Is it that slavery is not divine; that God did not establish it; that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? An American judge gets ten dollars for every victim he con signs to slavery, and five, when he fails to do so. 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.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.At the very moment that they are thanking God for the enjoyment of civil and religious liberty, and for the right to worship God according to the dictates of their own consciences, they are utterly silent in respect to a law which robs religion of its chief significance, and makes it utterly worthless to a world lying in wickedness. This is the inevitable conclusion, and from it there is no escape. It is the birthday of your National Independence, and of your political freedom. What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? 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. The feeling of the nation must be quickened; the conscience of the nation must be roused; the propriety of the nation must be startled; the hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed; and its crimes against God and man must be proclaimed and denounced.What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? 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. Read its preamble, consider its purposes. The Sharps, the Clarksons, the Wilberforces, the Buxtons, and Burchells and the Knibbs, were alike famous for their piety, and for their philanthropy. 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. It is called (in contradistinction to the foreign slave-trade) the internal slave trade. It is, probably, called so, too, in order to divert from it the horror with which the foreign slave-trade is contemplated. 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. Many of its most eloquent Divines. Would you argue more, and denounce less, would you persuade more, and rebuke less, your cause would be much more likely to succeed. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth. There are forces in operation, which must inevitably work The downfall of slavery. But the 1852 "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" speech remains the best known of his addresses on the occasion, especially as it became even more widely read in the late-20th century,. You discourse eloquently on the dignity of labor; yet, you sustain a system which, in its very essence, casts a stigma upon labor. that he is the rightful owner of his own body? (3) $3.99. You have no right to wear out and waste the hard-earned fame of your fathers to cover your indolence. But I differ from those who charge this baseness on the framers of the Constitution of the United States. I have better employments for my time and strength than such arguments would imply.What, then, remains to be argued? ROY: The event that were doing in Somerville puts pressure on whitewashed conceptions of the Fourth of July, as many people to this day still view it as a celebration of American food, fireworks, and freedom. The subject has been handled with masterly power by Lysander Spooner, Esq., by William Goodell, by Samuel E. Sewall, Esq., and last, though not least, by Gerritt Smith, Esq. Ex-Senator Benton tells us that the price of men was never higher than now. Panel on dispossession of African Americans says burying truth keeps Black Americans dispossessed, Legal scholar and historian puts the push to remove Confederate statues in context, Members of the community share memories, plans, hopes for the holiday, Quantum computing simulation reveals possible wormhole-like dynamics. They felt themselves the victims of grievous wrongs, wholly incurable in their colonial capacity. What is now known as the "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" speech was delivered on July 5, 1852 as an address to the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society in Rochester, New York. Douglass then returns to the topic of the founding of the United States. Your fathers have lived, died, and have done their work, and have done much of it well. dismay. After this, he turns his attention to the church. 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? In a Fourth of July holiday special, we hear the words of Frederick Douglass. "Meaning of the Fourth of July to a Negro" by Bridget Durham The Fourth of July is a day of celebration for many Americans because on July 4th, 1776, America declared independence from Britain and said that everyone was free under the US government, right? We need individual events like reading Douglass, but we also need to be thinking about ways to extend this conversation over the long term. Long established customs of hurtful character could formerly fence themselves in, and do their evil work with social impunity. Douglass equates this to being worse than many other things that are banned, in particular, books and plays that are banned for infidelity. by Frederick Douglass 1852 11th Grade Lexile: 1140 Font Size Frederick Douglass (1818-1895) was an African American social reformer, orator, and writer. 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. What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? 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. What would be thought of an instrument, drawn up, legally drawn up, for the purpose of entitling the city of Rochester to a track of land, in which no mention of land was made? Repetition Parallel structure ethos pathos Analogy Simile/Metaphor Rhetorical Question logos Part 2 - Slavery in America Fellow citizens, pardon me, and allow me to ask, why am I called uponto speak here today? The little experience I have had in addressing public meetings, in country schoolhouses, avails me nothing on the present occasion. Summary of Part 1:In part one of the speech "What to a Slave is the Fourth of July", Fredrick Douglass. 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. Yea! We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. Ex-Vice-President Dallas tells us that the Constitution is an object to which no American mind can be too attentive, and no American heart too devoted. In a case like that, the dumb might eloquently speak, and the lame man leap as an hart.But, such is not the state of the case. There, see the old man, with locks thinned and gray. $ 3.60. 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 occasion was the Society's Fourth of July celebration, but Douglass refused to give the speech on July 4; he would not celebrate the holiday so long as African Americans remained enslaved. 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. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth.Fellow-citizens; above your national, tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions! [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]. If I do forget, if I do not faithfully 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! To forget them, to pass lightly over their wrongs, and to chime in with the popular theme, would be treason most scandalous and shocking, and would make me a reproach before God and the world. 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. What to the American slave is your Fourth of July? Frederick Douglass delivered his famous speech at the Corinthian Hall in Rochester, NY, on July. Douglass then discusses the internal slave trade in America. It has been denounced with burning words, from the high places of the nation, as an execrable traffic. In this collection, students will review the life of Frederick Douglass and learn about one of his most famous speeches, "The Meaning of Fourth of July for the Negro" (it is also commonly referred to as "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July). . [16][17] Finally, the Act did not allow the accused individual of defending themselves in court. How can we sing the Lords song in a strange land? Douglass was a former slave of the 19th century and soon became a leader during the Abolitionist Movement. The arm of the Lord is not shortened, and the doom of slavery is certain. "[1][2] was a speech delivered by Frederick Douglass on July 5, 1852, at Corinthian Hall in Rochester, New York, at a meeting organized by the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society. The United States does not have to stay the way it is. Text Frederick Douglass, " What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? Nevertheless, Douglass claims that this can change. From the round top of your ship of state, dark and threatening clouds may be seen. 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. One of the parts of the speech that resonates with me the most is when Douglass says: What, to the American slave, is your 4th 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. And it also imposed severe penalties on anyone who helped enslaved people to escape. He implored the Rochester, N.Y., audience to think about the ongoing oppression of Black Americans during a holiday celebrating . Alison Drasner, the project coordinator for the Somerville Museum, teamed up with Dave Ortega at the Somerville Media Center to prerecord voices of 50 Somerville residents, including my 7-year-old daughter, Charlotte, to read sections of the speech. But we also need to invest as a city and as a society into reading and learning more about the present realities of oppressed peoples. 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. 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. your republican politics, not less than your republican religion, are flagrantly inconsistent. However, if slavery were abolished and equal rights given to all, that would no longer be the case. 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. They hate all changes, but silver, gold and copper change! 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