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. by Frederick Douglass 1852 11th Grade Lexile: 1140 Font Size Frederick Douglass (1818-1895) was an African American social reformer, orator, and writer. GAZETTE: What is something you have discovered about Douglass while researching this speech and his work more broadly that people might be surprised to learn? There are illustrations of it near and remote, ancient and modern. In that speech, he cast the abolitionist movement as being engaged in a "War" against defenders of slavery. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth.. The 4th of July is the first great fact in your nations historythe very ring-bolt in the chain of your yet undeveloped destiny. Their opposition to the then dangerous thought was earnest and powerful; but, amid all their terror and affrighted vociferations against it, the alarming and revolutionary idea moved on, and the country with it. You may rejoice, I must mourn. I am not included within the pale of this glorious anniversary! This Fourth [of] July is yours, not mine. Heavy billows, like mountains in the distance, disclose to the leeward huge forms of flinty rocks! The Fugitive Slave Law makes mercy to them a crime; and bribes the judge who tries them. Douglass then discusses the internal slave trade in America. Were not only going to be reading books like White Fragility, and Divided by Faith, but were also going to read and watch a number of speeches by Martin Luther King Jr., and documentaries like 13th and King in the Wilderness, as we try to get at the root of racial division so we can come together to remove it. when ye make many prayers, I will not hear. The 4th of July Address, delivered in Corinthian Hall, by Frederick Douglass, is published on good paper, and makes a neat pamphlet of forty pages. On July 4, 1852, Frederick Douglass-- a former American slave, abolitionist leader and adroit speaker-- spoke in Rochester, New York about the affectation of celebrating independence. 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. Table of Contents. Interview was lightly edited for clarity and length. Where these are, man is not sacred. we wept when we remembered Zion. The timid and the prudent (as has been intimated) of that day, were, of course, shocked and alarmed by it. Space is comparatively annihilated. 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. 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. 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. ts future might be shrouded in gloom, and the hope of its prophets go out in sorr. The United States does not have to stay the way it is. The arm of the Lord is not shortened, and the doom of slavery is certain. Senator Berrien tell us that the Constitution is the fundamental law, that which controls all others. May of Syracuse, and my esteemed friend (Rev. 15 November's Documents in Detail webinar was about Frederick Douglass's What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?, his oration delivered on 5 July 1862. ROY: The better we get to know the people that we live with, that we work around, that we see at the coffee shop, and the more we talk about these important racial issues with one another, the easier it will be to heal our divided communities. Your broad republican domain is hunting ground for men. I was glad to find one who sympathized with me in my horror.Fellow-citizens, this murderous traffic is, to-day, in active operation in this boasted republic. It is a religion for oppressors, tyrants, man-stealers, and thugs. No! 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. But a still more inhuman, disgraceful, and scandalous state of things remains to be presented. It is fashionable to do so; but there was a time when to pronounce against England, and in favor of the cause of the colonies, tried mens souls. 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? In spite of his praise of the Founding Fathers, he maintains that slaves owe nothing to and have no positive feelings towards the founding of the United States. 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. 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. Need I remind you that a similar thing is being done all over this country to-day? To honor Black History Month, as an introduction or review of rhetorical appeals and devices, or as a speech exemplar, this Frederick Douglass "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July" rhetoric activity is a fabulous addition to any lesson. The power is co-extensive with the Star-Spangled Banner and American Christianity. Douglass denounces the churches for betraying their own biblical and Christian values. Because the church stood behind the decision to abolish the selling and buying of people, so did the rest of the country. 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, a seventh part of the inhabitants of your country.Fellow-citizens! 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. Keidrick Roy, the host of the virtual reading event. Random House. To arrest it, to put an end to it, this nation keeps a squadron, at immense cost, on the coast of Africa. According to Douglass, these inconsistencies have made the United States the object of mockery and often contempt among the various nations of the world. 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. This Fourth [of] July is yours, not mine. 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. 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. This, to you, is what the Passover was to the emancipated people of God. What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I, therefore, leave off where I began, with hope. [Under the Act] it became illegal not to arrest and return runaway slaves. PDF. 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. My subject, then fellow-citizens, is AMERICAN SLAVERY. Frederick Douglass, ca 1855, Metropolitan Museum of Art. In the second part of the speech, Douglass turns to the present and his own feelings about the 4th of July . If youre not a person of color, its one thing to go to a couple of events or protests, or to read a few articles and move on. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth. These rules are well established. Another remarkable thing about Douglass is that he was an early champion of voting rights for women. Initially mentored by William Lloyd Garrison, Douglass 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! On the other hand it will be found to contain principles and purposes, entirely hostile to the existence of slavery.I have detained my audience entirely too long already. These ministers make religion a cold and flinty-hearted thing, having neither principles of right action, nor bowels of compassion. But, I submit, where all is plain there is nothing to be argued. For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. A general shout would go up from the church, demanding repeal, repeal, instant repeal!And it would go hard with that politician who presumed to solicit the votes of the people without inscribing this motto on his banner. There are seventy-two 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 the same crimes will subject a white man to the like punishment. Nobody doubts it. If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. Genius is the ultimate source of music knowledge, created by scholars like you who share facts and insight about the songs and artists they love. They, however, gradually flow back to the same old channel, and flow on as serenely as ever. Intelligence is penetrating the darkest corners of the globe. that gash on her shoulder tells her to move on. Douglass vividly describes the conditions under which those enslaved are bought and sold; he says that they are treated as no more than animals. If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. (3) $3.99. [28][29] The head of the organization responsible for the memorial speculated that it was vandalized in response to the removal of Confederate monuments in the wake of the George Floyd protests.[30]. After this, he turns his attention to the church. No abuse, no outrage whether in taste, sport or avarice, can now hide itself from the all-pervading light. There are exceptions, and I thank God that there are. What to the Slave is the Fourth of July | Historical Context The Colonial regime paved way for the transportation of slaves from different parts of the world, mostly from the African continent to work in southern states of America on cash crop plantations that generated a great source of income. Who can reason on such a proposition? be warned! He had delivered a series of seven lectures about slavery there in the winter of 185051. Douglass' speech came just 11 years before Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation hitting a poignant point in American history through his targeting of the slave as a crucial figure in desperate need of independence. The minister of American justice is bound by the law to hear but one side; and that side, is the side of the oppressor. 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! [7], The Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society was founded in 1851. Walled cities and empires have become unfashionable. Noble men may be found, scattered all over these Northern States, of whom Henry Ward Beecher of Brooklyn, Samuel J. 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