Similarities Between Frederick Douglass And W. E. B. Dubois

In every culture, there are the strong and there are the weak, the oppressor and the oppressed. Sometimes they are of the same race and sometimes not, but they all rely on a difference in power. Socrates, Frederick Douglass, and W.E.B. Du Bois each experience this power differential through the course of their lives. Socrates experiences this through his experience with the jury of Athens and his trial; Douglass through his life as a slave and his eventual escape. Du Bois experiences it through being a black man in the time of Reconstruction and being well off in comparison to other African-Americans at the time. Each man’s unique perspective on equality can illuminate why authority is so instrumental in the development of equality. Certain

One of the most easily recognized in this position is government. People will usually take up a change only once a) someone forces them to--ie the government passes laws that make old ways illegal--or b) they want to feel like they are part of a group and so will change in order to fit in. In terms of racial equality, both of these aspects are true. The majority of Northerners didn’t take up the rally for freedom of slaves until it was apparent that was what the North stood for. All who were in favor of slavery pretty much lived in the South. These two distinct areas stood for the two very different ideals. Once the North won the Civil War, Lincoln passed the Emancipation Proclamation, which freed all slaves. This was an example of people being forced to adopt change, while the North was an example of people choosing to adopt change. Douglass says, “To side with the right, against the wrong, with the weak against the strong, and with the oppressed against the oppressor! here lies the merit” (Douglass 122). To do what you believe in and stand up for those beliefs, even if it seems to go against all normalcy, is where true power comes through. To stand with the oppressed or the weak or the minority when everyone else is screaming that it’s wrong, that is where true power comes into

In terms of racial equality in America, the government was instrumental in giving the freed slaves a boost and putting them on equal footing as the whites and creating a country of equality. But as we can see from history, they didn’t do such a good job at that. Du Bois states, “ the Negro farmer started behind,--started in debt” (91). When you start behind, in a world run by men who see you as inferior and for years ranked you with cattle and pigs, it’s hard to ever get ahead. The white men, especially those of the South, were determined to carry out slavery through cloaked measures such as controlling the freed slaves wages, feeding on their lack of knowledge of saving and spending and their lack of knowledge in general. Du Bois claims this was “the crime of a happy-go-lucky nation which goes blundering along with its Reconstruction tragedies, its Spanish War interludes and Philippine matinees” (91). The US has a history of helping other countries “solve” their problems while ignoring what’s going on at home. The figure of authority, in this case the government, started efforts to make the black man equal to the white man, but before any real change could be made, they jumped right into another problem without finishing the previous one. Whoever holds the authority and power must be able to see things through and ensure that their plans are carried