Courtesy Wikimedia Commons
By Michael Bielawski
The state’s House Committee on General & Housing talked on Wednesday morning about a bill to have Vermonters – as citizens of the first state to formally ban slavery via its Constitution – pay reparations for the impacts of American slavery.
The bill H. 432 states that a special task force will look into, “how the State of Vermont will offer a formal apology on behalf of the people of Vermont for the perpetration of gross human rights violations and crimes against humanity on enslaved Africans and their descendants.”
The bill’s lone sponsor is Rep. Brian Cina, P/D Burlington. Cina has a history of introducing bills for progressive causes. In 2023 he was the lead sponsor of a bill for the elimination of all incarceration.
The bill states this task force must consider “full reparations.” They must look into “(A) how the recommendations comport with international standards of remedy for wrongs and injuries caused by the State, which include full reparations and special measures, as understood by various relevant international protocols, laws, and findings.”
It states that the task force must look into an apology on behalf of all Vermonters for slavery. They must consider “(B) how the State of Vermont will offer a formal apology on behalf of the people of Vermont for the perpetration of gross human rights violations and crimes against humanity on enslaved Africans and their descendants.”
The bill does not give an estimate on how much money might be paid to an African American household. It states that the task force will figure out “how any form of compensation to the descendants of enslaved persons should be calculated.”
The bill leaves the specific reparations vaguely defined. It states that the task force will see “what form of compensation should be awarded, through what instrumentalities, and who should be eligible for such compensation; and (G) how, in consideration of the Task Force’s findings, any other forms of rehabilitation or restitution to descendants of enslaved persons is warranted and what the form and scope of those measures should take.”
In California where reparations have also been considered, $223,000 per person was proposed and that’s only reparations for alleged housing discrimination in the mid-1900s, not including compensation for slavery itself.
Slavery still impacting African Americans?
Executive director of the Vermont Racial Justice Alliance Rev. Mark Hughes spoke to the committee via video about his thoughts. Hughes argues that the economic and social impacts of slavery continue even today.
“I’m drawing a direct connection with a continuous line that crosses the arc of history that connects us right back to Chattel Slavery,” Hughes said.
He said findings from previous studies on ongoing injustices include that white people currently have at least 13 times the wealth of black people.
Hughes had a definition of systemic racism on a slide. It states, “Systematic racism involves both the deep structures and the surface structures of racial oppression. It includes a complex array of anti-black practices, the unjustly gained political-economic power of whites, the continuing economic and other resource inequalities along racial lines, and the emotion-laden racist framing created by whites to maintain and rationalize their privilege and power.”
There may be a media campaign as well. A goal of the task force is to advise on public messaging to convince citizens to support their recommendations. The bill states they are to “recommend appropriate ways to educate the Vermont public of the Task Force’s findings.”
One point emphasized by Legislative Counsel Tucker Anderson was that the task force can only make recommendations, the power to set policy remains with elected legislators.
Constitutional implications?
Anderson also told legislators that there could be “Constitutional implications” to a reparations program.
He said, “They can recommend for example a systemic calculation for reparations, and recommend the persons who could be compensated for harm through a reparations program. Those recommendations would come back to the General Assembly and as I’ve heard Damien [legislative counsel Damien Leonard] discuss on the record before, there are Constitutional implications specifically for the quasi-judicial aspects of reparations programs.”
No further details were given. In January of 2022 for The Washington Times lawyer Hans Bader addressed the Constitutionality of reparations in a commentary titled “Giving reparations to slaves’ descendants in California is unconstitutional.”
He noted established legal precedent suggesting that reparations may not survive a court challenge.
He wrote, “The Supreme Court has said that race-based remedies are allowed only when they target the current effects of the government’s own widespread discrimination in the relatively recent past. In Richmond v. J.A. Croson, the high court ruled that the government cannot provide race-based “remedies that are ageless in their reach into the past.”
The piece gives more examples of court decisions setting a limit to how far back in time calls for reparations can go.
Burlington City Councilor spoke against reparations in 2020
Burlington City Councilor Ali Dieng, I-Ward 7, who is African American, told True North Reports back in 2020 that reparations for slavery would be tricky because it took place so long ago.
“How do we basically just apologize, and what will that really, really mean? I don’t know,” he said. ”… If we want to do it, apologizing only is not enough, we want reparation. For that reparation, how’s that gonna happen because it’s now 400 years later? It has been a very, very long time and things have changed.”
The whole roughly 1-hour long hearing can be watched here.
The author is a reporter for the Vermont Daily Chronicle
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Categories: State Government
Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don’t mean to do harm; but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves. — T.S. Eliot
Time to leave Vermont. I have nothing to apologize for. I have never held public office or government, nor created any regulations relative to housing or any systemic component of society. I have worked my entire life and spent much of it as an artist, living outside the dominant culture. Due to this decision and lack of a college degree, I didn’t meet the criteria for positions that paid any significant wage. Being white made no difference, as the white people I knew didn’t bend the rules for me, as the critical Social theories claim. I struggled to find safe housing and lived in socioeconomiclly poor areas, despite my white privilege. I had to once save a young white girl beat from an inch of her life by a black man who followed her into my building from the street The most traumatizing experience of my life. Do I get an apology from anyone? I finally completed college, going part time at the age of 55.
Please take note that the article references international standards. You can bet that those standards are set by the United Nations and its member states or African nations. African nations blame colonialism and slavery for poverty when in reality it is socialism and bureaucracy. I recently hear a woman from Africa talk on this issue. There is no free market system in Africa. The government manages all business relationships and contracts. All while sleeping racial discord that the people are oppressed by colonialism. I will look for the podcast and post it as a separate comment.
I worked all of my life helping disadvantaged children and families to try and get a fair shake and climb up the economic and social ladder. I will lie down in front of a moving semi on I 89 or jump to my death from the top of the state house, before I agree to let the state apologize for anything or take one scintilla of my money for reparations. In fact, I and many others like myself are owed an apology for the crappy wages we were paid trying to help people in need, and also an apology for even considering such a ridiculous and nasty idea such as this one.
Yes!!! Thankyou
When will the other “ethnicity’s” be paid “reparations” for their forced slavery/indentured servitude?
When will other ethnicity’s be forced to pay these reparations?
Can you say Irish?!
What a load of crap, whites/blacks, Muslims, Hispanic, Indian, Oriental…all have enslaved other races/ethnicity’s, in fact some still do to this day, and are actively out to get even more to be forced into human trafficking, but why single out just whites for slavery…
Remember the “Power of the Purse”, it’s high time We_the_People rise up and refuse to pay taxes, if the majority of US citizens that actually pay taxes would revolt & refuse to , what would the government do…lock us all up?! Don’t think so…
IDK about you, but I’m way beyond tired of paying “taxes” for services NOT rendered!
Agree! These legislators should better educate themselves: https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/thomas-sowell-on-slavery-and-this-fact-there-are-more-slaves-today-than-were-seized-from-africa-in-four-centuries/
He could also lead by example and give away his things to an allegedly repressed group. Anyone who proposes a bill like this should show us how it’s done first!
they are delusional, Vermont never had slavery, we sent our boys and men and died for freedom.
Where is the VTGOP on this?
What about our Governor?
Where is leadership?
Grifting?
Stop the Grift.
We are not responsible for other people’s crimes. We cannot be held for the actions of others.
Neil,
The state is floundering under the control by gaggle of fools we ” Vermont ” have in the statehouse and now this reparation foolishness, it just goes to show how feckless our representatives really are !!
Name me one person alive today, that was held in slavery…… just one ??
Fools in charge
Exactly, and show men a black in Vermont that had slaves in their family.
According to the Vermont historical society A total of 5,237 Vermonters were killed in battle or died from wounds, disease, or accidents while fighting to end slavery in the United States. Most of them were . These soldiers who died had wives, children, brothers, sisters and cousins who suffered in terrible ways with these losses. Where is the compensation for the descendants of these Vermonters?
Most of them were white
Those people paid the ultimate price as well as their families. When I talked to the EWSD equity director about this, she minimized this sacrifice.
Perhaps mr. cina is really trying to create a jobs program for his buddies and donors. While San Francisco debated reparations, their city government talked but paid out nothing, just as cina’s racist bill would. But! cina’s bill does create another
“special task force” to investigate, meet, create a staff, occupy office space and otherwise churn thru tax dollars, without result.
It has become painfully clear there are a substantial number of “democrat” and “progressive” legislators looking at the long game, are encumbered by donors to perform to the donor’s expectations and willingly prostitute themselves for campaign donations, grift and more- like careers after the legislature.
Yes. It’s disgusting
Another ridiculous dumb___ proposal from a person who is utterly embarrassed and suffering from depression because of their DNA. Whatever you do, don’t come crying to me, and try to infect me with the terrible affliction which you have infected yourself with. Go and deal with your self flagellation somewhere where those not sharing your affliction, do not have to listen or watch you beat up on yourself. Cheers !
The whole systemic racism concept is delusional, and the purchasing of votes with taxpayer money is the only goal expected by the left. This is all 🐴💩.
Well, it’s marxism. They really don’t give a crap about so called race or slavery.
There are so many factors wrong with the Vermont reparations argument that I barely know where to begin. At the top of the list however are: 1) the foundation of VT’s constitution 2) VT’s history at the core of the abolitionist movement and 3) the history of many if our families (Irish for example) who arrived here after the Civil War.
The entire reparations concept is another example of grasping on to issues that may be relevant elsewhere (in time or place) and imposing them on the here and now in VT. Progressive efforts such as these lack intellectual and moral integrity.
Add to that the fact that this whole subject is subjective ! Are white Americans the only people that have caused conditions that rise to a level where reparations are justified, or are white Americans the only people that can possibly be brow beaten suffiently to produce results ?
Vermont lawmakers can go kiss a moose. Progressive values are poison.
Progressive values are valuless !
Amen
Complete b.s. Vermont abolished slavery 30 years before there was a country, why the heck would we pay anything.
The problem we have in Montpeculier is intelligence or common sense are not needed to serve in the Vermont Legislation. We have 10 year olds with a greater grasp of U.S. and Vermont history. I would be ashamed to write such a ridiculous bill, and attach my name to it’s content.
Slavery was a terrible thing, that goes back at least 5,000 years ago, world wide. White, Brown, Black, Asian, Red, all were at some point in history subject to slavery. Today it’s not about skin color, it’s about sex slavery, mostly with women. If you want to write a bill, focus on sex slavery that is going on in all 50 States everyday. Many ushered to America through the southern border. If your focus is on slavery, put it on what is happening now, not something that ended 159 years ago, with no surviver still alive.
“intelligence or common sense are not needed to serve in the Vermont Legislation”.
I’ll go you one further. I believe that it is discouraged !
Brilliant.
Vermont banned slavery 247 years ago. If you can’t get over something in 247 years, seek therapy.
Send all felons in blue state prisons to the nazi states.
Load them in busses and drop them in the middle of the night in state capitals from Tallahassee to Austin.
Sure was a stellar group of sycophants at trumps victory party.
Noticeably absent were:
Rooody
Mark
Sydney
Jenna
Peter Navarro
KellyAnne
and all the other band of thieves
No one was talking about Trump here at all… Please keep it on topic and off derangements.
Ain’t you got a bridge somewhere you can hang out under ???
If trump came to Vermont, it would be the largest gathering of Vermonters on record, we couldn’t handle all the people from within the state that would greet him.
You point out some very selective justice….we’ve already noticed but thanks for bringing it to light.
Did you notice the 8 million law breakers are given money and set free?
Texas Rangers drowned a migrant family.
Can machine gun nests, land mines and flame throwers be far behind?
I think that stuff happens when you cross the border illegally into another countries soverign territory. Maybe they shouldn’t have brought their kids…
If I seem insensitive then you don’t understand cause and effect.
No one is advocating for such measures. Bring forward the article about the drowning. I doubt sincerely that it was intentional. All would agree that the death of the family is tragic and could have been avoided if the boarder was closed. So maybe you should contact the Biden Administration and share your concern. None of us can do anything about it.
cross the border of any other country and get back to us on how it went. Pick any three countries, let us know…..
likely we are conversing, not with a person but an AI generated troll…..
Bill that has been debunked and is fake news
You should compare the numbers of migrant drownings from when we enforced immigration law under Trump to now under Biden….
Please ignore poor Bill. He’s clearly a troll. Maybe on 7 days or diggers payroll?
Good one!
Fake news but because the regime won’t control the border Texas needs to do what it needs to do.
I think as a show of good Faith rep Cina should give up his home to the Irish, empty his bank account to the African Americans, and surrender to the British, just to be fair.
Sort of a “You FIRST!”
I’m not sure what he should give to the Indians, but they were here way before everyone else was, so cough up the clothes and that shiny bike and suit (https://www.cinaforhouse.com/about.html), you have some reparations to pay!
Just in case anyone is wondering about Burlington and the Irish:
https://vermonthistory.org/journal/74/04_Feeney.pdf
I was born and raised in Vermont! For the first time in my life I am seriously considering getting the hell out of this state! I am not sure what these lunatics are trying to accomplish but I have had ENOUGH!
That would be a shame. Kinda like handing them a win. Stay, and be the biggest pain in the azz that you can. That’s the way I roll ! I was here before them, and I will do everything in my power to be at the Mass. boarder to wave good bye to them when they leave.
Me too, Kathy, I love my little state, but what’s happening is criminal and reprehensible and we need to take back Vermont from the Soros/wef crowd of powermongers.
I can’t believe my own eyes and ears anymore!!
after reading all of these opinions/// i have no comment///except i will not leave vermont///
You will leave if & when you are ordered to leave. Heil!
Well, you can always ask your angelic Select Board members to help you out, I guess.
All this fuss for a state in which 1.3% are black, who have a higher educational attainment rate than the whites and a median income in the same $50K range as whites. And yes – Slavery was prohibited in 1777 in Vermont.
The BLM narrative has never fit in Vermont.
Time for Brian to go back to school in 1777.
The BLM narrative never fit anywhere.
It was & is just another means to an end.
Slavery is still ongoing all around the world, especially in Africa itself.
And China….just ask Amazon.
Cina needs to go back to New Jersey!
In my comment I referenced Africa demanding reparations due to slavery and colonialism. Here is the podcast I referenced called Africa is Not Poor Because of Colonialism: Here’s Why with Magatte Wade. Very informative.
https://youtu.be/Q9Deq3eg1CM?si=3rQTa4aKGIanjjHV
Resist.
Reject.
Refuse.
Revolt.
En Masse!!!
I want billions of dollars for being a slave of the deep state ,cabal ,corrupt government now !
NOW we’re talking!!!! They owe us for generations of abuse in their slave system they created for us.
Is this the same Brian Cina who owned a house in downtown Burlington before the age of 30, yet never had to serve anyone while working restaurant jobs like most of his peers? Or the same Brian Cina who would rack up bar tabs at Half Lounge every weekend looking for men from 2006-2010? Probably. So out of touch.
Yo bro, my white family lost 3 patriarchs in the Civil War fighting for the North. We get any reparations?
Lastly- how can white privilege exist when there are OVERWHELMING examples of Asian and Indian success in America? Please explain… I’ll wait.
John….you know what they don’t tell you? One of the most successful ethnic groups in America are Ethiopians. Very bright and well educated.
Of course that doesn’t fit the narrative.
But I guess they’ll get reparations just because of the color of their skin and not because their descendants were slaves.
The beatings will continue until moral improves……
It will be interesting to see if this changes how people vote.
I doubt it.
https://www.facebook.com/reel/1734355363739930?s=yWDuG2&fs=e&mibextid=2JQ9oc
“”The bill does not give an estimate on how much money might be paid to an African American household. It states that the task force will figure out “how any form of compensation to the descendants of enslaved persons should be calculated.””
Since certain boneheads in Montpeculiar are intent upon wasting precious time and our money, why don’t that start by identifying these descendants of enslaved persons, with the first and foremost criteria being they must be descended from persons enslaved here in Vermont? While we’re on the subject of enslaved individuals, let’s talk about those currently enslaved…that would be us, the near penniless taxpayers.
Thankyou. Exactly.
To the State of Vermont, just add it to my indentured servitude bill. “I’d rather owe you, than rip you off.” Once I’m dead, you can compost my remains and sell my meager belongings to other disenfranchised, unfortunate, non-caucasion types. In the meantime, I’ll keep my soul and character intact while you dead-eyed despots fight over scraps and the hides of a society lost in a deluded wilderness.
300,000 northern white folks killed in the civil war and many more seriously wounded; does anyone get any deductible credit for that; also, slavery is ubiquitous and I have a 5 greats grandfather seized in his field in New Hampshire in 1754 and held in slavery for 5 years in Quebec; am I eligible for any reparations?
I’ll help pay this bill when the English start paying for all the people, even their own that they mistreated. Think about the quote the English use to say “the sun never sets on the English empire” . The people in these foreign countries did not all give to them willingly. Look at all their atrocities. They probably owe everyone on the planet
Yes!
I sent an email to bill sponsor Brian Cina and reminded him that Vermont was the first colony to ban slavery in 1777 and Vermont moved to provide black males the right to vote. That 34,000 Vermonters served during the civil war which was more than 10% of our population and 5,237 Vermonters lost their lives during or as a direct result of the war. The financial cost to Vermont was $10,000,000. I asked him why Vermont tax payers should now pay for the sins of the south again. He responded ‘ I have publicly explained my position many times in the past. Why are you asking to do this again for you specifically? Do you need assistance with accessing the publicly available information? GENERAL GEORGE STANNARD MUST BE ROLLING OVER IN HIS GRAVE!!!
Human history is a record of injustice. Should everyone given everyone else reparations?
My “invisible disability” has been the basis fro endless discrimination througout my life. Much or what has been done to me is indictable.
Reparations? I’d settle for proper housing which is available and guaranteed to me by Law.
WTF LIBERAL LEFTIST DEM SWAMP RATS 🐀 🐀 WAKE UP AMERICANS WAKE UP VERMONTERS!!
All this garbage comes down to the ballot box. If we don’t break the supermajority In Montpelier, then they’re going to turn Vermont into California, we’re already being taxed like them. We all know people that complain about government state and federal, but they don’t vote. The biggest excuse I hear is that their vote doesn’t matter. In a presidential election with one electoral vote, Vermont makes very little impact there, but where our votes in state, and local elections can make a very big impact. This is what I tell these people when they say that. How do we get these people to get off their buts and vote. There is enough of them out there to make a big difference in our elections here in Vt.
amerika is finished.
I get the impression that you are rejoicing in this fact Billfromwhiteplains based on your other comments. I will apologize if I am confusing your commentary with another. The revolution started a long time ago and was greatly flamed by neo-communist and marxist Herbert Marcuse. This evolution is known as The Long March Through the Institutions. Academia has a key role to play as well as the United Nations and World Economic Forum.
question /// did the angelic selectboard members in pownal vermont know that a convicted pedophile was living in there town /// see court news///
I don’t know…..I have nothing to do with them nor do I believe any of them are anywhere close to angelic. Particularly NELSON BROWNELL who fosters discord and embodies corruption. You can ask them though.
And btw, convicted pedophiles live all over Vermont. You can easily access lists via the internet or your local police department. Last I checked, there were dozens residing in Pownal alone.
Speaking of Nelson Brownell again though, the very next time you are communicating with him, why not ask him about his “opinions” about Cock Fighting? Last I knew, it’s been illegal in VT for decades.
When I check the internet though, I do find a “Jason” of Vermont sharing the same surname who has apparently been convicted of rape. Hmmm….Let me know about that Cock Fighting issue.
just to set the record/// i have not talked with nelson brownell since 1964/// i must of struck a nerve/// must be over the target///
What target? I’m unclear of your inference and/or motives? What are you insinuating, especially since I haven’t lived in Pownal for nearly a decade.
Just to be clear, nothing will dissuade me from recounting anything or everything I witnessed first-hand during my time on the Planning Commision. Unlike most sheeple, I don’t play go ‘ol boy or girl.
I believe that it’s time for the “…(adjective deleted)…lawmakers” who are proposing this absurdity to seriously consider leaving Vermont. Like slavery, they too, should be outlawed…
I arrived in Vermont (grew up elsewhere in New England) in 2008. So, none of my family were involved in slavery. So they can take that legislation and put in their prison pouch and take it home for dinner.
And they will have to prove it first before I pay anything. Of course, you know how they will get around that? Add it to an omnibus type of bill and include it in your property taxes or some other hidden method…. Thieving b@sterds.
You want people to stop paying taxes? This is how you get people to stop paying taxes.
To “zkentvt”: Are you replying to me or in general?
If indeed you are replying to me, I do not believe those words were written by myself regarding what the populace should do or not do. I can only speak for myself.
If you are replying in general, I wholeheartedly agree.
Respectfully,
Pam Baker