Frederick Douglass, Where Are You?

In 2007, I want the America envisioned by Frederick Douglass, the former slave turned abolitionist. On January 26, 1865, with the Civil War grinding to halt, Mr. Douglass delivered a speech that has largely been forgotten by contemporary America, that nation of racial-pimps, racial set-asides and perpetual (and phony) racial injustices and the staged marches to address each. While Douglass's words received loud cheers and a standing ovation in 1865, these same words and ideals, if uttered in 2007, would be met by blacks with hissing, booing and maybe even rioting. Such words would be deemed "offensive" in these hyper-sensitive times.

Attempting to answer a popular question of the day -- "What does the black man want?" -- Mr. Douglass forcefully said:

"What I ask for the negro is not benevolence, not pity, not sympathy, but simply justice. The American people have always been anxious to know what they shall do with us. I have had one answer from the beginning. Do nothing with us! Your doing with us has already played mischief with us."

Mr. Douglass continued, offering his thoughts on a post Civil War America and freed blacks:

"If the apples will not remain on the tree of their own strength, if they are worm-eaten at the core, if they are early ripe and disposed to fall, let them fall."

He completes his analogy with the following:

"And if the negro cannot stand on his own legs, let him fall also. All I ask is given him a chance to stand on his own legs! Let him alone! Your interference is doing him positive injury!"

Powerful sentiments from a man who knew slavery firsthand, a man who fought and scratched for everything he had in a time when the deck was legally stacked against him. Frederick Douglass hated slavery, and as a teen continually sought ways to escape it. Yet he still believed in the promise of America.

Can anyone imagine any politician, especially a black politician, saying anything remotely similar to these words? Would Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton, the two self-inflated and self-appointed leaders of "Black America," ever give a speech calling for blacks to be responsible for themselves and accountable for their actions? Would either of these hucksters ever tell black folks, as Douglass did, to "sink or swim?" The answer is a definitive "no." However, these two scheisters are Pavlovian-like in their "blame-whitey-for-every-black-person's-problems." In a time when he could could have rightly done such, Frederick Douglass demurred, asking white folks to get out of the way and give blacks a chance.

Frederick Douglass, America needs you, or someone espousing your positions.

I have often wondered what Frederick Douglass would think of America in 2007. He would certainly be impressed with many things regarding black people. American blacks are the richest and best educated blacks on the planet. Many black citizens have risen to powerful positions in the corporate world and in governments, at the local, state and federal level. A black man, Barack Obama, is a leading candidate for the Democratic Party's nomination for President in 2008. Yes, there is much Frederick Douglass would celebrate.

However, there is much he would disdain.

I believe he would find the current definition of "civil rights" a bit awry. After all, for him in 1865, civil rights were something else entirely, namely ending slavery. In 2007, civil rights means "special rights." In many colleges, blacks only compete with blacks for admission. Government contracts and jobs are "set-aside" for blacks only. Sometime since the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, equal opportunity became "equal outcomes," which, of course, will never happen naturally, so the government forces such. As currently practiced, civil rights is nothing more than "cultural Marxism," where the cream is never allowed to rise to the top, settling instead at the bottom. American society is the lesser for this also. Massive mediocrity is the result of the cultural Marxism that is the current civil rights movement.

America, since that God-awful decade of the 1960s, has done the exact opposite of what Frederick Douglass desired. Instead of getting out of the way, the government has been a permanent crutch. Beginning with Lyndon B, Johnson's "War on Poverty" to Richard Nixon's signing the first affirmative action program, the government has done nothing to empower the black man, preferring instead to placate him and prop him up. Entitlement programs were not what Mr. Douglass wanted. He wanted black people to succeed on their own merit.

What would Frederick Douglass think of the current civil rights establishment? What would he make of marches such as the one held in September 2006 in Jena, Louisiana? What would Mr. Douglass think of thousands of black people converging on this small town to call for the release of and dismissal of charges against six young black men who attacked and beat a white classmate at Jena High School. I wonder what Mr. Douglass would think of the "New Black Panthers" descending on the small community of Pasadena, Texas to protest Joe Horn's shooting of two burglars who were coming out of a window of his neighbor's home? What would he think of the numerous "hate crime" hoaxes perpetrated by blacks like Donald Maynard, A Baltimore fireman, who wrote racist notes to himself and hung a noose in the station house in an attempt to garner some Jena-like sympathy. What would Mr. Douglass make of a professor at Columbia University who said a noose appeared on her office door, a noose that she most likely placed there herself to gain attention? What would Douglass think of the current civil rights movement, one based on pseudo-outrage, pompous indignation and political theater?

What would Mr. Douglass make of illegitimacy in the black community? Fully 70% of black children are born to a single mother. The government picks up the tab in most cases. Illegitimacy creates so many problems for the mom and the kids -- government dependence, poor school performance, poor health, criminally-inclined young men, more illegitimacy.

What would Frederick Douglass think of many young black males and their seeming lust for criminality? The Crips, Bloods, Vice-Lords and Gangster Disciples have become the extracurricular activity of choice for many school age black males. Crime has become a way of life for many black males aged 18-34. In some cities, one in three black males in this age group is connected to the justice system in some manner: awaiting trial, on probation or in jail. Homicide is leading cause of death for this age group, although it should be labeled "fratricide," as the majority of the deaths are at the hands of another black male in the demographic.

Since it was illegal to educate a slave, Frederick Douglass risked his own safety to learn how to read and write. In today's urban schools, one has to threaten the lives of some black males to make them read or learn anything outside of the latest filth from the rap community. Many American school systems struggle to graduate black students. In Detroit, just 21% of its students ever graduate from high school. In many other cities, the percentage rarely gets over 40-50%. Nationwide, just half of black students graduate from high school. A free education is on the table, and many refuse to take advantage of it. Billions have been (and are being) spent, yet this money might as well be tossed into a hole, for all the good it does.

America needs someone like Frederick Douglass, someone to say the things -- as ugly as they may be -- that need to be said, someone whose example is one to be lauded and emulated.

Of course, Mr. Douglass could rise from the grave and deliver this same speech on college campuses nationwide, and many blacks would simply call him an "Uncle Tom" and move on to their next march for set-asides and hate crime legislation.