If history proves anything it shows if civil rights, human rights, equality and even the right to live are to be denied to a class of people, they must first be stripped of their inherent value as human beings.

In the case of African Americans, it was slavery and the Dred Scott decision by the Supreme Court in 1857 that upheld that evil practice, justifying it by claiming Blacks were not citizens of the United States. An earlier “compromise” in 1787 declared that for purposes of representation in Congress, enslaved Blacks in a state would be counted as three-fifths of the number of white inhabitants of that state. Jim Crow laws enacted by Southern Democrats went further by preventing most Blacks from voting.

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Readers may email Cal Thomas at tcaeditors@tribpub.com. Look for Cal Thomas’ new book “America’s Expiration Date: The Fall of Empires and Superpowers and the Future of the United States” (HarperCollins/Zondervan).

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