African American Policy ForumVarmennettu tili

Some Fourth of July Black history: A thread.

The theme of hypocrisy found in Watkin's lamentation can also be seen in Frederick Douglass' famous speech "What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?" That speech was delivered on July 5, 1852 to the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society in Rochester, New York. Some excerpts:

"What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?" "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?"

"Fellow citizens; above your national, tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions! whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are, today, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee shouts that reach them." Full speech: https://rbscp.lib.rochester.edu/2945 

On July 8, 1876, a white militia led by future governor and U.S. Senator Ben Tillman massacred Black people in the town of Hamburg, South Carolina. The stated purpose for the massacre was white anger over a Black-led Fourth of July parade that had taken place in the city.

The Hamburg Massacre was part of a campaign of violence and white supremacist terrorism in which over 100 Black South Carolinians were murdered. One goal of this racist campaign was to suppress Black political activity throughout the state.