DOUGLASS FREDERICK The Claims of the Negro Ethnologically Co

Sale 2105 - Lot 175

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DOUGLASS, FREDERICK. The Claims of the Negro Ethnologically Considered. An Address before the Literary Society of Western Reserve College, At Commencement, July 12, 1854. 37 pages. 8vo, original printed wrappers; some damp-staining to the covers and through the text. Enclosed in a cloth chemise. Rochester: Lee, Mann & Co, 1854

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In this extraordinary speech, Douglass addresses the issues of ethnicity, racial equality and identity by answering an article that appeared in the "Richmond Examiner" stating that the Negro was "not a man." He replies that "what are technically called the Negro race, are a part of the human family, and are descended from a common ancestry." He proceeds to anticipate the work of the great "race men," like Joel Augustus Rogers and cites the history of the Nubian and Egyptian civilizations. "Egypt is in Africa. Pity that it had not been in Europe, or in Asia, or better still in America!" Later in his speech, discussing the distortion of the Negro features by white artists and engravers, he cites some of the great minds of his race such as Alexander Crummell, Henry Highland Garnett, and Martin Delany. It has been speculated that in this speech, Douglass for the first time addressed the issue of "Negro" ethnicity from the standpoint of how the Negro sees himself, closing in on the inescapable fact that average white person cannot see beyond the "blackness" of the Negro.