Frederick Douglass’ “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” and How We Need to Think About the Past

On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass gave a speech entitled “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” A few years ago on the Fourth of July, I wrote about a small section of this speech, and today I want to expand that discussion some more, looking at what Douglass says about what we should do, or shouldn’t do, with the past. The entire speech, of course, focuses on America’s history, specifically the promises of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” that Jefferson and the Founding Fathers proclaimed back in 1776. Seventy-six years later, in 1852, Douglass noted that America was not old, and that seventy six was “but a mere speck in the life of a nation.”

Before Douglass took to the stage in front of the Rochester Ladies’ Antislavery League, Rev. Robert R. Raymond read the Declaration of Independence. This recitation called upon the audience to think in historical terms, and Douglass’ speech does this as well. Douglass begins by humbly relaying his nervousness to the audience before turning to a history of America’s Independence from Britain. Here, Douglass rhetorically separates himself from the audience through the continual use of “you” and “your”: “your National Independence,” “your political freedom,” “your national life,” etc. This maneuver points out that…