A self-taught man, he escaped from slavery and eventually became a leader in the abolitionist movement. Some of these have had wives and children, dependent on them for bread; but of this, no account was made. 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! It saps the foundation of religion; it makes your name a hissing, and a by word to a mocking earth. 2. The Oratory of Fr. [8] Frederick Douglass had moved to Rochester in 1847 in order to publish his newspaper The North Star. Many of its most eloquent Divines. 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 British accomplished this through religion or more specifically, the church. 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 hypocrisya thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. An American judge gets ten dollars for every victim he con signs to slavery, and five, when he fails to do so. 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. 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, then will I argue with you that the slave is a man!For the present, it is enough to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race. If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. The crack you heard, was the sound of the slave-whip; the scream you heard, was from the woman you saw with the babe. (1982). nor the perfect gage I think I have of Corinthian Hall, the slave plantation, from which I escaped, and trusting to your patient and generous indulgence, I will proceed to lay them before you, This, for the purpose of this celebration, is the 4th of July. [11] Additionally, he had spoken there less than three months prior to this speech, on March 25. It has made itself the bulwark of American slavery, and the shield of American slave-hunters. The minister of American justice is bound by the law to hear but one side; and that side, is the side of the oppressor. But a still more inhuman, disgraceful, and scandalous state of things remains to be presented. Fellow-citizens, pardon me, allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here to-day? The speech has been notably performed or read by important figures, including the following: The paragraphing referenced here is taken from an edition of the speech at, African Americans In Congress: A Documentary History, by Eric Freedman and Stephen A, Jones, 2008, p. 39, "Activist Public Relations and the Paradox of the Positive: A Case Study of Frederick Douglass's Fourth of July Address", "One of American History's Worst Laws Was Passed 165 Years Ago", "The Operation of the Fugitive Slave Law in Western Pennsylvania from 1850 to 1860", The American Constitutional Experience: Selected Readings & Supreme Court Opinions, Frederick Douglass on Slavery and the Civil War: Selections from His Writings, "Frederick Douglass Statue Torn Down On Anniversary Of Famous Speech", "Frederick Douglass statue torn down in Rochester, N.Y., on anniversary of his famous Fourth of July speech", "Frederick Douglass statue torn down on anniversary of great speech", "VIDEO: Frederick Douglass' Descendants Deliver His 'Fourth Of July' Speech", A Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Frederick Douglass's Descendants Deliver His 'Fourth of July' Speech, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=What_to_the_Slave_Is_the_Fourth_of_July%3F&oldid=1137650578. It esteems sacrifice above mercy; psalm-singing above right doing; solemn meetings above practical righteousness. What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? This truth is not a doubtful one. How should I look to-day, in the presence of Americans, dividing, and subdividing a discourse, to show that men have a natural right to freedom? Ethiopia shall stretch out her hand unto God. In the fervent aspirations of William Lloyd Garrison, I say, and let every heart join in saying it: Frederick Douglass delivered his famous speech at the Corinthian Hall in Rochester, NY, on July 5th, 1852. These wretched people are to be sold singly, or in lots, to suit purchasers. was delivered in the decade preceding the American Civil War, which lasted from 1861 to 1865 and achieved the abolition of slavery. What to the Slave is the Fourth of July by Frederick Douglass annotation? Students also viewed In 1850, the Fugitive Slave Act had passed Congress as part of the broader Compromise of 1850. Is slavery among them? The4th of July is the first great fact in your nation's history the very ringbolt in the chain of your yet undeveloped destinyPride and patriotism, not less than gratitude, prompt you to celebrate and to hold it in perpetualremembrance. Cast one glance, if you please, upon that young mother, whose shoulders are bare to the scorching sun, her briny tears falling on the brow of the babe in her arms. All this we affirm to be true of the popular church, and the popular worship of our land and nation a religion, a church, and a worship which, on the authority of inspired wisdom, we pronounce to be an abomination in the sight of God. 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. . "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? We need individual events like reading Douglass, but we also need to be thinking about ways to extend this conversation over the long term. Hear his savage yells and his blood-chilling oaths, as he hurries on his affrighted captives! 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.Behold the practical operation of this internal slave-trade, the American slave-trade, sustained by American politics and America religion. And it also imposed severe penalties on anyone who helped enslaved people to escape. whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are, to-day, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee shouts that reach them. To do so, would be to make myself ridiculous, and to offer an insult to your understanding.There is not a man beneath the canopy of heaven, that does not know that slavery is wrong for him.What, 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 irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to bum their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters? 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. [17] This act drew the ire of the abolitionist movement,[9] and was directly criticized by Douglass in his speech. Follow the drove to New Orleans. To . What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I will not enlarge further on your national inconsistencies. 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. 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 of Him by whom the professed to he called to the ministry, deliberately taught us, against the example or the Hebrews and against the remonstrance of the Apostles, they teach that we ought to obey mans law before the law of God.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. But, with that blindness which seems to be the unvarying characteristic of tyrants, since Pharaoh and his hosts were drowned in the Red Sea. If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. Is it that slavery is not divine; that God did not establish it; that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? They inhabit all our Southern States. 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. With brave men there is always a remedy for oppression. The 4th of July is the first great fact in your nation's historythe very ring-bolt in the chain of your yet undeveloped destiny. Without this fight, the liberty of an American citizen would be as insecure as that of a Frenchman. True Christians, according to Douglass, should not stand idly by while the rights and liberty of others are stripped away. 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. On what branch of the subject do the people of this country need light? He validates the feelings of injustice the Founders felt then juxtaposes their experiences with vivid descriptions of the harshness of slavery.[21]. See this drove sold and separated forever; and never forget the deep, sad sobs that arose from that scattered multitude. Table of Contents. 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. It was demanded, in the name of humanity, and according to the law of the living God. 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.For my part, I would say, welcome infidelity! We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. But now is the time, the important time. From Boston to London is now a holiday excursion. 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. 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! 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 nationa system begun in avarice, supported in pride, and perpetuated in cruelty. 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.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.Take the American slave-trade, which, we are told by the papers, is especially prosperous just now. He implored the Rochester, N.Y., audience to think about the ongoing oppression of Black Americans during a holiday celebrating . There is not time now to argue the constitutional question at length nor have I the ability to discuss it as it ought to be discussed. There is always a remedy for oppression to be sold singly, or lots! 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