Frederick Douglass Pens Letter to Harriet Beecher Stowe

"The most killing refutation of slavery is the presentation of an industrious, enterprising, thrifty and intelligent free black population." (Frederick Douglass)

In March of 1853, escaped slave Frederick Douglass penned a letter to fellow escaped slave Harriet Beecher Stowe regarding the plight of blacks in the United States.  Mrs. Stowe had just written and published a little book called Uncle Tom's Cabin which would lay the groundwork for the Civil War less than a decade later.  (For more information about Uncle Tom's Cabin, visit http://alinefromlinda.blogspot.ca/2012/03/uncle-toms-cabin.html.

Mr. Douglass opened his letter with:  "You kindly informed me...that you designed to do something which should permanently contribute to the improvement and elevation of the free colored peopled in the United States."  He went on to describe the social disease that blacks of his era suffered from:  "poverty, ignorance and degradation". (http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/letter-to-harriet-beecher-stowe/)

Mr. Douglass explained that the only way that blacks could conquer the disease was to be put on an equal footing with whites, "in the sacred right to the pursuit of life, liberty and the pursuit happiness." He challenged Mrs. Stowe by saying;  "You dear madam can help the masses...by lifting these from the depths of poverty and ignorance...prejudice is a bar to the educated black among the whites; and ignorance is a bar to him among blacks." 

Frederick Douglass pointed out that America had three black lawyers at the time, but it was not near enough.  Furthermore, whites refused to employ them and blacks followed the lead of the whites.  Mr. Douglass announced that his master plan to improve the lot of the blacks was to open an industrial college.  As he concluded:  "...the most killing refutation of slavery is the presentation of an industrious, enterprising, thrifty and intelligent free black population."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Douglass

*This post was first published in 2015.

Frederick Douglass Pens Letter to Harriet Beecher Stowe

"The most killing refutation of slavery is the presentation of an industrious, enterprising, thrifty and intelligent free black population." (Frederick Douglass)

In March of 1853, escaped slave Frederick Douglass penned a letter to fellow escaped slave Harriet Beecher Stowe regarding the plight of blacks in the United States.  Mrs. Stowe had just written and published a little book called Uncle Tom's Cabin which would lay the groundwork for the Civil War less than a decade later.  (For more information about Uncle Tom's Cabin, visit http://alinefromlinda.blogspot.ca/2012/03/uncle-toms-cabin.html.

Mr. Douglass opened his letter with:  "You kindly informed me...that you designed to do something which should permanently contribute to the improvement and elevation of the free colored peopled in the United States."  He went on to describe the social disease that blacks of his era suffered from:  "poverty, ignorance and degradation". (http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/letter-to-harriet-beecher-stowe/)

Mr. Douglass explained that the only way that blacks could conquer the disease was to be put on an equal footing with whites, "in the sacred right to the pursuit of life, liberty and the pursuit happiness." He challenged Mrs. Stowe by saying;  "You dear madam can help the masses...by lifting these from the depths of poverty and ignorance...prejudice is a bar to the educated black among the whites; and ignorance is a bar to him among blacks." 

Frederick Douglass pointed out that America had three black lawyers at the time, but it was not near enough.  Furthermore, whites refused to employ them and blacks followed the lead of the whites.  Mr. Douglass announced that his master plan to improve the lot of the blacks was to open an industrial college.  As he concluded:  "...the most killing refutation of slavery is the presentation of an industrious, enterprising, thrifty and intelligent free black population."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Douglass

Civil Rights Poetry

From slavery to Black Power, poets have been moved to write about civil rights.

1.  To Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe (1854), was written in reaction to the anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, a novel loosely based on the slave life of Josiah Hensen
(http://utc.iath.virginia.edu/africam/afpo03at.html).

http://www.blackpast.org/aah/uncle-toms-cabin-1852

2.  The Hunters of Men (1835), written by John Greenleaf Whittier, brings to the forefront the hunting of escaped slaves, complete with hounds and whips (http://www.bartleby.com/372/236.html).

http://myweb.northshore.edu/users/sherman/whittier/abolitionist/huntersofmen.html

3.  I Have Seen Black Hands (1934), written by Richard Wright, who was denied a library card as a child because he was black (https://www.questia.com/magazine/1P3-44716921/i-have-seen-black-hands).

http://www.literaryramblings.com/1000-books-in-10-years-vol-262-quicksand-by-nella-larsen

4.  Let America be America Again (1936), written by Langston Hughes, talks about all skin colours (http://www.crmvet.org/poetry/fhughes.htm#flabaa).

http://hivesociety.weebly.com/the-buzz/let-america-be-america-again

5.  A Seat on the Bus for Rosa, by Luke Easter, focusses on seamstress Rosa Parks who, in 1954, refused to give up her seat on an Alabama bus to a white person, prompting the famous bus boycott (http://www.poetrysoup.com/poem/a_seat_on_the_bus_for_rosa_22607).

http://deepsouthmag.com/2015/02/mrs-parks-and-the-maids-of-mississippi/

6.  Ode to Emmett Till (2013) was written in honour of the black boy who was lynched for supposedly "whistling" at a white girl in 1955 (http://www.powerpoetry.org/poems/ode-emmett-till).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emmett_Till

7.  The Little Girl from Little Rock (2004), by Joan Dresner Bernstein, features the black girl who along with nine other helped integrate Little Rock High in 1957 (http://www.crmvet.org/poetry/pjoan.htm).



                             

http://potus-geeks.livejournal.com/232302.html

8.  Mississippi Burning Poem, written by blogger Leah (2011), talks about the four civil rights activists who were murdered in Mississippi in 1964 (http://until-im27.blogspot.ca/2011/06/mississippi-burning-poems.html).

http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/28/us/mississippi-murders/

9.  Here is my civil rights poem, Justice for Johnnie Mae (2008), written in honour of the mother of ten, Johnnie Mae Chappell, who was gunned down on her way home from work in Florida in 1964.

In the ditch at the end of the day

A black lady looked for her wallet.

Inside was all of her weekly pay,

This mother of ten named Johnnie Mae.

As a loud shot rang out, she was hit.

An ambulance marked "colored" was hailed.

Her husband held her hand for a bit,

Yet despite his pleas, her heart soon quit.

At the church, as her small children wailed

Murdered Johnnie Mae was laid to rest.

But five months went by with no one jailed

In old Jacksonville, justice had failed.

"Four white men killed her" detectives say.

But the sheriff freed them anyway.

Ten grown children continue to pray

All seeking justice for Johnnie Mae.

http://crimefeed.com/2014/04/murder-johnnie-mae-chappell/