Go where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the old world, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me, that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival. To say now that America was right, and England wrong, is exceedingly easy. Their conduct was wholly unexceptionable. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. 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? Their statesmanship looked beyond the passing moment, and stretched away in strength into the distant future. 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. There is hope in the thought, and hope is much needed, under the dark clouds which lower above the horizon. It is not the gentle shower, but thunder. May he not hope that high lessons of wisdom, of justice and of truth, will yet give direction to her destiny? 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. Frederick Douglass's, What To the Slave Is the Fourth of Standing with God and the crushed and bleeding slave on this occasion, I will in the name of humanity, which is outraged in the name of Liberty, which is fettered in the name of the constitution and the Bible, which are disregarded and trampled upon dare to call and question and to denounce with all the emphasis I can command everything that serves to perpetuate slavery, the great sin and shame of America. Would you argue more and denounce less? I trust, however, that mine will not be so considered. If I do forget, if I do not faithfully remember those bleeding children of sorrow this day, may my right hand forget her cunning, and may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth! To forget them, to pass lightly over their wrongs, and to chime in with the popular theme, would be treason most scandalous and shocking, and would make me a reproach before God and the world. These ministers make religion a cold and flinty-hearted thing, having neither principles of right action, nor bowels of compassion. They succeeded; and to-day you reap the fruits of their success. Were the nation older, the patriots heart might be sadder, and the reformers brow heavier. It is a religion for oppressors, tyrants, man-stealers, andthugs. You glory in your refinement and your universal education yet you maintain a system as barbarous and dreadful as ever stained the character of a nation a system begun in avarice, supported in pride, and perpetuated in cruelty. This trade is one of the peculiarities of American institutions. Should I seem at ease, my appearance would much misrepresent me. Fellows citizens, pardon me and allow me to ask, why am I called to speak here today? Sign up for NewsOne's email newsletter! No, I will not. What point in the anti-slavery creed would you have me argue? The little experience I have had in addressing public meetings, in country schoolhouses, avails me nothing on the present occasion. Then, I dare to affirm, notwithstanding all I have said before, your fathers stooped, basely stooped. Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? "The Lessons of the Hour" Speech by Frederick Douglass 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. It has been denounced with burning words, from the high places of the nation, as an execrable traffic. It was a startling idea, much more so, than we, at this distance of time, regard it. With brave men there is always a remedy for oppression. Prayers are made, hymns are sung, and sermons are preached in honor of this day; while the quick martial tramp of a great and multitudinous nation, echoed back by all the hills, valleys and mountains of a vast continent, bespeak the occasion one of thrilling and universal interest a nations jubilee. The slave holders themselves acknowledge it in the enactment of laws for their government. They did so in the form of a resolution; and as we seldom hit upon resolutions, drawn up in our day whose transparency is at all equal to this, it may refresh your minds and help my story if I read it. 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. Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens: He who could address this audience without a quailing sensation, has stronger nerves than I have. In that instrument I hold there is neither warrant, license, nor sanction of the hateful thing; but, interpreted as it ought to be interpreted, the Constitution is a GLORIOUS LIBERTY DOCUMENT. These wretched people are to be sold singly, or in lots, to suit purchasers. It was fashionable, hundreds of years ago, for the children of Jacob to boast, we have Abraham to our father, when they had long lost Abrahams faith and spirit. Would you argue more, and denounce less, would you persuade more, and rebuke less, your cause would be much more likely to succeed. The manhood of the slave is conceded. WebAn excerpt from the 1847 Frederick Douglass speech given for the anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society. Behold the practical operation of this internal slave-trade, the American slave-trade, sustained by American politics and America religion. By an act of the American Congress, not yet two years old, slavery has been nationalized in its most horrible and revolting form. weeping, as she thinks of the mother from whom she has been torn! Transcript Descendants of Frederick Douglass read excerpts from one of his most famous speeches: What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens: He who could address this audience without a quailing sensation, has We need the storm. To all inspiring motives, to noble deeds which can be gained from the past, we are welcome. I, therefore, leave off where I began, with hope. The far off and almost fabulous Pacific rolls in grandeur at our feet. Nations do not now stand in the same relation to each other that they did ages ago. And the lame man leap as an heart, but such is not the case. To him, your celebration is a sham, your boasted Liberty, an unholy license, your national greatness, swelling vanity. They strip the love of God of its beauty, and leave the throng of religion a huge, horrible, repulsive form. No abuse, no outrage whether in taste, sport or avarice, can now hide itself from the all-pervading light. For 186 years this doctrine of national independence has shaken the globeand it remains the most powerful force anywhere in the world today. But the church of this country is not only indifferent to the wrongs of the slave, it actually takes sides with the oppressors. Who can reason on such a proposition? Speech Ex-Senator Benton tells us that the price of men was never higher than now. who stand as the very lights of the church, have shamelessly given the sanction of religion and the Bible to the whole slave system. That he is the rightful owner of his own body? Speech They petitioned and remonstrated; they did so in a decorous, respectful, and loyal manner. My subject, then fellow-citizens, is AMERICAN SLAVERY. Africa must rise and put on her yet unwoven garment. Fellow-citizens, I shall not presume to dwell at length on the associations that cluster about this day. And the conscience of the nation must be roused. One is struck with the difference between the attitude of the American church towards the anti-slavery movement, and that occupied by the churches in England towards a similar movement in that country. In the summer of 2020, the U.S. commemorated Independence Day amid nationwide According to this fact, you are, even now, only in the beginning of your national career, still lingering in the period of childhood. I cannot. 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! I do not hesitate to declare with all my soul that the character and conduct of this nation never looked blacker to me than on this 4th of July. They felt themselves the victims of grievous wrongs, wholly incurable in their colonial capacity. They, that can, may. They acknowledge it when they punish disobedience on the part of the slave. The accepted time with God and his cause is the ever-living now. 1883 Speech by Frederick Douglass - accessible-archives.com Then would my task be light, and my burden easy and delightful. What is this but the acknowledgement that the slave is a moral, intellectual and responsible being? I scarcely need say, fellow-citizens, that my opinion of those measures fully accords with that of your fathers. Great streams are not easily turned from channels, worn deep in the course of ages. That which is inhuman, cannot be divine! 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. Read its preamble, consider its purposes. here lies the merit, and the one which, of all others, seems unfashionable in our day. Suicide Note Revealed After Shocking Death, Mississippi Cops Beat, Waterboarded Handcuffed Black Men, Shot 1 For Dating White Women': Lawyers, Indicted! 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! Your fathers staked their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, on the cause of their country. Your fathers esteemed the English Government as the home government; and England as the fatherland. This truth is not a doubtful one. They seized upon eternal principles, and set a glorious example in their defense. In order to put an end to it, some of these last have consented that their colored brethren (nominally free) should leave this country, and establish themselves on the western coast of Africa! R. R. Raymond) on the platform, are shining examples; and let me say further, that upon these men lies the duty to inspire our ranks with high religious faith and zeal, and to cheer us on in the great mission of the slaves redemption from his chains. Is it not astonishing that, while we are ploughing, planting and reaping, using all kinds of mechanical tools, erecting houses, constructing bridges, building ships, working in metals of brass, iron, copper, silver and gold; that, while we are reading, writing and cyphering, acting as clerks, merchants and secretaries, having among us lawyers, doctors, ministers, poets, authors, editors, orators and teachers; that, while we are engaged in all manner of enterprises common to other men, digging gold in California, capturing the whale in the Pacific, feeding sheep and cattle on the hill-side, living, moving, acting, thinking, planning, living in families as husbands, wives and children, and, above all, confessing and worshipping the Christians God, and looking hopefully for life and immortality beyond the grave, we are called upon to prove that we are men! There I see the tenderest ties ruthlessly broken, to gratify the lust, caprice and rapacity of the buyers and sellers of men. Descendants of Frederick Douglass read excerpts from one of his most famous speeches: What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? The slaveholders themselves acknowledge it in the enactment of laws for their government. See this drove sold and separated forever; and never forget the deep, sad sobs that arose from that scattered multitude. WebA speech celebrating both Lincoln and African Americans freedom wrought by Lincoln. Of this sort of change they are always strongly in favor. America is false to the past, false to the present and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. That year will come, and freedoms reign. America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? What, to the American Slave, Is Your Frederick Douglass: (01:08) WebCelebrating 200 years of Frederick Douglass. Many of you understand them better than I do. He can bring no witnesses for himself. Towards the end of It is a fact, that whatever makes for the wealth or for the reputation of Americans, and can be had cheap! Senator Berrien tell us that the Constitution is the fundamental law, that which controls all others. My subject then, fellow citizens, is American slavery. From Boston to London is now a holiday excursion. In a final celebratory post for Black History Month 2023, it is worth returning to the 1883 Douglass Banquet. Juneteenth Reading List: 10 Books To Learn More About Black Independence Day, Your email will be shared with newsone.com and subject to its, The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro address before an audience, at Corinthian Hall in Rochester, New York, on July 5, 1852, he was issuing , a scathing indictment of American hypocrisy, Washington Post columnist Courtland Milloy, . I am not included within the pales of this glorious anniversary. How can we sing the Lords song in a strange land? These rules are well established. Frederick Douglass: (02:57) Everybody can say it; the dastard, not less than the noble brave, can flippantly discant on the tyranny of England towards the American Colonies. 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. They, however, gradually flow back to the same old channel, and flow on as serenely as ever.