Some Recollections of Our Antislavery ConflictMay, Samuel J. (Samuel Joseph)
History
Some Recollections of Our Antislavery Conflict
May, Samuel J. (Samuel Joseph)
Antislavery movements -- United States
to the pew which you know is not large enough for them, so sure as your
name is A. B. and my name is S. J. M., the first time you afterwards
appear in the congregation, I will state the facts of the case exactly
as they are, and administer to you as severe a reproof as I may be able
to frame in words.” This had the desired effect. My colored friends
retained their new seat.
To counteract as much as possible the effect of this cruel prejudice,
of which I have given a few specimens, we Abolitionists gathered up and
gave to the public the numerous evidences that were easily obtained
of the intellectual and moral equality of the colored with the white
races of mankind. Mrs. Child, in her admirable “Appeal,” devoted two
excellent chapters to this purpose. The Hon. Alexander H. Everett
also, in 1835, delivered in Boston a lecture on “African Mind,” in
which he showed, on the authority of the fathers of history, that
the colored races of men were the leaders in civilization. He said:
“While Greece and Rome were yet barbarous, we find the ‘_light of
learning and improvement_ emanating from them,’ the inhabitants of the
degraded and accursed continent of Africa,--out of the very midst of
this woolly-haired, flat-nosed, thick-lipped, coal-black race which
some persons are tempted to station at a pretty low intermediate point
between men and monkeys.” Again he said: “The high estimation in which
the Africans were held for wisdom and virtue is strikingly shown by the
mythological fable, current among the ancient Greeks, and repeatedly
alluded to by Homer, which represented the Gods as going annually in
a body to make a long visit to the Ethiopians.” Referring my readers
to Mrs. Child’s chapters, and Mr. Everett’s oration on this subject, I
will give a few of my own recollections of facts going to establish the
natural equality of our colored brethren.
Since the admission of their children to the public schools, a fair
proportion of them have shown themselves to be fully equal to white
children in their aptness to learn. And surely no one who is acquainted
with them will presume to speak of the inferiority of such men as
Frederick Douglass, Henry H. Garnett, Samuel R. Ward, Charles L.
Remond, William Wells Brown, J. W. Loguen, and many more men and women
who have been our faithful and able fellow-laborers in the antislavery
cause.[O]
But I have, recorded in my memory, many touching evidences of the
_moral_ equality, if not superiority, of the colored race. Let
me premise these recollections by stating the general fact that,
notwithstanding the serious disadvantages to which our prejudices have
subjected them, the colored population of our country have nowhere
imposed upon the public their proportion of paupers or of criminals. In
this respect they are excelled only by the Quakers and the Jews.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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