Mike wrote: >> and would that be Thomas Jefferson, who owned slaves and backed legislation to protect the rights of the slave owning classes and who presided over a country that defined black people in its constitution as worth 60% of a white person?<<
Kakki replied >>Mike can you point me to the part of the US constitution that provides this definition? << Article 1, section 2, paragraph 3 states: "Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several states which may be included within this Union, according to their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding the whole number of free persons, including those bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other persons." This was changed by section 2 of Amendment XIV in 1868, 81 years after the signing of the Constitution, when 17 presidents had been in office, including Jefferson. The amendment was rejected by Kentucky and New Jersey, apologies to Lama and Rosalita for my bad taste in mentioning this. There is a good discussion on this by Naomi Zack in 'Race, Class, Gender, and Sexuality: The Big Questions', edited by Zack, Shrage, and Sartwell, and also, less well discussed, in my own "One drop of blood" article. mike in barcelona, winners of the European Basketball League. NPIMH We Are The Champions - thousands of people
