Larry Elder/Photo courtesy of Los Angeles Magazine
California gubernatorial candidate Larry Elder claimed that slaveholders are the ones who were due reparations because the emancipation of the enslaved caused them financial losses.
In July, Elder appeared on The Candace Owens Show and informed his fellow Black conservative that the United States was behind the United Kingdom in that slaveholders in the UK received reparations after slavery ended to make up for lost future profits.
“When people talk about reparations, do they really want to have that conversation? Like it or not, slavery was legal,” Elder said.
“Their legal property was taken away from them after the Civil War, so you could make an argument that the people that are owed reparations are not only just Black people but also the people whose ‘property’ was taken away after the end of the Civil War,” Elder continued.
For reference, the conversation began when Owens incorrectly claimed that the United States was one of the first countries to ban the trading of enslaved individuals.
The truth is that the United States was one of the last countries to abolish slavery behind Britain, Mexico, France and Denmark.
Further, in the United States, many enslaved people were held three years longer than they should have been according to the law. Apparently, Elder did not factor that in that variable.
The British Slave Compensation Commission paid £20 million in compensation to slaveholders after the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833 was passed. However, as the UK is still in possession of stolen artifacts from the countries it colonized and oppressed, the compensation only added insult to injury.
Elder suggesting what kind of argument could be made about monies owed is
galling in the face of allegations that he falsified his financial earnings in his application to run for governor in California’s upcoming recall election.In light of the end of COVID-19 unemployment benefits, the end of the eviction moratorium and highly restrictive abortion laws, it is concerning that Elder may be confused about what is legal and what is right.