You could instruct me in regard to them. They felt themselves the victims of grievous wrongs, wholly incurable in their colonial capacity. Let this damning fact be perpetually told. 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. Is it not astonishing that while we are plowing, planting and reaping, using all kinds of mechanical tools, erecting houses, constructing bridges, building ships, working in metal of brass, iron, copper, silver, and gold, that while we are reading, writing, and ciphering acting as clerks, merchants, and secretaries, having among us lawyers, doctors, ministers, poets, authors, editors, orators, and teachers that we are engaged in all the enterprises, common to other men, digging gold in California, capturing the whale in the Pacific feeding sheep and cattle on the hillside, living, moving, acting, thinking, planting, living in families as husbands, wives, and children, and above all confessing and worshiping the Christian God and looking hopefully for life and immortality beyond the grave. Yea! The whole scene, as I look back to it, was simple, dignified and sublime. I will use the severest language I can command. The right of the hunter to his prey stands superior to the right of marriage, and toallrights in this republic, the rights of God included! We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. Is a matter, the set with great difficulty involving a doubtful application of the principle of justice, hard to understand? The Sharps, the Clarksons, the Wilberforces, the Buxtons, and Burchells and the Knibbs, were alike famous for their piety, and for their philanthropy. They were not the men to look back.
What point in the anti-slavery creed would you have me argue? That, which is inhuman cannot be divine. But a still more inhuman, disgraceful, and scandalous state of things remains to be presented. There was, at that time, a grand slave mart kept at the head of Pratt Street, by Austin Woldfolk.
Frederick Douglass, What to the Slave Is the Fourth The coming into being of a nation, in any circumstances, is an interesting event. Your broad republican domain is hunting ground formen. 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: This Fourth of July is yours, not mine. The din of business, too, is hushed. Frederick Douglass: (08:30) Your fathers were wise men, and if they did not go mad, they became restive under this treatment. I take this law to be one of the grossest infringements of Christian Liberty, and, if the churches and ministers of our country were not stupidly blind, or most wickedly indifferent, they, too, would so regard it. Tell me citizens, WHERE, under the sun, you can witness a spectacle more fiendish and shocking. You may well cherish the memory of such men.
"The Lessons of the Hour" Speech by Frederick Douglass No nation can now shut itself up from the surrounding world, and trot round in the same old path of its fathers without interference. 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! welcome atheism! I do not remember ever to have appeared as a speaker before any assembly more shrinkingly, nor with greater distrust of my ability, than I do this day. I repeat, I am glad this is so. When the dogs in your streets, 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, thenwill I argue with you that the slave is a man! During I must mourn. 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. Oceans no longer divide, but link nations together. Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens: He who could address this audience nor grace my speech with any high sounding exordium. There is blasphemy in the thought. You have already declared it. The little experience I have had in addressing public meetings, in country schoolhouses, avails me nothing on the present occasion. Here you will see men and women reared like swine for the market. Ever ready to drink, to treat, and to gamble.
Frederick Douglass WebDescription. That trade has long since been denounced by this government, as piracy. Is it that slavery is not divine; that God did not establish it; that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? that gash on her shoulder tells her to move on. All Rights Reserved. America is false to the past, false to the present and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. Where these are, man is not sacred. See, too, that girl of thirteen, weeping, yes! With little experience and with less learning, I have been able to throw my thoughts hastily and imperfectly together; and These rules are well established. Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? Without this right, the liberty of an American citizen would be as insecure as that of a Frenchman. In a very telling sign, the fateful words of Frederick Douglass from a speech he delivered 170 years ago still resonate very much in 2022 as Black people in America continue the fight for the same kind of equality that the legendary abolitionist was demanding back in the mid-19th century. Frederick Douglass thought that such rationalizations were crap, and he had the right to think so. 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. Though a biting
Frederick Douglass I lived on Philpot Street, Fells Point, Baltimore, and have watched from the wharves, the slave ships in the Basin, anchored from the shore, with their cargoes of human flesh, waiting for favorable winds to waft them down the Chesapeake. You have no right to enjoy a childs share in the labor of your fathers, unless your children are to be blest by your labors. 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.. 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. your republican politics, not less than your republican religion, are flagrantly inconsistent. Space is comparatively annihilated. See this drove sold and separated forever; and never forget the deep, sad sobs that arose from that scattered multitude. Discover why Rev is the #1 speech-to-text service in the world. We thank you for taking the time to watch this community reading of Frederick Douglasss What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? Source: Blight, David. But now is the time, the important time. From the Potomac to the Delaware was a journey of many days. 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. Wind, steam, and lightning are its chartered agents. When Douglass delivered his famous 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 reminded readers. 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. 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. Must I undertake to prove that the slave is a man? The anguish of my boyish heart was intense; and I was often consoled, when speaking to my mistress in the morning, to hear her say that the custom was very wicked; that she hated to hear the rattle of the chains, and the heart-rending cries. America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. Fellow citizens, this murderous traffic is, today, in active operation in this boasted republic. Frederick Douglass's, What To the Slave Is the Fourth of Your cause would be much more likely to succeed. 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. Do you mean citizens to mock me by asking me to speak today? The crack you heard, was the sound of the slave-whip; the scream you heard, was from the woman you saw with the babe. The causes which led to the separation of the colonies from the British crown have never lacked for a tongue. Then would my task be light, and my burden easy and delightful. The papers and placards say, that I am to deliver a 4th [of] July oration. Even Mammon seems to have quitted his grasp on this day. On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass gave a speech at an Independence Day celebration organized by the Rochester Ladies Anti-Slavery Society. Read its preamble, consider its purposes. I shall see, this day, and its popular characteristics, from the slaves point of view. Frederick Douglass: (01:08) For the present, it is enough to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race. In a final celebratory post for Black History Month 2023, it is worth returning to the 1883 Douglass Banquet. 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. 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. I will show you a man-drover. It is a slander upon their memory, at least, so I believe. Thoughts expressed on one side of the Atlantic, are distinctly heard on the other. But, your fathers, who had not adopted the fashionable idea of this day, of the infallibility of government, and the absolute character of its acts, presumed to differ from the home government in respect to the wisdom and the justice of some of those burdens and restraints. There is hope in the thought, and hope is much needed, under the dark clouds which lower above the horizon. The manhood of the slave is conceded. Frederick Douglass: (07:35) we wept when we remembered Zion. Its future might be shrouded in gloom, and the hope of its prophets go out in sorrow. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me, by asking me to speak to-day? It destroys your moral power abroad; it corrupts your politicians at home. there is no matter in respect to which, the people of the North have allowed themselves to be so ruinously imposed upon, as that of the pro-slavery character of the Constitution. YOUR HANDS ARE FULL OF BLOOD; cease to do evil, learn to do well; seek judgment; relieve the oppressed; judge for the fatherless; plead for the widow., The American church is guilty, when viewed in connection with what it is doing to uphold slavery; but it is superlatively guilty when viewed in connection with its ability to abolish slavery. The Celestial Empire, the mystery of ages, is being solved. Neither steam nor lightning had then been reduced to order and discipline. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth.. 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. Oh, had I, the ability, and could I reach the nations ear, I would today pour out a fiery steam of biting ridicule, blasting reproach, withering sarcasm, and stern rebuke. The power is co-extensive with the Star-Spangled Banner and American Christianity. They petitioned and remonstrated; they did so in a decorous, respectful, and loyal manner. We are called upon to prove that we are men. Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery?
Speech Douglass views the monument and the day's ceremonies as reflecting honor upon African 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? His agents were sent into every town and county in Maryland, announcing their arrival, through the papers, and on flaming hand-bills, headed CASH FOR NEGROES. Long established customs of hurtful character could formerly fence themselves in, and do their evil work with social impunity. Senator Berrien tell us that the Constitution is the fundamental law, that which controls all others. For it is not light that is needed, but fire. Speech-to-Text live streaming for live captions, powered by the worlds leading speech recognition API. Some of these have had wives and children, dependent on them for bread; but of this, no account was made. A John Knox would be seen at every church door, and heard from every pulpit, and Fillmore would have no more quarter than was shown by Knox, to the beautiful, but treacherous queen Mary of Scotland. Fromwhat quarter, I beg to know, has proceeded a fire so deadly upon our ranks, during the last two years, as from the Northern pulpit?
Our Composite Nation: Frederick Douglass America These ministers make religion a cold and flinty-hearted thing, having neither principles of right action, nor bowels of compassion. Who can reason on such a proposition? Cling to this day cling to it, and to its principles, with the grasp of a storm-tossed mariner to a spar at midnight. Yea! VIDEO: Frederick Douglass' descendants deliver his 'Fourth of July' speech. You declare, before the world, and are understood by the world to declare, that you hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal; and are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; and that, among these are, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; and yet, you hold securely, in a bondage which, according to your own Thomas Jefferson, is worse than ages of that which your fathers rose in rebellion to oppose, aseventh partof the inhabitants of your country. An American judge gets ten dollars for every victim he consigns to slavery, and five, when he fails to do so. We are met on the threshold of our efforts for the redemption of the slave, by the church and ministry of the country, in battle arrayed against us; and we are compelled to fight or flee. WebFrederick Douglass, July 5, 1852 INTRODUCTION (Exordium) 1. The most accurate AI-powered transcription on the market. 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, That point is conceded already. The document is in the form of a Google Docs so it has a translation tool, dictionary, and voice to text. 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. Go search where you will. If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? I scarcely need say, fellow-citizens, that my opinion of those measures fully accords with that of your fathers. To all inspiring motives, to noble deeds which can be gained from the past, we are welcome. 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. 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. that it should be so; yet so it is. Your fathers staked their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, on the cause of their country. 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. who stand as the very lights of the church, have shamelessly given the sanction of religion and the Bible to the whole slave system. Frederick Douglass: (02:57) WebOn July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass gave a keynote address at an Independence Day celebration and asked, What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? Douglass was a powerful 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? It is not the gentle shower, but thunder. Is that a question for Republicans? WebFrederick Douglass speech Historical Document "The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro" 1852 Resource Bank Contents Click here for the text of this historical document. Is it to be settled by the rules of logic and argumentation, as a matter beset with great difficulty, involving a doubtful application of the principle of justice, hard to be understood? weeping, as she thinks of the mother from whom she has been torn! They may sometimes rise in quiet and stately majesty, and inundate the land, refreshing and fertilizing the earth with their mysterious properties. In a case like that, the dumb might eloquently speak. Mark the sad procession, as it moves wearily along, and the inhuman wretch who drives them. 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. 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VIDEO: Frederick Douglass' descendants deliver his 'Fourth of July' Get a weekly digest of the weeks most important transcripts in your inbox. Further, if this demand were not complied with, another Scotland would be added to the history of religious liberty, and the stern old Covenanters would be thrown into the shade. The questions are designed to provoke thought and guide the students through the document. This Fourth [of] July isyours, notmine. Americans! One of the parts of the speech that resonates with me the most is when Douglass says: What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? How can we sing the Lords song in a strange land?
1883 Speech by Frederick Douglass - accessible-archives.com They have all been taught in your common schools, narrated at your firesides, unfolded from your pulpits, and thundered from your legislative halls, and are as familiar to you as household words. That which is inhuman, cannot be divine! The text of Frederick Douglasss most famous speech, given in 1852, What, to a slave, is the Fourth of July? A chapter describing Douglasss early encounters with abolitionists, from his autobiography My Bondage and My Freedom, 1857. WebFrederick Douglass, July 5, 1852 INTRODUCTION (Exordium) 1. From the round top of your ship of state, dark and threatening clouds may be seen. The timid and the prudent (as has been intimated) of that day, were, of course, shocked and alarmed by it. It was demanded, in the name of humanity, and according to the law of the living God. Great streams are not easily turned from channels, worn deep in the course of ages. They seized upon eternal principles, and set a glorious example in their defense. If I do forget, if I do not 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. The population of the country, at the time, stood at the insignificant number of three millions. It is the antagonistic force in your government, the only thing that seriously disturbs and endangers yourUnion. Fellow-citizens, I shall not presume to dwell at length on the associations that cluster about this day. This is the inevitable conclusion, and from it there is no escape.
Speech 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! It fetters your progress; it is the enemy of improvement, the deadly foe of education; it fosters pride; it breeds insolence; it promotes vice; it shelters crime; it is a curse to the earth that supports it; and yet, you cling to it, as if it were the sheet anchor of all your hopes. 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! Full transcript of the famous speech What to the Slave is the 4th of July? by Frederick Douglass. They were great men too great enough to give fame to a great age. Transcript Descendants of Frederick Douglass read excerpts from one of his most famous speeches: What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? Extend your content reach and maximize your engagement rates. 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? be warned! Add English on-screen subtitles for videos. This, for the purpose of this celebration, is the 4th of July. Fair use is permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the old world. Frederick Douglass: (00:26) How circumspect, exact and proportionate were all their movements! No abuse, no outrage whether in taste, sport or avarice, can now hide itself from the all-pervading light. This is esteemed by some as a national trait perhaps a national weakness. I take it, therefore, that it is not presumption in a private citizen to form an opinion of that instrument. Where these go, may also go the merciless slave-hunter. Ethiopia shall stretch out her hand unto God. In the fervent aspirations of William Lloyd Garrison, I say, and let every heart join in saying it: Th oppressd shall vilely bend the knee.
What, to the American Slave, Is Your Frederick Douglass Transcribe your audio files to find high-impact insights in minutes. Not for thieves and robbers, enemies of society, merely, but for men guilty of no crime. I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us.
Frederick Douglass: Self-Made Man Speech | The Art of Manliness But I admit, where all is plain, there is nothing to be argued. The time for such argument is passed. They showed forbearance; but that they knew its limits. A worship that can be conducted by persons who refuse to give shelter to the houseless, to give bread to the hungry, clothing to the naked, and who enjoin obedience to a law forbidding these acts of mercy, is a curse, not a blessing to mankind. The freedom gained is yours; and you, therefore, may properly celebrate this anniversary. I can to-day take up the plaintive lament of a peeled and woe-smitten people!