The Permanent and Peculiar Institution

Comedy and tragedy are parallel to one another. Comedy and tragedy coexisted on full display in the legendary stand-up comedy film, Richard Pryor: Live on the Sunset Strip (1982). In that concert film, Pryor talked about his visit to Kenya, his life, and racism.  We should look at the global rise of America and consider what that really means.

The metaphorical engine that allowed America to grow and prosper to its present level is due to a single factor. Slavery. The People that built the United States remain its permanent underclass, and are referred to as the  American Descendants of Slavery (ADOS).  The accepted lie is that Slavery was a temporary, regional occurrence, and that the U.S. evolved from the institution of Slavery and transitioned to a free market economy. The reality is the fact that ADOS is a permanent underclass that is perpetually fed upon. The cotton produced in the South was  processed and financed by the North, and distributed around the world. The book, Cotton and Race in the Making of America: The Human Costs of Economic Power, by Gene Dattel shatters the myth which says that the Southern regions of the United States were the only ones that were directly involved with, and participated in, the institution known as Slavery.  Dattel points out that, “Slave-produced cotton connected the country’s regions, provided the export surplus the young nation desperately needed to gain its financial “sea legs,” brought commercial ascendancy to New York City, was the driving force for territorial expansion in the Old Southwest, and fostered trade between Europe and the United States.” Saying that Slavery was a Southern institution is a misnomer, and  fails to recognize the major part that Slavery played in the Agricultural Revolution. That movement facilitated the transition into the Industrial Age. The wealth attained from the blood, bones, and free labor (mind and body) of Slavery is responsible for this nation’s continued wealth still today.

Richard Pryor talked about his journey to Kenya and his emotional interaction with the people there. Step back from the Sunset Strip for a moment and look back 150 years. The U.S. North is viewed as a region of abolitionists and do-gooder allies that shunned the institution of Slavery. Dattel goes on to say how, “Northerners played a leading role in the cotton economy of the South and its accompanying racial disaster.” The highbrow attitudes that are associated with Northerners wrongly paints them as pious and religiously guided, when in fact, the Northern states were also willing participants in the scheme. 

The U.S. system of Slavery is based on the code of White Supremacy, which established a method of race classification that is still used today.  The book, One Dies, Get Another: Convict Leasing in the American South, by Matthew Mancini, explained why the transition from Slavery to legal servitude was a smooth process.  With the abolishment of U.S. Slavery in 1865, the adoption of the convict lease system was ready to continue, with “Black men and women” being worked like they have always been worked: underpaid, and coerced by state-supported policing.

It is important to take note of the book, States of Confinement: Policing, Detention, and Prisons,  by Joy James. Featured inside that collection is an article by Angela Y. Davis, titled, “From the Convict Lease System to the Super-Max Prison,” where Davis speaks about the way, ‘politicians, ‘White’ planters, and small farmers built a post-emancipation system that replaced the pre-emancipation racial order that was destroyed by the enactment of the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865. To do that, the penalties for petty crimes were increased.  The transition from enslavement to prison labor was a way to keep White Supremacy intact. A different incarnation of Slavery was instituted after the Emancipation Proclamation and continued by using the ‘loophole’ within the 13th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

In areas of U.S. society that involve ADOS labor, racial exploitation is institutionally built into the fabric of the U.S.  Some names, dates, and incidents concerning exploitation have been chronicled in the book, R & B: Rhythm and Business: The Political Economy of Black Music, edited by Norman Kelley, where he explained that, “Through various modes of production and avenues of exchange, the relationship between the two races has historically rested on whites’ ability to exploit and dominate blacks’ bodies, images, and cultures. In the case of music, black artists have rarely received the just benefits of their work, especially in comparison to their white counterparts and those who control the music industry.”  While other topics of discussion dominate mainstream media, the continued  silence about White Supremacy is not constructively discussed. No rectifying plan of action  has ever been taken.

In a September 1st, 2016 story titled, The Jobless Rate for Young Black Men Is a National Disgrace, written by Robert Cherry and published through the media organization  Real Clear Policy, Cherry explained that, “The U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey gathered data on the jobless rate of non-institutionalized men, 20 to 34 years old, averaged over the period, 2010-2014, for 34 major US cities … all had black jobless rates above 45 percent. In these cities, more young black men were either jobless or imprisoned than employed.” Few leaders or politicians are willing to solve this type of social collapse.  No one addresses the continuation of the permanent and Peculiar Institution.  It is funny how no one has the answer, and tragic that they never wanted one.