If the citizens don't unelect these morons, they will get more of the inefficiency evidenced, which tends to serve only parasites.

"I'm wondering whether this is merely symbolic (in which case it's a waste of time), or whether it's a foot in the door for reparations."

Whaddaya mean "or?" It's both - not to mention a blatant abandonment of some of the core values of democracy and equal justice under law. Since when was it fair to judge each other by our ancestors' actions, rather than our own?

It's also divisive, as it focuses attention on past actions that can't be undone, rather than on what we, AS AMERICANS, must do IN THE PRESENT AND FUTURE to make our country a better place for ALL of its people.

(Full disclosure: one of my ancestors owned about 13 slaves, in NC, and specified in his will which of his kids got which slave when he died. Dunno what happened to all the profits he made from them (I didn't get any), or how well he treated them.)

I can see requiring full disclosure of profits made from the Holocaust: that is a far more recent and relevant event. But slavery in the US? That is so century-and-a-half-ago.

The concept of reparations has an undelying assumption that the burden of slavery can be valued (in dollars). If so, then the price one would pay for freedom should exceed the cost of the burden. As my relatives fought and died to overturn slavery in the US, does that mean I can sue all blacks for past due freedom fees?

The United States traces its roots to the British Empire and did directly benefit from the British colonization of the Americas.

My ancestors were driven off their lands in Ireland by that same British Empire several hundred years ago.

Justice demands restitution and the United States should be forced to carry its share of the burden for those actions from which it benefitted.

Pay me!

Yeah, sure, I'll pay you, as soon as the Queen pays ME for driving my Scottish ancestors to the New World (and forcing them to buy slaves to work the land).

Oops, we gotta wait till the English get reparations from the Romans and Vikings. This could take awhile...

I love how city councils have nothing important to do but discuss businesses with past ties to slavery. Councilwoman Blondell Reynolds Brown must have already figured out a way to stop crime, improve the economy, and find the homeless jobs and housing.

Any such disclosure will not suffice. No matter what is reported it will be found in "error" and "incomplete". The politicans will demand revisions to confess the real truth (which they know).

Once historical guilt is established special "historical remediation fees" can be collected. Heirs of company stock will be pressured to atone with "donations".

New agencies will afterwords monitor these loathsome businesses to insure they do not revive slavery or again sell shoddy blankets for the Bureau Of Indian Affairs.

Think I'm kidding? What happened when stores were accused of selling clothing made in foreign sweat-shops? Did it matter that they didn't make it? Or that the foreign government didn't care?

To carry this idiocy further, why don't they hit up Brazil, since many more Negro slaves were shipped there than to North America? And Brazil never fought a Civil War to end slavery.

I have had it with Political Correctness.

To carry it further satirically, and speaking of Classical Values, the ancient Romans, the patrician families, owned slaves. Are their modern Italian descendants going to be hit up for money? The word "slave" comes from "Slav", the Slavic peoples such as the Bulgarians (from whom also comes the word "bugger", "buggery"), the Poles, the Russians, the Ukrainians, etc.. They were made slaves in ancient times. Therefore, we (or somebody) owes them money. There are descendents of the ancient Assyrians today. The Assyrians were known in ancient times to be a very warlike, cruel people. Are their descendents going to be hit up for money? What about Negroes whose ancestors owned slaves in Africa? Native American tribes often waged war against one another and took captives. Will they be hit up? Is Outer Mongolia being billed for the actions of Ghengis Khan? Around and around it goes, where it stops nobody knows....

This moralistic shakedown is not even remotely justifiable unless the law contains an explicit blanket guarantee that NO PUNITIVE ACTION WHATSOEVER will be taken against companies that disclose a connection with slavery or other past atrocities. (And speaking of past atrocities, will there be a similar disclosure rule regarding displacing or killing Native Americans, religious wars, gangsters who go legit, arms dealers, people who resisted immigration by Jews fleeing the Nazis, people who profited from pogroms or McCarthyism or other hysteria, etc. etc. ad nauseam? Didn't think so.)

I can see the merit of some sort of Truth and Reconciliation process a la South Africa - but as in South Africa, there would have to be a promise that no punishment would result.

Profited from McCarthyism? Hmmm.... Maybe I should go into business and sell buttons or bumper-stickers or T-shirts or whatever glorifying Tail-Gunner Joe.

By the same token, all Communists, Communist fronters, sympsthizers, fellow travellers, apologists, etc., should be made to apologize or pay reparations for the crimes of Lenin, Stalin, Kruschev, Mao, Pol Pot, Mengistu, Mugabe, Castro, etc.. Hmmm....

Don't forget the Arab Muslim slave trade, which was at least as large as the Western slave trade. The traditional routes across Africa are paved with the bones of the slaves who died on the way. Throw in a requirement that Arab and Muslim businesses acknowledge the evil nature of Koranic justifications for slavery and you'll see PC hypocrites soiling their pants from coast to coast.

But this is a good thing. This began a decade or so ago in New England, with old-time institutions like Brown University and the Hartford Courant making public hand-wringing confessions that their old money was tainted by slavery. Before long you realize that everything in the North that existed before 1860 has slave blood on its hands.

Maybe now we can start to realize slavery as a national issue, not a Southern one. Finally, we'll stop scapegoating one third of the states for something that all participated in.

If you will allow a link, I've been beating the drum about Northern slavery for a while. Believe me, the "truth" that this will reveal will put a cork in a lot of loudmouth Red-State-bashers.

It also will quell any serious talk about reparations.

I wonder how many firms are even around today that existed before 1865. My guess would be a couple banks, and not much else.