During the Civil War, Douglass said that since Massachusetts had been the first state to join the Patriot cause during the American Revolutionary War, black men should go to Massachusetts to enlist in the Union Army. GAZETTE: This is your second year as host of Reading Frederick Douglass Together in Somerville. 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. These ministers make religion a cold and flinty-hearted thing, having neither principles of right action, nor bowels of compassion. a horrible reptile is coiled up in your nations bosom; the venomous creature is nursing at the tender breast of your youthful republic; for the love of God, tear away, and fling from you the hideous monster, and let the weight of twenty millions crush and destroy it forever!But it is answered in reply to all this, that precisely what I have now denounced is, in fact, guaranteed and sanctioned by the Constitution of the United States; that the right to hold and to hunt slaves is a part of that Constitution framed by the illustrious Fathers of this Republic.Then, I dare to affirm, notwithstanding all I have said before, your fathers stooped, basely stooped. They may also rise in wrath and fury, and bear away, on their angry waves, the accumulated wealth of years of toil and hardship. 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. So its important that our city and our society are outraged by the recent murders of unarmed black people. It is a religion for oppressors, tyrants, man-stealers, and thugs. The iron shoe, and crippled foot of China must be seen, in contrast with nature. Assignment in book chapter School Alief Early College High School Course English language and literature (ELL2002) Uploaded by God Academic year2021/2022 Helpful? The 4th of July is the first great fact in your nations historythe very ring-bolt in the chain of your yet undeveloped destiny. I will not equivocate; I will not excuse;. 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. It has made itself the bulwark of American slavery, and the shield of American slave-hunters. Born into slavery around 1818, Douglass became a key leader of the abolitionist. Great for your high school American Literature class. Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. In the solitude of my spirit, I see clouds of dust raised on the highways of the South; I see the bleeding footsteps; I hear the doleful wail of fettered humanity, on the way to the slave-markets, where the victims are to be sold like horses, sheep, and swine, knocked off to the highest bidder. What to the American slave is your Fourth of July? By an act of the American Congress, not yet two years old, Mason and Dixons line has been obliterated, Did this law concern the mint, anise, and cumin. 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. Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? ARI . That point is conceded already. 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. The right of the hunter to his prey stands superior to the right of marriage, and to all rights in this republic, the rights of God included! 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? Your fathers were wise men, and if they did not go mad, they became restive under this treatment. He talks about how Americans are proud of their country and their religion and how they rejoice in the name of freedom and liberty and yet they do not offer those things to millions of their country's residents. What to the Slave is the Fourth of July | Historical Context The Colonial regime paved way for the transportation of slaves from different parts of the world, mostly from the African continent to work in southern states of America on cash crop plantations that generated a great source of income. "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? The slaveholders themselves acknowledge it in the enactment of laws for their government. Fellow-citizens, pardon me, allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here to-day? [16] Additionally, it awarded $10 to a judge who sentenced an individual to return to enslavement, while awarding only $5 if the claim was dismissed. one of the most important speeches of the 19th century? The well-known speech was previously known as The Meaning of July the Fourth for the Negro. Later, the speech was re-titled based on Douglasss question, What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July?. Is slavery among them? The fiat of the Almighty, Let there be Light, has not yet spent its force. The Oratory of Fr. No nation can now shut itself up from the surrounding world, and trot round in the same old path of its fathers without interference. we wept when we remembered Zion. It is said that America is built on the idea of liberty and freedom, but Douglass tells his audience that more than anything, it is built on inconsistencies and hypocrisies that have been overlooked for so long they appear to be truths. Where these are, man is not sacred. In the end, Douglass wants to keep his hope and faith in humanity high. 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? be warned! Creative people have bypassed gatekeepers for centuries to distribute what they wanted to share so badly. They find common ground in Houghton Library exhibition. I will show you a man-drover. 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. Many of its most eloquent Divines. Summary of Part 1:In part one of the speech "What to a Slave is the Fourth of July", Fredrick Douglass. Seventy-six years, though a good old age for a man, is but a mere speck in the life of a nation. He argues that the Constitution does not permit slavery, contrary to the claims of contemporary defenders of the institution. welcome atheism! This act forced citizens to report people who had escaped their enslavement and escaped to a free state, under punishment of a fine or imprisonment. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. Rhetoricians R. L. Heath and D. Waymer refer to this as the "paradox of the positive" because it highlights how something positive and meant to be positive can also exclude individuals. 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. He can bring no witnesses for himself. 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. In this respect, Douglass's views converged with that of Abraham Lincoln's[25] in that those politicians who were saying that the Constitution was a justification for their beliefs in regard to slavery were doing so dishonestly. [9][10] He had previously lived in Boston, but did not want his newspaper to interfere with sales of The Liberator, published by William Lloyd Garrison. What characteristics does he praise about them? 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. 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. [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]. Frederick Douglass delivered his famous speech at the Corinthian Hall in Rochester, NY, on July. 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). But a change has now come over the affairs of mankind. whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are, to-day, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee shouts that reach them. What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? But it is answered in reply to all this, that precisely what I have now denounced is, in fact, guaranteed and sanctioned by the Constitution of the United States; that the right to hold and to hunt slaves is a part of that Constitution framed by the illustrious Fathers of this Republic. [12], According to the 1850 Census, there were around 3.2 million enslaved persons in the United States. Douglass believed that slavery could be eliminated with the support of the church, and also with the reexamination of what the Bible was actually saying. Some of these have had wives and children, dependent on them for bread; but of this, no account was made. 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. 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