"If A can prove…that he may of right enslave B, why may not B snatch the same argument and prove equally that he may enslave A?" Why do you think Lincoln's logic failed to sway more of the population?

Ana finds a note Lincoln wrote outlining his thoughts on slavery (p.86): "If A can prove…that he may of right enslave B, why may not B snatch the same argument and prove equally that he may enslave A?" Why do you think his logic failed to sway more of the population?

I think it was a combination of factors. I feel like there is always a group of people who need to feel better than someone else, and it was easy/socially acceptable to look down on Blacks at the time. I also think that those who should have known better were looking at their pocketbooks - a lot of people made a lot of money from slave labor (including from cotton exported from Northern cities).

The wealthy white male was in charge at this point in history - some claim that to still be the case, of course. But there were far more white males in society than black men and women, more white population than black. Isn't it possible that those who were slave owners felt they had so much power and wealth, hence more right due to their numbers that it would not be possible for the roles to reverse themselves.

When it comes to race, sex, and religion, logic is difficult to apply logically. There are too many preconceived illogical ideas that become very emotional. Much of the discussion revolves around power and money. The best book I have read is Caste that discusses, not only racism, but India's untouchables, and Nazism.

Human nature is to pick teams and want to be on top. There needs to be someone below you whether it's race or economic for people to feel successful in life.

My take is that this argument only works if A sees B as an equal. With slavery, the ‘A’ group saw themselves as so superior, the logic sounds as convincing as “if people can have dogs as pets, then why can’t dogs have people as pets.”

Slavery is such a horrific, unbelievable, insane idea I find it hard to even contemplate how it could be justified.

I think Stephanie's analogy of the ‘A’ group seeing themselves as so superior, "the logic sounds as convincing as 'if people can have dogs as pets, then why can’t dogs have people as pets' is very apt. What makes her analogy even more apt is that so many of the 'A' group did not even consider the 'B' group human.

The statement ignores the reality of the day. The enslaved were severed from everything they knew. They had no power, no education, no money, no connections and no language. White voters simply believed they were superior, they even manipulated religion to support the social conventions of the day. They did not believe and did not want to imagine a different set of facts.

I think it has to do with power and money. The white males, who were the majority at the time, had the power, money, land, status, education; they were the government, the ones making the laws. It came down to greed and fear of losing what one had amassed. Power and money were, and unfortunately still are, what cause people to use others for their own personal gain.