Prometheus 6

Hat tip to Unmitigated Word, else (given that I feel apologies for hundred-year-old stuff is meaningless while you keep offending today) I'd have never known about it.

It?

This week, the House of Representatives – by an overwhelming vote of  399-1 - passed a resolution acknowledging the role slaves played in constructing the Capitol building. The lone voice of dissent: Rep. Steve King (R-IA).

And Rep. Steve King (R-IA) had given us the reason for his dissent.

“In the Capitol Visitor’s Center, we agreed to change the name of the Great Hall - which honored the immigrants that came legally to America - to Emancipation Hall to honor the 645,000 slaves and their descendants who were brought to the United States more than two centuries ago.

“Last night I opposed yet another bill to erect another monument to slavery because it was used as a bargaining chip to allow for the actual depiction of ‘In God We Trust’ in the CVC. The Architect of the Capitol and liberal activists opposed every reference to America’s Christian heritage, even to the extent of scrubbing ‘In God We Trust’ from the depiction of the actual Speaker’s chair in the U.S. House of Representatives.

“This is just the latest example of a several year effort by liberals in Congress to scrub references to America’s Christian heritage from our nation's Capitol. Liberals want to amend our country’s history to eradicate the role of Christianity in America and chisel references to God or faith from our historical buildings.

“Our Judeo-Christian heritage is an essential foundation stone of our great nation and should not be held hostage to yet another effort to place guilt on future Americans for the sins of some of their ancestors. Christian abolitionists gave their lives by the hundreds of thousands to end slavery. Great American leaders like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. worshiped God just as our Founding Fathers did. We must never forget this important aspect of our heritage or use it as a political bargaining chip.”

...which has not a damn thing to do with the resolution.

I would really like Rep. Steve King (R-IA) to explain how does acknowledging slave labor was used to build the Capital Building "place guilt on future Americans for the sins of some of their ancestors"? To attempt to explain it anyway. I think he felt a flood of personal guilt and knee-jerked it away instead of trying to understand it.