Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Mrs. Scharf
APEL
2020 March 01
About 150 years ago, slaves from Africa were brought to the United States. The slave
owners mistreated, overworked, and abused the slaves for the longest of time. And just like how
Native-Americans receive reparations for having their land taken away, a lot of people believe
that the descendants of slaves also deserve reparations for all the suffering and hard work their
ancestors went through. Now what are reparations? Some might ask. Reparations are the making
of amends for a wrong one has done, it can come in the form of money, land, etc. That being
said, slave descendants should receive reparations, however, not in the form of instant money.
Reparations for slave descendants has long been discussed among people of different
backgrounds. Some believe that they deserve said reparations and some don’t. A common
question that can be heard is why do we need to “be held reliable for something that happened
150 years ago?” or “How do you put a cash value on hundreds of years of forced servitude?”
(Sources B and F). Personally, I believe that even though it happened many years ago, what the
slaves went through cannot be erased from history and in our minds, which is why they deserve
reparations.
Now, reparations do not always come in money form. “Reparations could come in the
form of special social programs. It could mean giving away land” (Source F). An example of
such reparations the “forty acres and a mule” formed by Major General, W.T. Sherman.
Sherman’s address to his army states that “ex-slaves throughout the old Confederacy would be
given the confiscated lands of former plantation owners” (Source A). Though said order wasn’t
put into action, said piece of land may be given to slave descendants as a form of reparation.
Another way of giving reparations are through special programs. Some universities like
Georgetown University, offer lesser tuition or more scholarship money for those who are proven
to be descendants of slaves (video). There are many ways to give reparations, however, “the best
reparation we can get is better treatment and the improvement of America as a whole” (video).
Lastly, the question of where the money would come from is a given in the discussion.
According to data, “the United States alone benefitted from a total of 222,505,049 hours of
forced labor” (Source F). With that much amount of work, the money that’s supposed to be given
to slave descendants would have our country in deep debt. Not only that, if we are to give every
single slave descendant reparations, tax payers would have to give so much more in order to gain
In conclusion, Reparations should be given not lump sum, but gradually. Said reparations
could take form in special programs, giving promised lands to slave descendants, or better
treatment to African-Americans. Acknowledging the slaves’ hard work and honoring them being