Page:Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (1892).djvu/737

Rh me a scapegoat to bear off the sins of others. It may be noted, too, that prompt advantage has been taken of the fact that falsehood is not easily exposed when it has had an early start in advance of truth. As mindful of some things as they were, however, they forgot that innocence needs no defense until it is accused.

"The charge is, that I have been the means of defeating the acquisition of an important United States naval station at the Môle St. Nicolas. It is said, in general terms, that I wasted the whole of my first year in Haïti in needless parley and delay, and finally reduced the chances of getting the Môle to such a narrow margin as to make it necessary for our government to appoint Rear-Admiral Gherardi as a special commissioner to Haïti to take the whole matter of negotiation for the Môle out of my hands. One of the charitable apologies they are pleased to make for my failure is my color; and the implication is that a white man would have succeeded where I failed. This color argument is not new. It besieged the White House before I was appointed Minister Resident and Consul-General to Haïti. At once and all along the line, the contention was then raised that no man with African blood in his veins should be sent as minister to the Black Republic. White men professed to speak in the interest of black Haïti; and I could have applauded their alacrity in upholding her dignity if I could have respected their sincerity. They thought it monstrous to compel black Haïti to receive a minister as black as herself. They did not see that it would be shockingly inconsistent for Haïti to object to a black minister while she herself is black.

"Prejudice sets all logic at defiance. It takes no account of reason or consistency. One of the duties