Frederick Douglass' Dream for Equality

However, he.
             did reinvent his thinking.
             Douglass eventually made his way with what amounted to the applied ideas.
             of Alexis de Tocqueville and Fancis Grund, both of which were writing at the.
             time when Douglass realized the truth about abolition. Grund and Tocqueville.
             celebrated the "new man," the "self-made" men who were breaking through old.
             restraints. These restraints included monopolized privileges, restricted.
             franchises, and the basic refusal of the main chance of equal opportunity. The.
             blacks were confronted by the most vicious and deadly restraints any "new man".
             had been compelled to face in the United States. This was horrendous, but it.
             was not insurmountable.
             Douglass decided that the separation between whites was an advantage to his.
             cause. He could then make allies with one of the disputants in the fight and.
             exploit the alliance to yield guarantees of access to the devices of power and.
             mobility the "new man" had historically sought. In conclusion, he and his.
             allies would not share any common causes except that "your enemy is my enemy.".
             Influenced by Grund's and Tocqueville's beliefs, this was Douglass' new.
             political strategy and social goal.
             William Garrison continued to hounded Douglass. He once said, "I regard.
             him as thoroughly base and selfish.He reveals himself more and more to me as.
             destitute of every principle of honor, ungrateful to the last degree.He is.
             not worthy of respect, confidence, or countenance." (Garrison Papers).
             But in 1862, during wartime, Douglass was ready to bury their.
             differences and implement his new political strategy.
             "Every man who is ready to work for the overthrow of slavery, whether a voter or.
             non-voter, a Garrisonian or a Gerrit Smith man, black or white, is both clansman.
             and kinsman of ours. Whatever political or personal differences, which have in.
             other days divided and distracted us, a common object and a common emergency.
             makes us for the time at least, forget those differences.