On the recordJanuary 1, 1855
I heard the words brother and sisters, and knew they must mean something; but slavery had robbed these terms of their true meaning.
Said by
Frederick Douglass
Source
gutenberg.orgI heard the words brother and sisters, and knew they must mean something; but slavery had robbed these terms of their true meaning.
From his autobiography, Douglass explains how slavery stripped fundamental family terms like "brother" and "sister" of their inherent emotional and social significance.
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An exceptionally poor and dependent people will be despised by the opulent and despise themselves.
They cannot be coaxed or driven to vote with their enemies against their friends.
I will not listen, myself, and I would not have you listen to the nonsense, that no people can succeed in life among a people by whom they have been despised and oppressed.
To-day the negro, starting from nothing, pays taxes upon six millions in Georgia, and forty millions in Louisiana.