Frederick Douglass: “If this were done, there would be no Negro problem or national problem to vex the South or to vex the nation.”

My grandmother was all the world to me, and the thought of being separated from her was a most unwelcome suggestion to my affections and hopes.

It was in the air, and men breathed it and were permeated by it, often when they were quite unconscious of its presence.

It only abolished slavery where it did not exist, and left it intact where it did exist.

Guilty or not guilty, to be accused was to be sure of a flogging.