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Films >> Birth of a Nation (1915) >>

0:00:27 A Plea For the Art of the Motion Picture
We do not fear censorship, for we have no wish to offend with improprieties or obscenities, but we do demand, as a right, the liberty to show the dark side of wrong, that we may illuminate the bright side of virtue -- the same liberty that is conceded to the art of the written word -- that art to which we owe the Bible and the works of Shakespeare.
0:01:04
If in this work we have conveyed to the mind the ravages of war to the end that war may be held in abhorrence, this effort will not have been in vain.
0:01:11
The bringing of the African to America planted the first seed of disunion.
0:15:12
“IF THE NORTH CARRIES THE ELECTION, THE SOUTH WILL SECEDE.”
0:18:33
The great leader’s weakness that is to blight a nation.
0:26:29
The first flag of the Confederacy baptized in glory at Bull Run.
0:28:42
Conquer we must for our cause is just. Victory or death.
0:29:09
A mother’s gift to the cause--three sons off for the war.
0:39:23
On the battlefield. War claims its bitter, useless, sacrifice. True to their promise the chums meet again.
0:41:43
The last of their dearest possessions to be sold for the failing cause.
0:57:06
War’s peace.
0:59:41
War, the breeder of hate.
1:05:05
“We will ask mercy from the Great Heart.”
1:07:59
“Mr. Lincoln has given back your life to me.”
1:10:48
The end of state sovereignty. The soul of Daniel Webster calling to America: “Liberty and union, one and inseparable, now and forever.”
1:17:06
“Their leaders must be hanged and their states treated as conquered provinces.”
1:17:31
“I shall deal with them as though they had never been away.”
1:18:09
The South under Lincoln’s fostering hand goes to work to rebuild itself.
1:18:37
“And then, when the terrible days were over and a healing time of peace was at hand” …. came the fated night of April 14, 1865.
1:25:36
“You are now the greatest power in America.”
1:26:14
“Our best friend is gone, What is to become of us now!”
1:27:03 Excerpts from Woodrow Wilson’s “History of the American People:”
"….. Adventurers swarmed out of the North, as much the enemies of the one race as of the other, to cozen, beguile, and use the negroes ….. In the villages the negroes were the office holders, men who knew none of the uses of authority, except its insolences."

“…. The policy of the congressional leaders wrought … a veritable overthrow of civilization in the South….. in their determination to ‘put the white South under the heel of the black South.’” Woodrow Wilson.

“The white men were roused by a mere instinct of self-preservation….. until at last there had sprung into existence a great Ku Klux Klan, a veritable empire of the South, to protect the Southern country.” Woodrow Wilson.
1:27:55
The uncrowned king. The Executive Mansion of the Nation has shifted from the White House to this strange house on the Capitol Hill.
1:29:59
“Don’t scrape to me. You are the equal of any man here.”
1:30:11
The great Radical delivers his edict that the blacks shall be raised to full equality with the whites.
1:32:01
“I shall make this man, Silas Lynch, as a symbol of his race, the peer of any white man living.”
1:35:20
“This sidewalk belongs to us as much as it does to you, ‘Colonel’ Cameron.”
1:36:53
“Yo’ northern low down black trash, don’t try no airs on me.”
1:37:56
“Dem free-niggers f’um de N’of am sho’ crazy.”
1:40:44
EQUALITY
Equal Rights
Equal Politics
Equal Marriage
1:41:40
“Ef I doan’ get ‘nuf franchise to fill mah bucket, I doan’ want it nohow.”
1:50:49
“The case was tried before a negro magistrate and the verdict rendered against the whites by the negro jury.”
1:56:11
Passage of a bill, providing for intermarriage of blacks and whites.
1:57:25
Gus, the renegade, a product of the vicious doctrines spread by the carpetbaggers.
2:00:41
In agony of soul over the degradation and ruin of his people.
2:01:32
The result. The Ku Klux Klan, the organization that saved the South from the anarchy of black rule, but not without the shedding of more blood than at Gettysburg, according to Judge Tourgee of the carpet-baggers.
2:03:54
“We shall crush the white South under the heel of the black South.”
2:04:18
“Your lover belongs to this murderous band of outlaws.”
2:12:21
“You see, I’m a Captain nowâ€"and I want to marry-“
2:13:05
“Wait, missie, I won’t hurt yeh.”
2:16:11
“Stay away or I’ll jump!”
2:28:23
“Brethren, this flag bears the red stain of the life of a Southern woman, a priceless sacrifice on the altar of an outraged civilization.”
2:28:39
“Here I raise the ancient symbol of an unconquered race of men, the fiery cross of old Scotland’s hills….. I quench its flames in the sweetest blood that ever stained the sands of Time!”
2:44:03
“See! My people fill the streets. With them I will build a Black Empire and you as a Queen shall sit by my side.”
2:45:36
Lynch, drunk with wine and power, orders his henchmen to hurry preparations for a forced marriage.
2:49:28
“I want to marry a white woman.”
2:50:45
“The lady I want to marry is your daughter.”
3:06:42
“Liberty and union, one and inseparable, now and forever!”
EJG logo Edward J. Gallagher
Lehigh University Digital Library