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? In a final celebratory post for Black History Month 2023, it is worth returning to the 1883 Douglass Banquet. WebAn excerpt from the 1847 Frederick Douglass speech given for the anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society. Its the news, without the news. In a final celebratory post for Black History Month 2023, it is worth returning to the 1883 Douglass Banquet. I have better employments for my time and strength than such arguments would imply. WebFrederick Douglass speech Historical Document "The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro" 1852 Resource Bank Contents Click here for the text of this historical document. 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! What point in the anti-slavery creed would you have me argue? Her speed had faltered under the weight of her child and her chains! 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 speaking of it, relatively and positively, negatively and affirmatively? Take the American slave-trade, which, we are told by the papers, is especially prosperous just now. Oppression makes a wise man mad. 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. 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? Many of its most eloquent Divines. This, to you, is what the Passover was to the emancipated people of God. May of Syracuse, and my esteemed friend (Rev. Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. Translated on-screen subtitles for videos. 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? Where these go, may also go the merciless slave-hunter. Heavy billows, like mountains in the distance, disclose to the leeward huge forms of flinty rocks! Oh! You live and must die, and you must do your work. 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. There are forces in operation, which must inevitably work the downfall of slavery. This truth is not a doubtful one. 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! To him, your celebration is a sham, your boasted Liberty, an unholy license, your national greatness, swelling vanity. Racist Ex-University Of Kentucky 'Karen' Sophia Rosing Is Charged For Assaulting Black Student. 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? 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. That trade has long since been denounced by this government, as piracy. Who can reason on such a proposition? Would you argue more and denounce less? I am glad, fellow-citizens, that your nation is so young. 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. When a sufficient number have been collected here, a ship is chartered, for the purpose of conveying the forlorn crew to Mobile, or to New Orleans. Fellow-citizens! According to this fact, you are, even now, only in the beginning of your national career, still lingering in the period of childhood. 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. welcome atheism! Frederick Douglass's, What To the Slave Is the Fourth of I take it, therefore, that it is not presumption in a private citizen to form an opinion of that instrument. They strip the love of God of its beauty, and leave the throng of religion a huge, horrible, repulsive form. Extend your content reach and maximize your engagement rates. These ministers make religion a cold and flinty-hearted thing, having neither principles of right action, nor bowels of compassion. On what branch of the subject do the people of this country need light? Frederick Douglass: (04:09) It has made itself the bulwark of American slavery, and the shield of American slave-hunters. The Fugitive SlaveLawmakes mercy to them a crime; and bribes the judge who tries them. There were then no means of concert and combination, such as exist now. Frederick Douglass: (06:44) Read the full text below of the sage words from one of the greatest orators of all time. Transcript Descendants of Frederick Douglass read excerpts from one of his most famous speeches: What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? In prosecuting the anti-slavery enterprise, we have been asked to spare the church, to spare the ministry; buthow, we ask, could such a thing be done? They that can, may; I cannot. Would to God, both for your sakes and ours, that an affirmative answer could be truthfully returned to these questions! We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and to the future. Douglass views the monument and the day's ceremonies as reflecting honor upon African 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.. Frederick Douglass, circa 1879. Difference between Rittenhouse and McMichael-Bryan verdicts? Frederick Douglass delivered his famous speech What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? in 1852, drawing parallels between the Revolutionary War and the fight to abolish slavery. They inhabit all our Southern States. To say now that America was right, and England wrong, is exceedingly easy. In their admiration of liberty, they lost sight of all other interests. The time for such argument is past. For the present, it is enough to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race. Would you have me argue that man is entitled to Liberty, that he is the rightful owner of his body? You have already declared it. 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. Fellow Citizens, I am not wanting in respect for the fathers of this republic. 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 Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? 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. The subject has been handled with masterly power by Lysander Spooner, Esq., by William Goodell, by Samuel E. Sewall, Esq., and last, though not least, by Gerritt Smith, Esq. May he not hope that high lessons of wisdom, of justice and of truth, will yet give direction to her destiny? America is false to the past, false to the present and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. Roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the old world. It is the birthday of your National Independence, and of your political freedom. That I am here to-day is, to me, a matter of astonishment as well as of gratitude. Is a matter, the set with great difficulty involving a doubtful application of the principle of justice, hard to understand? Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. A speech given at Rochester, New York, July 5, 1852 . They may also rise in wrath and fury, and bear away, on their angry waves, the accumulated wealth of years of toil and hardship. Without this right, the liberty of an American citizen would be as insecure as that of a Frenchman. Then would my task be light and my burden easy and delightful? Is it at the gateway? 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. 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. 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! When a child, my soul was often pierced with a sense of its horrors. WebCelebrating 200 years of Frederick Douglass. In glaring violation of justice, in shameless disregard of the forms of administering law, in cunning arrangement to entrap the defenseless, and in diabolical intent, this Fugitive Slave Law stands alone in the annals of tyrannical legislation. "What to the Slave is the 4th of July?" My subject, then fellow-citizens, is AMERICAN SLAVERY. 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, . 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. How unlike the politicians of an hour! The feeling of the nation must be quickened. 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. I will not enlarge further on your national inconsistencies. Resolved, That these united colonies are, and of right, ought to be free and Independent States; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown; and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, dissolved.. Everywhere, in this country, it is safe to speak of this foreign slave-trade, as a most inhuman traffic, opposed alike to the laws of God and of man. Thoughts expressed on one side of the Atlantic, are distinctly heard on the other. An American judge gets ten dollars for every victim he consigns to slavery, and five, when he fails to do so. Frederick Douglass: (05:02) 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. 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. Speech-to-Text API for pre-recorded audio, powered by the worlds leading speech recognition engine. It is a religion for oppressors, tyrants, man-stealers, andthugs. Is it that slavery is not divine, that God did not establish it, that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? Suicide Note Revealed After Shocking Death, Mississippi Cops Beat, Waterboarded Handcuffed Black Men, Shot 1 For Dating White Women': Lawyers, Indicted! Your fathers were wise men, and if they did not go mad, they became restive under this treatment. 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. Just here, the idea of a total separation of the colonies from the crown was born! On the other hand it will be found to contain principles and purposes, entirely hostile to the existence of slavery. 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. I will show you a man-drover. 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! Frederick Douglass: (07:35) Our eyes are met with demonstrations of joyous enthusiasm. 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. If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. Yea! Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? He is a bird for the sportsmans gun. Everybody can say it; the dastard, not less than the noble brave, can flippantly discant on the tyranny of England towards the American Colonies. 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. They, however, gradually flow back to the same old channel, and flow on as serenely as ever. Calculate how much it costs to transcribe, caption, or subtitle your content. Your broad republican domain is hunting ground formen. 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! I, therefore, leave off where I began, with hope. 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. welcome anything! It was a startling idea, much more so, than we, at this distance of time, regard it. They hate all changes, but silver, gold and copper change! This, for the purpose of this celebration, is the 4th of July. They were great men too great enough to give fame to a great age. That people contented themselves under the shadow of Abrahams great name, while they repudiated the deeds which made his name great. From Boston to London is now a holiday excursion. These men were generally well dressed men, and very captivating in their manners. Create a better, more engaging experience for every student. Mark them! I am not included within the pales of this glorious anniversary. The arm of the Lord is not shortened, and the doom of slavery is certain. 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. How circumspect, exact and proportionate were all their movements! The arm of commerce has borne away the gates of the strong city. My soul sickens at the sight. 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! To do so, would be to make myself ridiculous, and to offer an insult to your understanding. The task before me is one which requires much previous thought and study for its proper performance. Transcribe your audio files to find high-impact insights in minutes. I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us. We are called upon to prove that we are men. Not for thieves and robbers, enemies of society, merely, but for men guilty of no crime. 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.. Yet they persevered. But neither their familiar faces, nor the perfect gage I think I have of Corinthian Hall, seems to free me from embarrassment. 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? If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth.. 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. Now, take the Constitution according to its plain reading, and I defy the presentation of a single pro-slavery clause in it. Americans! The Sharps, the Clarksons, the Wilberforces, the Buxtons, and Burchells and the Knibbs, were alike famous for their piety, and for their philanthropy. They succeeded; and to-day you reap the fruits of their success. See this drove sold and separated forever; and never forget the deep, sad sobs that arose from that scattered multitude. speaking of it relatively, and positively, negatively, and affirmatively. 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. These gentlemen have, as I think, fully and clearly vindicated the Constitution from any design to support slavery for an hour. The propriety of the nation must be startled. Try Rev and save time transcribing, captioning, and subtitling. 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! To do so would be to make myself ridiculous and to offer an insult to your understanding. The point from which I am compelled to view them is not, certainly, the most favorable; and yet I cannot contemplate their great deeds with less than admiration. Yea! 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. At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed. Walled cities and empires have become unfashionable. Frederick Douglass: (10:31) Read its preamble, consider its purposes. The drove moves tardily. What to the Slave is the 4th of July? Speech Transcript by Frederick Douglass, Congressional Testimony & Hearing Transcripts. Speech-to-Text live streaming for live captions, powered by the worlds leading speech recognition API. your republican politics, not less than your republican religion, are flagrantly inconsistent. 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. What then remains to be argued? Its deeply moving to hear Douglass defend the honor of Black soldiers in his 1863 speech, The Proclamation And a Negro Army, read by Colman Domingo, while his final speech, 1894s Lessons of the Hour, lays out the crucial steps toward achieving equality that have yet to be followed today.The actor selected to read these words is We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake. WebBoth anniversaries remind us that the fight for independence and equality did not end in the 18th century - a theme highlighted in Douglass speech. 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. 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 and sacrilegious irony. The causes which led to the separation of the colonies from the British crown have never lacked for a tongue. But I admit, where all is plain, there is nothing to be argued. He mentions the fact to show that slavery is in no danger. By that most foul and fiendish of all human decrees, the liberty and person of every man are put in peril. You know what is a swine-drover? Copyright 2023 Interactive One, LLC. For the present, it is enough to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race. Your fathers esteemed the English Government as the home government; and England as the fatherland. But a change has now come over the affairs of mankind. They were quiet men; but they did not shrink from agitating against oppression. Is that a question for Republicans? The manhood of the slave is conceded. As noted here, that banquet was attended by prominent He further says, the Constitution, in its words, is plain and intelligible, and is meant for the home-bred, unsophisticated understandings of our fellow-citizens. in preference to the gospel,as preached by those Divines! They believed in order; but not in the order of tyranny. Where these are, man is not sacred. 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 he is the rightful owner of his own body? What to the American slave is your 4th of July? He rose from the shackles of slavery to become an author, newspaper publisher, and respected abolitionist. It esteems sacrifice above mercy; psalm-singing above right doing; solemn meetings above practical righteousness. It does not often happen to a nation to raise, at one time, such a number of truly great men. The accepted time with God and his cause is the ever-living now. There is blasphemy in the thought. For who is there so cold, that a nations sympathy could not warm him? This is esteemed by some as a national trait perhaps a national weakness. The timid and the prudent (as has been intimated) of that day, were, of course, shocked and alarmed by it. Frederick Douglass: (02:57) There are exceptions, and I thank God that there are. I repeat, I am glad this is so. They form the staple of your national poetry and eloquence. At the very moment that they are thanking God for the enjoyment of civil and religious liberty, and for the right to worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences, they are utterly silent in respect to a law which robs religion of its chief significance, and makes it utterly worthless to a world lying in wickedness. Three score years and ten is the allotted time for individual men; but nations number their years by thousands. And yet not one word shall escape me that any man whose judgment is not blinded by prejudice or who is not at heart, a slaveholder shall not confess to be right and just. Douglass gave this speech to a group of abolitionists 168 years ago. 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? No! This Fourth [of] July isyours, notmine. 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. The duty to extirpate and destroy it, is admitted even by our DOCTORS OF DIVINITY. 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. The far off and almost fabulous Pacific rolls in grandeur at our feet. Is that a question for Republicans? 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? 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. 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. A RESTful API to access Revs workforce of fast, high quality transcriptionists and captioners. Its future might be shrouded in gloom, and the hope of its prophets go out in sorrow. Nobody doubts it. From the slave prison to the ship, they are usually driven in the darkness of night; for since the antislavery agitation, a certain caution is observed. I remember, also, that, as a people, Americans are remarkably familiar with all facts which make in their own favor. 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. Senator Berrien tell us that the Constitution is the fundamental law, that which controls all others. Mark the sad procession, as it moves wearily along, and the inhuman wretch who drives them. You could instruct me in regard to them. 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? Wind, steam, and lightning are its chartered agents. 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They were peace men; but they preferred revolution to peaceful submission to bondage. Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens: He who could address this audience without a quailing sensation, has
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