[mpen-dayton] FW: "Saturday in Dayton" & "Bernie endorses Hillary!" & "Nate Silver: 'TRUMP CAN WIN'" & "#BlackLivesMatter" & "Ban assault weapons" and more
FYI. Best, Munsup
P.S. Please reply back to me with 'unsubscribe' on the subject line if you no longer want to receive my e-Newsletters. The convenient link to unsubscribe is no longer available due to security reasons to protect my email servers.
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· FW: Saturday in Dayton
· FW: "Bernie endorses Hillary!"
· FW: Social Security and the Democratic Party
· FW: Nate Silver: "TRUMP CAN WIN"
· FW: The secret lab to take on Trump
· FW: #BlackLivesMatter
· FW: Editorial Statement on recent Shooting Deaths
· FW: A law professor's epic smackdown of a whining, privileged student
· FW: Ban assault weapons (sign the petition)
· FW: Rejecting the gun lobby's influence
· FW: Slavery as free trade
· FW: Sign the petition: Freedom of the press, not attacks and intimidation
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From: Katharine, Victoria, Iram, Gabriela, and the rest of the Ohio Against Hate team MoveOn.org Political Action
Subject: Saturday in Dayton
Like it or not, a week from today the Republican National Convention will be underway in Cleveland, and it will bring with it the hate-mongering, bigotry, and fear that Donald Trump stands for.
Instead of burying our heads in the sand, Ohioans are organizing to demonstrate there is an alternative to Trump's vitriol: we are uniting against hate. More than ever, our communities have to unite around a different vision for our county—one of inclusion, unity, and respect.
That's why we launched Ohio against Hate, a campaign to ensure Donald Trump does not become the 45th president of the United States.
This Saturday, July 16, we will show the Republican Party that inclusion overpowers hate by going door to door across the state to talk to our neighbors about the values that we share. We'll ask our neighbors to commit to vote in November so we can defeat Donald Trump once and for all.
Will you join your neighbors and friends this Saturday, July 16 at 10 a.m. in Dayton and help defeat Trump's message of division?
Across the state, Ohioans have stepped up to take part in community canvasses. MoveOn members refuse to sit idly by while Donald Trump attempts to further divide our state and country.
We know that talking with potential voters face to face is the number one best way to increase civic engagement. That's why we're starting now, and not waiting til the fall. We'll have postcards that we'll invite folks to sign, pledging to vote—and we'll mail those postcards back to them in October, before election day, as a personal reminder.
Can you join us this Saturday in Dayton?
Yes, I will join my neighbors on July 16 to stand up to Donald Trump's bigotry by being part of the Ohio Against Hate community canvass in Dayton.
Want to support our work? MoveOn member contributions have powered our work together for more than 17 years. Hundreds of thousands of people chip in each year—which is why we're able to be fiercely independent, answering to no individual, corporation, politician, or political party. You can become a monthly donor by clicking here, or chip in a one-time gift here.
PAID FOR BY MOVEON.ORG POLITICAL ACTION, http://pol.moveon.org/. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.
From: ENDORSEMENT ALERT (via boldpac.com)
Subject: Bernie endorses Hillary!
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From: Michael Phelan, Social Security Works
Subject: Social Security and the Democratic Party
Call on all Democrats running for office to make Social Security expansion a centerpiece of their campaigns.
Democrats win when they act boldly.
And that is exactly what the Democratic Party Platform Committee did this past weekend when passing the most progressive Party platform in history. Included in the platform – for the first time – is protecting and expanding Social Security:
"We will fight every effort to cut, privatize, or weaken Social Security….Democrats will expand Social Security...and we will make sure Social Security's guaranteed benefits continue for generations by asking those at the top to pay more."
If Democrats want to win the White House and win back the U.S. House and Senate, it is time for all Democrats running for office to embrace Social Security expansion and make it a centerpiece of their campaigns.
Sign the petition today. Call on all Democrats running for office to make Social Security expansion a centerpiece of their campaigns.
Expanding Social Security is a solution to our nation's rising income and wealth inequality. And its near universality, efficiency, fairness in its benefit distribution, portability from job to job, and security, make it the obvious solution to the nation's looming retirement income crisis.
With 79% of likely voters – Democrats, Republicans and Independents – supporting expansion, and paying for it by asking the wealthy to pay their fair share, it is time that EVERY Democrat running for office make Social Security expansion a centerpiece to their campaigns.
Please, stand with Social Security Works today and call on all Democrats running for office to embrace Social Security expansion.
You have made Social Security expansion the official position of the Democratic Party. Now let's bring our movement to every race in the country.
P.S. Could you take a moment and vote for Social Security Works at CREDOdonations.com? Your vote could win us up to $100,000 to fight for Social Security — the more votes, the more funding we receive!
PAID FOR AND AUTHORIZED BY SOCIAL SECURITY WORKS
From: Progressive Turnout Project
Subject: Nate Silver: "TRUMP CAN WIN"
BREAKING: Political forecaster Nate Silver says "Trump can win"
This is TERRIBLE news.
To stop this horrific nightmare from becoming reality, we're working around the clock to get Democratic voters out to VOTE on Election Day.
We can't do this alone. Chip in $5 or $10 right now to help us defeat Trump→
Throughout this race, Democrats and Republicans alike have underestimated Donald Trump. Experts have been waiting for him to sabotage his own campaign and disappear from the political scene for good.
But acclaimed political forecaster Nate Silver just announced that this is no joke: Trump can win this fall.
Munsup, we don't need to tell you how high the stakes are.
If just 1 percent of our supporters stepped up today, we could ramp up our field operation in key battleground districts and make sure more Democrats get out to vote on Election Day.
Please rush an emergency contribution right now to help us DEFEAT Donald Trump:
http://go.turnoutpac.org/Donate
The only way we win is by making sure Democrats get out to vote this November!
Paid for by the Progressive Turnout Project and not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee
From: Robert Reich
Subject: The secret lab to take on Trump
For over a year now, MoveOn and I have partnered on making a new video every few weeks. These videos—on issues like money in politics, too-big-to-fail Wall Street banks, mass incarceration, the fight for a $15-per-hour minimum wage, threats to Social Security, the skyrocketing cost of education, and Bernie Sanders—have gotten tens of millions of views and helped change the public debate.
As I recently mentioned, instead of just producing an online video every few weeks, MoveOn's gearing up to produce one practically every day. Although I won't be writing, narrating, or illustrating this new series, I'm enthusiastic about MoveOn taking on this project.
To pull it off, MoveOn's put together a "Video Lab"—a team of industry-tested producers, videographers, and motion graphic artists—that's already having huge success. A recent video featuring Senator Elizabeth Warren talking about Donald Trump's taxes hit 7 million views in less than 72 hours—and it's up past 15 million now.
With success like this, MoveOn's new Video Lab can reach an audience equivalent to that of an entire cable news TV show—all without a dime of corporate advertising.
But continuing this level of success—and being powerful enough to keep taking on Donald Trump directly—is possible only if enough MoveOn members chip in.
Will you chip in to help MoveOn's new Video Lab?
Express Donate: $10 Express Donate: $40 Express Donate: $150 Donate another amount
Donald Trump has benefited from nearly $3 billion in free media coverage in this election cycle, driven in large part by the unfiltered, off-the-cuff way he uses Twitter and his penchant for sensationalist sound bites that are then amplified by traditional media outlets.1
All the paid ads in the world can't compete with that type of free coverage. But MoveOn's new Video Lab can. In addition to millions of people seeing the videos directly, there's a kind of ripple effect I've experienced with my own videos for MoveOn. People post about the videos on blogs and other social media sites. They get excerpted and played on TV shows. They get reposted by other sites, from the Huffington Post to the New York Times. These videos end up feeding a vibrant, ongoing public conversation—meaning they're a much-needed counterweight to all the narrow-minded, hyper-conservative content circulating online.
Can you chip in to power MoveOn's Video Lab and help MoveOn go toe-to-toe with Trump online?
Express Donate: $10 Express Donate: $40 Express Donate: $150 Donate another amount
When Trump's rallies grew violent earlier this year, and he tried to pin the blame on groups like MoveOn, MoveOn produced an original video that showed it was Trump himself who was explicitly inciting violence. That video got nearly 5 million views. A video I produced with MoveOn about the Bernie Sanders agenda drew 14 million views.
And this week, MoveOn is getting ready to respond to Donald Trump's choice of vice president—an announcement that could be made as early as today.
It's 2016. We don't have to settle for whatever the media happens to report. Through our dollars, our videos, and our shares online, we can replace the media. And our collective voice—standing for the values of inclusion, decency, and equality that Americans, at their best, strive to advance—is more powerful than any narrow-minded, hate-baiting politician. Let's make sure our voice is heard.
Will you help MoveOn's video lab respond to key political moments?
Express Donate: $10 Express Donate: $40 Express Donate: $150 Donate another amount
Source:
1. "Trump has gotten nearly $3 billion in 'free' advertising," MarketWatch, May 6, 2016
http://act.moveon.org/go/4479?t=17&akid=166644.1195276.9F6T1n
Want to support our work? MoveOn member contributions have powered our work together for more than 17 years. Hundreds of thousands of people chip in each year—which is why we're able to be fiercely independent, answering to no individual, corporation, politician, or political party. You can become a monthly donor by clicking here, or chip in a one-time gift here.
PAID FOR BY MOVEON.ORG POLITICAL ACTION, http://pol.moveon.org/. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.
From: Kristin, MomsRising.org
Subject: #BlackLivesMatter
Have you heard the latest recording from the police scanner before Philando Castile was stopped? Talk about racial profiling.
· "I'm going to stop a car," the officer says on the recording.
· "I'm going to check IDs. I have reason to pull it over."
· "The two occupants just look like people that were involved in a robbery," the officer says. "The driver looks more like one of our suspects, just 'cause of the wide set nose'…" [1]
It turns out the Philando Castile was pulled over more than 50 times in recent years mainly because, as officers said, he looked like a suspect. [2] That's the very definition of harassment by racial profiling, which too often turns deadly when coupled with police brutality as in the case of Castile. This isn't just Castile's bad luck. In fact a recent study of dozens of police departments found officers stopped minority drivers at greater rates than whites and searched them at greater rates, but found contraband in those searches at lower rates than whites. In some suburban areas in particular, Blacks were stopped about 310 percent more often than expected. [3] This is not okay. Too often this turns deadly.
This has been a heartbreaking week for all Americans.
We mourn the tragic killings of Alton Sterling, Philando Castile, and the five Dallas police officers who were on duty during a peaceful protest. These deaths compel us to address our nation's legacy of structural racism and toxic gun culture in order to move forward.
That's why I want to be sure you saw the email and action link from Monifa below. (Scroll down)
No mother, father, child or neighbor should ever have to mourn the loss of a loved one to violence. We are better than this.
*Join us in calling on the executive branch of the federal government to take comprehensive steps to protect civil and human rights for everyone!
All of our voices, signatures, and attention is needed now to make sure we have systems in place that protect and lift everyone equally.
We can, and we must, do better. – Kristin
[1]http://action.momsrising.org/go/28385?t=5&akid=8114.2407866.T63zsi
[2] https://action.momsrising.org/go/28386?t=7&akid=8114.2407866.T63zsi
[3] https://action.momsrising.org/go/28386?t=9&akid=8114.2407866.T63zsi
p.s. Don't forget to scroll down and see more info below:
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Monifa, Kristin, Gloria, Donna, dream, Anita, Karen and the entire MomsRising.org team
Subject: Moms want police reform nationwide!
"We are being hunted" ~ Valerie Castile, mother of Philando Castile who was killed by police
Demand police reform now! |
Yesterday morning, we witnessed 15-year-old Cameron Sterling's heart-rending breakdown at the press conference about his father Alton's shooting death by law enforcement.[1]
This morning, we woke up to the grief of Valerie Castile, who is experiencing every parent's nightmare: the death of a child, who also died at the hands of an officer of the law. Her son, Philando Castile of Falcon Heights, Minnesota, had a permit to carry a gun and was shot and killed by police during a minor traffic stop because of a broken taillight. [2] His girlfriend, Lavish Reynolds, and her 4-year-old daughter were in the car with him at the time and she videoed the aftermath, including her young daughter heartbreakingly comforting her mom with, "It's O.K., Mommy. It's O.K. I'm right here with you." [3]
Families should never have to fear that our loved ones could come to harm at the hands of those charged with protecting them.
Join us in calling on the executive branch of the federal government to take comprehensive steps to protect civil and human rights for everyone!
Philando Castile of Falcon Heights, Minnesota, and Alton Sterling of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, join a long and unending line of African American and Latino youth and community members killed by police, including:
- Eric Garner, husband and father, who was choked to death in New York. [4]
- John Crawford, who was shot to death when he picked up a toy gun that was for sale in an Ohio Walmart. [5]
- Seventeen-year-old unarmed Jesús Huerta was shot to death while handcuffed in the back of a police car. [6]
- Eighteen-year-old unarmed Ramarley Graham who was shot to death in Bronx, NY [7]
- Sandra Bland, a 28-year-old black woman who was found hanged in a jail cell in Waller County, Texas. [8]
This year, already more than 500 people have been shot and killed by police. [9] Studies show that, even though White Americans outnumber Black Americans five-fold, Black people are three times more likely than White people to be killed when they encounter the police in the US, [10] and Black teenagers are far likelier to be killed by police than White teenagers. [11]
Enough is enough.
*Tell the executive branch of the federal government it's time to take comprehensive steps to protect civil and human rights for everyone!
At the national level, we need higher standards of policing, strengthened accountability mechanisms, and critical reforms to end: Biased racial profiling, police brutality, and militarized policing targeting African American and Latino youth, families, and communities throughout our country.
Local police departments have all too often been ineffective in investigating themselves. It is time for fair, outside, independent, federal investigation and prosecution of police misconduct. The more pressure we mount, the more voices we share, the stronger the call for justice.
Every day there is another death. We must end this now.
[1] "Baton Rouge Man's Son Breaks Down as Mom Addresses Deadly Cop Shooting," ABC News, July 6, 2016.
[2] "Mom of black man shot by police: We are being hunted," USAToday, July 7, 2016.
[3] "Philando Castile Shooting in Minnesota Leads Governor to Seek U.S. Investigation," The New York Times, July 7, 2016.
[4] "Beyond the Chokehold: The Path to Eric Garner's Death," The New York Times, June 13, 2015.
[5] "1 Year After John Crawford III's Shooting by Police, His Family Is Still Waiting for Justice," The Root, August 5, 2015.
[6] "17-year-old dies in Durham police custody," WRAL.com, December 10, 2013.
[7] "Officer in Ramarley Graham Shooting Won't Face U.S. Charges," The New York Times, March 8, 2016.
[8] "What Happened to Sandra Bland?" The Nation, April 21, 2016.
[9] Fatal Force, The Washington Post.
[10] "Mike Brown's shooting and Jim Crow lynchings have too much in common. It's time for America to own up," The Guardian, August 25, 2014.
[11] "The FBI is trying to get better data on police killings. Here's what we know now," Vox, April 10, 2015.
Like what we're doing? Donate: We're a bootstrap, low overhead, mom run organization. Your donations make the work of MomsRising.org possible--and we deeply appreciate your support. Every little bit counts. Donate today on our new, secure website.
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What should MomsRising tackle next? Tell us what's on your mind.
From: Mrs. Sybil Edwards-McNabb; Ohio Conference NAACP President
Subject: Editorial Statement on recent Shooting Deaths
Editorial Statement on the Shooting Deaths of Alton Sterling,
Philando Castile and Five White Police Officers
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Ohio Conference NAACP State Office, ohnaacpst@sbcglobal.net, 614-840-0134
Columbus, Ohio (July 11, 2016) – Ohio Conference NAACP President Sybil Edwards-McNabb and James Workman, Legal Redress Chair today issued the following statement regarding the fatal shooting deaths of Alton Sterling, Philando Castile and 5 White Police Officers.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident: not just black lives, but all lives matter. White ones, brown ones, yellow ones, red ones, and black ones should not leave this world like disposable trash." We agree with the Minnesota Governor (Mark Dayton), nobody should be shot and killed by police officers in a routine traffic stop for a tail light violation (a minor misdemeanor), because the tail light is broken, not working, or is out of order. Such behavior is outrageous and it offends our sensibilities as American citizens. The horrific shooting death of this thirty-two (32) year old black man (Philando Castile) during this routine traffic stop on July 6, 2016, near St. Paul, Minnesota, demands swift social, economic, and judicial justice! Mr. Castile was not shot once or twice; but instead, he was shot three (3) to five (5) times by the police. This type of act has become a disturbing trend or pattern all across America. The question is: Why? The earlier fatal shooting of another black man, Alton Sterling, on July 5, 2016, during a police encounter in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, also appears to be more of the same: police officers abusing their power when encountering a black male suspect, in connection with a routine, non-life threatening law enforcement investigation or situation. Again, the question is: Why? Police brutality has become a very disturbing trend, which is only getting worse, and has now triggered an eruption in the very social fabric of our nation.
On July 7, 2016, Micah Johnson, a twenty-five (25) year old black man in Dallas, Texas, angrily reacted to this trend of white racism by police officers against black men. With a skewed perception of police brutality, and their perceived hatred of blacks, Johnson became a vindictive and bitter sniper, whose actions resulted in the shooting deaths of five (5) white police officers. He had no previous criminal record, and he was a recipient of the Army Achievement Medal and a N.A.T.O. Medal, after serving our country on an eight (8) month tour of duty in Afghanistan. Was his behavior a result of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder caused by his battlefield exposure, or was it an extreme reaction to white police officer brutality upon black men, after he risked his life for our country? We will likely never know the answers to these questions.
The Congressional Black Caucus responded quickly by demanding a joint session in Congress to discuss the need for gun control. Many other organizations and leaders voiced their opinions about what is needed to prevent future violence, including the 44th President of the United States, Barack Obama. We need to avoid racial stereotyping: not all white police officers are bad and neither are all black men criminals, nor do they all hate white police officers. We need racial healing in America. Racism is obviously alive and running rampant. Racial profiling is also a culprit. Our concern is that there may be more such shooting incidents like those above, unless we can peacefully sit down at the table of brotherhood, and agree to stop the madness. Our very souls are at stake; and so is America the Beautiful. We, like most of you, are now grieving for all those men this past week, whose lives were lost unnecessarily.
From: Eric Kramer
Subject: A law professor's epic smackdown of a whining, privileged student
Priceless! https://imgur.com/a/YkDVQ - 
E
From: Heidi Hess; Senior Campaign Manager, CREDO Action from Working Assets
Subject: Ban assault weapons (sign the petition)
Congress must act on gun control
Tell Republicans in Congress:
"It's time to put your constituents before the NRA. Bring real gun control legislation to the floor of the House and the Senate."
|
Last week, Alton Sterling, Philando Castile and five Dallas police officers were among the hundreds of people who lost their lives to gun violence. Last month, 49 people were killed in the deadly massacre targeting LGBT people in Orlando. Their deaths shine a harsh light not only on the devastating impact of systemic racism and anti-LGBT discrimination on our society, but on the ways that our culture of fear and hate-driven gun ownership puts the lives of far too many Americans at risk.
After Orlando, Democrats in Congress took steps to try to pressure Republicans to break their allegiance with the National Rifle Association and take action on gun control. And as expected, Republicans failed to step up to the challenge.
The last fews weeks have proven that breaking the NRA's chokehold on Congress will require massive grassroots pressure on our elected officials, demanding they take bold action for comprehensive gun control and offer more than their thoughts and prayers in the face of our epidemic of gun violence.
On Friday, President Obama condemned Congress's inability to take proactive action to combat gun violence. He said, "I think I speak for every single American when I say that we are horrified...When people are armed with powerful weapons, unfortunately, it makes attacks like these more deadly and more tragic." Today we're standing with the president. Can you add your voice today to tell Republican leaders to vote on a meaningful package of gun control reforms, including an assault weapons ban?
Tell Republicans in Congress: We need real gun control now. Click here to sign the petition.
Republican members of Congress respond to gun tragedies while they're in the news. But, they don't take responsibility for how their actions, and inaction, lay the groundwork for hate crimes and gun violence, nor do they take action to prevent these tragedies from happening again. Instead, they offer up either fleeting sentiments or xenophobic and racist policies. They need to pass real gun control now, including:
- Prohibiting the manufacture and sale of assault weapons and "large capacity" magazines for civilian use.
- Closing the loophole that allows people to buy guns without undergoing background checks through private sales, at gun shows and online. An estimated 40 percent of all firearms transferred in the U.S. are transferred by unlicensed individuals not required to conduct background checks on buyers.1
- Banning convicted domestic abusers and stalkers from buying guns. Abused women are five times more likely to be killed by their abuser if that individual has access to a firearm.2
- Channeling resources into urban gun violence prevention programs
- Ending the ban on gun violence research
In 2014 alone, the gun lobby spent over $30 million on political advertising and lobbying to influence legislators in Congress and state capitals across the country.3 If Republicans really want to protect Americans, they need to break their blind allegiance to the NRA and pass gun control legislation. But they'll never act unless we force them. Can you add your voice today?
When Republicans disagree with advances in women's rights, LGBT rights, or civil rights, they don't just offer their thoughts and prayers, they push legislation. In just the last year, Republicans in Congress and in state legislatures across the country have worked to make abortion impossible to access, to discriminate against LGBT people, and to take away voting rights. At the same time, they have aggressively pushed the NRA's agenda to weaken gun laws, from campus carry to permitless carry to stand your ground.
It's clear that current Republican leaders in Congress lack the care, or courage, to act on their own. Now we have to make them.
Tell Republicans in Congress: It's time to ban assault weapons Click the link below to sign the petition:
http://act.credoaction.com/sign/Orlando_Gun_Control_refresh/?t=7&akid=18592.10312106.nyMPgZ
Thank you for your activism,
|
1. "Universal Background Checks & the "Private" Sale Loophole Policy Summary," Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, September 10, 2015.
2. "Gabby Giffords, National Domestic Violence Prevention Leaders Applaud New House Legislation to Keep Guns out of the Hands of Abusers," Americans for Responsible Solutions, July 22, 2015.
3. Ben Geier, "NRA's Massive Political Spending Gains Attention," Fortune, December 3, 2015.
From: Team Honda
Subject: Rejecting the gun lobby's influence
Tomorrow marks the one-month anniversary of the massacre at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando. As we continue to grieve for those we lost, we take comfort in the fact that so many Americans of different backgrounds and experiences have been able to unite in calling for sensible reforms to our gun laws. At one of our darkest moments, the American people have been the light that inspires us to continue fighting for a better future.
We know, however, that the National Rifle Association and other special interest groups are not happy that Americans are uniting in their calls for basic gun safety reforms. If Mike Honda cared about keeping the NRA happy, that might be a problem for us, but as we told you last month, this campaign is proud of Mike's "F" rating from the NRA – it's just one more sign that the gun lobby can't buy him.
Because of his constant progressive leadership to reform our gun laws, Mike's no friend to the gun lobby. Yesterday, the National Firearms Education and Information Group even named him an "Enemy of the Second Amendment." But that's not going to stop him from fighting to re-enact the federal assault weapons ban with tighter restrictions. It's not enough to stop him from fighting the NRA's gag-rule on CDC research into gun violence.
Chip in to send a message – delivered by a messenger with a consistent and dedicated record on gun safety reform – to the special interests who want to buy this election.
More than ever, we need a representative in Congress who is going to stand up to special interests from the NRA, Wall Street, or whoever wants to buy influence in our democracy with campaign donations. We need Mike Honda.
Ending the scourge of gun violence will not happen overnight, and even with the strongest reforms that we can pass in place, its threat may never fully leave us. But we can begin by taking the first step and telling the NRA and other special interests in the gun lobby that we are tired of letting them buy our elected officials, only to have those same officials offer thoughts and prayers when legislation and changes in policy are required.
Mike has been leading the charge on gun reform in Congress for years. His actions speak louder than any bought politician's words.
So please, chip in whatever you can afford to send Mike back to Congress in November to keep fighting the influence of the gun lobby and other special interests in Congress.
Paid For By Mike Honda for Congress |
From: Thomas Scott
Subject: Fw: Slavery as free trade
Slavery as free trade
Blake Smith is a PhD candidate in history at Northwestern University in Illinois and the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences in Paris. His research, focusing on the French East India Company, has appeared in scholarly journals such as French Cultural Studies and the Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, as well as popular media such as TheWire.in and The... Read More in ESSAYS
Slavery as free trade
The 18th-century thinkers behind laissez-faire economics saw slavery as a great example of global free trade
by Blake Smith
Plan of the French slave ship La Marie Seraphique c.1770. © Château des ducs de Bretagne - Musée d'histoire de Nantes.
For nearly four centuries, the Atlantic slave trade brought millions of people into bondage. Scholars estimate that around 1.5 million people perished in the brutal middle passage across the Atlantic. The slave trade linked Africa, Europe and the Americas in a horrific enterprise of death and torture and profit. Yet, in the middle of the 18th century, as the slave trade boomed like never before, some notable European observers saw it as a model of free enterprise and indeed of 'liberty' itself. They were not slave traders or slave-ship captains but economic thinkers, and very influential ones. They were a pioneering group of economic thinkers committed to the principle of laissez-faire: a term they themselves coined. United around the French official Vincent de Gournay (1712-1759), they were among the first European intellectuals to argue for limitations on government intervention in the economy. They organised campaigns for the deregulation of domestic and international trade, and they made the slave trade a key piece of evidence in their arguments.
For a generation, the relationship between slavery and capitalism has preoccupied historians. The publication of several major pieces of scholarship on the matter has won attention from the media. Scholars demonstrate that the Industrial Revolution, centred on the mass production of cotton textiles in the factories of England and New England, depended on raw cotton grown by slaves on plantations in the American South. Capitalists often touted the superiority of the industrial economies and their supposedly 'free labour'. 'Free labour' means the system in which workers are not enslaved but free to contract with any manufacturer they chose, free to sell their labour. It means that there is a labour market, not a slave market.
But because 'free labour' was working with and dependent on raw materials produced by slaves, the simple distinction between an industrial economy of free labour on the one hand and a slave-based plantation system on the other falls apart. So too does the boundary between the southern 'slave states' and northern 'free states' in America. While the South grew rich from plantation agriculture that depended on slave labour, New England also grew rich off the slave trade, investing in the shipping and maritime insurance that made the transport of slaves from Africa to the United States possible and profitable. The sale of enslaved Africans brought together agriculture and industry, north and south, forming a global commercial network from which the modern world emerged.
It is only in the past few decades that scholars have come to grips with how slavery and capitalism intertwined. But for the 18th-century French thinkers who laid the foundations of laissez-faire capitalism, it made perfect sense to associate the slave trade with free enterprise. Their writings, which inspired the Scottish philosopher Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations (1776), aimed to convince the French monarchy to deregulate key businesses such as the sale of grain and trade with Asia. Only a few specialists read them today. Yet these pamphlets, letters and manuscripts clearly proclaim a powerful message: the birth of modern capitalism depended not only on the labour of enslaved people and the profits of the slave trade, but also on the example of slavery as a deregulated global enterprise.
For centuries after European colonisation of the Americas commenced, European governments regulated the Atlantic slave trade. They organised it in accordance with what was known as mercantilism. This was the authoritative economic thinking of the 16th, 17th and much of the 18th century. It favoured heavy government intervention, particularly in international trade. For mercantilist thinkers, trade was a kind of war in which nations could defeat their rivals by accumulating silver and gold, and by exporting manufactured goods while importing agricultural products. All aspects of trade were to be precisely organised in order to serve these goals, leaving little initiative to private traders. A few decades after Christopher Columbus's arrival in the Caribbean in 1492, it became clear to the Spanish monarchy that enslaving indigenous peoples of the Americas was not enough to supply its growing colonies' need for labour. The Spanish turned to the slave trade in West Africa. Europeans and Arabs had long engaged in the African slave trade. Well-meaning Spanish critics of the horrific mistreatment of indigenous peoples, such as Bartolomé de las Casas, supported this decision. They argued that Africans were better fit for hard labour than American Indians.
In a system known as the asiento (contract), the Spanish government began granting some European merchants special monopoly contracts. These allowed the traders to become the sole merchants permitted to sell slaves in a particular area. The Spanish government carefully controlled the whole economy of its American colonies, only allowing a select handful of foreigners to trade with its valuable possessions. Since the slave trade was one of the most lucrative sectors of colonial commerce, it was particularly restricted. In the 16th century, the Spanish government granted these asiento monopolies over the slave trade in its colonies to Italian, German and Portuguese investors who came from countries in the orbit of Spain's global empire. By the end of the 17th century, however, Spain was declining as a military power. It was less and less able to grant the asiento to merchants of its own choosing. Other European empires coveted the riches of the asiento for themselves, and tried to seize it. In 1701, the Spanish king died with no heir. The French king, Louis XIV, invaded Spain and installed his own grandson on the throne. One of the newly crowned ruler's first acts was to hand over control of the asiento to his grandfather. Now France would have the sole right to supply Spain's colonies with enslaved Africans, ensuring huge profits for French slave traders.
The asiento was a rich prize, and France was not the only country to covet it. Louis XIV's enemies quickly snatched it back from him. Great Britain, the Netherlands and a number of other countries formed an alliance against France, initiating the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714). This ended in French defeat. As part of its share of the spoils of war, Britain took control of the asiento. In order to run this valuable new commerce, it created an innovative corporation called the South Sea Company. This was one of the first joint stock companies to attract thousands of investors, who imagined that the profits of the slave trade to the Spanish colonies made it a sure bet. The price of shares spiralled ever higher, until the frenzy of speculation triggered a nationwide financial crisis. Shocked by the sudden rise and disastrous fall of the value of their shares, bewildered investors discovered the stock-market 'bubble', the first of its kind.
More slaves in the colonies meant more consumption of sugar, coffee and chocolate in Europe: feeding on itself, the slave trade seemed to expand without limits
While the British public was trading shares in the slave trade, French slave traders faced an uncertain future. The end of the War of the Spanish Succession deprived them of access to what had been their best markets. They demanded action from the government. But the French government had financial problems of its own. The war left it burdened with massive debts and desperate for a way out. It turned to the professional gambler-turned-business guru John Law (1671-1729), who promised that a new twist on mercantilist polices would solve the problems of both the state and of slave traders. On his advice, the French monarchy created a new state-run corporation, the French East India Company. This behemoth had global ambitions. Headed by Law himself, it had a monopoly on all trade between France and Asia, and also the exclusive right to supply France's sugar-producing colonies in the Caribbean with African slaves. The initial excitement of Law's scheme, like initial excitement in Britain over the South Sea Company, led to wild speculation by the public on shares of the new company. When the price of these shares rose far enough beyond their real value, it finally collapsed, bringing Law, his company and the French economy into ruin.
With yet another economic crisis on its hands, the French government took a desperate, unprecedented step. In defiance of mercantilist ideas, it deregulated the slave trade. For the first time, the monarchy allowed private firms to send slave ships to Africa and on to the Americas. There would be no new state monopoly company to control the French slave trade. From a business perspective, the result was a wild success. Private traders sent increasing numbers of slaves to France's colonies of Martinique, Guadeloupe and Saint-Domingue (now Haiti). At the beginning of the 18th century, a few thousand slaves were brought to the French Caribbean each year. By the end of the 18th century, more than a 100,000 slaves were taken there annually. The huge increase in the volume of slaves coming to France's colonies transformed these islands into centres of global commerce. The more that traders sent slaves to the colonies, the more colonial plantation owners could expand their production of sugar. The cheaper sugar became, the more a growing number of Europeans could consume it, often paired with other colonial substances such as coffee and chocolate. These were also produced in tropical colonies by enslaved Africans. More slaves in the colonies meant more consumption of sugar, coffee and chocolate in Europe, and thus also meant even more demand for slaves. Feeding on itself, the slave trade seemed to expand without limits.
This economic boom was a human tragedy. Slavery was brutal everywhere in the Americas, but slavery in France's sugar plantations might have been the most brutal of all. Many enslaved Africans died before reaching the Caribbean colonies and, once they arrived, their average life expectancy was less than five years. They were simply worked to death. It was no accident that Saint-Domingue, the largest French colony, would be the scene of the most important and most violent slave revolt in the history of the Americas. Breaking out in the midst of the French Revolution, this revolt forced the French government to abolish slavery in 1793. When France began to attempt to restore slavery 10 years later, a new revolt broke out. This time, the rebels won their independence from France, creating the Republic of Haiti in 1804.
While tensions brewed in Saint-Domingue, the enormity of the Atlantic slave trade slowly began to register on French consciences. In the 1780s, on the eve of the French Revolution, anti-slavery activists gathered in Paris to lobby for the abolition of the slave trade. But a generation before this, another group of activists known as the Gournay Circle were more concerned about the lessons that the growing slave trade had for the French economy. They were inspired by Gournay, the intellectual who coined the phrase laissez-faire, laissez-passer('let do, let go') to sum up his innovative views.
Gournay and his entourage revolutionised economic thinking by calling for the systematic elimination of international and domestic trade barriers such as state monopolies, guilds and prohibitions on foreign imports. Never before had a group of thinkers so directly challenged mercantilist ideas. When the French monarchy had deregulated the slave trade in the 1720s, it had acted out of desperation in regard to a particular crisis, not out of a conviction that mercantilism itself had failed. It was only three decades later that members of the Gournay Circle observed the dramatic growth of the slave trade and slave-based colonial economies, and drew a more general conclusion. They argued that the slave trade's success proved that deregulation should be pursued not just as a last-ditch tactic, but as a deliberate and comprehensive strategy. The slave trade showed that the top-down regulations of mercantilism were obsolete.
The Gournay Circle lobbied the French monarchy for sweeping changes. One of its most important targets was the French East India Company, the successor to Law's ambitious super-corporation. Deprived of its monopoly over the French Atlantic slave trade in 1720, this state monopoly company was now responsible for all French trade with the Indian Ocean region. No private traders were allowed to sail east past the Cape of Good Hope. The Company managed to make a reasonable profit most years. However, it neither satisfied French demand for South Asian commodities nor exported more than a handful of French goods to South Asia. It ran a massive trade deficit and, by the middle of the 18th century, was sinking into debt.
Sensing an opportunity to advance their ideals of laissez-faire, Gournay and his circle attacked the Company. They compared the unsatisfactory state of France's trade with the Indian Ocean to the flourishing and ever-expanding Atlantic slave trade. The first revealed the weaknesses of mercantilism, while the second showed the strengths of laissez-faire. Gournay first developed this argument in a series of unpublishedObservations on the Company written in the mid-1750s. He wrote that 'the largest branches of commerce that the nation [France] has acquired since 1720… have been obtained only by parting from the Company's privilege'. In the Atlantic market, where Law's Company had lost the right the monopolise trade, business boomed. In the Asian market, where the Company's successor still had a monopoly, trade languished. Gournay pointed to the growth of France's Caribbean colonies after the deregulation of the slave trade. He noted that 'the islands of Saint Domingue and Martinique would still be almost entirely without Negroes and thus without agriculture' if the monarchy had not deregulated the slave trade.
Gournay died not long after making these comments, but his protégé André Morellet (1727-1819) picked up where he left off. Morellet became the spokesman for a movement against the French East India Company. In 1769, he published the incendiary pamphlet On the Current Condition of the India Company, which included Gournay's notes in his own text, and expanded on their themes. Morellet insisted that state enterprises in general should be abolished, and cited the success of French slave traders after 1720 as proof of the superiority of laissez-faire over mercantilism. To those who felt that the deregulation of France's trade with Asia was too risky, he answered: 'This pretext is always relied on in the creation of monopoly Companies, and notably in the trade in Negroes on the African coast … However since then it has been observed that this competition, far from destroying commerce, sustained it. The French colonies in America had remained, until then [1720], in a state of great weakness; liberty revived them.' Liberty, of course, meant in this case the expansion of the slave trade. Colonial slavery was a force for economic freedom.
Morellet reasoned that the slave trade proved Africans were equal to Europeans. Self-interest motivated both groups to sell or purchase enslaved people
It is a grotesque irony that this pioneering free-trader could equate 'liberty' and the slave trade, but Morellet was not finished yet. Defenders of the Company argued that South Asia was so different from Europe that private traders would be unable to carry out business there. Only a monopoly company, they claimed, could afford to hire experts familiar with the region's languages, cultures and geography. They warned that private traders would be unable to hire such experts, and would arrive in South Asia unable even to communicate with their local counterparts. The example of the slave trade, Morellet countered, showed that such arguments were false. After 1720, private traders from French ports began to arrive in West Africa. They had no experience of local cultures, yet African merchants and political leaders soon brokered contracts.
In spite of vast linguistic and cultural differences, French traders were able to purchase slaves in exchange for textiles, guns, tools and other items. Business would find a way to overcome any difference between diverse peoples. Indeed, the slave trade proved that Africans and Europeans were, at least in economic terms, exactly alike, hardly different after all: 'the truth is that, on the subject of trade, people… act in the same way, because they are all guided by the same principle, that is to say, by interest'. Morellet reasoned that the slave trade proved Africans were equal to Europeans. Self-interest motivated both groups to sell or purchase enslaved people.
Morellet and his fellow free-traders' campaign against the French East India Company, based on the example of the successfully deregulated Atlantic slave trade, was a triumph. They celebrated the deregulation of France's trade with Asia in 1769. This victory, in turn, inspired economic thinkers across Europe to consider how laissez-faire principles could be applied to other markets. Morellet's call for freedom of trade particularly struck Adam Smith, who referred to Morellet extensively in The Wealth of Nations (1776), a landmark text that still informs many people's belief in the 'free market'.
Indeed, Smith became far more influential than his teacher. As his own version of laissez-faire ideas came to seem like common sense in the following century, the pioneering Gournay Circle was largely forgotten. Their sense that the slave trade was a prime example of free trade in action disappeared. Yet the writings of Gournay and Morellet reveal that modern capitalism is entangled with slavery in multiple, profound ways. Slave labour supplied the cotton, sugar and other vital commodities. The profits from the sale of slaves created fortunes on both sides of the Atlantic. And, in a disturbing paradox, the founding fathers of laissez-fairesaw the slave trade as a showcase of liberty.
From: Ben Betz; Online Engagement Director, People For the American Way
Subject: Sign the petition: Freedom of the press, not attacks and intimidation
Throughout the world, writers and journalists play a vital role in upholding democracy and ensuring the public's right to information. That's why freedom of the press is protected by both the US Constitution and international law.
But what happens when major political figures turn their hostility toward journalists with whom they disagree?
That's what's happening in this year's presidential campaign as candidates and their supporters launch vicious insults and threats at journalists, exclude reporters and media outlets from access to campaigns, and make hostile remarks and gestures toward individual journalists.
Please stand with People For the American Way and PEN America in denouncing the intimidation of journalists.
Call on the presidential candidates of both major parties to publicly reject these attacks and defend freedom of the press at their parties' national conventions>>
Varying degrees of cooperation with the press and transparency are to be expected. And, sadly, we've gotten used to politicians on the Right scapegoating the press, and their efforts to delegitimize facts by delegitimizing the entire press, as a whole, as overtly biased.
But now, thanks to the extreme tone set in the presidential primaries, and by the GOP's presumptive nominee himself, Donald Trump, journalists are being attacked on the basis of their race, sex, religion, cultural background, and even for physical disabilities.
Legal protections of press freedom and free expression are being threatened. Meanwhile candidates incite anger toward journalists and stand idly by as the resulting attacks play out in the public eye.
A blog post from PEN America, our partners on this action, cites some scary examples to illustrate the trend:[1]
Journalist Julia Ioffe received a torrent of anti-Semitic threats and abuse, some including graphic Holocaust-related imagery, after writing a profile of Donald Trump's wife for GQ. Others including New York Times editor Jonathan Weisman and freelancer Bethany Mandel have been similarly targeted. These tactics constrain informed debate. When candidates fail to swiftly and unequivocally condemn such tactics, they can give tacit license to them.
Sign the petition today to demand that presidential candidates of the Republican and Democratic Parties denounce attacks on journalists and uphold freedom of the press at their parties' conventions>>
Together we must defend our democracy and our right to information. Thanks for taking the time to speak out.
This action is cosponsored by:
End of MPEN e-Newsletter
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