Grammy Winner Can't Pay Taxes Because Her Ancestors Were Slaves

Lauryn Hill, maybe better known as a member of the group, The Fugees, has been sentenced to 3 months in federal prison for failing to pay more than a million dollars in back taxes. Her reason?

“I am a child of former slaves who had a system imposed on them,” Hill said before U.S. Magistrate Madeline Cox Arleo. “I had an economic system imposed on me.”

She said the treatment she received while she was in the entertainment business led to her decision to leave it.

“There were veiled threats, there was blacklisting,” she said, without giving specifics. “I was told, `That’s how it goes, it comes with the territory.’ I came to be perceived as a cash cow and not a person. When people capitalize on a persona, they forget there is a person in there.”

Maybe so. Maybe she did feel overwhelmed. But that doesn't excuse you from paying your taxes. And YOU were not a slave, Ms. Hill. And neither were your parents. You obviously have been given great opportunity...it made you millions...yet you think you don't have to pay taxes because your ancestors were slaves? (Insert me screaming in frustration here)

Let me give you a little history lesson, Ms. Hill. Sharpen up and pay attention!

Anthony Johnson was an Angolan held as an indentured servant by a merchant in the Colony of Virginia in 1620, but later freed to become a successful tobacco farmer and property owner. Notably, he was the first to hold a black African servant as a slave in the mainland American colonies.

By July 1651 Johnson had five indentured servants of his own and he claimed an additional 250 acres (100 ha) of land based on the headright system. He is recognized in Virginia court documents when he pled for tax relief in 1653 after a fire destroyed much of his plantation, and in a case brought in 1654 in which he contested the freedom suit of a servant, John Casor. Johnson won the suit and retained Casor as his servant for life. The case effectively made Casor the first true slave in Virginia. In the tax-relief case, the justices noted that Anthony and Mary "have lived Inhabitants in Virginia (above thirty years)" and had been respected for their "hard labor and known service".

Slavery was unofficially established in Virginia in 1655, when Johnson convinced a court that his servant John Casor (also a black man), was his for life. Johnson himself had been brought to Virginia some years earlier as an indentured servant but he had saved enough money to buy out the remainder of his contract and that of his wife. The court ruling in Johnson’s favor resulted in Casor becoming the first state-recognized slave in the Colony of Virginia. Slavery in Virginia was officially enacted in state law in 1661.

So, I really don't want to hear any more about how white people are holding the black man down, okay? It was a black man who owned the first slave and took it to court to make it legal to own him for life. It was also Democrats that owned these slaves AND fought to keep them. There was no Republican party until it was formed by Abraham Lincoln...you know...the guy who FREED the slaves.

Get your history straight and stop acting the victim. It was your own race that put your ancestors in bonds and it was democrats that fought to keep them there. Grow up and pay your taxes. You have earned more than most and have been blessed with a better life, financially, than most. To hear you whine is a disgrace. You're killin' me Lauryn...and not so softly.