"An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage" | Library of Congress If these bless them, they are blest indeed; but if these blast them, they are blasted indeed. But upon none of these things is reliance placed. A. to ask that African Americans be permitted to be members of Congress B. to warn that southern states are planning for a second rebellion C. to persuade Congress to extend voting rights to freed slaves Plainly enough, the peace not less than the prosperity of this country is involved in the great measure of impartial suffrage. But no such appeal shall be relied on here. The dreadful calamities of the past few years came not by accident, nor unbidden, from the ground. It is no less a crime against the manhood of a man, to declare that he shall not share in the making and directing of the government under which he lives, than to say that he shall not acquire property and education. An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage by Frederick Douglass An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage was published in the Atlantic Monthly, Issue 19, January 1867, pp. If black men have no rights in the eyes of white men, of course the white can have none in the eyes of the blacks. High School US History Reading - Slavery's Last Gasp Under the potent shield of State Rights, the game would be in their own hands. The South fought for perfect and permanent control over the Southern laborer. Peace to the country has literally meant war to the loyal men of the South, white and black; and negro suffrage is the measure to arrest and put an end to that dreadful strife. Can that statesmanship be wise which would leave the negro good ground to hesitate, when the exigencies of the country required his prompt assistance? Masses of men can take care of themselves. It was a war of the rich against the poor. Congress must supplant the evident sectional tendencies of the South by national dispositions and tendencies. From "Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage" How does Douglass support his claim that African Americans have rendered a "score of past services" to the United States? You shudder to-day at the harvest of blood sown in the spring-time of the Republic by your patriot fathers. It is to save the people of the South from themselves, and the nation from detriment on their account. BlackPast.org is a 501(c)(3) non-profit and our EIN is 26-1625373. In 1867 Frederick Douglass, noted abolitionist and civil rights leader, weighed in on one of the most contentious issues of the day, suffrage for black men following the Civil War. But why are the Southerners so willing to make these sacrifices? In a word, it must enfranchise the negro, and by means of the loyal negroes and the loyal white men of the South build up a national party there, and in time bridge the chasm between North and South, so that our country may have a common liberty and a common civilization. Slaves--Emancipation, - Is not Austria wise in removing all ground of complaint against her on the part of Hungary? It will swallow all the unconstitutional test oaths, repeal all the ordinances of Secession, repudiate the Rebel debt, promise to pay the debt incurred in conquering its people, pass all the constitutional amendments, if only it can have the negro left under its political control. Disfranchise them, and the mark of Cain is set upon them less mercifully than upon the first murderer, for no man was to hurt him. Citizenship Paper. Massachusetts and South Carolina may draw tears from the eyes of our tender-hearted President by walking arm in arm into his Philadelphia Convention, but a citizen of Massachusetts is still an alien in the Palmetto State. Loyalty is hardly safe with traitors. o " We have crushed the Rebellion, but not its hopes or its malign purposes. Once firmly seated in Congress, their alliance with Northern Democrats re-established, their States restored to their former position inside the Union, they can easily find means of keeping the Federal government entirely too busy with other important matters to pay much attention to the local affairs of the Southern States. Does any sane man doubt for a moment that the men who followed Jefferson Davis through the late terrible Rebellion, often marching barefooted and hungry, naked and penniless, and who now only profess an enforced loyalty, would plunge this country into a foreign war to-day, if they could thereby gain their coveted independence, and their still more coveted mastery over the negroes? 'Adobe Photoshop CS3 Windows 2010:08:10 15:03:38 & | &( . It early mastered the Constitution, became superior to the Union, and enthroned itself above the law. Credit Line: Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress, More about Copyright and other Restrictions. King Cotton is deposed, but only deposed, and is ready to-day to reassert all his ancient pretensions upon the first favorable opportunity. the repetition of words in successive clauses in reverse grammatical order. Read the next essay; It will tell how they forded and swam rivers, with what consummate address they evaded the sharp-eyed Rebel pickets, how they toiled in the darkness of night through the tangled marshes of briers and thorns, barefooted and weary, running the risk of losing their lives, to warn our generals of Rebel schemes to surprise and destroy our loyal army. Nor can we afford to endure the moral blight which the existence of a degraded and hated class must necessarily inflict upon any people among whom such a class may exist. SURVEY. The South fought for perfect and permanent control over the Southern laborer. Their history is parallel to that of the country; but while the history of the latter has been cheerful and bright with blessings, theirs has been heavy and dark with agonies and curses. Though the battle is for the present lost, the hope of gaining this object still exists, and pervades the whole South with a feverish excitement. It is no less a crime against the manhood of a man, to declare that he shall not share in the making and directing of the government under which he lives, than to say that he shall not acquire property and education. Under the potent shield of State Rights, the game would be in their own hands. The work of destruction has already been set in motion all over the South. The principle of slavery, which they tolerated under the erroneous impression that it would soon die out, became at last the dominant principle and power at the South. It is true that they fought side by side in the loyal cause with our gallant and patriotic white soldiers, and that, but for their help,divided as the loyal States were,the Rebels might have succeeded in breaking up the Union, thereby entailing border wars and troubles of unknown duration and incalculable calamity. Garrison, William Lloyd, 1805-1879--Correspondence, - African Americans--Washington (D.C.), - Can that statesmanship be wise which would leave the negro good ground to hesitate, when the exigencies of the country required his prompt assistance? her fellow suffragettes. He is a man, and by every fact and argument by which any man can sustain his right to vote, the negro can sustain his right equally. To make peace with our enemies is all well enough; but to prefer our enemies and sacrifice our friends, to exalt our enemies and cast down our friends, to clothe our enemies, who sought the destruction of the government, with all political power, and leave our friends powerless in their hands, is an act which need not be characterized here. JFIF H H Exif MM * b j( 1 r2 i Do you find this information helpful? Image 1 of Frederick Douglass Papers: Speech, Article, and Book File, 1846-1894; Speeches, Articles, and Other Writings Attributed to Frederick or Helen Pitts Douglass, 1881-1887; "An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage," 1881. 112-117. This evil principle again seeks admission into our body politic. <> stream Douglass, Joseph H. (Joseph Henry), 1871-1935, - We want the cheerful activity of the quickened manhood of these sable millions. It is nothing against this reasoning that all men who vote are not good men or good citizens. . by noting that the economy has greatly benefited from African- Americans' labor . by citing the community improvements that have resulted from African-Americans' charitable activities Give the negro the elective franchise, and you give him at once a powerful motive for all noble exertion, and make him a man among men. Besides, the disabilities imposed upon all are necessarily without that bitter and stinging element of invidiousness which attaches to disfranchisement in a republic. The South does not now ask for slavery. The South will comply with any conditions but suffrage for the negro. H H JFIF H H Adobe_CM Adobe d The doctrine that some men have no rights that others are bound to respect is a doctrine which we must banish, as we have banished slavery, from which it emanated. The soil is in readiness, and the seed-time has come. Hardships, services, sufferings, and sacrifices are all waived. If the doctrine that taxation should go hand in hand with representation can be appealed to in behalf of recent traitors and rebels, may it not properly be asserted in behalf of a people who have ever been loyal and faithful to the government? <> Civil rights, - Freedom of speech and of the press it slowly but successfully banished from the South, dictated its own code of honor and manners to the nation, brandished the bludgeon and the bowie-knife over Congressional debate, sapped the foundations of loyalty, dried up the springs of patriotism, blotted out the testimonies of the fathers against oppression, padlocked the pulpit, expelled liberty from its literature, invented nonsensical theories about master-races and slave-races of men, and in due season produced a Rebellion fierce, foul, and bloody. Plainly enough, the peace not less than the prosperity of this country is involved in the great measure of impartial suffrage. The answer plainly is, they see in this policy the only hope of saving something of their old sectional peculiarities and power. The South will comply with any conditions but suffrage for the negro. From "Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage" - Brainly The fundamental and unanswerable argument in favor of the enfranchisement of the negro is found in the undisputed fact of his manhood. Men are so constituted that they largely derive their ideas of their abilities and their possibilities from the settled judgments of their fellow-men, and especially from such as they read in the institutions under which they live. Manuscript/Mixed Material. 1 0 obj Man is the only government-making animal in the world. Though the battle is for the present lost, the hope of gaining this object still exists, and pervades the whole South with a feverish excitement. For in respect to this grand measure it is the good fortune of the negro that enlightened selfishness, not less than justice, fights on his side. It is true that they came to the relief of the country at the hour of its extremest need. But why are the Southerners so willing to make these sacrifices? Statesmen, beware what you do. (1867) Frederick Douglass, "Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage" ' Look across the sea. End of preview Upload your study docs or become a member. An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage "Statesmen, beware what you do. While nothing may be urged here as to the past services of the negro, it is quite within the line of this appeal to remind the nation of the possibility that a time may come when the services of the negro may be a second time required. PDF An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffr age - ortn.edu What does the following sentence from the essay An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage by Frederick Douglas depict Impartial history will paint them as men who deserved well of their country It will tell how they forded and swam rivers with what consummate address they evaded the sharp eyed Rebel pickets how they toiled in the darkness of The last and shrewdest turn of Southern politics is a recognition of the necessity of getting into Congress immediately, and at any price. Richardson family--Correspondence, - But in a country like ours, where men of all nations, kindred, and tongues are freely enfranchised, and allowed to vote, to say to the negro, You shall not vote, is to deal his manhood a staggering blow, and to burn into his soul a bitter and goading sense of wrong, or else work in him a stupid indifference to all the elements of a manly character. or will you profit by the blood-bought wisdom all round you, and forever expel every vestige of the old abomination from our national borders? Douglass, Frederick. While nothing may be urged here as to the past services of the negro, it is quite within the line of this appeal to remind the nation of the possibility that a time may come when the services of the negro may be a second time required. The new wine must be put into new bottles. It is plain that, if the right belongs to any, it belongs to all. It may be "traced like a wounded man through a crowd, by the blood." An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage Frederick Douglass. Was not the nation stronger when two hundred thousand sable soldiers were hurled against the Rebel fortifications, than it would have been without them? Statesmen of America! An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage - The Atlantic Strong as we are, we need the energy that slumbers in the black mans arm to make us stronger. It is true that they came to the relief of the country at the hour of its extremest need. To appreciate the full force of this argument, it must be observed, that disfranchisement in a republican government based upon the idea of human equality and universal suffrage, is a very different thing from disfranchisement in governments based upon the idea of the divine right of kings, or the entire subjugation of the masses. They fought the government, not because they hated the government as such, but because they found it, as they thought, in the way between them and their one grand purpose of rendering permanent and indestructible their authority and power over the Southern laborer. It only asks for a large degraded caste, which shall have no political rights. These facts speak to the better dispositions of the human heart; but they seem of little weight with the opponents of impartial suffrage. An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage by Frederick Douglass A very limited statement of the argu-ment for impartial suffrage, and for including the negro in the body politic, would require more space than can be reasonably asked here. Nations, not less than individuals, reap as they sow. The dreadful calamities of the past few years came not by accident, nor unbidden, from the ground. Address to Congress on Women's Suffrage - Quizizz Besides, the disabilities imposed upon all are necessarily without that bitter and stinging element of invidiousness which attaches to disfranchisement in a republic. It comes now in shape of a denial of political rights to four million loyal colored people. It is supported by reasons as broad as the nature of man, and as numerous as the wants of society. Frederick Douglass: An Appeal To Congress For Impartial Suffrage 753 Words | 4 Pages. Exclude the negroes as a class from political rights,teach them that the high and manly privilege of suffrage is to be enjoyed by white citizens only, that they may bear the burdens of the state, but that they are to have no part in its direction or its honors,and you at once deprive them of one of the main incentives to manly character and patriotic devotion to the interests of the government; in a word, you stamp them as a degraded caste,you teach them to despise themselves, and all others to despise them. appeal to moderate voters despite the parties' ideological orientation. King Cotton is deposed, but only deposed, and is ready to-day to reassert all his ancient pretensions upon the first favorable opportunity. Foreign countries abound with his agents. Nations, not less than individuals, reap as they sow. Casting aside all thought of justice and magnanimity, is it wise to impose upon the negro all the burdens involved in sustaining government against foes within and foes without, to make him equal sharer in all sacrifices for the public good, to tax him in peace and conscript him in war, and then coldly exclude him from the ballot-box? Give the negro the elective franchise, and you at once destroy the purely sectional policy, and wheel the Southern States into line with national interests and national objects. My Escape from Slavery. The fundamental and unanswerable argument in favor of the enfranchisement of the negro is found in the undisputed fact of his manhood. But upon none of these things is reliance placed. Statesmen, beware what you do. Give the negro the elective franchise, and you at once destroy the purely sectional policy, and wheel the Southern States into line with national interests and national objects. The answers to these questions are too obvious to require statement. Douglass, Anna Murray, -1882, - The fundamental and unanswerable argument in favor of the enfranchisement of the negro is found in the undisputed fact of his manhood. Reconstruction, and an Appeal to Impartial Suffrage Loyalty is hardly safe with traitors. Here they are, four millions of them, and, for weal or for woe, here they must remain. Foreign countries abound with his agents. It comes now in shape of a denial of political rights to four million loyal colored people. Review Us. You have read "An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage" by It must cease to recognize the old slave-masters as the only competent persons to rule the South. It may be traced like a wounded man through a crowd, by the blood. Yet the negroes have marvelously survived all the exterminating forces of slavery, and have emerged at the end of two hundred and fifty years of bondage, not morose, misanthropic, and revengeful, but cheerful, hopeful, and forgiving. And does not the Emperor of Russia act wisely, as well as generously, when he not only breaks up the bondage of the serf, but extends him all the advantages of Russian citizenship? Statesmen of America! Which of the following sentences from the essay "An Appeal - Kunduz These sable millions are too powerful to be allowed to remain either indifferent or discontented. There is something immeasurably mean, to say nothing of the cruelty, in placing the loyal negroes of the South under the political power of their Rebel masters. Caption title. The new wine must be put into new bottles. Is the present movement in England in favor of manhood suffragefor the purpose of bringing four millions of British subjects into full sympathy and co-operation with the British governmenta wise and humane movement, or otherwise? But no such appeal shall be relied on here. Can that statesmanship be wise which would leave the negro good ground to hesitate, when the exigencies of the country required his prompt assistance? His address, given in January 1867 in Washington, D.C., during the Congressional debate on black Read More(1867) Frederick Douglass, "Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage" 104 104. Is Ireland, in her present condition, fretful, discontented, compelled to support an establishment in which she does not believe, and which the vast majority of her people abhor, a source of power or of weakness to Great Britain? Statesmen of America! History is said to repeat itself, and, if so, having wanted the negro once, we may want him again. They who waged it had no objection to the government, while they could use it as a means of confirming their power over the laborer. But no such an appeal shall be relied on here. There is something immeasurably mean, to say nothing of the cruelty, in placing the loyal negroes of the South under the political power of their Rebel masters. Does any sane man doubt for a moment that the men who followed Jefferson Davis through the late terrible Rebellion, often marching barefooted and hungry, naked and penniless, and who now only profess an enforced loyalty, would plunge this country into a foreign war to-day, if they could thereby gain their coveted independence, and their still more coveted mastery over the negroes? Arming the negro was an urgent military necessity three years ago,--are we sure that another quite as pressing may not await us? You shudder to-day at the harvest of blood sown in the spring-time of the Republic by your patriot fathers. Frederick Douglass Papers: Speech, Article, and Book File, -1894; Speeches, Articles, and Other Writings Attributed to Frederick or Helen Pitts Douglass, 1881 to 1887; "An Appeal to Congress for Impartial Suffrage," 1881. the members of congress. A character is demanded of him, and here as elsewhere demand favors supply. In fact, all the elements of treason and rebellion are there under the thinnest disguise which necessity can impose. It will tell how these poor people, whose rights we still despised, behaved to our wounded soldiers, when found cold, hungry, and bleeding on the deserted battle-field; how they assisted our escaping prisoners from Andersonville, Belle Isle, Castle Thunder, and elsewhere, sharing with them their wretched crusts, and otherwise affording them aid and comfort; how they promptly responded to the trumpet call for their services, fighting against a foe that denied them the rights of civilized warfare, and for a government which was without the courage to assert those rights and avenge their violation in their behalf; with what gallantry they flung themselves upon Rebel fortifications, meeting death as fearlessly as any other troops in the service.