What we do here will be an example in distant places.

Everywhere throughout the region lately cursed by Slavery this dark prejudice still lingers and lowers.

From our vantage-ground here we must strike it, and, according to our power, destroy it.

The laws creating the present system of separate schools for colored children in this District were enacted as a temporary expedient to meet a condition of things which has now passed away.

That condition of things was a part of the legacy of Slavery.

That they recognize and tend to perpetuate a cruel, unreasonable, and unchristian prejudice, which has been and is the source of untold wrong and injustice to that class of the community which we represent, is ample reason for their…

The experience of this community for the last few years has fully demonstrated that the association of different races, in their daily occupations and civic duties, is as consistent with the general convenience as it is with justice.

And custom is now fully reconciled at this capital to the seating side by side of white and colored people in the railway car, the jury-box, the municipal and Government offices, in the city councils, and even in the Halls of the two…

Yet, while the fathers may sit together in those high places of honor and trust, the children are required by law to be educated apart.

We see neither reason nor justice in this discrimination.

Children, naturally, are not affected by this prejudice of race or color.

To educate them in separate schools tends to beget and intensify it in their young minds, and so to perpetuate it to future generations.

Here I would interpose the further inquiry, Why will you make your school-house the nursery of prejudice inconsistent with the declared principles of your institutions?

And yet, could my friend prevail, he would train up a child in the way he should not go; but he would not, I know, encourage him in this prejudice.

The right of the colored man to ride in the railway cars, to cast the ballot, to sit on the jury, to hold office, and even to bear arms in defence of his country, has encountered the same objection.

There is no argument for equality at the ballot-box, in the cars, on the jury, in holding office and bearing arms, which is not equally applicable in the present case.

If this be so, then with what show of consistency or reason can they object to the children of both classes sitting side by side in school?

That the custom of separation on account of color must disappear from our public schools, as it has from our halls of justice and of legislation, we regard as but a question of time.

Whether this unjust, unreasonable, and unchristian discrimination against our children shall continue at the capital of this great Republic is for the wisdom of Congress to determine.

Let all discrimination on account of color be avoided in the public schools of Washington, let them be amply provided for in respect to funds and teachers, and a very few years will see the example followed all over our free country.

The colored race will feel the stimulating effects of direct competition with the white race, their ambition and self-respect will grow under its influence and add dignity to their character, and rapidly develop a style and type of manhood…

It has been met and conquered at the ballot-box and in the halls of our local and general Legislatures, and why should it not receive the same fate in our school-rooms?

Life is too short to prolong this process; and I do not believe that the people of the District of Columbia would reject for their children the advantages of the common schools simply because these schools were brought into harmony with…

But his speech had a plainness not without effect, especially before the people, where the facts and figures which he presented with honest voice were eloquent.

The Rebellion found this faithful Representative in his place, and from the first moment to the last he gave to its suppression time, inexhaustible energy, and that infinite treasure, the life of a son.