PrintAugust 22, 2012
Break the Chains, Says Joe
There was something almost charming about Vice President Joe Biden (D) playing the race card last week, singing the "They'll put y'all in chains" number with a great big stage wink. After all, when you play the race card, you are supposed to inject real fear into your African-American audience, not do a soft-shoe routine.
But perhaps the vice president, diligently discharging his duties, was merely seconding Walter Russell Mead's motion for a new Race Compromise, although the presiding officer of the United States Senate is supposed to limit his activities to breaking a tie vote.
In the current American Interest, Mead leads us through the whole shabby history of race compromise in the United States, starting with the Compromise of 1787, a Constitution that "effectively banned Congress from interfering with slavery in the states" but balanced that by counting slaves as three-fifths of a person when apportioning seats in Congress.
Then it was on to the shabby Compromises of...(Read Full Article)
