If I had a thousand tongues and each tongue were a thousand thunderbolts and each thunderbolt had a thousand voices, I would use them all today to help you understand a loyal and misrepresented and misjudged people.” These were the words of Joseph C. Price, founder and President of Livingston College in North Carolina, who in 1890 delivered an address to the National Education Association annual convention held in Minneapolis. Price’s words reflect on the long tradition of African American oratory. Listed below are some of the most significant orations by African Americans with links to the actual speeches.
By the time of the Civil War Angelina Grimke Weld had spent three decades fighting the institution of slavery. The Civil War and especially the Emancipation Proclamation which went into effect on January 1, 1863, seemed inevitably to bring her work to her desired conclusion. … Read More(1863) Angelina Grimké Weld “Address at the Women’s Loyal National League”
For the first two years of the Civil War black and white abolitionists urged both the liberation of the slaves and the recruitment of African American men in defense of the Union. Barely three months after Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation went into effect, Frederick Douglass gave … Read More(1863) Frederick Douglass, Men of Color, To Arms!
By September, 1863 African American men were entering their ninth month of service in the United States Army. They had already shown their valor at Fort Wagner in South Carolina and Port Hudson in Louisiana as well as dozens of other battle sites from Virginia … Read More(1863) J. Stanley, “A Tribute To A Fallen Black Soldier”
African Americans throughout the North held meetings and church services on January 1, 1863 to celebrate the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation. Almost always the festivities revolved around a central speaker. One of those speeches was delivered by Rev. Jonathan C. Gibbs, pastor of the … Read More(1863) Rev. Jonathan C. Gibbs, “Freedom’s Joyful Day”
During the Civil War Northerners organized sanitary fairs to raise funds on behalf of the United States Sanitary Commission, a charitable relief organization which promoted the welfare of Union Soldiers. President Abraham Lincoln addressed one such fair in Baltimore, Maryland on April 18, 1864. The … Read More(1864) Abraham Lincoln “Address at a Sanitary Fair”
Reconstruction began in Federally-occupied Louisiana in the midst of the Civil War. In 1863 African American men in New Orleans called for the right to vote in the new loyal government being organized under Union Army protection. However when President Lincoln announced his new reconstruction … Read More(1864) Arnold Bertonneau, “Every Man Should Stand Equal Before the Law”
On January 13, 1864, Frederick Douglass was invited to deliver a speech before the Woman’s Loyal League at the Cooper Institute in New York City. He used the occasion to add his voice to the ongoing debate about the mission and meaning of the Civil … Read More(1864) Frederick Douglass “The Mission Of The War”
As African Americans entered the Union Army in early 1863, they quickly found that racial discrimination followed them. The pay differential was one of the most egregious Federal discriminatory policies. African American soldiers were paid $10 per month, $3 of which was deducted for clothing, … Read More(1864) Rev. J. P. Campbell, “Give Us Equal Pay and We Will Go To War”
On Saturday March 4, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated and began his second term as President. His address to the audience of thousands of spectators was brief, one of the shortest inaugural addresses on record. The Civil War was drawing to a close as … Read More(1865) Abraham Lincoln “Second Inaugural Address”
On April 11, 1865, two days after Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his army to Union General Ulysses S. Grant, President Abraham Lincoln addressed a jubilant crowd that had gathered outside the White House in Washington, D.C. While the crowd expected an address celebrating … Read More(1865) Abraham Lincoln, “Last Public Address”
