Speeches

Born into slavery around 1818, Douglass became a key leader of the abolitionist movement. On July 5, 1852, in Rochester, New York, he gave one of his most famous speeches, “The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro.” He was addressing the Rochester Ladies Antislavery Society. This is actor James Earl Jones reading the speech during a performance of historian Howard Zinn’s acclaimed book, “Voices of a People’s History of the United States.” He was introduced by Zinn.

In 1967, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., isolated himself from the demands of the civil rights movement, rented a house in Jamaica with no telephone, and labored over his final manuscript. In this prophetic work, which has been unavailable for more than ten years, he lays out his thoughts, plans, and dreams for America’s future, including the need for better jobs, higher wages, decent housing, and quality education. With a universal message of hope that continues to resonate, King demanded an end t

Wells first published a version this speech on June 25, 1892, in the New York Age. She delivered this speech at Lyric Hall in New York City on October 5, 1892, and published the speech as a pamphlet on Oct. 26, 1892. She delivered a similar speech twice in February 1893, at the Tremont Temple in Boston, Massachusetts, and by invitation of Frederick Douglass at the Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church, Washington, D.C. Preface The greater part of what is contained in these pages was pu

On April 14, 1967, Martin Luther King Jr. delivered a speech at Stanford University called “The Other America”. He gave the speech in both 1967 and 1968 to a variety of audiences. In the speech, King describes the two Americas that exist alongside one another and made a bold claim that America as a whole was a racist country. Members of the faculty and members of the student body of this great institution of learning; ladies and gentlemen. Now there are several things that one could talk about

The following are excerpts from a speech that Malcolm X gave on May 5, 1962 at the funeral service of Ronald Stokes in Los Angeles, who was killed by the LAPD. The incident occurred on April 27, 1962 at a mosque that previously been monitored by the police department. Then one night there was a disputed altercation between the police and the members of the mosque that resulted in an overwhelming police force killing of seven members of the Nation of Islam that night, including Stokes. The Police

On April 27, 1962, a confrontation initiated by Los Angeles Police Department officers against members of the Nation of Islam (NOI) at their Mosque No. 27 (located near downtown Los Angeles) turned deadly. What began as police harassment of two NOI members (falsely suspected of selling stolen clothing) escalated when officers used a racial epithet and attempted to place one of the men in a chokehold. Amid the physical struggle, NOI members inside of the mosque rushed outside to assist. 70 LAPD o

What came to be known as the Atlanta Compromise stemmed from a speech given by Booker T. Washington, president of the Tuskegee Institute, to the Cotton States and International Exposition in Atlanta, Georgia, on September 18, 1895. In the speech, also known as the Atlanta Exposition Speech, Washington promoted vocational education, industrial occupations, and the learning of other practical trades that would give African Americans opportunities for economic advancement and wealth creation rather

MLK_The-Three-Evils-of-Society.mp3Mr. Chairman, friends and brothers in this first gathering of the National Conference on New Politics. Ladies and gentlemen. . .can you hear me in the back? (No) I don’t know if the Klan is in here tonight or not with all the troubles we’re having with these microphones. Seldom if ever. . . .has. . . .we’re still working with it. As I was about to say, seldom if ever has such a diverse and truly ecumenical gathering convened under the egis of politics in our nat

The U.S. celebrates this Independence Day amid nationwide protests and calls for systemic reforms. In this short film, five young descendants of Frederick Douglass read and respond to excerpts of his famous speech, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” which asks all of us to consider America’s long history of denying equal rights to Black Americans.

Douglass’ Monthly, January, 1862  It is curious to observe, at this juncture, when the existence of slavery is threatened by an aroused nation, when national necessity is combining with an enlightened sense of justice to put away the huge abomination forever, that the enemies of human liberty are resorting to all the old and ten thousand times refuted objections to emancipation with which they confronted the abolition movement twenty-five years ago. Like the one stated above, these proslavery ob

On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass was invited to address the citizens of his hometown, Rochester, New York. Whatever the expectations of his audience on that 76th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Douglass used the occasion not to celebrate the nation’s triumphs but to remind all of its continuing enslavement of millions of people. Douglass’s speech appears below. Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens: He who could address this audience without a quailing sens