Post by ShivaTD on Nov 19, 2013 12:30:28 GMT
There is a fact about the founding of America as it related to invidious prejudice and discrimination in the United States that is loosely related to the same historical religious prejudice of the English against the Catholics. It probably warrants it's own thread but I will address it here in brief.
When the United States was founded there were fundamentally two different groups that in today's lexicon we'd refer to as the "classical liberals" and the "conservatives" that represented two different positions.
The "classical liberals" established the philosophical ideals upon which America was founded based upon the Inalienable (natural) Rights of the Person. Their political philosophy is what we read in the Declaration of Independence where all men are created equal and endowed with certain inalienable rights. It was upon this ideal that the United States was founded and they had a vision for a new nation dedicated to this philosophy.
Then there were the "conservatives" that, while accepting the "ideal" expressed by the "classical liberals" were looking to establish a nation based upon an English "White Ango-Saxon Protestant" (WASP) foundation and for them the term "all men" only referred to WASP (males) and not to literally "all men/women" in their view. For them the Bible established that all races were not equal and their religious beliefs limited their interpretations of the ideals expressed by the classical liberals of the times. The "Conservatives" were predominately represented by the slave holders and people of the Southern colonies. They sought to establish a nation based upon traditional WASP English ideologies in American (which is why I refer to them as "conservatives" as they sought to preserve these traditional WASP values).
It took both the classical liberals and the conservatives joining together in an alliance to achieve independence and to establish a new nation. It was an unholy alliance in most respects but a necessary one pragmatically.
The historical result was that the classical liberals defined the political ideology of America while the "conservatives" defined the actual government of America. The ideology included "all people" while the government only included the "WASP" males as all others have been discriminated against since the very founding of the United States.
WASP males are the only group in America that have never been discriminated against in the history of America because the "conservative" ideology has always maintained political control.
So when we look back at the historical discrimination and tyranny against Native-Americans it is a reflection of the "conservative" political power that has held control of the United States since it's inception. Only slowly has the classical liberal ideology of inalienable rights for all Americans made steps forward in American over the history of our nation generally with two steps forward and one step back. It remains an ongoing conflict between the classical liberal ideology and conservative political power in the United States today.
When the United States was founded there were fundamentally two different groups that in today's lexicon we'd refer to as the "classical liberals" and the "conservatives" that represented two different positions.
The "classical liberals" established the philosophical ideals upon which America was founded based upon the Inalienable (natural) Rights of the Person. Their political philosophy is what we read in the Declaration of Independence where all men are created equal and endowed with certain inalienable rights. It was upon this ideal that the United States was founded and they had a vision for a new nation dedicated to this philosophy.
Then there were the "conservatives" that, while accepting the "ideal" expressed by the "classical liberals" were looking to establish a nation based upon an English "White Ango-Saxon Protestant" (WASP) foundation and for them the term "all men" only referred to WASP (males) and not to literally "all men/women" in their view. For them the Bible established that all races were not equal and their religious beliefs limited their interpretations of the ideals expressed by the classical liberals of the times. The "Conservatives" were predominately represented by the slave holders and people of the Southern colonies. They sought to establish a nation based upon traditional WASP English ideologies in American (which is why I refer to them as "conservatives" as they sought to preserve these traditional WASP values).
It took both the classical liberals and the conservatives joining together in an alliance to achieve independence and to establish a new nation. It was an unholy alliance in most respects but a necessary one pragmatically.
The historical result was that the classical liberals defined the political ideology of America while the "conservatives" defined the actual government of America. The ideology included "all people" while the government only included the "WASP" males as all others have been discriminated against since the very founding of the United States.
WASP males are the only group in America that have never been discriminated against in the history of America because the "conservative" ideology has always maintained political control.
So when we look back at the historical discrimination and tyranny against Native-Americans it is a reflection of the "conservative" political power that has held control of the United States since it's inception. Only slowly has the classical liberal ideology of inalienable rights for all Americans made steps forward in American over the history of our nation generally with two steps forward and one step back. It remains an ongoing conflict between the classical liberal ideology and conservative political power in the United States today.
