speech was delivered on July 5, 1852 as an address to the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society in Rochester, New York. Before you read the speech you can follow these links to learn more about Douglasss life and the evolution of his thought in this period. Short bio of Frederick Douglass The Frederick Douglass Papers Library of Congress This is a primary source reading analysis of Frederick Douglass' famous speech. 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? Fellow-citizens, pardon me, allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here to-day? There are exceptions, and I thank God that there are. Senator Berrien tell us that the Constitution is the fundamental law, that which controls all others. The madness of this course, we believe, is admitted now, even by England; but we fear the lesson is wholly lost on our present ruler. The feeling of the nation must be quickened. They acknowledge it when they punish disobedience on the part of the slave. 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. Douglass views the monument and the day's ceremonies as reflecting honor upon African I am glad, fellow-citizens, that your nation is so young. 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. Some of these have had wives and children, dependent on them for bread; but of this, no account was made. Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? These people were called Tories in the days of your fathers; and the appellation, probably, conveyed the same idea that is meant by a more modern, though a somewhat less euphonious term, which we often find in our papers, applied to some of our old politicians. There I see the tenderest ties ruthlessly broken, to gratify the lust, caprice and rapacity of the buyers and sellers of men. 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. You know what is a swine-drover? 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! WebA speech celebrating both Lincoln and African Americans freedom wrought by Lincoln. On July 5, 1852, eminent African American abolitionist Frederick Douglass delivered a brilliant speech to nearly six hundred people filling Rochester, New Yorks Corinthian Hall, as organized by the Rochester Ladies Anti-Slavery Sewing Society. Then, I dare to affirm, notwithstanding all I have said before, your fathers stooped, basely stooped. Douglass gave this speech to a group of abolitionists 168 years ago. Frederick Douglass: (08:30) 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. The time for such argument is passed. With little experience and with less learning, I have been able to throw my thoughts hastily and imperfectly together; and trusting to your patient and generous indulgence, I will proceed to lay them before you. Mark them! No nation can now shut itself up from the surrounding world, and trot round in the same old path of its fathers without interference. 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 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. I have detained my audience entirely too long already. 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. You will see one of these human flesh-jobbers, armed with pistol, whip and bowie-knife, driving a company of a hundred men, women, and children, from the Potomac to the slave market at New Orleans. They, however, gradually flow back to the same old channel, and flow on as serenely as ever. What was possible for him, he sincerely believed was possible for any man who was willing to work hard. The message of Frederick Douglasss 1852 speech on the contradiction of Americas just ideals and unjust realities endures. The propriety of the nation must be startled. As the champions of oppressors, the chosen men of American theology have appeared men, honored for their so-called piety, and their real learning. Oceans no longer divide, but link nations together. In the summer of 2020, the U.S. commemorated Independence Day amid nationwide Whether we turn to the declarations of the past, or to the professions of the present, the conduct of the nation seems equally hideous and revolting. 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. Must I undertake to prove that the slave is a man? At a time like this, scorching irony not convincing argument is needed. "What to the Slave is the 4th of July?" 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. 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. 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. Sign up for NewsOne's email newsletter! 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. How unlike the politicians of an hour! These wretched people are to be sold singly, or in lots, to suit purchasers. Is it that slavery is not divine, that God did not establish it, that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? Under these, and innumerable other disadvantages, your fathers declared for liberty and independence and triumphed. I think that, in whatever else I may be deficient, I have The arm of commerce has borne away the gates of the strong city. Go where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the old world, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me, that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival. They have taught that man may, properly, be a slave; that the relation of master and slave is ordained of God; that to send back an escaped bondman to his master is clearly the duty of all the followers of the Lord Jesus Christ; and this horrible blasphemy is palmed off upon the world for Christianity. WATCH VIDEO: Should Black Americans Celebrate Independence Day? My subject, then fellow-citizens, is AMERICAN SLAVERY. But, with that blindness which seems to be the unvarying characteristic of tyrants, since Pharaoh and his hosts were drowned in the Red Sea, the British Government persisted in the exactions complained of. For the present, it is enough to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race. It has been denounced with burning words, from the high places of the nation, as an execrable traffic. 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 manhood of the slave is conceded. The causes which led to the separation of the colonies from the British crown have never lacked for a tongue. By that most foul and fiendish of all human decrees, the liberty and person of every man are put in peril. See, too, that girl of thirteen, weeping, yes! 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. What is this but the acknowledgement that the slave is a moral, intellectual and responsible being? What? Where these are, man is not sacred. You hurl your anathemas at the crowned headed tyrants of Russia and Austria, and pride yourselves on your Democratic institutions, while you yourselves consent to be the meretoolsand body-guardsof the tyrants of Virginia and Carolina. The questions are designed to provoke thought and guide the students through the document. 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. They acknowledge it when they punish disobedience on the part of the slave. They strip the love of God of its beauty, and leave the throng of religion a huge, horrible, repulsive form. Convert your audio or video into 99% accurate text by a professional. It is neither. 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! They saw themselves treated with sovereign indifference, coldness and scorn. It was a startling idea, much more so, than we, at this distance of time, regard it. Were the nation older, the patriots heart might be sadder, and the reformers brow heavier. What point in the anti-slavery creed would you have me argue? 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. How can we sing the Lords song in a strange land? 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. Is it to be settled by the rules of logic and argumentation? That he is the rightful owner of his own body? 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. Sydney Smith tells us that men seldom eulogize the wisdom and virtues of their fathers, but to excuse some folly or wickedness of their own. 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. They were peace men; but they preferred revolution to peaceful submission to bondage. For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. WebAn excerpt from the 1847 Frederick Douglass speech given for the anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society. In several states, this trade is a chief source of wealth. 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. 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. Mark the sad procession, as it moves wearily along, and the inhuman wretch who drives them. 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. Descendants of Frederick Douglass read excerpts from one of his most famous speeches: What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? In their admiration of liberty, they lost sight of all other interests. 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. 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. O! The accepted time with God and his cause is the ever-living now. Then would my task be light and my burden easy and delightful? 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. There, the church, true to its mission of ameliorating, elevating, and improving the condition of mankind, came forward promptly, bound up the wounds of the West Indian slave, and restored him to his liberty. It saps the foundation of religion; it makes your name a hissing, and a bye-word to a mocking earth. But a still more inhuman, disgraceful, and scandalous state of things remains to be presented. They may sometimes rise in quiet and stately majesty, and inundate the land, refreshing and fertilizing the earth with their mysterious properties. This certainly sounds large, and out of the common way, for it is true that I have often had the privilege to speak in this beautiful Hall, and to address many who now honor me with their presence. In speaking of the American church, however, let it be distinctly understood that I mean the great mass of the religious organizations of our land. And it would go hard with that politician who presumed to solicit the votes of the people without inscribing this motto on his banner. The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. 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. And the conscience of the nation must be roused. Fellows citizens, pardon me and allow me to ask, why am I called to speak here today? I cannot. This is esteemed by some as a national trait perhaps a national weakness. your republican politics, not less than your republican religion, are flagrantly inconsistent. Transcript Descendants of Frederick Douglass read excerpts from one of his most famous speeches: What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens: He who could address this audience without a quailing sensation, has stronger nerves than I have. Fellow-citizens, I shall not presume to dwell at length on the associations that cluster about this day. America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. The flesh-mongers gather up their victims by dozens, and drive them, chained, to the general depot at Baltimore. But I admit, where all is plain, there is nothing to be argued. 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. Of this fundamental work, this day is the anniversary. Wind, steam, and lightning are its chartered agents. 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. Fellow citizens, this murderous traffic is, today, in active operation in this boasted republic. This is the inevitable conclusion, and from it there is no escape. They believed in order; but not in the order of tyranny. Banners and pennants wave exultingly on the breeze. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me, by asking me to speak to-day? 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 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 high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. There is not a man beneath the canopy of heaven, that does not know that slavery is wrong for him. Washington could not die till he had broken the chains of his slaves. And while slavery has long been abolished and outlawed, the sentiment behind the address still applies in many unfortunate ways when it comes to the overall Black experience in America. We are called upon to prove that we are men. The papers and placards say, that I am to deliver a 4th [of] July oration. These men were generally well dressed men, and very captivating in their manners. The document is in the form of a Google Docs so it has a translation tool, dictionary, and voice to text. Their conduct was wholly unexceptionable. The population was weak and scattered, and the country a wilderness unsubdued. 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. There are illustrations of it near and remote, ancient and modern. Go search where you will. Morel is right that the 1876 speech by Frederick Douglass is remarkable and masterful. For 186 years this doctrine of national independence has shaken the globeand it remains the most powerful force anywhere in the world today. Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood and stained with pollution is wrong? welcome atheism! Great streams are not easily turned from channels, worn deep in the course of ages. Yet they persevered. It is the birthday of your National Independence, and of your political freedom. Intelligence is penetrating the darkest corners of the globe. 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. You have already declared it. Yet his monument is built up by the price of human blood, and the traders in the bodies and souls of men shout We have Washington toour father. Alas! 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. 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. 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. They were quiet men; but they did not shrink from agitating against oppression. 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. I will not. No, I will not. Youmay rejoice,Imust mourn. But, besides general considerations, there were peculiar circumstances which make the advent of this republic an event of special attractiveness. 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! Africa must rise and put on her yet unwoven garment. Their solid manhood stands out the more as we contrast it with these degenerate times. The time was when such could be done. By an act of the American Congress, not yet two years old, slavery has been nationalized in its most horrible and revolting form. No abuse, no outrage whether in taste, sport or avarice, can now hide itself from the all-pervading light. 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 He rose from the shackles of slavery to become an author, 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. 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. They may also rise in wrath and fury, and bear away, on their angry waves, the accumulated wealth of years of toil and hardship. 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. 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. Frederick Douglass's, What To the Slave Is the Fourth of Yea! The sunlight that brought life and healing to you has brought stripes and death to me. 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. 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. 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, Not for thieves and robbers, enemies of society, merely, but for men guilty of no crime. I leave, therefore, the great deeds of your fathers to other gentlemen whose claim to have been regularly descended will be less likely to be disputed than mine! 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. Our eyes are met with demonstrations of joyous enthusiasm. Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens: He who could address this audience nor grace my speech with any high sounding exordium. Thoughts expressed on one side of the Atlantic, are distinctly heard on the other. Frederick Douglass (1818-1895) was a social reformer and advocate, abolitionist, orator, writer, minister, and statesman. 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. Three score years and ten is the allotted time for individual men; but nations number their years by thousands. Your fathers have lived, died, and have done their work, and have done much of it well. 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.. What to the American slave is your 4th of July? I doubt if there be another nation on the globe, having the brass and the baseness to put such a law on the statute-book. 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? That point is conceded already. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence bequeathed by your fathers is shared by you, not by me.

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