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Frederick Douglass calls Fourth of July a fraud, hypocrisy

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From: Miami Times
Date: 20030708
Author:

Miami Times
07-08-2003
At an 1852 Independence Day celebration and meeting sponsored by the white
abolitionist group, (N.Y.) Ladies Anti Slavery Society, Douglass was asked
to be the guest speaker. Following are excerpts from that speech, one of
his most famous orations.

Fellow-citizens, pardon me, allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak
here today?

What have I, or those I represent to do with your national independence?

Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice
embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? And am I,
therefore, called upon to bring ...

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