Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1867-07-23


bd- The mulatto man, Fred Douglass
made a speech in Portsmouth, N. H., on
the fourth of July, in which be said q
great many good and sensible things to
his colored friends. Douglass is very
able man, and probably the ablest freed
man on this continent There are but
few white men of better intellect OF
higher Attainments, or more honesty.
And he is to colored people their
greatest and best leader, and what Mr..
Webster, Calhoun or Clay were to the
white people.
Now, what does this great colored man
say to his brothers and friends, his fell
low freedmen
First, he said be hated and abhorred
slavery, with ell its evils and cruelties,
and denounced it and expected all his
race everywhere to denounce, and con-
tinue to thunder forth anathemas against
it, from every stand and for all time.
But, next he said slavery, with its
hardships and its stripes, was not now
the sad and sorrowful condition of the
black man-that now the black man was
in an entirely different situation, and had
new rights and with them new duties to
perform. He said let the dead past bury
its dead, and let there be no heartburn
ing because Of the gloomy and suffering
past. Let time soften and sweep away
all prejudices existing between white
men and black men, and particularly in
view of the fact that all the white men
were alike responsible for slavery and
equally guilty, and the black mans pre-
tended friends among them we're no bet
Ter than the rest He said he was once
pulled out Of coach in Boston for the
fault Of being black man. He was
hard treated while slave, and had
marks of the lash on his back.
But again he said he had no hard and
ranking feeling in his heart towards his
old master, who, in condition of sla-
very, had to enforce obedience from
him, that he had every good wish for his
masters family living in Maryland, and
that they are among his personal friends.
He had no doubt there existed some of
the same good feeling between the freed
men who heard him and their old mas
tiers. And he told them all through his
speech, and was very anxious to impress
on their minds as his opinion, that hu-
mainly, justice, their own interest, and
every thing demand friendship between
the two races, for, he said their interests
were the same, the black laboring man
having precisely the same interests as
the white laboring man, and confidence
and dependence must be mutual.
He thought that as they were now free
aud would have to pay taxes they ought
to be allowed to vote, and TO learn how
to vote as fast as possible. He told
them that practically and for want Of
education they we're now inferior to white
men, but not originally and naturally so.
Said he, the white man uses light
ming to convey his thoughts to distant
parts Of the earth. He eonstru cts
mighty ships TO pillow The great deep, and
directs their course around the world.
He measures the immense heavenly
bodies which roll in space, and calcu-
lates their distance from earth with uE-
erring skill. he makes more books than
we can read. These things, said he,
you cannot do. But it behooves yon to
endeavor TO learn these things from your
white friends, and thus make yourselves
their equals in these voried departments
Of knowledge He said prejudice, be-
cause Of slavery, caused the black man
to be estimated as a natural coward
inferior to every other man Of every
other race in physical and moral
courage he said the late war
has given evidence OF the negrO's
pluck for fight TO his entire
credit And, said Fred. Douglass, had
the Southern Confeieraey not been
blinded BY prejudice, she would have
used the means which vas in her power
to employ, Of achieving independence.
That is. the Confederate government
would have unshsckled every slave, and
As freedmen, armed Tor the fghi, marched
them, shoulder 70 shoulder viih the
whites, 10 the feld Of battle Had this
been done, said The black orator, to day