In December 1860, Frederick Douglass, America’s greatest liberty messenger, delivered a lecture at Boston’s Music Hall. Entitled, Plea for Free Speech in Boston, Douglass made several thought-provoking statements about the importance of free speech.
Douglass said, “Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one’s thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist.
”There can be no right of speech where any man, however lifted up, or however humble, however young, or however old, is overawed by force, and compelled to suppress his honest sentiments."
Last week, retired three-star general Gary Volesky, working as a civilian contractor with the U.S. Army as a mentor to officers, was suspended after he responded to First Lady Jill Biden’s remark about the recent Supreme Court decision. She tweeted, “The right of women to have abortions had been ‘stolen’.” General Volesky responded to Jill Biden’s tweet by writing that he was glad she finally knows what a woman is. As a result, the government suspended General Volesky’s $92 an hour contract to mentor active-duty officers for speaking his mind.
Free speech suppression such as this is what goes on in Communist China, Russia, North Korea, and other communist regimes. The U.S. is rapidly heading in the same direction under our current Democrat leadership.
Americans who speak freely against anyone connected to our federal government today are canceled, their speech is shut down, and many are silenced. Tyrants cannot tolerate free speech.
Americans who protested peacefully against the stolen election on January 6, 2021, in a last-ditch effort to “stop the steal,” are still held as political prisoners in our country’s jails and maliciously prosecuted, while a “select” committee of political opportunists make a mockery of our U.S. Congress and broadcasts their antics and lies on television.
Are we now becoming slaves under the same class of political elites who once owned slave plantations? Americans need to wake up and understand what is happening to our God-given rights, which the U.S. Constitution was established to secure.
Douglass explained in his first autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, that Democrat slave plantation owners did not allow slaves to speak freely. Even after being wrongly accused of crimes, they could not speak or testify in their own defense. One man (Demby) who stood his ground and spoke in his own defense was shot dead by the slave overseer to make an example of him and demonstrate to other slaves that free speech did not apply to them.
In the famous Dred Scott case before the Supreme Court, Democrat Chief Justice Roger Taney explained at length that slaves could not be allowed to exercise the same rights as white citizens, because those rights would allow them to travel, assemble, SPEAK FREELY, and carry guns to defend themselves.
Make no mistake about it. I would be just as concerned about free speech suppression if the culprits of the act were Republicans. Free speech MUST be protected for ALL Americans, regardless of who the offender might be.
A former member of President Trump’s Coalition Advisory Board, KCarl Smith is the President and CEO of KCarl Consulting Group, empowering freedom advocates with the confidence, knowledge and skills to trump the race card. His column normally appears every Thursday in 1819 News. To contact KCarl or request him for a speaking engagement go to http://kcarlinc.com/bookingsandfees. The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy or position of 1819 News. To comment, please send an email with your name and contact information to Commentary@1819News.com.
