Frederick Douglass

The object of my labors in Great Britain was the concentration of the moral and religious sentiment of its people against American slavery.

I may mention here an incident somewhat amusing and instructive, as it serves to illustrate how easily Americans could set aside their notoriously inveterate prejudice against color, when it stood in the way of their wishes, or when in an…

Since it was you who brought it upon us, take it now and do what you will with it, for we are too weary to bear it.

I cannot do so for this good reason: there are at this moment three millions of the American population, by slavery and prejudice, placed entirely beyond the pale of American temperance societies.

Those who would have been most likely to elect me as a delegate, could not, because they are to-night held in abject slavery in the United States.

It was not an American or a white man’s convention, but one composed of men of all nations and races; and as such, the convention had the right to know all about the temperance cause in every part of the world, and especially to know what…

My own opinion is increasingly that this spirit must be exorcised out of England and America before any substantial good can be effected for the cause of the slave.

I employ a cab--I am seated beside white people--I reach the hotel--I enter the same door--I am shown into the same parlor-- I dine at the same table--and no one is offended.

He possessed the great advantage so valuable to a Parliamentary debater, of being able to make all interruptions serve the purposes of his thought and speech, and carry on a dialogue with several persons without interrupting the rapid…

Listening to him was like standing near the track of a railway train, drawn by a locomotive at the rate of forty miles an hour.

I felt that a great champion of freedom had fallen, and that the cause of the American slave, not less than the cause of his country, had met with a great loss.

He held Ireland within the grasp of his strong hand, and could lead it withersoever he would, for Ireland believed in him and loved him, as she has loved and believed in no leader since.