We must not beg men to do for us what we ought to do for ourselves. A great deal is at stake in this critique, and it demands a clear, forthright response: These charges against the Founders are false as well as pernicious. Douglass made these particular remarks in a speech at the dedication of an industrial education institution in the state of Virginia, but they represent an extension of his broader advocacy, in this period, of a federally established system of public schools. In the Narrative of the Life Of Frederick Douglass, we are exposed to the iniquity of slavery and the dehumanization of the black race, which then led Frederick Douglass to recognize that literacy and education would aid him in his flight to freedom. : Da Capo Press, 2001), p. 688. There are a number of key arguments in "The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass". There are three parts of the structure of an argumentative essay: introduction, body, and conclusion. Protagoras was a Greek philosopher who is widely considered the father of argument and debate. The proper remedy for these violations, as he conceived of it, was in accord with this conviction. how does douglass refute this counterclaim? - laque.com.my The rise of this abolitionist agitation would alarm slaveholders, who would respond by attempting to suppress abolitionist speech and to strengthen and perpetuate their political power by expanding slaverys presence in federal territories, thus preparing the admission of additional slave states. Douglasss postwar arguments were consistent with this position. The reason "capital punishment costs taxpayers more than life in prison" answers "why" capital punishment should be banned. Then, it's time for your evidence, which, again, you have thoughtfully and thoroughly prepared. [2] Cornel West, Race Matters (Boston: Beacon Press, 1993), chapter 1. The propensity of the latter, he warned, was to foster an enervating spirit of alienationa perpetual longing for some mighty revolution, diverting and dissipating the energies of those who harbored it.[59]. To remedy the degradation and impoverishment that proceeded from this culture of indolence, Douglass throughout the postwar years insistently extolled the property right and the virtues of free labor that supported it, and he called upon his fellow black Americans in particular to cultivate the self-reliant virtues of industry, productivity, and thrift. (b) How early in the speech does he introduce this claim? We utterly repudiate all invidious distinctions, whether in our favor or against us, and ask only for a fair field and no favor.[49]. A claim tells what you think is true about a topic based on your knowledge and your research. Space permits here only a brief sketch of Douglasss singularly remarkable life story, which sheds much light on the formation of his political philosophy. IV, p. 68 (emphasis in original). A reason tells why. As he gathered his energies to prepare yet another lecture on the imperative of equal justice for all, he suffered a sudden heart attack or stroke and died on February 20, 1895. Although the election meant that a new order of eventsis now fairly opening upon the country, he reserved judgment as to just how significant a change was in prospect. All of the violence and the degradation was intended, Douglass makes clear, to rob African-Americans of their humanity. Douglass's central claim in his autobiography is that slavery is as harmful to whites as it is to slaves. IV, p. 319. Douglasss mind was opened to the wisdom of Lincolns statesmanship as he came to see the depth of Lincolns commitment to the anti-slavery cause. [3] William Jefferson Clinton, Memphis Church of God in Christ Convention Speech, November 13, 1993, at http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/wjclintonmemphis.htm (November 8, 2010). But there are two sides to every argument. [58] The Blessings of Liberty and Education, in Douglass Papers, Vol. V, p. 624. Second, any truly salutary public assistance must also be integrative, not divisive, in its design and effects. how does douglass refute this counterclaim? - indbras.com.br Soon enough after AfricanAmericans gained the vote, Douglass believed, the interests of white politicians and voters would overcome their prejudices; blacks would be courted by the leaders of all parties, and their rights and interests would be recognized in law and policy.[41]. Woe, woe! He gives reasons for this claim and backs them up with evidence. Formulated more precisely, his demand Let [the Negro] alone meant Give him fair play and let him alone, but be sure you give him fair play.[34] In its most general meaning, fair play or justice to black Americans was to be determined by a principle of non-exceptionalism. Slavery, in their view, was simply unconstitutional; the Constitution delegated to the federal government both the right and the duty to abolish slavery immediately, everywhere in the Union.[18]. position? These paragraphs contain the author's sub-claims/reasoning, counterclaims, and evidence. How do you think that refuting a misconception strengthened your presentation? Covey as an event that "revived within me a sense of my own manhood". What Are the Parts of an Argumentative Essay? - Study.com Frederick Douglass pure story telling in the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass directly goes against any argument for slavery from Fitzhugh, by revealing the harshness of the institution of slavery and the individuals behind it. Want this question answered? It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without the remedy. The voting right was, for Douglass, the keystone of the arch of human liberty, as it was the primary, indispensable means of guarding every other right. The KansasNebraska Act reversed a federal prohibition of slavery within those two territories, thus betraying the principles of the Declaration by making moral indifference to slavery the guiding principle of federal policy and prompting an alarmed Abraham Lincoln to return to electoral politics. Such attention is properly directed toward, but also beyond, the icons of the recent era of reform. Proponents of this skeptical view cite the persistence of racial segregation in neighborhoods and schools; the persistence of stark disparities between black and white Americans in various measures of social and economic well-being; and, most alarmingly, the deepening alienationthe nihilism, as Cornel West candidly named it[2]prevalent among many AfricanAmericans living in urban poverty. First, it makes clear that Douglasss demand for nothing but fair play allowed for vigorous protective and remedial action by the federal government. In paragraph 5, (a) What does Douglass acknowledge as a counterclaim to his Enrolling in a course lets you earn progress by passing quizzes and exams. Fortunately, his master never treated him unkindly, until he was sent to be with a master that was the extreme opposite. [50] My Bondage and My Freedom, in Autobiographies, p. 286; Douglass to Stowe, March 8, 1853, in Life and Writings, Vol. Not just, 'Because I said so.' It is very difficult to see how the forward- and upward-looking labor required to achieve the ends of justice for all and black elevation in America is to be sustained amid a spreading sentiment of alienation from America. In time, Douglass came to see the wisdom in Lincolns prudent statesmanship, as he acknowledged in his most developed reflection on Lincoln, his speech at the unveiling of the Freedmens Monument to Lincoln in 1876. II, p. 360. The conclusion should sum up the author's entire argument from the essay. His final break with Garrison came in 1851, when he announced that he had come to reject the core Garrisonian doctrine that the U.S. Constitution was a pro-slavery instrument. His first hand accounts of the cruel nature of slavery and the thought processes of the various slave owners help to substantiate his assertion. Create your account. Frederick Douglass's speech "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?" has many of the elements of a good argumentative structure. To correct this historical record is at once an intellectual, a civic, and a moral imperative, but to reaffirm the old integrationist faith in Americas principles and institutions, it is necessary (if not sufficient) to recover the Founders actual opinions about slavery and race. [60] Douglass, This Decision Has Humbled the Nation, in Douglass Papers, Vol. In the postwar decades, Douglasss initially bright hopes for rapid, lasting reforms faded as the nations governing majority, weary of conflict, flagged in its commitment to enforcing the civil and political rights of the freedpeople in the ex-rebel states. In the "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass," Douglass has the ability to show the psychological battle between the white slave holders and their black slaves, which is shown by Douglass' own intellectual struggles against his white slave holders. V, p. 625. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, brings to light many of the social injustices that colored men, women, and children all were forced to endure throughout the nineteenth century under Southern slavery laws. As the author of three autobiographies, Douglass framed his life story as a series of reversals of fortune suggestive of the possibility of liberating revolutionary change. How might a group of people denounce a government policy? Facebook Instagram. Frederick Douglass Project: Claims of Our Common Cause | RBSCP When Douglass wrote this book, slavery was still legal in a large portion of the United States. He was appealing to the public to honor those victims claim for a slight measure of compensation in a fashion carefully tailored to their needs and to the deepest of the wrongs that they had suffered. Its my students first attempt at writing the argumentative essay. 'My friends that have Internet access make the Honor Roll.'. Due to this criticism, he had to mask much of his work with irony. It was doubtful liberty at most, and almost certain death is we failed. [51] Frederick Douglass was one of the most commonly known slaves to have existed. Reiterating at the end of his life a powerful theme of his earliest writings, Douglass insisted that educationmeans emancipation. Open Document. What I ask for the negro, he explained in 1865, is not benevolence, not pity, not sympathy, but simply justice.[48]. Every nation, owing to its peculiar character and composition, has a definite mission in the world, Douglass observed in 1869, but Americas mission, clearer than ever in the aftermath of the war, marks it as exceptional. III, p. 274. That Douglass sympathized, for a period in his youth, with anti-America radicalism is hardly surprising. Criticizethe evidence and analysis of the counterclaimas being unimportant, irrelevant, or a misinterpretation. He also goes on to say a number of other things that basically establish that slaves live an easy and good life compared to others. Because of Douglasss quest for freedom, his daring attitude, and determination to learn, he shows us the way through American Slavery in his eyes. Roy P. Basler (Cambridge, Mass. Here is where the author has a bit of discretion over how to organize their essay. I was a man now.[9]. Soon after his master discovers this, and commences the teaching at once. He allowed that Lincolns election has demonstrated the possibility of electingan anti-slavery reputation to the Presidency of the United States.[24] But an anti-slavery reputation was a far cry from a genuine abolitionist, in Douglasss estimation, and Douglass at first expected little of Lincoln, who did not share his radically abolitionist reading of the Constitution. Slaverys primary victims, mostly knowing nothing of the Declaration itself, would corroborate its truth by their various acts of resistance, displaying their natural love of liberty and their moral humanity as rights-possessors. how does douglass refute this counterclaim? In a widely publicized speech commemorating the Constitutions bicentennial, Marshall asserted that in its infamously pro-slavery ruling in Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857), the Supreme Court merely reaffirmed the prevailing opinion of the Framers regarding the rights of Negroes in America. He claimed that Chief Justice Roger Taney, writing for the Court in that case, had accurately described the Founders views when he alleged that in the Founders day, black Americans, had for more than a century before been regarded as beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white raceand so far inferior, that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect; and that the Negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit.
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