Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn were written in the late 1800's when society talked and acted in a certain way.  By today's standards, many would consider these things to be offensive, but does that mean we should revise these classics of literature?  NewSouth Books does: http://www.publishersweekly.co.....ates-the-n-word.html
As Whoopi Goldberg said in her foreword on the Merry Melodies Collection DVDs, editing out racist depictions (and therefore effectively denying that the racism of the era ever happened) is worse than actually showing them.

Quoted Text

"The people whom Huck and Jim encounter on the Mississippi are drunkards, murderers, bullies, swindlers, lynchers, thieves, liars, mows, frauds, child abusers, numbskulls, hypocrites, windbags and traders in human flesh. All are white. The one man of honor in this phantasmagoria is 'black person Jim,' as Twain called him to emphasize the irony of a society in which the only true gentleman was held beneath contempt."

- Russell Baker

lol...  this forum replaces the n-word (since I can't write the actual thing without getting censored) with "black person".  How appropriate.