Talk:Eric Foner

Eric Foner political categorization

I would argue that Foner deserves to be labeled in the communist category. I would say so for several reasons. First, his dad and uncle were both members of the CPUSA, and we already know Foner is pretty progressive, as the information on his page says. Although this does not necessarily suggest he is a communist, him being a progressive suggests that the apple likely didn't fall far from the tree. I think that itself is good evidence he technically has communist ties. Second, although he may have gotten a thing or two right about Reconstruction here or there, we must understand people like Foner, Zinn, and McPherson have a different view of Reconstruction than we do. While we view Reconstruction as the Republican Party trying to promote civil rights and accomplish Hamiltonian goals that had failed to be accomplished ever since Thomas Jefferson beat John Adams in 1800, Foner and his allies see it as a refounding of America, hence why he called it an "unfinished revolution". While he may have gotten a couple of things right about civil service reform and the free market, he also sees Reconstruction as sort of a Marxist revolution, even though it wasn't really and I certainly would have supported it had I been alive then. To people like Foner, America was founded as a systemically pro-slavery country in 1776, and the Constitution, which was ratified in 1789, is too. They see the Reconstruction Amendments and the process of Reconstruction as making a new constitution and a new America, one that was very progressive and that was supposed to be communist. Hence, to them Reconstruction is an unfinished revolution as we need to finish the job of making America fully progressive and woke. Obviously this is just very bad history and no one should agree with it, Reconstruction wasn't really any of these things, but that is how I would argue people like Foner see it. -Mr. Nationalist (talk) 00:29, May 15, 2023 (EDT)