On the recordJanuary 1, 1855
These holidays serve the purpose of keeping the minds of the slaves occupied with prospective pleasure, within the limits of slavery.
Said by
Frederick Douglass
Source
gutenberg.orgThese holidays serve the purpose of keeping the minds of the slaves occupied with prospective pleasure, within the limits of slavery.
In his autobiography, Douglass describes how slave holidays were designed to distract enslaved people with limited pleasures.
Share
More from Frederick Douglass
In any fair condition of things the men who till the soil will become proprietors of the soil.
The nation or people which shall comply with them will rise, and those which violate them will fall, and perhaps will disappear altogether.
No power beneath the sky can make an ignorant, wasteful, and idle people prosperous, or a licentious people happy.
Still another ground of hope I find in the fact that colored men are strong in their gratitude to benefactors, and firm in their political convictions.