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. your republican politics, not less than your republican religion, are flagrantly inconsistent. 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. 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? Frederick Douglass: (10:31) If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth.. This trade is one of the peculiarities of American institutions. Section 107, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. 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. See, too, that girl of thirteen, weeping, yes! Take the American slave-trade, which, we are told by the papers, is especially prosperous just now. The country was poor in the munitions of war. The time was when such could be done. The coming into being of a nation, in any circumstances, is an interesting event. Washington could not die till he had broken the chains of his slaves. They acknowledge it when they punish disobedience on the part of the slave. Read the full text below of the sage words from one of the greatest orators of all time. In the language of Isaiah, the American church might be well addressed, Bring no more vain ablations; incense is an abomination unto me: the new moons and Sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with; it is iniquity even the solemn meeting. To say now that America was right, and England wrong, is exceedingly easy. Everybody can say it; the dastard, not less than the noble brave, can flippantly discant on the tyranny of England towards the American Colonies. They strip the love of God of its beauty, and leave the throng of religion a huge, horrible, repulsive form. My spirit wearies of such blasphemy; and how such men can be supported, as the standing types and representatives of Jesus Christ, is a mystery which I leave others to penetrate. 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, What was possible for him, he sincerely believed was possible for any man who was willing to work hard. At a time like this, scorching irony not convincing argument is needed. He rose from the shackles of slavery to become an author, newspaper publisher, and respected abolitionist. And let me warn you that it is dangerous to copy the example of a nation whose crimes, lowering up to heaven, were thrown down by the breath of the Almighty, burying that nation in irrecoverable ruin! That is a branch of knowledge in which you feel, perhaps, a much deeper interest than your speaker. You may rejoice. It is not that pure and undefiled religion which is from above, and which is first pure, then peaceable, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits,without partiality, and without hypocrisy. But a religion which favors the rich against the poor; which exalts the proud above the humble; which divides mankind into two classes, tyrants and slaves; which says to the man in chains,stay there; and to the oppressor,oppress on; it is a religion which may be professed and enjoyed by all the robbers and enslavers of mankind; it makes God a respecter of persons, denies his fatherhood of the race, and tramples in the dust the great truth of the brotherhood of man. I scarcely need say, fellow-citizens, that my opinion of those measures fully accords with that of your fathers. This Fourth [of] July isyours, notmine. You know what is a swine-drover? To side with the right, against the wrong, with the weak against the strong, and with the oppressed against the oppressor! The charter of our liberties, which every citizen has a personal interest in understanding thoroughly. But, I submit, where all is plain there is nothing to be argued. Is it that slavery is not divine; that God did not establish it; that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? What point in the anti-slavery creed would you have me argue? 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. Calculate how much it costs to transcribe, caption, or subtitle your content. 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. 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. What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? 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. Descendants of Frederick Douglass read excerpts from one of his most famous speeches: What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? 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? Suicide Note Revealed After Shocking Death, Mississippi Cops Beat, Waterboarded Handcuffed Black Men, Shot 1 For Dating White Women': Lawyers, Indicted! The simple story of it is that, 76 years ago, the people of this country were British subjects. What to the American slave is your 4th of July? They petitioned and remonstrated; they did so in a decorous, respectful, and loyal manner. Citizens, your fathers made good that resolution. Need I remind you that a similar thing is being done all over this country to-day? 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. What then remains to be argued? For the present, it is enough to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race. 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 not enlarge further on your national inconsistencies. May of Syracuse, and my esteemed friend (Rev. For 186 years this doctrine of national independence has shaken the globeand it remains the most powerful force anywhere in the world today. As the sheet anchor takes a firmer hold, when the ship is tossed by the storm, so did the cause of your fathers grow stronger, as it breasted the chilling blasts of kingly displeasure. WebDescription. I repeat, I am glad this is so. Behold the practical operation of this internal slave-trade, the American slave-trade, sustained by American politics and America religion. The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Ex-Vice-President Dallas tells us that the Constitution is an object to which no American mind can be too attentive, and no American heart too devoted. The propriety of the nation must be startled. The style and title of your sovereign people (in which you now glory) was not then born. The testimony of Senator Breese, Lewis Cass, and many others that might be named, who are everywhere esteemed as sound lawyers, so regard the constitution. Your fathers staked their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, on the cause of their country. Then, I dare to affirm, notwithstanding all I have said before, your fathers stooped, basely stooped. No nation can now shut itself up from the surrounding world, and trot round in the same old path of its fathers without interference. He is a bird for the sportsmans gun. 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! 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. Without this right, the liberty of an American citizen would be as insecure as that of a Frenchman. 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. There is blasphemy in the thought. What to the Slave is the 4th of July? Speech Transcript by Frederick Douglass, Congressional Testimony & Hearing Transcripts. 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! 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! 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. Space is comparatively annihilated. Not for thieves and robbers, enemies of society, merely, but for men guilty of no crime. How can we sing the Lords song in a strange land? A feeling has crept over me, quite unfavorable to the exercise of my limited powers of speech. That people contented themselves under the shadow of Abrahams great name, while they repudiated the deeds which made his name great. we wept when we remembered Zion. The Celestial Empire, the mystery of ages, is being solved. 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 in question and to denounce, with all the emphasis I can command, everything that serves to perpetuate slavery the great sin and shame of America! Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens: He who could address this audience nor grace my speech with any high sounding exordium. 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. Pride and patriotism, not less than gratitude, prompt you to celebrate and to hold it in perpetual remembrance. To forget them, to pass lightly over their wrongs and to chime in with the popular theme would be treason most sacrilegious and shocking and would make me a reproach before God and the world. Speech-to-Text live streaming for live captions, powered by the worlds leading speech recognition API. 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.. And instead of being the honest men I have before declared them to be, they were the veriest imposters that ever practiced on mankind. The freedom gained is yours; and you, therefore, may properly celebrate this anniversary. Speech-to-Text API for pre-recorded audio, powered by the worlds leading speech recognition engine. Frederick Douglass: (03:37) Born to an enslaved family in 1818, Frederick Douglass never knew his actual birthday, a fact not uncommon for those enslaved. in preference to the gospel,as preached by those Divines! This is esteemed by some as a national trait perhaps a national weakness. It is carried on in all the large towns and cities in one-half of this confederacy; and millions are pocketed every year, by dealers in this horrid traffic. I am not included within the pale of this glorious anniversary! Yet they persevered. The task before me is one which requires much previous thought and study for its proper performance. While I do not intend to argue this question on the present occasion, let me ask, if it be not somewhat singular that, if the Constitution were intended to be, by its framers and adopters, a slave-holding instrument, why neither slavery, slaveholding, nor slave can anywhere be found in it. There are illustrations of it near and remote, ancient and modern. What is this but the acknowledgement that the slave is a moral, intellectual and responsible being? To arrest it, to put an end to it, this nation keeps a squadron, at immense cost, on the coast of Africa. The 4th of July is the first great fact in your nations history the very ring-bolt in the chain of your yet undeveloped destiny. Hear his savage yells and his blood-chilling oaths, as he hurries on his affrighted captives! be warned! 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. Three score years and ten is the allotted time for individual men; but nations number their years by thousands. Thu 5 Jul 2018 07.00 EDT Last modified on Wed 24 Jul 2019 11.58 EDT. Fellow citizens, above your national tumultuous joy I hear the mournful wail of millions whose chains heavy and grievous yesterday are today rendered more intolerable by the jubilant shouts that reach them. They went so far in their excitement as to pronounce the measures of government unjust, unreasonable, and oppressive, and altogether such as ought not to be quietly submitted to. 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. welcome anything! But I differ from those who charge this baseness on the framers of the Constitution of the United States. My soul sickens at the sight. Frederick Douglass: (05:02) I have detained my audience entirely too long already. The crack you heard, was the sound of the slave-whip; the scream you heard, was from the woman you saw with the babe. Where these are, man is not sacred. You can bare your bosom to the storm of British artillery to throw off a threepenny tax on tea; and yet wring the last hard-earned farthing from the grasp of the black laborers of your country. 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! Translated on-screen subtitles for videos. 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. They were great in their day and generation. On the other hand it will be found to contain principles and purposes, entirely hostile to the existence of slavery. Your fathers esteemed the English Government as the home government; and England as the fatherland. Let the religious press, the pulpit, the Sunday school, the conference meeting, the great ecclesiastical, missionary, Bible and tract associations of the land array their immense powers against slavery and slave-holding; and the whole system of crime and blood would be scattered to the winds; and that they do not do this involves them in the most awful responsibility of which the mind can conceive. 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. Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? 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 discourse eloquently on the dignity of labor; yet, you sustain a system which, in its very essence, casts a stigma upon labor. Easily integrate Rev using our robust APIs to start building your product quickly. Is that a question for Republicans? What would be thought of an instrument, drawn up, legally drawn up, for the purpose of entitling the city of Rochester to a track of land, in which no mention of land was made? 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. Frederick Douglass: (02:57) 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. That he is the rightful owner of his own body? You have already declared it. These rules are well established. I was born amid such sights and scenes. Read its preamble, consider its purposes. 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. Make your content more accessible to people with disabilities. It carries your minds back to the day, and to the act of your great deliverance; and to the signs, and to the wonders, associated with that act, and that day. that gash on her shoulder tells her to move on. They were statesmen, patriots and heroes, and for the good they did, and the principles they contended for, I will unite with you to honor their memory. From the Potomac to the Delaware was a journey of many days. It is not the gentle shower, but thunder. I take it, therefore, that it is not presumption in a private citizen to form an opinion of that instrument. The population was weak and scattered, and the country a wilderness unsubdued. From Boston to London is now a holiday excursion. 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. It makes its pathway over and under the sea, as well as on the earth. Let it be thundered around the world, that, in tyrant-killing, king-hating, people-loving, democratic, Christian America, the seats of justice are filled with judges, who hold their offices under an open and palpablebribe, and are bound, in deciding in the case of a mans liberty,hear only his accusers! Who so obdurate and dead to the claims of gratitude, that would not thankfully acknowledge such priceless benefits? Do you mean citizens to mock me by asking me to speak today? Is it to be settled by the rules of logic and argumentation? The sin of which it is guilty is one of omission as well as of commission. The most accurate AI-powered transcription on the market. I will use the severest language I can command. Then would my task be light, and my burden easy and delightful. Their solid manhood stands out the more as we contrast it with these degenerate times. Go search where you will. This is the inevitable conclusion, and from it there is no escape. He can bring no witnesses for himself. The document is in the form of a Google Docs so it has a translation tool, dictionary, and voice to text. WebCelebrating 200 years of Frederick Douglass. You could instruct me in regard to them. Frederick Douglass: (06:44) Your cause would be much more likely to succeed. They form the staple of your national poetry and eloquence. 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 and write. speaking of it relatively, and positively, negatively, and affirmatively. While drawing encouragement from the Declaration of Independence, the great principles it contains, and the genius of American Institutions, my spirit is also cheered by the obvious tendencies of the age. The fact that the church of our country, (with fractional exceptions), does not esteem the Fugitive Slave Law as a declaration of war against religious liberty, implies that that church regards religion simply as a form of worship, an empty ceremony, andnota vital principle, requiring active benevolence, justice, love and good will towards man. And it would go hard with that politician who presumed to solicit the votes of the people without inscribing this motto on his banner. You invite to your shores fugitives of oppression from abroad, honor them with banquets, greet them with ovations, cheer them, toast them, salute them, protect them, and pour out your money to them like water; but the fugitives from your own land you advertise, hunt, arrest, shoot and kill. I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us. WebFrederick Douglass, Fifth of July speech (1852) O! 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. Such a declaration of agreement on my part would not be worth much to anybody. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth. WebIn December 1860, the great American orator and former slave Frederick Douglass delivered one of his finest speeches, A Plea for Free Speech in Boston. In it, he boldly declared that liberty is meaningless where the right to utter ones thoughts and The fiat of the Almighty, Let there be Light, has not yet spent its force. The whole scene, as I look back to it, was simple, dignified and sublime. They are food for the cotton-field, and the deadly sugar-mill. How should I look today, in the presence of Americans, dividing, and subdividing a discourse, to show that men have a natural right to freedom? Albert Barnes but uttered what the common sense of every man at all observant of the actual state of the case will receive as truth, when he declared that There is no power out of the church that could sustain slavery an hour, if it were not sustained in it.. WebThe Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro by Frederick Douglass. Standing, there, identified with the American bondman, making his wrongs mine, 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! 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.

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