Joel McDurmon on Reparations
Lest there be any confusion, no one has written more forcefully than myself opposing the state and statist, socialist programs, including public schools. Even if I were to be persuaded of a program for “reparations” and even used the term, it could only meaningfully be carried out through private means. The practical obstacles to a state-run program of reparations for, say, the effects of slavery, are so voluminous and massive they render the idea not only merely daunting but virtually impossible. (Who gets paid? Who does not? Who pays? How much? What form? How long? Is it only blacks? All blacks? What exactly constitutes the type of grievances for which someone could receive? What about whites who immigrated well after slavery and had nothing to do with it? And scores more questions.) This does not mean some form of restitution was never due, or that some form of help or aid no longer is; conservatives and Christians would do well to dwell long on this point. When we deny that the state can be the Good Samaritan, we do not simultaneously deny that there is a problem still before us. Dismissing progressivism should only impress a burden more consciously upon us as private individuals.
From The Problem of Slavery in Christian America, pp 395.
Also see God versus Socialism.