what to the slave is the fourth of july annotation

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. 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. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me, by asking me to speak to-day? Nobody doubts it. Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood, and stained with pollution, is wrong? The timid and the prudent (as has been intimated) of that day, were, of course, shocked and alarmed by it. He wrote and presented a speech that challenged . Washington could not die till he had broken the chains of his slaves. 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. He took action to raise the voices of others and to aid their work on the national stage, especially that of two Black women in the last half of the 19th century. 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. These wretched people are to be sold singly, or in lots, to suit purchasers. Douglass referred not only to the captivity of enslaved people, but to the merciless exploitation and the cruelty and torture that slaves were subjected to in the United States. 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! These men were generally well dressed men, and very captivating in their manners. [20]:346 To prove evidence of these inconsistencies, as one historian noted, during the speech Douglass claims that the United States Constitution is an abolitionist document and not a pro-slavery document.[22][23][24]. PDF. Senator Berrien tell us that the Constitution is the fundamental law, that which controls all others. This is the inevitable conclusion, and from it there is no escape. He thinks they were extremely intelligent, and the thinks it is admirable that when they realized they were oppressed by Britain, they rebelled. This Fourth [of] July is yours, not mine. 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. It is the birthday of your National Independence, and of your political freedom. Worksheet Excerpt Analyzing Rhetorical Devices in "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?": 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. More than 150 years later, Keidrick Roy, a doctoral student in American Studies at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and a U.S. Air Force veteran, will host a virtual community reading and discussion of the storied speech at the Somerville Museum on Thursday as part of the annual state-wide MassHumanities program Reading Frederick Douglass Together.. What is this but the acknowledgement that the slave is a moral, intellectual and responsible being? 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. 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. He refers to the Constitution as a "Glorious Liberty Document". As the champions of oppressors, the chosen men of American theology have appearedmen, honored for their so-called piety, and their real learning. In a Fourth of July holiday special, we begin with the words of Frederick Douglass. My subject, then fellow-citizens, is AMERICAN SLAVERY. Oceans no longer divide, but link nations together. The country can progress like it has before, transforming from being a colony of a far-away king to an independent nation. 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! Her speed had faltered under the weight of her child and her chains! 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. Would you have me argue that man is entitled to liberty? It was fashionable, hundreds of years ago, for the children of Jacob to boast, we have Abraham to our father, when they had long lost Abrahams faith and spirit. The Fugitive Slave Law makes mercy to them a crime; and bribes the judge who tries them. According to this fact, you are, even now, only in the beginning of your national career, still lingering in the period of childhood. R, R. Raymond) on the platform, are shining examples; and let me say further, that upon these men lies the duty to inspire our ranks with high religious faith and zeal, and to cheer us on in the great mission of the slaves redemption from his chains.One is struck with the difference between the attitude of the American church towards the anti-slavery movement, and that occupied by the churches in England towards a similar movement in that country. The speech has since been published under the above title in The Frederick Douglass Papers, Series One, Vol. Your fathers esteemed the English Government as the home government; and England as the fatherland. It esteems sacrifice above mercy; psalm-singing above right doing; solemn meetings above practical righteousness. And instead of being the honest men I have before declared them to be, they were the veriest imposters that ever practiced on mankind. In several states, this trade is a chief source of wealth. 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. What point in the anti-slavery creed would you have me argue? 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 charter of our liberties, which every citizen has a personal interest in understanding thoroughly. I hold that every American citizen has a fight to form an opinion of the constitution, and to propagate that opinion, and to use all honorable means to make his opinion the prevailing one. Table of Contents. Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? Mark the sad procession, as it moves wearily along, and the inhuman wretch who drives them. By that most foul and fiendish of all human decrees, the liberty and person of every man are put in peril. 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. He can bring no witnesses for himself. Now, there are certain rules of interpretation, for the proper understanding of all legal instruments. The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice, are not enjoyed in common. There is consolation in the thought that America is young. 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, and not a vital principle, requiring active benevolence, justice, love and good will towards man. Your fathers were wise men, and if they did not go mad, they became restive under this treatment. Three score years and ten is the allotted time for individual men; but nations number their years by thousands. 5.0. The manhood of the slave is conceded. He was fortunate to have been taught to read by his slave owner mistress, and he would go on to become one of the major literary figures of his time. The eye of the reformer is met with angry flashes, portending disastrous times; but his heart may well beat lighter at the thought that America is young, and that she is still in the impressible stage of her existence. See this drove sold and separated forever; and never forget the deep, sad sobs that arose from that scattered multitude. Wind, steam, and lightning are its chartered agents. [3] In the address, Douglass states that positive statements about American values, such as liberty, citizenship, and freedom, were an offense to the enslaved population of the United States because they lacked those rights. Frederick Douglass delivered his famous speech at the Corinthian Hall in Rochester, NY, on July. 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. The Oratory of Fr. He describes the legislation as "tyrannical," and believes that it is in "violation of justice.". 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. In the language of Isaiah, the American church might be well addressed, Bring no more vain ablations; incense is an abomination unto me: the new moons and Sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with; it is iniquity even the solemn meeting. The accepted time with God and his cause is the ever-living now. 2. Summary of Part 1:In part one of the speech "What to a Slave is the Fourth of July", Fredrick Douglass. There was, at that time, a grand slave mart kept at the head of Pratt Street, by Austin Woldfolk. But I differ from those who charge this baseness on the framers of the Constitution of the United States. 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. There are illustrations of it near and remote, ancient and modern. The time was when such could be done. 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. And it also imposed severe penalties on anyone who helped enslaved people to escape. You have no right to wear out and waste the hard-earned fame of your fathers to cover your indolence. Douglass equates this to being worse than many other things that are banned, in particular, books and plays that are banned for infidelity. You shed tears over fallen Hungary, and make the sad story of her wrongs the theme of your poets, statesmen and orators, till your gallant sons are ready to fly to arms to vindicate her cause against her oppressors; but, in regard to the ten thousand wrongs of the American slave, you would enforce the strictest silence, and would hail him as an enemy of the nation who dares to make those wrongs the subject of public discourse! 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. Keidrick Roy, the host of the virtual reading event. 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. The far off and almost fabulous Pacific rolls in grandeur at our feet. What to a Slave is the Fourth of July Frederick Douglass Fredrick speech. It was demanded, in the name of humanity, and according to the law of the living God. There, see the old man, with locks thinned and gray. That point is conceded already. 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. It is carried on in all the large towns and cities in one-half of this confederacy; and millions are pocketed every year, by dealers in this horrid traffic. They are a trouble to me; I am weary to bear them; and when ye spread forth your hands I will hide mine eyes from you. The 'Address' may be had at this office, price ten cents, a single copy, or six dollars per hundred. Did this law concern the mint, anise, and cuminabridge the fight to sing psalms, to partake of the sacrament, or to engage in any of the ceremonies of religion, it would be smitten by the thunder of a thousand pulpits. Youll never experience a black hole, but Avi Loeb can help you imagine one, We need individual events like reading Douglass, but we also need to be thinking about ways to extend this conversation over the long term., Level of cannabis use could determine post-op outcomes, Historian says Fla. dispute shows why AP class in African American studies is needed, Why Church Committee alums urged new House panel to avoid partisanship, What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?, Rewriting history to include all of it this time. They petitioned and remonstrated; they did so in a decorous, respectful, and loyal manner. But, with that blindness which seems to be the unvarying characteristic of tyrants, since Pharaoh and his hosts were drowned in the Red Sea. . 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. But a still more inhuman, disgraceful, and scandalous state of things remains to be presented. Nevertheless, Douglass claims that this can change. [6] Due to this and the variant titles given to it in various places, and the fact that it is called a July Fourth Oration but was actually delivered on July 5, some confusion has arisen about the date and contents of the speech. One small step toward understanding gravity, Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is. Who can reason on such a proposition? But a change has now come over the affairs of mankind. Per hundred on anyone who helped enslaved people to escape Jerusalem, let my right hand forget cunning! Have no right to wear out and waste the hard-earned fame of your fathers cover! 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Most foul and fiendish of all human decrees, the liberty and person of man! Remonstrated ; they did so in a Fourth of July holiday special, we begin with the of. Then fellow-citizens, is wrong had at this office, price ten cents, a single copy, or dollars! Slave mart kept at the head of Pratt Street, by asking me to speak to-day `` violation of.. Esteems sacrifice above mercy ; psalm-singing above right doing ; solemn meetings above practical righteousness the hard-earned of.
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