Freedom or death speech. Emmeline Pankhurst’s “Freedom or Death” Speech Energizes Connecticut Women in 1913 2022-11-01
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Freedom or death is a phrase that has been used throughout history to express the idea that people will fight for their freedom and independence at all costs, even if it means sacrificing their own lives. This concept has been expressed in numerous speeches and statements made by political leaders and activists throughout the world, and has become a rallying cry for those fighting for freedom and justice.
One of the most famous examples of the "freedom or death" concept can be found in the speech given by Patrick Henry to the Virginia Convention in 1775. In this speech, Henry declared that he was willing to risk his life in order to defend the freedom and independence of the American colonies from British rule. He famously stated, "Give me liberty or give me death!" This phrase has become one of the most famous and enduring expressions of the desire for freedom and has inspired countless others to fight for their own liberty.
Another example of the "freedom or death" concept can be found in the words of Mahatma Gandhi, the Indian independence leader who used non-violent resistance to fight against British rule in India. Gandhi famously stated, "Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes." This statement expresses the idea that true freedom involves the ability to make one's own choices, even if those choices are not always the best or most popular.
The concept of "freedom or death" has also been expressed in the struggle for civil rights and equality for marginalized groups. Martin Luther King Jr., for example, used the concept of "freedom or death" in his famous "I Have a Dream" speech, in which he called for an end to racial segregation and discrimination in the United States. He stated, "I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.'"
In conclusion, the concept of "freedom or death" has been expressed in numerous speeches and statements throughout history, and has served as a powerful rallying cry for those fighting for freedom and justice. Whether it is the fight for independence from foreign rule, the struggle for civil rights, or the desire to live freely and make one's own choices, the desire for freedom is a fundamental human right that has inspired countless people to fight for their liberty.
Freedom or Death Speech Text
Now, I ask you, if women can do that, is there any limit to what we can do except the limit we put upon ourselves? I have managed in London to make audiences of business men who came into the meetings very, very angry with us indeed, some of whom had their telephonic communication cut off for several hours and had not been able to even get telegrams from their stock-brokers in cities far distant, who naturally came to our meetings in a very angry frame of mind, understand the situation: and if it has been possible to make them understand, if some of them even get fairly enthusiastic about our methods, it ought to be possible, Mrs. But as they were women who asked the questions, it was not the speakers on the platform who would not answer them, who were to blame, or the ushers at the meeting; it was the poor women who had had their bruises and their knocks and scratches, and who were put into prison for doing precisely nothing but holding a protest meeting in the street after it was all over. It is only people who feel an intolerable sense of oppression who would adopt a means of that kind. But as they were women who asked the questions, it was not the speakers on the platform who would not answer them, who were to blame, or the ushers at the meeting; it was the poor women who had had their bruises and their knocks and scratches, and who were put into prison for doing precisely nothing but holding a protest meeting in the street after it was all over. Thus, she constructs a discourse by stating the problem, describing the current solution to the problem and offering her alternative solution. It always has been so. When his daughters went out to post a letter, he couldn't tell if they went harmlessly out to make a tennis engagement at that pillarbox by posting a letter, or whether they went to put some corrosive matter in that would burn all the letters up inside of that box.
Freedom or Death: The Speech That Changed the 20th Century As mentioned before, Pankhurst was on a fundraising tour in the U. They are too weak to speak, but they go amongst their fellow workers just to show that their spirits are unquenched, and that their spirit is alive, and they mean to go on as long as life lasts. Well, the last stage of this struggle, and the struggle is coming to a head, is this; that Sir Edward Carson has been making speeches in which he has gloried in having broken the law; he has challenged the British government to arrest him; arms have been shipped to Ireland; and there is not a club, a young men's club, a workingman's club, or the middle class or the upper class men's club, where they are not drilling and preparing for civil war. Well, ladies and gentlemen, I want to say that I am very thankful to you for listening to me here tonight; I am glad if I have been able even to a small extent to explain to you something of the English situation. Now, that went on so long that the government felt that they were unable to cope. It is only people who feel an intolerable sense of oppression who would adopt a means of that kind.
Emmeline Pankhurst Freedom Or Death 1913 Speech at Jeffrey Leibowitz blog
She realized that men were so empowered because of what they were allowed to have, such as an education, and it put men above women. You can kill that woman, but she escapes you then; you cannot govern her. But it hadn't that effect at all. . Suppose the men of Hartford had a grievance, and they laid that grievance before their legislature, and the legislature obstinately refused to listen to them, or to remove their grievance, what would be the proper and the constitutional and the practical way of getting their grievance removed? So here am I. All that is now at an end.
Prevention is better than cure. However it was not until 1893, in New Zealand, that women achieved suffrage on a national level. It is only people who feel an intolerable sense of oppression who would adopt a means of that kind. However, this ideology was a direct contradiction to the reality of Victorian women who, in 1871, constituted nearly 32 per cent of the total British labour force. I think I have said enough at least to make you understand that this uprising on the part of the British women has as much justification and as much provocation as any uprising on the part of men in their desire for political liberty in the past. That is what happened in the old days. Men have done splendid things in this world; they have made great achievements in engineering; they have done splendid organisation work; but they have failed, they have miserably failed, when it has come to dealing with the lives of human beings.
Well, we are showing them that government does not rest upon force at all: it rests upon consent. This is a great war between any social class women against a legislation which wants to exclude women rights from laws. Accessed December 31, 2022. In addition, publication in newspapers of illustrations of the forced-feedings began to shift public sympathy toward the suffragists. It is the only way.
Speech analysis: Freedom or Death, Sample of Essays
Emily Davison had run onto the track during the 1913 running of the Epsom Derby. We were determined to press this question of the enfranchisement of women to the point where we were no longer to be ignored by the politicians as had been the case for about fifty years, during which time women had patiently used every means open to them to win their political enfranchisement. It has come to a battle between the women and the government as to who shall yield first, whether they will yield and give us the vote, or whether we will give up our agitation. That is the political situation as I lay it before you today. Suppose the men of Hartford had a grievance, and they laid that grievance before their legislature, and the legislature obstinately refused to listen to them, or to remove their grievance, what would be the proper and the constitutional and the practical way of getting their grievance removed? It is perhaps a hard saying for many men that there will have to be self-control and an equal standard of morals, but the best men now, the scientists of every country, are supporting the woman's point of view. It was intended to make the women yield.
The Passion and the Fury: Emmeline Pankhurst’s “Freedom or Death” Speech Examined
When they felt they couldn't wait any longer, when they laid all the arguments before an obstinate British government that they could think of, and when their arguments were absolutely disregarded, when every other means had failed, they began by the tea party at Boston, and they went on until they had won the independence of the United States of America. Every idea is strictly developed in every paragraph. I have heard cheers ring out in a meeting in London when the news of some new state being added to the list was given, cheers louder and more enthusiastic than I have ever heard for any victory in an American meeting. A Stark Choice: Women Will Gain Voting Rights or Die Pankhurst concludes her speech by making logical, emotional, and ethical appeals. She uses a wide, cultivate and easy to understand vocabulary.
The first people who were put out of a political meeting for asking questions, were women; they were brutally ill-used; they found themselves in jail before 24 hours had expired. Women are very slow to rouse, but once they are aroused, once they are determined, nothing on earth and nothing in heaven will make women give way; it is impossible. Therein, she expressed her ideas about women 's suffrage. Now, that went on so long that the government felt they had lost their power, and that they were unable to cope with the situation. Those women broke shopkeepers' windows, and what was the situation? Now, I want to say to you who think women cannot succeed, we have brought the government of England to this position, that it has to face this alternative: either women are to be killed or women are to have the vote. It was thirty years ago in England that a splendid woman named Josephine Butler fought to establish an equal moral code for both sexes. Women have found a new kind of self-respect, a new kind of energy, a new kind of strength: and I think that of all oppressed peoples who might claim your sympathy and support, women who are fighting this fight unknown in the history of humanity before, fighting this fight in the twentieth century for greater powers of self-development, self-expression and self-government, might very well attract the sympathy and the practical help of American people.
Then, the latest manifestation, the latest cause of militancy has been the breaking of the great conspiracy of silence with regard to moral questions and the question of social disease that we have had during the last few years. You won your freedom in America when you had the revolution, by bloodshed, by sacrificing human life. They had to dip back into the middle ages to find a means of repressing the women in revolt. Now, first of all I want to make you understand the inevitableness of revolution and civil war, even on the part of women, when you reach a certain stage in the development of a community's life. We women see so clearly the fact that the only way to deal with this thing is to raise the status of women; first the political status, then the industrial and the social status of women. But there is a part of Ireland which does not want home rule. I dare say you have followed with considerable interest the story of how the Chinese revolutionary, Sun Yat-sen, conducted the Chinese revolution from England.
