A
speech given at Rochester, New York, July 5, 1852
“…I am not included
within the pale of this glorious anniversary! Your high independence only
reveals the immeasurable distance between us. The blessings in which you, this
day, rejoice, are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice,
liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by
you, not by me. The sunlight that brought light and healing to you, has brought
stripes and death to me. This Fourth of July is yours, not mine. You may
rejoice, I must mourn…
“I shall see this day
and its popular characteristics from the slave's point of view. 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 Fourth of July! 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.
“America is false to
the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the
future. 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! ‘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…
“What, to the American
slave, is your Fourth of July? 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 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 denunciation 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. There
is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than
are the people of the United States, at this very hour…
“Behold the practical
operation of this internal slave-trade, the American slave-trade, sustained by
American politics and American religion. Here you will see men and women reared
like swine for the market. You know what is a swine-drover? I will show you a
man-drover. They inhabit all our Southern States. They perambulate the country,
and crowd the highways of the nation, with droves of human stock. 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.
“These wretched people
are to be sold singly, or in lots, to suit purchasers. They are food for the
cotton-field and the deadly sugar-mill. Mark the sad procession, as it moves
wearily along, and the inhuman wretch who drives them. Hear his savage yells
and his blood-curdling oaths, as he hurries on his affrighted captives!
“There, see the old man
with locks thinned and gray. 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. See, too, that girl of thirteen, weeping,
yes! Weeping, as she thinks of the mother from whom she has been torn! The
drove moves tardily. 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. The crack
you heard was the sound of the slave-whip; the scream you heard was from the
woman you saw with the babe. Her speed had faltered under the weight of her
child and her chains! That gash on her shoulder tells her to move on.
“Follow this drove to
New Orleans. 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. See this drove sold and separated forever, and never forget the
deep, sad sobs that arose from that scattered multitude. Tell me, citizens,
where, under the sun, you can witness a spectacle more fiendish and shocking.
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…
“[T]he church of this
country is not only indifferent to the wrongs of the slave, it actually takes
sides with the oppressors. It has made itself the bulwark of American slavery
and the shield of American slave-hunters. Many of its most eloquent Divines,
who stand as the very lights of the church, have shamelessly given the sanction
of religion and the Bible to the whole slave system. 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…
“These ministers make
religion a cold and flinty-hearted thing, having neither principles of right
action nor bowels of compassion. They strip the love of God of its beauty and
leave the throne of religion a huge, horrible, repulsive form. It is a religion
for oppressors, tyrants, man-stealers, and thugs. 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. 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… 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 its connection
with its ability to abolish slavery…
“Americans! Your
republican politics, not less than your republican religion, are flagrantly
inconsistent. 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…
“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 in alienable 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…’
“The existence of
slavery in this country brands your republicanism as a sham, your humanity as a
base pretense, and your Christianity as a lie. It destroys your moral power
abroad: it corrupts your politicians at home. It saps the foundation of
religion; it makes your name a hissing and a bye-word to a mocking earth. It is
the antagonistic force in your government, the only thing that seriously
disturbs and endangers your Union. 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…
“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. 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. Read its preamble, consider
its purposes. Is slavery among them? Is it at the gate way? Or is it in the
temple? It is neither…”
For the entire speech,
click here.
" There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States, at this very hour…"
ReplyDeleteThis is true on July 4, 2017; it is true on the basis many of the references stated 165 years ago by Douglass. The subjects can be changed from black slaves to the poor, the oppressed, the underpaid wage slaves, the aged and infirm, the poorly educated, the disabled, and others. These created social minorities are today's slaves, yet many do not realize this harsh truth.
It calls to mind Robin Morgan's paraphrase of Harriet Tubman's attributed statement, "I could have saved thousands - if only they knew they were slaves."
We are endangered as a humane nation as our well-paid (by campaign donors) legislators dismantle America for the power and profit of the .001%, the super wealthy.
Iwas so moved by the words of Fredrick Douglas however, I was more moved by the fact that a hundred and sixty years later that these words still ring true. In view of the Brett Kaunaugh appointment and the sham of a investigation that our country was just a part of, lets me see America for what it really is. A place where power and control reign free over all justice and morality. How the very people whomcalled themselves public servants are only concerned about their own agendas. We have the nerve to put on our currency.'In GOd We Trust." We are so delusional that we cant separate the truth from the false. May God help us all.
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