The Brother on the Right: Why Not African-American?

Saturday, January 26, 2008

Why Not African-American?

My good friend Carlton sent me an reply to the video regarding Black vs. African-American. His basic premise is that we adopted the name "African-American" out of a need for us to identify with a place of origin as a people.

He makes an interesting point and it is very thought provoking. I understand his line of thought and I can see how it would be very comforting to know where you came from. Nothing at all wrong with that. My assertion is that being a Black American is much more important than knowing where my ancestors lived and died in Africa, Ireland, the West Indies, America, etc.

In other words, if someone walked up to me and announced that they were from some African historical society and dropped some dusty scroll in my lap which revealed the origins of my ancestors, that would truly be very exciting and revealing. Of course I would want access to that information. However, armed with that information what am I going to do with it now? Hmm? It's nice to know that some of my ancestors came from the so and so village and that one of my great great great grandfathers was a chief of this or that...but where does any of that leave me and my family. Yes I can tell my kids that we came from kings but I've been telling that that all along anyhow.

The reality is no matter where my ancestors came from I am here, now and I need to know where I'm going. Having access to historical information about my ancestors will not lead me to where I need to go. In order to get where I want to go, I have determined that I will identify with "Black American" or better yet "American" and leave it at that.

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Wisdom of Our Fathers...Words We Need Today

A people... who are possessed of the spirit of commerce, who see and who will pursue their advantages may achieve almost anything.
George Washington

The propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right, which Heaven itself has ordained.
George Washington, First Inaugural Address, April 30, 1789

There is but one straight course, and that is to seek truth and pursue it steadily.
George Washington

To be prepared for war, is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.
George Washington

But a Constitution of Government once changed from Freedom, can never be restored. Liberty, once lost, is lost forever.
John Adams

Human government is more or less perfect as it approaches nearer or diverges farther from the imitation of this perfect plan of divine and moral government.
John Adams

I have accepted a seat in the [Massachusetts] House of Representatives, and thereby have consented to my own ruin, to your ruin, and the ruin of our children. I give you this warning, that you may prepare your mind for your fate.
John Adams

I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. In my youth I traveled much, and I observed in different countries, that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer.
Benjamin Franklin

I pronounce it as certain that there was never yet a truly great man that was not at the same time truly virtuous.
Benjamin Franklin

It is very imprudent to deprive America of any of her privileges. If her commerce and friendship are of any importance to you, they are to be had on no other terms than leaving her in the full enjoyment of her rights.
Benjamin Franklin

Repeal that [welfare] law, and you will soon see a change in their manners. St. Monday and St. Tuesday, will soon cease to be holidays. Six days shalt thou labor, though one of the old commandments long treated as out of date, will again be looked upon as a respectable precept; industry will increase, and with it plenty among the lower people; their circumstances will mend, and more will be done for their happiness by inuring them to provide for themselves, than could be done by dividing all your estates among them.
Benjamin Franklin

That wise Men have in all Ages thought Government necessary for the Good of Mankind; and, that wise Governments have always thought Religion necessary for the well ordering and well-being of Society, and accordingly have been ever careful to encourage and protect the Ministers of it, paying them the highest publick Honours, that their Doctrines might thereby meet with the greater Respect among the common People.
Benjamin Franklin

They that can give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
Benjamin Franklin

We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.
Benjamin Franklin

Without Freedom of Thought there can be no such Thing as Wisdom; and no such Thing as Public Liberty, without Freedom of Speech.
Benjamin Franklin

A fondness for power is implanted, in most men, and it is natural to abuse it, when acquired.
Alexander Hamilton

Here sir, the people govern.
Alexander Hamilton

It is evident from the state of the country, from the habits of the people, from the experience we have had on the point itself, that it is impracticable to raise any very considerable sums by direct taxation.
Alexander Hamilton

The fabric of American empire ought to rest on the solid basis of THE CONSENT OF THE PEOPLE. The streams of national power ought to flow from that pure, original fountain of all legitimate authority.
Alexander Hamilton

The history of ancient and modern republics had taught them that many of the evils which those republics suffered arose from the want of a certain balance...Alexander Hamilton
[H]owever weak our country may be, I hope we shall never sacrifice our liberties.
Alexander Hamilton

A free people [claim] their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate.
Thomas Jefferson

Although a republican government is slow to move, yet when once in motion, its momentum becomes irresistible.
Thomas Jefferson

An honest man can feel no pleasure in the exercise of power over his fellow citizens....
Thomas Jefferson

And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God?
Thomas Jefferson

Born in other countries, yet believing you could be happy in this, our laws acknowledge, as they should do, your right to join us in society, conforming, as I doubt not you will do, to our established rules.
Thomas Jefferson

Cherish, therefore, the spirit of our people...
Thomas Jefferson

Enlighten the people, generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like spirits at the dawn of day.
Thomas Jefferson

Every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle. We have called by different names brethren of the same principle.
Thomas Jefferson

Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves, therefore, are its only safe depositories.
Thomas Jefferson

Experience having long taught me the reasonableness of mutual sacrifices of opinion among those who are to act together for any common object, and the expediency of doing what good we can; when we cannot do all we would wish.
Thomas Jefferson

I have sometimes asked myself whether my country is the better for my having lived at all? I do not know that it is. I have been the instrument of doing the following things; but they would have been done by others; some of them, perhaps, a little better.
Thomas Jefferson

I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.
Thomas Jefferson

I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power.
Thomas Jefferson

I have no ambition to govern men. It is a painful and thankless office.
Thomas Jefferson

I think all the world would gain by setting commerce at perfect liberty.
Thomas Jefferson

I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labor of the industrious.
Thomas Jefferson

I will not believe our labors are lost. I shall not die without a hope that light and liberty are on a steady advance.
Thomas Jefferson

I would rather be exposed to the inconveniencies attending too much liberty than those attending too small a degree of it.
Thomas Jefferson

If a nation expects to be ignorant — and free — in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.
Thomas Jefferson

If the present Congress errs in too much talking, how can it be otherwise in a body to which the people send 150 lawyers, whose trade it is to question everything, yield nothing, & talk by the hour? That 150 lawyers should do business together ought not to be expected.
Thomas Jefferson

If we move in mass, be it ever so circuitously, we shall attain our object; but if we break into squads, everyone pursuing the path he thinks most direct, we become an easy conquest to those who can now barely hold us in check.
Thomas Jefferson

In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution.
Thomas Jefferson

In times of peace the people look most to their representatives; but in war, to the executive solely.
Thomas Jefferson

It is of great importance to set a resolution, not to be shaken, never to tell an untruth. There is no vice so mean, so pitiful, so contemptible; and he who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it a second and a third time, till at length it becomes habitual; he tells lies without attending to it, and truths without the world's believing him. This falsehood of the tongue leads to that of the heart, and in time depraves all its good disposition.
Thomas Jefferson

Laws are made for men of ordinary understanding and should, therefore, be construed by the ordinary rules of common sense. Their meaning is not to be sought for in metaphysical subtleties which may make anything mean everything or nothing at pleasure.
Thomas Jefferson

Love your neighbor as yourself and your country more than yourself.
Thomas Jefferson

Nothing is more certainly written in the book of fate than that these people are to be free.
Thomas Jefferson

Nothing then is unchangeable but the inherent and unalienable rights of man.
Thomas Jefferson

One loves to possess arms, though they hope never to have occasion for them.
Thomas Jefferson

One single object... [will merit] the endless gratitude of the society: that of restraining the judges from usurping legislation.
Thomas Jefferson

Our peculiar security is in the possession of a written Constitution. Let us not make it a blank paper by construction. Thomas Jefferson

Taxes should be continued by annual or biennial reeactments, because a constant hold, by the nation, of the strings of the public purse is a salutary restraint from which an honest government ought not wish, nor a corrupt one to be permitted, to be free.
Thomas Jefferson

The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only legitimate object of good government.
Thomas Jefferson

What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value.
Thomas Paine

A little matter will move a party, but it must be something great that moves a nation.
Thomas Paine

I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. 'Tis the business of little minds to shrink; but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death.
Thomas Paine

If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace.
Thomas Paine

If, from the more wretched parts of the old world, we look at those which are in an advanced stage of improvement, we still find the greedy hand of government thrusting itself into every corner and crevice of industry, and grasping the spoil of the multitude. Invention is continually exercised, to furnish new pretenses for revenues and taxation. It watches prosperity as its prey and permits none to escape without tribute.
Thomas Paine

The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind.
Thomas Paine

All men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree.
James Madison

Public opinion sets bounds to every government, and is the real sovereign in every free one.
James Madison

Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression.
James Madison

Here sir, the people govern.
Alexander Hamilton, speech to the New York Ratifying Convention, June 17, 1788

If it be asked, What is the most sacred duty and the greatest source of our security in a Republic? The answer would be, An inviolable respect for the Constitution and Laws — the first growing out of the last.... A sacred respect for the constitutional law is the vital principle, the sustaining energy of a free government.
Alexander Hamilton

It is evident from the state of the country, from the habits of the people, from the experience we have had on the point itself, that it is impracticable to raise any very considerable sums by direct taxation.
Alexander Hamilton

[H]owever weak our country may be, I hope we shall never sacrifice our liberties.
Alexander Hamilton

The Brother on the Right