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. If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To the slave, Douglass tells the audience, "your 4th of July is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license [for enslaving blacks] . that he is the rightful owner of his own body? Yet this is but a glance at the American slave-trade, as it exists, at this moment, in the ruling part of the United States. An American judge gets ten dollars for every victim he con signs to slavery, and five, when he fails to do so. Follow the drove to New Orleans. He wrote a glowing letter of encouragement to Harriet Tubman, which served as the preface to Sarah Bradfords 1869 biography about Tubmans life. Pride and patriotism, not less than gratitude, prompt you to celebrate and to hold it in perpetual remembrance. GAZETTE: What is the historical setting for this speech, and why did Douglass focus on the Fourth of July? If any man in this assembly thinks differently from me in this matter, and feels able to disprove my statements, I will gladly confront him at any suitable time and place he may select.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.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. Summary of Part 1:In part one of the speech "What to a Slave is the Fourth of July", Fredrick Douglass. and am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar, and to confess the benefits and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us?Would to God, both for your sakes and ours, that an affirmative answer could be truthfully returned to these questions! Yea! Students also viewed You profess to believe that, of one blood, God made all nations of men to dwell on the face of all the earth, and hath commanded all men, everywhere to love one another; yet you notoriously hate, (and glory in your hatred), all men whose skins are not colored like your own. ROY:One of the things that Douglass writings shows us is that he believed in amplifying a variety of voices. [Under the Act] it became illegal not to arrest and return runaway slaves. He talks about how Americans are proud of their country and their religion and how they rejoice in the name of freedom and liberty and yet they do not offer those things to millions of their country's residents. The Celestial Empire, the mystery of ages, is being solved. Born into slavery around 1818, Douglass became a key leader of the abolitionist movement. 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. [5] American studies professor Andrew S. Bibby argues that because many of the editions produced for educational use are abridged, they often misrepresent Douglass's original through omission or editorial focus. Douglass was a former slave of the 19th century and soon became a leader during the Abolitionist Movement. When a child, my soul was often pierced with a sense of its horrors. There, the question of emancipation was a high religious question. How can we sing the Lords song in a strange land? They strip the love of God of its beauty, and leave the throng of religion a huge, horrible, repulsive form. The speech 'What to the Slaves is the Fourth of July' projected the American Day of Independence from a slave's point of view and brought to light the horrific experiences of slavery. Kate Harris Date Published September 28, 2016 Last Modified November 14, 2021 Description. He can bring no witnesses for himself. It would, certainly, prove nothing, as to what part I might have taken, had I lived during the great controversy of 1776. Great streams are not easily turned from channels, worn deep in the course of ages. It saps the foundation of religion; it makes your name a hissing, and a by word to a mocking earth. Without this fight, the liberty of an American citizen would be as insecure as that of a Frenchman. Interview was lightly edited for clarity and length. They strip the love of God of its beauty, and leave the throng of religion a huge, horrible, repulsive form. For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. 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. He became a leader in the abolitionist movement, which sought to end the practice of slavery, before and during the Civil War. 00 Comments Please sign inor registerto post comments. Oceans no longer divide, but link nations together. [4], Noted for its biting irony and bitter rhetoric, and acute textual analysis of the U.S. Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Christian Bible, the speech is among the most widely known of all of Douglass's writings. These wretched people are to be sold singly, or in lots, to suit purchasers. How digital misinformation may keep you from a good nights sleep, Study finds surgical patients with addiction issues may be at greater risk for complications, including sudden cardiac death after anesthesia, Khalil Gibran Muhammad says College Board needs to stand firm behind curriculum, Chief counsel of respected mid-70s Senate inquiry into improper federal investigations says credibility of oversight function at stake, 2023 The President and Fellows of Harvard College, Photo courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration, By Manisha Aggarwal-Schifellite Harvard Staff Writer, 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. Wind, steam, and lightning are its chartered agents. He implored the Rochester, N.Y., audience to think about the ongoing oppression of Black Americans during a holiday celebrating freedom. 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. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth.Fellow-citizens; above your national, tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions! The feeling of the nation must be quickened; the conscience of the nation must be roused; the propriety of the nation must be startled; the hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed; and its crimes against God and man must be proclaimed and denounced.What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me. Is slavery among them? This is the inevitable conclusion, and from it there is no escape. Yea! [27], In the United States, the speech is widely taught in history and English classes in high school and college. As the project scholar, my role is to advise the process as it rolls out, to give a talk that provides contemporary and historical context and to facilitate the community discussion around the speech against the backdrop of other relevant issues. 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. Before you read the speech you can follow these links to learn more about Douglass's life and the evolution of his thought in this period. [5], A statue of Douglass erected in Rochester in 2018 was torn down on July 5, 2020the 168th anniversary of the speech. [16][17] Finally, the Act did not allow the accused individual of defending themselves in court. They are plain, common-sense rules, such as you and I, and all of us, can understand and apply, without having passed years in the study of law. They perambulate the country, and crowd the highways of the nation, with droves of human stock. [7], The Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society was founded in 1851. No! I will not equivocate; I will not excuse; I will use the severest language I can command; 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.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. be warned! The manhood of the slave is conceded. 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. The United States does not have to stay the way it is. Alison Drasner, the project coordinator for the Somerville Museum, teamed up with Dave Ortega at the Somerville Media Center to prerecord voices of 50 Somerville residents, including my 7-year-old daughter, Charlotte, to read sections of the speech. ROY: Douglass wrote the speech in the wake of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which effectively extended the reach of slave power in the South throughout the rest of the country. There is blasphemy in the thought. See, too, that girl of thirteen, weeping, yes! [17] This act drew the ire of the abolitionist movement,[9] and was directly criticized by Douglass in his speech. 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? 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.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. In a Fourth of July holiday special, we hear the words of Frederick Douglass. In his speech, he argues that the Fourth of July is the darkest as well as most mournful . America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. By an act of the American Congress, not yet two years old, Mason and Dixons line has been obliterated, Did this law concern the mint, anise, and cumin. In an 1868 speech, he said, No man should be excluded from the government on the basis of his color, no woman on account of her sex.
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