The daily Cairo bulletin. (Cairo, Ill.) 1878-1???, 1878-08-07
THE BLACK RACE.
AN ELOQUENT SPEECH By GEN. JIG.
BLACK,

DELIVERED AT DANyILLE, Ills, THURSDAY
LAST, on THE OCCASION OF THE ANNIvER-
sARY OF EMANCIPATION.
General Black was greeted with cheers as
he came forward.
SPEECH OF GEN. ]. c. BLACK.
Mr.. Chairman and fellow citizens: | was
sitting in my office this morning busily en-
gagged with my professional duties when the
president Of the day was kind enough to
wait upon me and inform me that there was
probability that the speakers you had en-
gagged would not be present. He asked me
also if | could be present and address your
assemblage. consented so to do with a
great deal Of reluctance. | thought at first
that my duty to this assembly and to my
self required that | should decline such an
invitation. 1t is meet and proper that when
men and women are gathered to celebrate
an event such as that which you this day
are called upon to celebrate. the intellectual
entertainment that is afforded them should
be of the highest character and most fully
prepared; but if you are willing to take
what shall be able to offer after the thought
Of an hour or two | shall be satisfied.
THE AFRICAN RACE ITS HISTORY.
In order TO estimate any event we are
examining we must consider it in the light
Of its surroundings; and we Judge of the
majesty of people, and the possibilities
OF their future. by knowing what they have
been in the past, and knowing what they
are to-day. BY the light or history /
search tor the record of the African race.
find that with the exception Of the Egyp-
| tian kings, and she OF Shcba, who came
from the mysterious heart of Ethiopia,
bearing her presents to the then most
enlightened king Of the earth, your people
have left no trace that history has thought
worthy Of preservation. ~ the Numidian
Guard you throttIcd liberty amid the ruins
OF falling empire.
You have adorned the triumphs Of con-
suls and generals; wherever humanity has
been struggling YOU have been in the dust,
and the feet OF conqucrors have been upon
your necks. No great achievements in arms
or in empire, during all Of the remote past,
| that does not bear somewhere the traces OF
your blood and the story of your captivity.
| You have been exposed for sale in the marts
not Of an empire, or Of a continent alone,
but OF the entire world. You had never
drawn the sword for your own freedom.
Your bodies had been bought and sold.
The highest point to which you climbed
was the auction block; your families had
been torn asunder your fathers had been
transported, that their blood and their
| strength might 90 to swell the wealth and
| increase the power of their COnquerors.
Your women had been made the polluted
vassalS of the luSts of Others; you were the
debris in the highways Of conquest,
Your history in the American continent
presented no exception to tins sorrowtul
career. Your fathers were brought in
chains under tne burning suns OF the Mid
die Passage, in the darkness OF the prison
| hulks across the wide Atlantic, and landed
as the lowest of the low upon our coasts :;
and one hundred and fifty years brought no
amclioation of your condition. Wherever
! the civilization of America had gone there
the law of slavery was found to he written;
and even on the bosom of this broad north
west that to-day is the spreading abode of
liberty, your simple story was written in the
Black Code of Illinois, slaves to the lowest
of those who differ from you in color. But
He who rules the affairs of men, gu,Ediny
your race through darkness and through
disasters, reserved you for the mighty
events Of 1861.
THE EVENTS OF 1861.
Wealth breeds arrogance, and power
breeds tyranny, Arrogance and tyranny
united rendered the rebellion of 1861 "A
possibility against the American govern
ment, The patriots of the nation were
slow, indeed, to recognize the mighty con-
ditions and the mighty problems of the
war They were Slow indeed. to unchain
the sincwy black arms that lay unarmcd in
untried strength in the cotton field, in the
sugar plantations, and in all the South.
They We're slow to listen to the reasoning of
Toussaint Louverture; they were slow to
listen to the voice that came up from the
humblcst of the negro quarters They
were slow to believe that the God of lIu.
manity had called you TO the struggle when
thcircedom Of your race was the demand of
liberty and the life Of great people the
mighty prize of that war.
We entered the war of 1861. The en-
battling sodicrly of the North, and the en-.
battling hosts Of Secession, were alike
enemies Of the free African, with here AMI
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