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Slavery has often been called America's "original sin" and it sometimes seems as if there is no end of penance. Last month, Florida's legislature formally apologized for the state's "shameful" history of slavery, joining five other states that have expressed public regret for the practice.

Are modern apologies appropriate for historical wrongs? Ben Boychuk and Joel Mathis, the moderators of RedBlueAmerica.com, weigh in.

Joel Mathis

By any measure, Brown University in Rhode Island is one of the nation's elite colleges. It is in the Ivy League, costs and arm and a leg to attend, and boasts a glittering array of graduates whose names are well-known in politics and the humanities. Alumni have good reason to be proud -- but they also have reason for sorrow. Last year, Brown officials acknowledged the university was created and built using money earned in the 18th century slave trade. Today's accomplishments were made possible, in part, by yesterday's sins.

Slavery was abolished in the United States more than 140 years ago, but Brown University is not unique. There are thousands of 21st century family fortunes, companies and institutions that have their roots in the practice. But many Americans grow weary at the thought of wrestling with a legacy they didn't create and have no control over. That's understandable.

The legacy exists, nonetheless. We spend a lot of time celebrating America's historical accomplishments; we have holidays for just that purpose. A healthy society should also contemplate the darker side of its past, if only to guard against arrogance and the repetition of great mistakes. An apology is an imperfect way to do that, but it's a start.

Ben Boychuk

The United States today has a perverse talent for contemplating the dark side of its past. A public school history curriculum is a litany of American sins reaching back to the pilgrims landing on Plymouth Rock. At this point, does any American of any race not recognize the evil of slavery?

An apology, Vanderbilt political scientist Carol Swain wrote in 2005, "would bring closure and healing to a festering wound."

Would it? Americans would have reason to doubt that any apology would put the racial grievance industry out of work. To whom would America apologize for slavery? From whom would America ask forgiveness? The descendants of slaves, people for whom bondage is more a mindset than reality. Who would be apologizing? Americans who, with rare exception, live in an era of civil rights and take racial equality as a given.

Nor would an apology eradicate the legacy of slavery that we are told burdens blacks in America today. Americans could apologize once or 100 times or even a million times for slavery, but American penance for a sin whose stain can never be erased is endless.

Abraham Lincoln offered the finest words, if not the apology some seek, in 1865: "With Malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds." Let's get on with it. 

See also:

• Florida apologies for slavery... should the United States?
• Poll: Should the United States apologize for slavery?