Photo: Indiana State Government
Indiana Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith is under fire after calling the Three-Fifths Compromise "a great move."
On Friday (April 25), Beckwith share on video on X, where he discussed the Three-Fifths Compromise, a former clause in the U.S. Constitution that counted enslaved people as three-fifths of a person for representation and taxation.
Beckwith claimed the clause was a "great move."
"This was a great move by the North to make sure that slavery would be eradicated in our nation. They knew what they were doing," Beckwith said in the video.
Beckwith shared the video amid controversy over Indiana Senate Bill 289, which aims to limit DEI initiatives in government. Senate Democrats compared the measure to past policies, including the Three-Fifths Compromise.
The Indiana Lt. Governor took aim at Democrats over the comparison, saying the Three-Fifths Compromise wasn't a "terrible thing."
"That's why you had the Senate Democrats who were getting up talking about the Three-Fifths Compromise like it was some sort of terrible thing in our past. It was not," Beckwith said. "It actually was the exact opposite that helped to root out slavery and lead us into a more perfect union that we now see, where black, white, red, brown, all people can have equal representation under the law."
In a statement, leaders from the Concerned Clergy of Indianapolis, the Indiana Chapter of the National Action Network, and the Baptist Ministers' Alliance urged Beckwith to retract his "historically inaccurate" and "morally repugnant" comments. The groups also called on Gov. Mike Braun to condemn the remarks.
"We can have different opinions, but we can't have different facts," Rev. David Greene, president of the Concerned Clergy of Indianapolis, said in a statement. "And what are the facts around the Three-Fifths piece regarding why it happened?"
In response to the backlash, Beckwith doubled down on his sentiment, writing that the reaction to his video "proved that our education system has been corrupted by the woke mind virus."
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