The Supreme Court of the United States is not the only power in this world. Judge Taney can do many things, but he cannot perform impossibilities. He cannot bale out the ocean, annihilate this firm old earth, or pluck the silvery star of liberty from our Northern sky.
Original passage & context
"The Supreme Court of the United States is not the only power in this world. [...] Judge Taney can do many things, but he cannot perform impossibilities. He cannot bale out the ocean, annihilate this firm old earth, or pluck the silvery star of liberty from our Northern sky."
Asked how the decision affected him, Douglass answered that his hopes were never brighter. His reasoning was strategic, not consoling: a ruling this extreme could not be absorbed quietly, and would force the country to decide. The one voice in this feed belonging to a man the decision declared could never be a citizen.
Read it in the original — Two Speeches by Frederick Douglass (Rochester, 1857) ↗