journal for Apess

"Apess, a Pequot, used his position as a Methodist preacher to reach white audiences, both in speech and in print. Although he defended the virtues of native oral traditions, he was acutely aware of the damage inflicted by a written historical record devoted entirely to the victors' version of events."
http://www.library.upenn.edu/exhibits/rbm/kislak/print/williamapes.html


"Assemble all nations together in your imagination, and then let the whites be seated among them, and then let us look for the whites, and I doubt not it would be hard finding them; for to the rest of the nations they are still but a handful. Now suppose these skins were put together, and each skin had its national crimes written upon it - which skin do you think would have the greatest? I will ask one question more. Can you charge the Indians with robbing a nation almost of their whole continent, and murdering their women and children, and then robbing the remainder of their lawful rights, that nature and God require them to have? And to cap the climax, rob another nation to till their grounds and welter out their days under the lash with hunger and fatigue under the scorching rays of a burning sun?" (Apess, p. 1054-55).

How eloquent and succinct that is. It makes the entire argument for not only the Indian but also the African case against the white settlers of the United States who claim racial and cultural superiority and entitlement to the land and toil of others.
Apess has the clarity of vision and skill in expression that we saw in Frederick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs, the ability to master rhetorical expression and rise above adversity to become a powerful voice for the oppressed and dispossessed. As a minister and believer, he is well versed in Christian teaching, and he is able to frame his appeal in religious terms in a way that there is no arguing with. His argument is so straightforward and so just that there is isn't much to say about it. He asks how can you claim to be a Christian and treat the Indians as you have done. He is also very generous in his willingness to put the past aside and continue forward on a different course. One of the interesting points that he makes, continuing along the racial lines in the passage quoted above, is that Jesus was more similar in appearance and racial characteristics to those the white man deems inferior than to the white man himself; that Christ himself was a man of color.