On Tuesday, The Daily Caller posted the following headline:
Every Living US President Except Donald Trump Is Descended From Slaveholders: REPORT
Wow.
The article reports:
A genealogical study carried out by Reuters found that every living president except Donald Trump is directly descended from slaveholders.
Reuters set out to examine the genealogical histories of America’s political elite, “many of whom have staked key positions on policies related to race.” Through their research, the investigators found that every living U.S. president — a group that comprises Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump and Joe Biden — is directly descended from slaveholders, except Donald Trump, whose ancestors came to America after slavery was abolished.
Obama is directly descended from slaveholders on his mother’s side, the investigators found.
The investigative team traced the lineages of America’s elite by analyzing census records, tax documents, slave records, estate records and family Bibles, as well as birth and death certificates. Their findings were then vetted by board-certified genealogists.
In addition to U.S. presidents, investigators found that among the 536 sitting members of the last Congress, 100 were descended from slaveholders, including Republican Sens. Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, Tom Cotton and James Lankford, and Democrats Elizabeth Warren, Tammy Duckworth, Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan.
This is hilarious, but actually makes sense. The majority of our political leaders come from families that have been in America for many generations. Slavery was an acceptable part of society around the world until the mid-nineteenth century. During the early days of America, it was acceptable to own slaves. If our political leadership extends back into the late 1700’s and the early 1800’s, it makes perfect sense that they would have owned slaves. Since Donald Trump’s family arrived in America after the Civil War, it makes sense that his family would not have owned slaves.
The article has a very wise conclusion:
Henry Louis Gates Jr, a professor at Harvard University who focuses on African and African American research and hosts the popular television genealogy show Finding Your Roots on PBS, stressed that the findings were not intended to cast blame, but rather to showcase how closely the nation is still linked to the institution of slavery.
“We do not inherit guilt for our ancestors’ actions,” Gates said, arguing this was instead a “learning opportunity for each individual.”
“It is also a learning opportunity for their constituency … and for the American people as a whole,” he added.