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Re: Heritage of Drum & Fife
Ronald Kephart (rkephart@OSPREY.UNF.EDU)
Sat, 25 May 1996 15:18:59 -0400
In message <Pine.HPP.3.91.960524170026.3133B-100000@huey.csun.edu> mike shupp
writes:
> Well, those German ancestors were floating around the country for a
> lengthy period, if not quite as long as the Mayflower crowd, so I
> wouldn't claim none of them had any responsibility for anything that
> you or I might disapprove of today.
>
> They were probably quite tolerant of slavery for example. A terrible
> thing to be sure, but a lot of early Americans were tolerant of
> slavery.
True. I found some of my German ancestors in the 1790 census. Some were slave
owners, living on small farms in the hills of Western Maryland. I don't hold
myself guilty for what they did, but I do realize that at least some things in
my life are the way they are because I happened to be born into the (former)
slave-owning class, rather than into the (former) slave class. This is why the
folks who rant against programs like affirmative action are wrong; they don't
understand the difference between being responsible for what our ancestors did
and being, thru the luck of the draw, the beneficiaries of what they did.
Ronald Kephart
Dept of Language & Literature
University of North Florida
Jacksonville, FL USA 32224-2645
Phone: (904) 646-2580
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