No loftier tribute can be paid to the most illustrious of all the benefactors of mankind than we pay to these unrecognized soldiers, when we write above their graves this shining epitaph.
In his 1871 Decoration Day speech at Arlington, Douglass asserts that the tribute given to the unrecognized loyal soldiers is as high as any paid to humanity's greatest benefactors.
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A son of toil himself, he was linked in brotherly sympathy with the sons of toil in every loyal part of the republic.
We could not but believe that there existed at the South a latent and powerful Union sentiment which would assert itself at last.
He was called upon not merely to administer the government, but to decide, in the face of terrible odds, the fate of the Republic.