You shed tears over fallen Hungary, and make the sad story of her wrongs the theme of your poets, statesmen and orators, till your gallant sons are ready to fly to arms to vindicate her cause against her oppressors; but, in regard to the ten thousand wrongs of the American slave, you would enforce the strictest silence, and would hail him as an enemy of the nation who dares to make those wrongs the subject of public discourse! It is, however, a notable fact that, while so much execration is poured out by Americans upon those engaged in the foreign slave-trade, the men engaged in the slave-trade between the states pass without condemnation, and their business is deemed honorable. Heat and sorrow have nearly consumed their strength; suddenly you hear a quick snap, like the discharge of a rifle; the fetters clank, and the chain rattles simultaneously; your ears are saluted with a scream, that seems to have torn its way to the center of your soul! Then would my task be light, and my burden easy and delightful. WebFrederick Douglass, July 5, 1852 INTRODUCTION (Exordium) 1. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth. Friends and citizens, I need not enter further into the causes which led to this anniversary. Even Mammon seems to have quitted his grasp on this day. Would you have me argue that man is entitled to liberty? 1883 Speech by Frederick Douglass - accessible-archives.com And the conscience of the nation must be roused. Frederick Douglass: (06:03) The hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed and its crimes against God and man must be denounced. The iron shoe, and crippled foot of China must be seen, in contrast with nature. Long established customs of hurtful character could formerly fence themselves in, and do their evil work with social impunity. Yet this is but a glance at the American slave-trade, as it exists, at this moment, in the ruling part of the United States. That bolt drawn, that chain broken, and all is lost. I will not. Speech-to-Text live streaming for live captions, powered by the worlds leading speech recognition API. We need the storm. Speech Allow me to say, in conclusion, notwithstanding the dark picture I have this day presented of the state of the nation, I do not despair of this country. I trust, however, that mine will not be so considered. Your fathers were wise men, and if they did not go mad, they became restive under this treatment. I have better employment for my time and strength than such arguments would imply. Need I tell you that the Jews are not the only people who built the tombs of the prophets, and garnished the sepulchres of the righteous? The Bible addresses all such persons as scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites, who pay tithe ofmint, anise,andcumin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy and faith.. I scarcely need say, fellow-citizens, that my opinion of those measures fully accords with that of your fathers. You are all on fire at the mention of liberty for France or for Ireland; but are as cold as an iceberg at the thought of liberty for the enslaved of America. To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated temple of Liberty and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems were inhuman mockery in sacrilegious irony. And am I therefore called upon to bring our humble offering to the national alter and to confess the benefits and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us? Nations do not now stand in the same relation to each other that they did ages ago. who stand as the very lights of the church, have shamelessly given the sanction of religion and the Bible to the whole slave system. Yet his monument is built up by the price of human blood, and the traders in the bodies and souls of men shout We have Washington toour father. Alas! The Lords of Buffalo, the Springs of New York, the Lathrops of Auburn, the Coxes and Spencers of Brooklyn, the Gannets and Sharps of Boston, the Deweys of Washington, and other great religious lights of the land have, in utter denial of the authority ofHimby whom they professed to be called to the ministry, deliberately taught us, against the example or the Hebrews and against the remonstrance of the Apostles, they teachthat we ought to obey mans law before the law of God. No, I will not. They are a trouble to me; I am weary to bear them; and when ye spread forth your hands I will hide mine eyes from you. WebA speech celebrating both Lincoln and African Americans freedom wrought by Lincoln. From police shootings to the wage gap to crippling stereotypes (and everything in between), there are too many parallels today with what Douglass described in his speech to white America, including this relevant line. The slave holders themselves acknowledge it in the enactment of laws for their government. For there, they that carried us away captive, required of us a song; and they who wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion. They petitioned and remonstrated; they did so in a decorous, respectful, and loyal manner. your republican politics, not less than your republican religion, are flagrantly inconsistent. I doubt if there be another nation on the globe, having the brass and the baseness to put such a law on the statute-book. Where these go, may also go the merciless slave-hunter. I hold that every American citizen has a right to form an opinion of the constitution, and to propagate that opinion, and to use all honorable means to make his opinion the prevailing one. The madness of this course, we believe, is admitted now, even by England; but we fear the lesson is wholly lost on our present ruler. What to the American slave is your 4th of July? Thoughts expressed on one side of the Atlantic, are distinctly heard on the other. Become a freelancer and work on your own terms. See this drove sold and separated forever; and never forget the deep, sad sobs that arose from that scattered multitude. in preference to the gospel,as preached by those Divines! speech was delivered on July 5, 1852 as an address to the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society in Rochester, New York. Before you read the speech you can follow these links to learn more about Douglasss life and the evolution of his thought in this period. Short bio of Frederick Douglass The Frederick Douglass Papers Library of Congress This is a primary source reading analysis of Frederick Douglass' famous speech. In the solitude of my spirit, I see clouds of dust raised on the highways of the South; I see the bleeding footsteps; I hear the doleful wail of fettered humanity, on the way to the slave markets, where the victims are to be sold like horses, sheep, and swine, knocked off to the highest bidder. had I the ability, and could I reach the nations ear, I would, to-day, pour out a fiery stream of biting ridicule, blasting reproach, withering sarcasm, and stern rebuke. Frederick Douglass thought that such rationalizations were crap, and he had the right to think so. I shall not be charged with slandering Americans, if I say I think the American side of any question may be safely left in American hands. Frederick Douglass's, What To the Slave Is the Fourth of The far off and almost fabulous Pacific rolls in grandeur at our feet. Fellow-citizens! Is it that slavery is not divine; that God did not establish it; that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? But I fancy I hear some one of my audience say, it is just in this circumstance that you and your brother abolitionists fail to make a favorable impression on the public mind. Not fewer than forty Americans have, within the past two years, been hunted down and, without a moments warning, hurried away in chains, and consigned to slavery and excruciating torture. There is not time now to argue the constitutional question at length nor have I the ability to discuss it as it ought to be discussed. You have no right to wear out and waste the hard-earned fame of your fathers to cover your indolence. Frederick Douglass: (00:26) Intelligence is penetrating the darkest corners of the globe. Cling to this day cling to it, and to its principles, with the grasp of a storm-tossed mariner to a spar at midnight. Just here, the idea of a total separation of the colonies from the crown was born! Its quite a remarkable speech as Douglass in a way reenacts his own journey in appreciation for the work that Lincoln did, not just for blacks, but for whites in this country. It is the antagonistic force in your government, the only thing that seriously disturbs and endangers yourUnion. For it is not light that is needed, but fire. The style and title of your sovereign people (in which you now glory) was not then born. When the dogs in your street, when the fowls of the air, when the cattle on your hills, when the fish of the sea and the reptiles that crawl shall be unable to distinguish the slave from a brute, then I will argue with you that the slave is a man. I was born amid such sights and scenes. You may rejoice. Fellow citizens, this murderous traffic is, today, in active operation in this boasted republic. In the deep still darkness of midnight, I have been often aroused by the dead heavy footsteps, and the piteous cries of the chained gangs that passed our door. They believed in order; but not in the order of tyranny. On July 5, 1852, eminent African American abolitionist Frederick Douglass delivered a brilliant speech to nearly six hundred people filling Rochester, New Yorks Corinthian Hall, as organized by the Rochester Ladies Anti-Slavery Sewing Society. It is fashionable to do so; but there was a time when to pronounce against England, and in favor of the cause of the colonies, tried mens souls. Is that a question for Republicans? will be found by Americans. You live and must die, and you must do your work. As noted here, that banquet was attended by prominent African-American professional men in celebration of the twenty-first anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation.After the toast provided by former Senator Blanche K. Bruce, In their admiration of liberty, they lost sight of all other interests. welcome atheism! This, to you, is what the Passover was to the emancipated people of God. Is it at the gateway? Now, there are certain rules of interpretation, for the proper understanding of all legal instruments. Their conduct was wholly unexceptionable. Your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless, your shouts of Liberty and equality, hallow mocked, your prayers and hymns your sermons and Thanksgivings with all your religious parade in solemnity are to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, a thin veil to cover up crimes, which would disgrace a nation of savages. Industry-leading accurate legal transcription to ensure you dont miss a statement. But a change has now come over the affairs of mankind. Though a biting a horrible reptile is coiled up in your nations bosom; the venomous creature is nursing at the tender breast of your youthful republic;for the love of God, tear away, and fling from you the hideous monster, andlet the weight of twenty millions crush and destroy it forever! Let this damning fact be perpetually told. The Celestial Empire, the mystery of ages, is being solved. Would to God, both for your sakes and ours, that an affirmative answer could be truthfully returned to those questions. You have already declared it. This is esteemed by some as a national trait perhaps a national weakness. He can bring no witnesses for himself. A Plea for Free Speech in Boston (1860) | Constitution Center To side with the right, against the wrong, with the weak against the strong, and with the oppressed against the oppressor! There were then no means of concert and combination, such as exist now. These wretched people are to be sold singly, or in lots, to suit purchasers. There are seventy-two crimes in the State of Virginia, which, if committed by a black man, (no matter how ignorant he be), subject him to the punishment of death; while only two of the same crimes will subject a white man to the like punishment. Behold the practical operation of this internal slave-trade, the American slave-trade, sustained by American politics and America religion. From the round top of your ship of state, dark and threatening clouds may be seen. welcome anything! Under these, and innumerable other disadvantages, your fathers declared for liberty and independence and triumphed. Need I remind you that a similar thing is being done all over this country to-day? Your President, your Secretary of State, ourlords,nobles, and ecclesiastics, enforce, as a duty you owe to your free and glorious country, and to your God, that you do this accursed thing. By an act of the American Congress, not yet two years old, slavery has been nationalized in its most horrible and revolting form. There was, at that time, a grand slave mart kept at the head of Pratt Street, by Austin Woldfolk. Their solid manhood stands out the more as we contrast it with these degenerate times. At some future period I will gladly avail myself of an opportunity to give this subject a full and fair discussion. The feeling of the nation must be quickened. But neither their familiar faces, nor the perfect gage I think I have of Corinthian Hall, seems to free me from embarrassment. Make your content more accessible to people with disabilities. They succeeded; and to-day you reap the fruits of their success. Who so obdurate and dead to the claims of gratitude, that would not thankfully acknowledge such priceless benefits? Roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the old world. They hate all changes, but silver, gold and copper change! Three score years and ten is the allotted time for individual men; but nations number their years by thousands. Web"The Lessons of the Hour" Speech by Frederick Douglass, January 9, 1894 Friends and Fellow Citizens : No man should come before an audience like the one by whose presence I am now honored, without a noble object and a fixed and earnest purpose. In a case like that, the dumb might eloquently speak. But now is the time, the important time. The signers of the Declaration of Independence were brave men. I say it with a sad sense of disparity between us. There are illustrations of it near and remote, ancient and modern. They felt themselves the victims of grievous wrongs, wholly incurable in their colonial capacity. Neither steam nor lightning had then been reduced to order and discipline. It has been denounced with burning words, from the high places of the nation, as an execrable traffic. WebThe Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro by Frederick Douglass. You will not, therefore, be surprised, if in what I have to say I evince no elaborate preparation, nor grace my speech with any high sounding exordium. To all inspiring motives, to noble deeds which can be gained from the past, we are welcome. I am not that man. As noted here, that banquet was attended by prominent I have detained my audience entirely too long already. In a case like that, the dumb might eloquently speak, and the lame man leap as an hart.. "The Lessons of the Hour" Speech by Frederick Douglass My business, if I have any here today, is with the present. Ever ready to drink, to treat, and to gamble. My subject then, fellow citizens, is American slavery. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciations of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade, and solemnity, are, to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. Fellows citizens, pardon me and allow me to ask, why am I called to speak here today? Like our content? Section 107, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fellow Citizens, I am not wanting in respect for the fathers of this republic. The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice, are not enjoyed in common. All this we affirm to be true of the popular church, and the popular worship of our land and nation a religion, a church, and a worship which, on the authority of inspired wisdom, we pronounce to be an abomination in the sight of God. No nation can now shut itself up from the surrounding world, and trot round in the same old path of its fathers without interference. On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass gave a speech at an Independence Day celebration organized by the Rochester Ladies Anti-Slavery Society. There, the church, true to its mission of ameliorating, elevating, and improving the condition of mankind, came forward promptly, bound up the wounds of the West Indian slave, and restored him to his liberty. From the Potomac to the Delaware was a journey of many days. Everybody can say it; the dastard, not less than the noble brave, can flippantly discant on the tyranny of England towards the American Colonies. All Rights Reserved. Of this fundamental work, this day is the anniversary. Copyright 2023 Interactive One, LLC. For the present, it is enough to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race. Such a declaration of agreement on my part would not be worth much to anybody. There are 72 crimes in the state of Virginia, which if committed by a black man, no matter how ignorant he be, subject him to the punishment of death, while only two of these same crimes will subject a white man to like punishment. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me. For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. But, with that blindness which seems to be the unvarying characteristic of tyrants, since Pharaoh and his hosts were drowned in the Red Sea, the British Government persisted in the exactions complained of. Douglass gave this speech to a group of abolitionists 168 years ago. The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. What was possible for him, he sincerely believed was possible for any man who was willing to work hard. For who is there so cold that a nation sympathy cannot warm him, who so adore it and dead to the claims of gratitude that would not thankfully acknowledge such priceless benefits? To do so, would be to make myself ridiculous, and to offer an insult to your understanding. or is it in the temple? Frederick Douglass, What to the Slave Is the Fourth Frederick Douglass (1818-1895) was a social reformer and advocate, abolitionist, orator, writer, minister, and statesman. And it would go hard with that politician who presumed to solicit the votes of the people without inscribing this motto on his banner. that it should be so; yet so it is. His death, according to Douglass was not only tragic, but also prevented recently freed slaves and African Americans from gaining the ear of wise and well-intentioned leader. Of this sort of change they are always strongly in favor. The arm of the Lord is not shortened, and the doom of slavery is certain. Your fathers staked their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, on the cause of their country. What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? - Wikipedia Fellow-citizens! WebBoth anniversaries remind us that the fight for independence and equality did not end in the 18th century - a theme highlighted in Douglass speech. Frederick Douglass: (08:30) Sign up for NewsOne's email newsletter! They convert the very name of religion into an engine of tyranny, and barbarous cruelty, and serve to confirm more infidels, in this age, than all the infidel writings of Thomas Paine, Voltaire, and Bolingbroke, put together, have done! It is admitted in the fact that Southern statute books are covered with enactments forbidding, under severe fines and penalties, the teaching of the slave to read or to write. Frederick Douglass' Descendants Read His Famous The whole scene, as I look back to it, was simple, dignified and sublime. Am I to argue that it is wrong to make men brutes, to Rob them of their Liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with ions, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters? At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed. Here you will see men and women reared like swine for the market. Hear his savage yells and his blood-chilling oaths, as he hurries on his affrighted captives! It was, Milloy continued, a critique of a nation that claimed to hold dear the principles of freedom, justice and equality even as it enslaved black people.. Washington could not die till he had broken the chains of his slaves. The oath of any two villains is sufficient, under this hell-black enactment, to send the most pious and exemplary black man into the remorseless jaws of slavery! There is hope in the thought, and hope is much needed, under the dark clouds which lower above the horizon. To do so would be to make myself ridiculous and to offer an insult to your understanding. He who will, intelligently, lay down his life for his country, is a man whom it is not in human nature to despise. Frederick Douglass Descendants of Frederick Douglass read excerpts from one of his most famous speeches: What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? This home government, you know, although a considerable distance from your home, did, in the exercise of its parental prerogatives, impose upon its colonial children, such restraints, burdens and limitations, as, in its mature judgment, it deemed wise, right and proper. The minister of American justice is bound by the law to hear butoneside; andthatside, is the side of the oppressor. Who so stolid and selfish, that would not give his voice to swell the hallelujahs of a nations jubilee, when the chains of servitude had been torn from his limbs? These ministers make religion a cold and flinty-hearted thing, having neither principles of right action, nor bowels of compassion. We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and to the future. There, the question of emancipation was a high religious question. Attend the auction; see men examined like horses; see the forms of women rudely and brutally exposed to the shocking gaze of American slave-buyers. Ex-Senator Benton tells us that the price of men was never higher than now. A speech given at Rochester, New York, July 5, 1852 . The ear-piercing fife and the stirring drum unite their accents with the ascending peal of a thousand church bells. It is a religion for oppressors, tyrants, man-stealers, andthugs. What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? had I the ability, and could I reach the nations ear, I would, to-day, pour out a fiery stream of biting ridicule, blasting reproach, What is this but the acknowledgement that the slave is a moral, intellectual and responsible being? Such people lived then, had lived before, and will, probably, ever have a place on this planet; and their course, in respect to any great change, (no matter how great the good to be attained, or the wrong to be redressed by it), may be calculated with as much precision as can be the course of the stars. You hurl your anathemas at the crowned headed tyrants of Russia and Austria, and pride yourselves on your Democratic institutions, while you yourselves consent to be the meretoolsand body-guardsof the tyrants of Virginia and Carolina. The charter of our liberties, which every citizen has a personal interest in understanding thoroughly. Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens: He who could address this audience without a quailing sensation, has stronger nerves than I have. Create a better, more engaging experience for every student. How can we sing the Lords song in a strange land? What, am I to argue that it is wrong to make men brutes, to rob them of their liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters? At the time of the delivery of this speech, Douglass had been living in Rochester, New York for several years editing a weekly abolitionist newspaper. He was invited to give a fourth of July speech by the Ladies Anti-Slavery Society of Rochester. In the early 1850s, tensions over slavery were high across the county. Frederick Douglass: (05:02) The slaveholders themselves acknowledge it in the enactment of laws for their government. The fact is, ladies and gentlemen, the distance between this platform and the slave plantation, from which I escaped, is considerable and the difficulties to be overcome in getting from the latter to the former, are by no means slight. speech The papers and placards say, that I am to deliver a 4th [of] July oration. It esteems sacrifice above mercy; psalm-singing above right doing; solemn meetings above practical righteousness. The time was when such could be done. Is it that slavery is not divine, that God did not establish it, that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? It is called (in contradistinction to the foreign slave-trade) the internal slave trade. It is, probably, called so, too, in order to divert from it the horror with which the foreign slave-trade is contemplated. Follow the drove to New Orleans. You boast of your love of liberty, your superior civilization, and your pure Christianity, while the whole political power of the nation (as embodied in the two great political parties), is solemnly pledged to support and perpetuate the enslavement of three millions of your countrymen. That year will come, and freedoms reign. The eye of the reformer is met with angry flashes, portending disastrous times; but his heart may well beat lighter at the thought that America is young, and that she is still in the impressible stage of her existence. What have I, or those I represent to do with your national independence. Under Title 17 U.S.C. May he not hope that high lessons of wisdom, of justice and of truth, will yet give direction to her destiny? WebDescription. For my part, I would say, welcome infidelity! Towards the end of Full transcript of the famous speech What to the Slave is the 4th of July? by Frederick Douglass. When you can point to any such laws in reference to the beasts of the field, then I may consent to argue the manhood of the slave. WebIn the late 1860sat a moment of great hope for the promise of equality under the lawthe famed orator and once-enslaved abolitionist Frederick Douglass took his Our Composite Nation speech on the road to argue for a plural American democracy. Discover why Rev is the #1 speech-to-text service in the world. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices, more shocking and bloody, than are the people of these United States, at this very hour. What, then, remains to be argued? I, therefore, leave off where I began, with hope. If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. They seized upon eternal principles, and set a glorious example in their defense. There is consolation in the thought that America is young.
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