The Confederates didn't invent slavery

I didn’t plan on contributing to the discussion on the Confederate Battle Flag, but today I learned that the Ohio State Fair plans to prohibit the sale of merchandise with the flag at this year’s fair. My only credential for my contribution to this discussion is that I once successfully petitioned my employer to have the Stars and Bars removed from the building where I worked. Besides my concern about offending African-Americans, I didn’t like to see that flag flying in a free state. Even in a slave state, they lost the war, for crying out loud. I wanted at least to see it pushed back across the Ohio.

Now, I think that we should think about the consequences before we start banning or prohibiting the flag. The first thing that comes to mind is arguments over definitions. I believe that the Confederate Battle Flag has 11 stars to represent the 11 states of the Confederate States of America. Well, what if somebody sells a hat or other item that has 10 stars on it? Could the vendor claim that it does not meet the definition of the Confederate Battle Flag? Or, what if they start making and marketing the actual flag of the Confederate States of America? It’s not as visually appealing as the Battle Flag, but it represents the same thing.

Banning the Confederate Battle Flag would make it easier for us to forget about the millions of slaves working for us every day. If you consume sugar, cannabis, coffee, or many other products, you benefit from the work of slaves. Slavery has been with us at least since we invented civilization. Somewhere in the negotiations between farmers and the warriors they hired to protect them, the farmers lost. It became even more hellish when we came up with cash crops.

Abolitionists succeeded in eliminating legal slavery, but not de facto slavery. Today’s slaves are not counted as such on a census. Today’s slavers think of themselves as good negotiators. Our consumer culture and its economy depend on keeping the cost of labor as low as possible. It is appropriate for a state agency to discontinue displaying a symbol of oppression, but we should let the free market reveal where people’s sympathies lie. I would hope that merchants would stop selling the Confederate battle flag because of lack of demand, but I don’t see that happening in my lifetime.

The Stars and Bars serve as a reminder that the United States became a wealthy nation because black people harvested the cotton. If we continue to see the Confederate Battle Flag flown, it reminds us that many people in our society need reminding that we are all God’s children. It should also serve as a reminder that slaves provide our comfortable way of life. We fought a war to end legal slavery in our country. Let the vanquished of that war remind us that we still have much to do.