"Coatesville" by John Jay Chapman

With the attendance of only two people, John Jay Chapman, a graduate of Harvard, delivered a speech in Coatesville, Pennsylvania. He spoke about a lynching that had took place there and about the indifference the people felt towards it. Chapman claimed that, even if the bystanders took no part in the lynching, everyone was to blame for it. He explained that the true cause for the crime was due to the people as a whole and that America must correct an evil within everyone and they wish to stop future crimes from taking place.

Chapman argued that the cause of these crimes was due to the lack of love in the hearts of the American people. He expresses this through figurative language and Enumeration. “As I read the newspaper accounts of the scene enacted here in Coatesville a year ago, I seemed to get a glimpse into the unconscious soul of this country. I saw a seldom revealed picture of the American heart and of the American nature. I seemed to be looking into the heart of the criminal—a cold thing, an awful thing” (Chapman 71-72). Utilizing satire to make his next point, Chapman blames the flaws in humanity in order to bring in his real purpose: Reflecting and reshaping. After pointing out the issue, the indifference, in humanity, he writes, “I say that our need is new life, and that books and resolutions will not save us, but only such disposition in our hearts and souls as will enable the new life, love, force, hope, virtue, which surround us always, to enter us” (Chapman 73). By abandoning our hate, Chapman believes will we be able to find the kindness to erase the evils in all of us. Overall, the essay is nicely tied together and effectively turns the lynching in Coatesville, Pennsylvania, into a much broader concern that may inspire people to want to change the way they are towards others.

Bibliography

“John Jay Chapman”. Encyclopædia Britannica. Encylcopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2016. Web. 28 Aug. 2016

To feel apathy towards evil is to wish death on all kindness

source: blog.tenthamendmentcenter.com

"Corn-pone Opinions" by Mark Twain

Mark Twain is the author of two literary classics known as The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. His essay, “Corn-pone Opinions”, speaks about the patterns of public opinion and conformity. He writes towards everyone, including himself, because everyone is involved. It is most likely that there is not a single person in the audience who has not ‘gone with the flow’ and conformed to a trend in order to win positive public opinion at some time in their lives. Twain explains that while some think a man only conforms to a majority view rather than expressing his own, not everyone follows those same expectations. He argues that new ideas are not always buried deep within to never come into the light for consideration. Most new ideas and trends are a result of a person who refused to conform to the majority and continued through life being the way they wanted to. As a result the people would catch on and the trend would begin.

Twain simplifies and enhances his ideas with several analogies. One analogy he makes is in regards to fashion. He writes, "A new thing in costume appears--the flaring hoopskirt, for example--and the passers-by are shocked,  and th irrelevant laugh. Six months later everybody is reconciled; the fashion has established itself; it is admired, now, and no one laughs" (Twain 2). With the simplification of the concept, the reader is better able to grasp what is being proposed. Mark Twain also uses repetition in his essays which also shows the reader just how habitual the pattern is. With every analogy, Twain ends it with some variation of "we merely notice and conform" (Twain 3). I find that, with these examples and sense of repetition, Mark Twain was very successful in drawing in the audience and having them listen to what he has to say. Many readers would most likely see a validility in his ideas. His word choices and rhetorical devices efficiently prove how people are merely affected by the decisions made around them.

Bibliography

Biography.com Editors. "Mark Twain Biography." Bio.com. A&E Networks Television, 27 Nov. 2015. Web. 28 Aug. 2016.

Nobody wishes to listen to those that do not conform to the majority

source: www.twainquotes.com/Public_opinion.html

“How It Feels to Be Colored Me” by Zora Neale Hurston

Zora Neale Hurston, a known American novelist, speaks about her life in the sense of how she is independent of her race yet still connected to it. Being a major part of the Harlem Renaissance, Hurston wrote the piece to convey the individuality in her dark-skinned self as well as point out the fact that, despite differing skin tones, we are all human inside. She wrote for the rest of the black community with the intention of letting others feel self-pride in their own ways as well. 
In this essay, Hurston expressed her feelings towards race while growing up. Going into school as a child never made her look back on her identity in a negative light despite being surrounded by lighter-skinned citizens with that exact goal in mind. They wanted her to feel shame, but she never found a reason to fall into despair when the slavery her ancestors were subjected to had ended a long time ago for her. Despite knowing that many people wanted her to feel ‘colored’ in society, Hurston points out that she never felt ‘colored’ unless she was put in a large majority of the contrasting skin tone and vice versa if only for the idea of being the odd one out in regards to appearance. 
Hurston’s juxtaposition of certain phrases and use of rhetorical devices such as sarcasm and somewhat elaborate metaphors or analogies was what really enforced her ideas. Her use of sarcasm in one line caught my attention. She wrote, “Someone is always at my elbow reminding me that I am the grand-daughter of slaves. It fails to register depression with me. Slavery is sixty years in the past. The operation was successful and the patient is doing well, thank you (Hurston 115). The dismissive attitude towards being “tragically colored”, as she put it, amazed me in an admirable manner. Even if her grandparents did not share the same social status as the whites, she was still human either way and should not have to look back on those events to let it define her as a person. Her bag analogy of all the different races also drove home the argument of everyone being human despite their skin color. She wrote, "But in the main, I feel like a brown bag of miscellany propped against a wall. Against a wall in company with other bags, white, red and yellow" (Hurlston 117). Hurlston continued on to explain that, even if a person were to empty out all the bags into a pile and randomly refill them, their contents would not change much at all. The bags would all still contain the same sorts of junk. With these kinds of comparisons that are easy to visualize, Hurston was able to successfully make her point to the audience.

Bibliography

History.com Staff. "Harlem Renaissance." History.com. A&E Television Networks, 2009. Web. 26 Aug. 2016.

Even if our tones are different, the skin is all made the same.

source: georgemagar.deviantart.com