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Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground.

Frederick Douglass

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Frederick Douglass
Age: 77 †
Born: 1818
Born: February 14
Died: 1895
Died: February 20
Abolitionist
Autobiographer
Businessperson
Caulker
Diplomat
Editor
Film Editor
Journalist
Orator
Politician
Suffragist
Writer
Talbot County
Maryland
Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey
Frederick Augustus Washington Baly
Fred Bailey
Freddie Bailey
Literature
Crops
Freedom
Patriotic
Without
Favor
Men
Favors
Depreciation
Tyranny
Depreciate
Slave
Abolitionist
Ground
Profess
Liberty
Agitation

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American labor rights activist, on activities of the National Farm Workers Association Human law may know no distinction among men in respect of rights, but human practice may.
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There is no negro problem. The problem is whether the American people have loyalty enough, honor enough, patriotism enough, to live up to their own constitution
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Who would be free themselves must strike the blow. Better even to die free than to live slaves.
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Did John Brown fail? John Brown began the war that ended American slavery and made this a free Republic.
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Some know the value of education by having it. I know it's value by not having it.
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We succeed, not alone by the laborious exertions of our faculties, be they small or great, but by the regular, thoughtful and systematic exercise of them.
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I could, as a free man, look across the bay toward the Eastern Shore where I was born a slave.
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To suppress free speech is a double wrong. It violates the rights of the hearer as well as those of the speaker.
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This war, disguise it as they may, is virtually nothing more or less than perpetual slavery against universal freedoms.
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Fortune may crowd a man's life with fortunate circumstances and happy opportunities, but they will, as we all know, avail him nothing unless he makes a wise and vigorous use of them.
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I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of others, rather than to be false, and to incur my own abhorrence.
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Freedom now appeared, to disappear no more forever... I saw nothing without seeing it, I heard nothing without hearing it, and felt nothing without feeling it. It looked from every star, it smiled in every calm, breathed in every wind, and moved in every storm.
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Truth is proper and beautiful in all times and in all places.
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Without Struggle There Is No Success
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What I ask for the Negro is not benevolence, not pity, not sympathy, but simply justice. ... All I ask is, give him a chance to stand on his own legs! Let him alone! ... Your interference is doing him positive injury.
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Beat and cuff your slave, keep him hungry and spiritless, and he will follow the chain of his master like a dog. Feed and clothe him well, work him moderately, surround him with physical comfort and dreams of freedom intrude.
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Allow us the dignity to fight for our own freedom
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He who would be free must strike the first blow.
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I know no class of my fellowmen, however just, enlightened, and humane, which can be wisely and safely trusted absolutely with the liberties of any other class.
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The law on the side of freedom is of great advantage only when there is power to make that law respected.
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