On the recordJanuary 1, 1881
A look, a word, a gesture, accidental or intentional, never failed to be taken as impudence when he was in the right mood for such an offense.
Said by
Frederick Douglass
Source
gutenberg.orgFrederick Douglass: “A look, a word, a gesture, accidental or intentional, never failed to be taken as impudence when he was in the right…”
Editor's note · Context
From his autobiography, Douglass details the trivial actions that an overseer could interpret as "impudence" to justify violence against enslaved people.
Share
More from Frederick Douglass
Jan 1, 1881
This was a new and special revelation, dispelling a painful mystery against which my youthful understanding had struggled, and struggled in vain, to wit, the white man’s power to perpetuate the enslavement of the black man.
Jan 1, 1881
We (the people of the North) are a charitable people, and in the excess of this feeling we were disposed to put the very best construction upon the strange behavior of our southern brethren.