5 ms·
To My Old Master (1865)
- gruseom 14y agoThis one is also worth reading. In fact, it's hard to forget. http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/11/wretched-woman.html http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/11/wretched-woman.html
- blux 14y agoGreat, great read.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- lsb 14y agoHe asks for almost $12000, in a lump sum, with interest added, in 1865 dollars, which is roughly $200k in 2013 dollars. As a lump sum.
- jfb 14y agoIn recompense for 32 years of chattel slavery, any dollar amount would be a laughable pittance.
- svachalek 14y agoActually, 52 years since he is including 20 years for his wife as well. Comes out to $3846/person/yr in today's dollars if the above calculation is correct, which is considerably lower than what I'd sell myself into slavery for.
- etrain 14y agoBut, and this is where it gets really messed up - $4k/person/year is significantly more than current global median income. Last I checked (around 2007), this is about $850/year. (Yeah, if you're reading this website, you are insanely lucky). Of course, this doesn't take into account things like income disparity between countries and so on - that is, median income in Bangladesh is very different than the US today, but this was Antebellum south, at a time when America was still a developing country. All this to say - maybe $4k/year was a "fair price."
- yen223 14y agoI'm from a developing third-world country. $4k/year is our minimum wage. It's hardly a fair price for 32 years of service.
- shardling 14y agoIt's meant to highlight how ridiculous the Colonel's own request was.
- diminish 14y agothat reminds me my ex-boss tiring to hire me again and the of $4250, he cut back from our salaries, during dotcom bust. He promised to pay back when the time comes...
- monochromatic 14y agoI wonder what it would come to with room and board subtracted. Considerably less I'm sure.
- davidroberts 14y agoSince, as he mentions in the letter, room and board were included in the wage he uses as a reference, there is no need to deduct them from the wages his former master owes.
- monochromatic 14y agoOops, missed that point.
- yen223 14y agoIf someone offered to pay you $200,000 now, but in return you have to be his slave for 32 years, would you do it?
- chris_engel 14y agoSo you would work for 520$/month? Wow.
- yen223 14y agoI never said I would :)
- RobotCaleb 14y agoWas there ever a response?
- RobotCaleb 14y agohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jordan_Anderson#Aftermath http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jordan_Anderson#Aftermath
- talmir 14y agoWow, the relatives are still angry he didnt come back. What the heck is wrong with those people? :O
- gruseom 14y agoThe article is a little wrong to link to the Emancipation Proclamation, because Lincoln specifically exempted Tennessee from that. According to the easiest links to dig up on Google [1,2], Tennessee was the only state to free its slaves by popular vote and didn't do so until February 1865, less than six months before Jourdon dictated his letter and certainly well after he had left the farm, since the letter makes clear that was 1864 at the latest. That explains why Anderson (the master) shot at him when he was leaving: he hadn't actually been emancipated yet. What it doesn't explain is how he got his "free papers" in Nashville in 1864. Since Nashville was obviously in Tennessee too, why would he have been any more emancipated there? My bet is it had something to do with joining or supporting the war effort. Tennessee was under Union control. Another thing I didn't know: the Governor of Tennessee at the time was Andrew Johnson, who became president after Lincoln was killed. 1. http://www.tnhistoryforkids.org/stories/emancipation http://www.tnhistoryforkids.org/stories/emancipation — this web page says it's "for kids"; one wishes all web pages were so informative. 2. http://www.afrigeneas.com/states/tn/ http://www.afrigeneas.com/states/tn/
- KorvinSzanto 14y agoWhy is this on hackernews?
- gruseom 14y agoBecause it's damned interesting.
- hcarvalhoalves 14y agoI would guess the new Django Unchained movie brought this subject to light again.
- nmridul 14y agoBecause it teaches you how not to treat your workers.
- kragen 14y agoAre you saying it's not good to think of your workers as being more like server hardware than like founders?
- JonnyB 14y agoThat's exactly what it sounds like
- jfb 14y agoI think that any comparisons between wage labor and slavery are simply category errors.
- elemenohpee 14y agoOk, many people think otherwise and have written at length about it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_slavery http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_slavery You can't simply label something a category error and call it a day.
- 14y ago
- hcarvalhoalves 14y agoPriceless. He was such a gentleman on the letter.
- accountswu 14y agoAmazing chutzpah the slave-owner showed and amazing response from the brilliant guy!