Frederick Douglass

On this 4th of July weekend, I'd like to actually post a speech that Frederick Douglass gave about Abraham Lincoln on April 14, 1876. I think it's in keeping with our election year and in keeping with one of the roles of a true patriot: to help our nation live up to its highest ideals. An excerpt first from the book "Douglass and Lincoln : how a revolutionary black leader and a reluctant liberator struggled to end slavery and save the Union" by Paul Kendrick and Stephen Kendrick:

"In the most inciscive estimation of Lincoln that Douglass was ever to make, the speaker reminded his audience that at the time of the beginning of the war, abolitionists (including Douglass) had seen him as 'tardy, cold, dull, and indifferent,' but when Douglass measured him against the rest of the coutnry at the time, Lincoln was 'swift, zealous, radical, and determined.' Douglass now fully understood what Lincoln had gone through, balancing public opinion and justice.

In the end, Douglass's people had come to love this president, and for a simple reason: 'We came to the conclusion that the hour and the man of our redemption has somehow met in the person of Abraham Lincoln.'