Haley said Wednesday that the Civil War was about “capitalism” and “economic freedom” and “freedom to do or be anything they want to be without government getting in the way.” That made her sound like she was talking about the freedom of Southern enslavers. After all, the enslaved didn’t have any capital or economic freedom to defend, and their oppressor wasn’t the federal government but private plantation owners.
Is that a fair interpretation? Haley’s retraction Thursday confirmed that it is.
The tell was Haley’s use of the word, “but.” Haley said we mustn’t “go back to slavery, but what’s the lesson in all that?” If Haley were talking about freedom for the enslaved and their descendants, she wouldn’t have said “but”; she’d have said “and.” Haley was talking about the freedoms of enslavers and their descendants.A more complete analysis is here:
If you look at this, this is exactly the point that would be made by abolitionists. They would clearly argue that government should "secure the rights and freedoms of the people”, including the enslaved. They would absolutely argue government should make sure “you have freedom.”
But again, whose “freedom” is she talking about?
Well, that becomes clear when she says “We need to have capitalism, economic freedom.” She argues against government intervention, which means she is not suggesting that the government *stop* the slave trade. So she’s not talking about the freedom of the enslaved people, she talking about government getting in the way of people being allowed to do commerce in the way they see fit.
At their center, these people are Confederates.
