The dilemma of how to make reparations to descendants of African slaves in America has been a thorn in the country’s side since the abolition of slavery in 1865. When Union troops of the North defeated the Confederacy of the South in the bloodiest battle ever fought on US soil, it was about economic interests, cultural values and the power of federal government, not ending the business and institution of slavery. In the Americas, slavery involved the complete separation of a people from their land, language and culture. These are atrocities difficult to make amends for.

The phrase “40 acres and a mule” formed part of the federal government’s promise to redistribute land seized from white owners to newly freed slaves after the Civil War. In the aftermath of the war, it came to symbolise the rights of African Americans and the government’s broken pledge to compensate them for the crimes of slavery. The order was issued by general William Sherman and approved by then president Abraham Lincoln, who had declared the Emancipation Proclamation two years earlier, granting newly freed slaves the right to compensation for unpaid labour and protection from the military. When Andrew Johnson succeeded him as president after his assassination, however, he quickly vetoed the legislation and returned confiscated land to white southern owners in return for an oath of loyalty. Forty acres and a mule have come to epitomise America’s “unfinished revolution”.

The Juneteenth celebration, commemorating the announcement of the abolition of slavery on June 19, 1865, was marked this year with a long overdue House judiciary committee hearing regarding legislation for reparations. It was overshadowed, however, the day before when Kentucky state senator and Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell told reporters: "I don’t think reparations for something that happened 150 years ago, for whom none of us currently living are responsible, [are] a good idea.” Adding insult to injury, Mr McConnell went on to say: “We've tried to deal with our original sin of slavery by fighting a civil war, passing landmark civil rights legislation. We elected an African American president.” It showed a flagrant misunderstanding of what reparations would mean for the country and, indeed, the rest of the world. If slavery is America’s “original sin”, then surely the country should repent and atone by apologising and making reparations?

The sort of thinking exhibited by Mr McConnell is what many black Americans experience when forced to seek relief for a wrong committed against them, from the very person who committed the wrong. It is like the hen appealing to the fox for fair treatment. It is unclear to what extent the senator has witnessed the effects of slavery but he and many others have undoubtedly benefited from the institutions created by its brutality.

But his comments, however crass and insensitive, do raise an uncomfortable question: why was the issue of slavery and reparations overlooked by the Obama administration? Former president Barack Obama might have done more for race relations in America than any other leader but when he was recently asked about reparations in an interview with the writer Ta-Nehisi Coates for The Atlantic, he was cautious in his response: “I have much more confidence in my ability, or any president or any leader’s ability, to mobilise the American people around a multi-year, multibillion-dollar investment to help every child in poverty in this country, than I am in being able to mobilise the country around providing a benefit specific to African Americans as a consequence of slavery.”

His statement seems to back the theory that as America’s first black president, Mr Obama was so conscious of how he might be perceived that he disassociated himself from the inflammatory pastor of his church, Jeremiah Wright, and even from the struggles of his own people, so as not to compromise his presidency. Some even claim that the rise of the alt-right and the overt racism found in America today is a direct backlash against his leadership.

Coates eloquently dismantled Mr McConnell’s comments in his heartfelt testimony to the House committee, describing reparations as “a dilemma of inheritance”. Typical of American politics, he shared the stage with the young black writer Coleman Hughes, a critic of reparations, who argued that “our desire to fix the past is compromising America’s opportunity to focus on the present”. His use of the word “our” is questionable and his divisive ideology can be traced back to the days of slavery.

There was always a threat of a slave disagreeing or disapproving of the actions of another slave, even going so far as to inform his “master” of plans for a revolt and in some cases, acting on behalf of the slave master.

The writer is an assistant professor at Zayed University, UAE