Having no fear of my kind mistress before my eyes, (she had then given me no reason to fear,) I frankly asked her to teach me to read; and, without hesitation, the dear woman began the task, and very soon, by her assistance, I was master of the alphabet, and could spell words of three or four letters.
Douglass reflects on the pivotal moment when he first learned to read, highlighting the importance of education in his journey to freedom.
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To-day the negro, starting from nothing, pays taxes upon six millions in Georgia, and forty millions in Louisiana.
In any fair condition of things the men who till the soil will become proprietors of the soil.
Nothing but the shot-gun or the bull-dozer’s whip can keep them from voting their convictions.