Frederick Douglass and the Fourth of July Remembered

By Christine Kinealy

July 10th, 2024

From making an impromptu speech during an anti-slavery convention in Nantucket in August 1841, to speaking at a women’s suffrage meeting in Washington in February 1895, only hours before he died, Frederick’s Douglass’s skill as a public orator was universally acknowledged. During 55 years of public service, he delivered thousands of speeches and lectures, some lasting for two hours, in which he argued for social justice for all, while liberally quoting from the Bible, William Shakespeare, Scottish poet Robert Burns, and Irish lyricist Thomas Moore. When in Ireland in 1845, Douglass used his magnificent voice in a different way—by singing “plantation songs” to his abolitionist audiences. Douglass’s ability to mesmerize and galvanize an audience was even more impressive given that he had been born into enslavement and was self-emancipated and self-educated.

One of Douglass’s most quoted and powerful speeches was given in 1852, when he was in his early 30s. It was delivered on 5 July in the Corinthian Hall in Rochester, New York, at an event organized by the Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society. Although Douglass was a vocal supporter of women’s suffrage, the focus of this oration was the hypocrisy of celebrating the Fourth of July and American independence while the country continued to be a slave-holding republic. It was a lacerating and uncompromising attack on “the peculiar institution,” delivered before an audience of predominantly White people, including several influential politicians, most notably President Millard Fillmore.

Although Douglass commenced with his usual humility—claiming that his expertise was “limited” and that he was “quailing”— adding:

You will not, therefore, be surprised, if in what I have to say, I evince no elaborate preparation, nor grace my speech with any high-sounding exordium. With little experience and with less learning, I have been able to throw my thoughts hastily and imperfectly together; and trusting to your patient and generous indulgence, I will proceed to lay them before you.

He then delivered an impassioned address that was unwavering in its use of rhetoric, sarcasm and dramatic irony.

Douglass wove together past and present grievances against Black people as a way of providing a blueprint for a future without slavery. His targets were many. They included contemporary lawmakers in Washington, especially those who were responsible for the draconian 1850 Fugitive Slave Act, which, he believed, ensured “slavery has been nationalized in its most horrible and revolting form.” Unusually, and with admirable bravado, Douglass criticised America’s “Founding Fathers” for not abolishing the institution of slavery, despite “your boasted liberty.” Nonetheless, this criticism was tempered by Douglass insisting:

I am not wanting in respect for the fathers of this republic … They were statesmen, patriots and heroes, and for the good they did, and the principles they contended for, I will unite with you to honor their memory.

A further target were the churches, for their complicity in allowing the continuation of enslavement, and their lack of true Christian values. Yet, while churches had been part of the problem, Douglass believed that they could be part of the solution by persuading public opinion to reject the continuation of keeping any human being in bondage.

Inadvertently perhaps, this speech also provided an affirmation of Douglass’s rejection of the doctrines of his former mentor, William Lloyd Garrison. In particular, Douglass made it clear that he believed that the Constitution did not permit slavery, in contrast to Garrison who had described the document as a “covenant with death” and “an agreement with Hell”.

The centre-piece of Douglass’s admonition was his dismissal of the Fourth July celebrations as a day for national rejoicing:.

What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelly to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham

…

This, for the purpose of this celebration, is the 4th of July. It is the birthday of your National Independence, and of your political freedom. This, to you, is what the Passover was to the emancipated people of God. It carries your minds back to the day, and to the act of your great deliverance; and to the signs, and to the wonders, associated with that act, and that day. This celebration also marks the beginning of another year of your national life; and reminds you that the Republic of America is now 76 years old. I am glad, fellow-citizens, that your nation is so young. Seventy-six years, though a good old age for a man, is but a mere speck in the life of a nation. Three score years and ten is the allotted time for individual men; but nations number their years by thousands. According to this fact, you are, even now, only in the beginning of your national career.

Throughout, Douglass positioned himself as an outsider by constantly referring to “your”, not “our” institutions. This viewpoint was powerfully emphasized in the sentence, “This Fourth of July is yours, not mine, You may rejoice, I must mourn.” Frederick Douglass would continue to be a central figure in the struggle for Black equality for a further 35 years. His writings, oratory and activism inspired generations of campaigners for social justice long after he was dead. For many, however, his speech of 10,403 words, delivered on 5 July 1852 in Rochester, remained a clear clarion call—for a nation tainted by the shame of enslavement to fully discover its humanity.

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Dr. Christine Kinealy is author of Black Abolitionists in Ireland, vols 1 and 2 (Routledge, 2020 and 2023).