If the time shall ever come when we shall possess in the colored people of the United States, a class of men noted for enterprise, industry, economy, and success, we shall no longer have any trouble in the matter of civil and political rights.
From his autobiography, Douglass expresses his conviction that economic prosperity within the Black community will lead to the attainment of civil and political rights.
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Let us then, wherever we are, whether at the North or at the South, resolutely struggle on in the belief that there is a better day coming, and that we by patience, industry, uprightness, and economy may hasten that better day.
It was born in the tempest and whirlwind of war, and has lived in a storm of violence and blood.
In any fair condition of things the men who till the soil will become proprietors of the soil.
The fact that we have endured wrongs and hardships, which would have destroyed any other race, and have increased in numbers and public consideration, ought to strengthen our faith in ourselves and our future.