledsoe's attempt to maintain hierarchy.

There's a lot to say about Bledsoe's and Holcombe's concern for order. It says a lot about how southern courts operated and a lot about the prosecutions of enslaved people (and the failure to hold slave-owners to account for abuse of their slaves).

Ray Campbell

I guess the ultimate question your interesting series of posts have brought to mind is this: how much does the ideology that developed to support the institution of slavery still impact American life? I realize tracing the intellectual history of something like that would be difficult, but I'm wondering if the ideology outlasted the institution of slavery and found homes in other areas. I would expect, for example, that the ideology of Jim Crow must owe a lot to the justifications for slavery. Certainly in my lifetime, and I think up to the present, the justifications for Jim Crow impact the way some people act and speak. The quote about "those not fit for freedom" reads like it comes out of a speech from a contemporary politician supporting high rates of incarceration. While it would seem that something different is meant by "not fit for freedom" the racial disparities that are a core part of our penal system make me wonder if there's more of a connection than at first meets the idea.

anon

"I guess the ultimate question your interesting series of posts have brought to mind ..."

"I'm wondering if the ideology outlasted the institution of slavery and found homes in other areas."

"the racial disparities that are a core part of our penal system make me wonder if there's more of a connection than at first meets the idea."

I'm wondering if the real question that have been brought to mind are whether an idea of slavery found a homes in other areas and whether the continuing effects of slavery are more connected to slavery than when I first met this novel idea.

Ray Campbell

than at first meets the eye is what I meant to say.

Sorry.

I think the anon post above, by the way, was created by some kind of bot. Software that recaps posts according to Markovian analysis is the only thing I know that creates that kind of weird syntax. What's odd is that such posts are normally accompanied by link to some scam site, and that seems to be missing here.

anon

No. Just quoting and using your syntax and grammar, Ray.

Alfred L. Brophy

Ray, those are really intriguing questions of how persistent are ideas like Bledsoe's over time. Obviously a lot of his thinking was officially rejected in the fourteenth amendment (though not everyone subscribed to the idea of equality in it). There are some parallels between pre-war thought and post-war racial hierarchy. I see those parallels as particularly strong in the period 1890-1930. I'm not sure that this is a case where ideas made popular by academics are carried down over the years -- as with many areas I think academics are gauges of ideas with deep roots in the culture of which they are a part.

Ray Campbell

In college, a course in southern history had Cannibals All on the reading list. After reading your post, I pulled it off Gutenberg and was struck by how his core ideas intersected with F.A. Hayek's. To oversimplify: Fitzhugh saw slavery as socialism, and hence saw slavery as good. Hayek saw socialism as slavery, and hence saw socialism as bad.

Barry

Ray Campbell: "Certainly in my lifetime, and I think up to the present, the justifications for Jim Crow impact the way some people act and speak. The quote about "those not fit for freedom" reads like it comes out of a speech from a contemporary politician supporting high rates of incarceration. While it would seem that something different is meant by "not fit for freedom" the racial disparities that are a core part of our penal system make me wonder if there's more of a connection than at first meets the idea."

This is where sociologists, historians and political scientists come in. I suggest reviewing the archives of Ta-Nesi Coates' blog on The Atlantic.

And speaking casually, I've seen so many comparisons of attitudes in the US by race and region that it's clear that yes, slavery (and it's successor, Jim Crow) still strongly influence the USA.

The comments to this entry are closed.

StatCounter

  • StatCounter
Blog powered by Typepad