Quotes by Frederick Douglass

American abolitionist and writer1818–1895

Frederick Douglass escaped from slavery in Maryland in 1838 and became one of the leading voices of the abolitionist movement. He published his first autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, in 1845 and edited the newspaper The North Star.

If there is no struggle, there is no progress.

Frederick Douglass“West India Emancipation” speech, Canandaigua, New York, 3 August 1857

Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.

Frederick Douglass“West India Emancipation” speech, Canandaigua, New York, 3 August 1857

What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim.

Frederick Douglass“What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?”, Rochester, New York, 5 July 1852