Meta-Buffy/America Thought

[butterfly]

"Uh, reconstruction began after the... construction, which was... shoddy, so they had to reconstruct."
Buffy, Angel (S1), on The Reconstruction

Actually, this strikes me as very true, even if Buffy may not have realized it. The construction of America was shoddy -- built on hypocrisy ("Actually, it was Jefferson." "Kept slaves. Remember?" -- Willow and Cordelia, Go Fish (S2)) and thus unstable. The Civil War was a demolition, the tearing down of a compromised structure, and then came the Reconstruction.

Comments

[jic]

Correction: "Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons," clearly refers to slavery and indentured servitude, but it does not address any rights or restrictions based thereon. It only refers to how to calculate the census for purposes of representation and taxation.