Allen C. Guelzo

About the author: Allen C. Guelzo is dean of the Templeton Honors College at Eastern University in St. David's, Pennsylvania, and is the author of Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President.

Reparations payments made to Jewish survivors of the Holocaust and to Japanese Americans for their internment during World War II are cited as legal precedents by proponents of slavery reparations for African Americans. The federal government, however, cannot be held liable for slavery because slavery was legalized by state, not federal, statutes. In addition, too many years have passed to hold corporations involved in the slave trade accountable. Identifying who should receive reparations would be even more difficult since much racial mixing has occured since the Civil War. The Civil War itself should be considered the ultimate "mechanism of justice" paid to African Americans...