On the recordJanuary 1, 1855
This spirit made me a freeman in fact, while I remained a slave in form.
Said by
Frederick Douglass
Source
gutenberg.orgThis spirit made me a freeman in fact, while I remained a slave in form.
Douglass articulates the distinction between his internal state of liberation and his external legal status, emphasizing the power of the human spirit.
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More from Frederick Douglass
Nothing but the shot-gun or the bull-dozer’s whip can keep them from voting their convictions.
They cannot be coaxed or driven to vote with their enemies against their friends.
To-day the negro, starting from nothing, pays taxes upon six millions in Georgia, and forty millions in Louisiana.
No power beneath the sky can make an ignorant, wasteful, and idle people prosperous, or a licentious people happy.