The Abolitionists



Frederick Douglass



There is an odd phrase, "coming of age", that generally refers to something hormonal but mainly refers to that time of life when you can actually do something about what you are thinking.  In the bookends to those years, I remember a lot about integration "struggles", Lincoln, King, Evers et al, the three civil rights workers murdered in Mississippi (Mississippi Burning - the movie) and although sympathetic and supportive, I didn't do much.  I regret that as I was of an age and mind to do something but didn't. Then again, Frederick Douglass wasn't on our radar, wasn't in our textbooks, and in a high school of 3600 white kids and 3 blacks (all of whom physician's kids and "acceptable"), what went on in the South, or Harlem or Detroit for that matter was both on the news but also on the moon for all its currency and day to day relevancy.

 

I caught "The Abolitionists" on the American Experience (PBS) last night. You should too. I'm now somewhat inspired to get a few books out the library regarding Mr. Douglass, hold them and read them. Maybe it will remind me that to hold a book and be able to read it - both the skill of reading and the pleasure of holding it - were something that Douglass was nearly beaten to death for doing.

 

 “Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation, are people who want crops without ploughing the ground; they want rain without thunder and lightning; they want the ocean without the roar of its many waters. The struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, or it may be both. But it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.”
― Frederick Douglass