Some say that because the United States was wrong before, it cannot possibly be right now, or has not the right to be right. (The British Empire sent a fleet to Africa and the Caribbean to maintain the slave trade while the very same empire later sent another fleet to enforce abolition. I would not have opposed the second policy because of my objections to the first; rather it seems to me that the second policy was morally necessitated by its predecessor.)

Summary

This quote suggests that just because the United States made wrong decisions or had questionable actions in the past, it does not necessarily mean that it cannot make right decisions or have the right to do so now. The example of the British Empire's historical shift on the slave trade is cited to demonstrate that a previous wrong action can morally necessitate subsequent corrective actions. The quote suggests that moral progress and evolving actions can be intertwined, and one should not judge present actions solely based on past mistakes.

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