In some few instances, their incredulity arises from a want of reflection; but, generally, it indicates a hatred of the light, a desire to shield slavery from the assaults of its foes, a contempt of the colored race, whether bond or free.
Douglass addresses the disbelief some people have regarding the realities of slavery, linking it to a broader societal contempt for Black individuals.
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No power beneath the sky can make an ignorant, wasteful, and idle people prosperous, or a licentious people happy.
They cannot be coaxed or driven to vote with their enemies against their friends.
The vote of the colored man, formerly beaten down and stamped out by intimidation, is now revived, sought, and defended by powerful allies, and this from no transient sentiment of the moment, but from the permanent laws controlling the…