To a slave, being human means being free. Since a slave has no freedom, he has no sense of humanity. A slave is not free in his own country. He is a deprived person of his every right as a human being. When America gained its independence, it meant that everyone within the country had gained his or her own rights as being part the nation. However, everyone gained their independence except those that were considered less than human, which were slaves. Being human fulfills the basis for living your life according to your morals, values, and standards that were promised in you. A slave is denied the same opportunities as others. While he lacked in literacy and any form of education, he sees no hope of ever seeing a way to the

future.

Before America gained its independence they, themselves, were considered slaves. They had no chance to declare their freedom until a war was fought. A nation that was once without freedom should have stepped back and taken a look at their own lives and view of being human. Perhaps, the nation did not understand what freedom was. For a person to really understand the value of being free, one must understand denial. Denial is one thing that comes from many forms and many different aspects for a slave. It deals with the fact that a slave that can make no account of what they experienced. Those that were free should have thought about what it means to be a human that has no rights.

Denial was very cruel and harmful to a slave because it tried their self-confidence and self-worth. For a nation to want people to fight for them, come together and be unified, that was not possible because a slave had been in denial for so long. A slave felt as though if he were to go and fight for his own freedom, he would end up back where he began or even worse off then he was before. Being denied by your fellow people of your rights to be rejoicing in happiness over a declaration of the nation's independence did nothing but harm to a slave. As a slave in your own country, one cannot help but feel that sense of denial move upon them. This is a slave's country and they should have every right that a free man has. Freedom is something that you would just expect to be justifiable in your own country. Since a slave had no form education, he could not write his own history. Douglass said in his speech that if a slave couldn't write his history that he didn't have one. Autonomy versus Responsibility was very obvious during this speech. There were two autonomies in this society. One that opposed slavery, while the other supported slavery. In society, there cannot be two autonomies. Both of those different groups could not come together to agree upon the issue of slavery. Both of those different groups cannot come together to agree upon the issue of slavery. The group

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Approximate Word count = 1690
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)