Instigator / Pro
TheRedeemer's avatar
0
TheRedeemer
1490
rating
1
debates
0.0%
won
Topic
#963

The U.S was founded as a White Nation

Status
Finished

The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.

Winner & statistics
Winner
0
3

After 3 votes and with 3 points ahead, the winner is...

Barney
Tags
Politics
Parameters
Publication date
Last updated date
Type
Standard
Number of rounds
1
Time for argument
One day
Max argument characters
30,000
Voting period
One week
Point system
Winner selection
Voting system
Open
Contender / Con
Barney's avatar
3
Barney
1815
rating
53
debates
100.0%
won
Description

Discussion will range from the corruption of what our founding fathers intended, and how the United States has strayed away from it's original ideals.

Round 1
TheRedeemer's avatar
TheRedeemer
Pro
#1
This argument is not supposed to outline United States today, it is to argue on the original intent of the founding fathers, and that they were indeed as we say today- "Racist".

The first immigration act limited immigration to quote "free white men"

Laws existed so White Americans will not miscegenation.  

Thomas Jefferson

".... It will probably be asked, Why not retain and incorporate the blacks into the state, and thus save the expense of supplying, by importation of white settlers, the vacancies they will leave? Deep rooted prejudices entertained by the whites; ten thousand recollections, by the blacks, of the injuries they have sustained; new provocations; the real distinctions which nature has made; and many other circumstances, will divide us into parties, and produce convulsions, which will probably never end but in the extermination of the one or the other race..."



James Madison on Equality

"To be consistent with existing and probably unalterable prejudices in the U. S. the freed blacks ought to be permanently removed beyond the region occupied by or allotted to a White population. The objections to a thorough incorporation of the two people are, with most of the Whites insuperable; and are admitted by all of them to be very powerful. If the blacks, strongly marked as they are by Physical & lasting peculiarities, be retained amid the Whites, under the degrading privation of equal rights political or social, they must be always dissatisfied with their condition as a change only from one to another species of oppression; always secretly confederated agst. the ruling & privileged class; and always uncontroulled by some of the most cogent motives to moral and respectable conduct. The character of the free blacks, even where their legal condition is least affected by their colour, seems to put these truths beyond question. It is material also that the removal of the blacks be to a distance precluding the jealousies & hostilities to be apprehended from a neighboring people stimulated by the contempt known to be entertained for their peculiar features; to say nothing of their vindictive recollections, or the predatory propensities which their State of Society might foster..."

Ben Franklin

"Which leads me to add one Remark: That the Number of purely white People in the World is proportionably very small. All Africa is black or tawny. Asia chiefly tawny. America (exclusive of the new Comers) wholly so. And in Europe, the Spaniards, Italians, French, Russians and Swedes, are generally of what we call a swarthy Complexion; as are the Germans also, the Saxons only excepted, who with the English, make the principal Body of White People on the Face of the Earth. I could wish their Numbers were increased."

Charles Pinckney

In answer, I say, that, at the time I drew that constitution, I perfectly knew that there did not then exist such a thing in the Union as a black or colored citizen, nor could I then have conceived it possible such a thing could have ever existed in it; nor, notwithstanding all that has been said on the subject, do I now believe one does exist in it."

To conclude, this is not written in support of the policies of our founding fathers, but an acknowledgement of their beliefs and what they wanted the future of this nation to be
Barney's avatar
Barney
Con
#2
Interpreting the Resolution:
This debate is not about if racism showed up early in the history of the USA, but specifically if it was founded as an ethnostate.

I will use a Modus Tollens refutation of pro's case (RationalMedia Foundation):
P1: If the USA was founded as a "white nation," it was NOT founded on principles of equality.
P2: The USA was founded on principles of equality.
C1: Therefore, the USA was NOT founded as a "white nation."

The USA Was Founded on Equality
The USA was formally established in 1776, at which point it “bestowed upon all individuals, equal civic rights as well as the power to alter or to abolish the government whenever it was felt to be posing a threat to people’s fundamental rights” (Pillai). Any racist activity not codified at that time, are outside the scope of this debate.
 
In case anyone does not accept the declaration of independence counts as founding the nation, I will point to a secondary date of 1787 for the constitution. The constitution assured birthright citizenship to “all persons,” without any white clause (Blakemore).
 
Due to pro opting to not make any counter arguments, I will show a likely counter point to my own case: Someone could senselessly argue that the USA was re-founded each time a racist legislation passed, but that would likewise support that each time a non-racist one was passed it was re-founded again; therein denying that it was ever successfully founded at all, invalidating any meaning to the resolution.


Direct Refutations:
While my above proof is already enough, I shall address pro's case.

"The first immigration act..."
Irrelevant. This happened in 1790, long after the founding. It was really an attempt to co-opt the nation against its' founding principles.
This objection applies even more so to the rest of pro's case, such as Charles Pinckney's writing from over three-decades further out from the founding.

"miscegenation"
Irrelevant. First, anti-religious laws against marriage suck, but they have nothing to do with the resolution. They were equally limiting to people of all skin pigmentation. Second, these laws were done at the state rather than national level, so are not connected to the founding of the nation.

"Thomas Jefferson," and "James Madison"
Irrelevant. They could have been a pair of T-Rexs disguised by wearing top hats, and what they enshrined into the founding documents would be unchanged.

"Ben Franklin"
Irrelevant, as he says nothing on topic of a "white nation." I'll give context to his words with an analogy: That he would like a certain population increased, is like pointing out that I would like the population of Tom Hiddleston increased; which does not mean I've schemed for the secret founding of a nation of Tom Hiddleston clones... Yet.

"Charles Pinckney"
I'm honestly confused how pro thought this would support his case. A guy reflecting on a time when citizens of a new nation did not yet exist (of any skin pigment), and him wholly agreeing that ones of dark skin pigment (non-"whites") now exist, and he has no complaint about the idea of citizens of all skin pigments.

 
Bonus History Lesson:
This is skippable (it is straying from the topic), but undermines the very ideas to which pro's case is based.

Neo-Nazis are almost exclusively functionally illiterate. They lack knowledge of the evolving history of the word white, and default to “Aryan”; failing to realize that their own scriptures call for the death of anyone who isn’t a pure blooded mix of Iranian and Indian (Sullivan). So the very White most of them talk about, doesn’t exist, and homicidally excludes themselves. Tied to the resolution, a hypothetical "white nation" as Neo-Nazis refer to, would have required the bloody murder of all the founding fathers of the USA along with the entire rest of the population, leading to no nation at all.
 
 
Sources: