Frederick Douglass as an Anti-Slavery Activist

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Analysis
Conclusion

Introduction

Frederick Douglass, a notable anti-slavery activist, managed to present the different aspects of slavery to convince the audience of its abnormality. In this work, extracts from three of his speeches are analyzed. Among the essential components of these speeches were his self-posture as a victim of slavery and the embodiment of the black experience and his black nationalism.

Analysis

Frederick Douglass was an eminent abolitionist and statesman known as a skilled orator and writer. As a former slave, who escaped to freedom, he was a fierce opponent of slavery. In his writings and speeches, Douglass condemned slavery and supported the rights of black people, as well as the other oppressed groups. The analyzed document contains excerpts from his three speeches, “What to the slave is the fourth of July?” “The internal slave trade,” and “The slavery party.”

All three speeches are devoted to the topic of slavery, taking its different aspects into consideration. In “What to the slave is the fourth of July?” the orator drives the attention of his audience to a serious contradiction: Americans consider the Declaration of independence a document that proclaimed freedom, but this freedom has no relation to black people. “The internal slave trade” reflects on another contradiction: people in America often condemn the external slave trade as a horrible thing, but the same people think that the internal slave trade is normal while it is no less horrible. “The slavery party” is concentrated on the political aspect of slavery. Douglass characterizes the political lobby of slavery as a separate “party,” whose members, no matter Whigs or Democrats, do their best to support slaveholding and suppress abolitionism, as well as, promote the expatriation of all the free colored people from America.

An important component of the three speeches is the subject-position of the author. Being a former slave, Douglass refers to his experience and uses it to illustrate his notions about the horribleness of slavery. In “What to the slave is the fourth of July?” he presents himself as the symbol of black Americans in general. Addressing to white people, he says that the celebration is theirs, not his and that this day (July 4, 1776) has brought life to them but death to him. Surely, Douglass was not there in 1776, as well as his audience; this speech figure means that Douglass adopts the whole past experience of black people in America as his own, personal experience. Similarly, in “The internal slave trade,” Douglass tells that he has been seeing the slave trade every day as a child. At the moment of the speech, he is probably not seeing it so frequently, but he still feels it, which means that he adopts the present experience of black people as well. In the same way, he calls the suffering of black people “our misfortunes.”

In the selected three speeches, Douglass also develops a specific concept of freedom. As he claims, the current understanding of freedom by American society is deeply flawed. Many people believe that the signing of the Declaration of Independence brought freedom and that America is the land of liberty. However, Douglass states, it is not true liberty until slavery is ended. True freedom, as Douglass is sure, is a natural right of any person; all people are entitled to freedom. To Douglass, it seems ridiculous that the rights of black people to their liberty is a question for discussion. He believes that is should be logically understood that all people, no matter their race, should have basic human rights, including freedom. The orator also includes a religious component to his discourse. He convinces his audience that slavery is not godlike, that it was not God who created slavery, that slavery is opposed to His laws, and that He does not justify a breach of someone’s right to be free.

Another essential component of Douglass’s concepts developed in the three speeches is nationalism or, to be more precise, black nationalism. It can be seen in the sentences, where he refers to black people as “us” and white people as “you.” Such a rhetoric opposition can be considered a nationalist feature. Douglass presents black people as a separate entity with its own unique historical experience and features. Douglass also does not share the traditional “American” (in fact, white American) values such as honoring the Declaration of Independence as a charter of liberty. One more nationalist feature is that, in a political aspect, he does not divide Americans by their political views (Whigs or Democrats); instead, he divides them by their attitude to black people. Douglass also does not recognize “American” as a national identity. For his, “black” is a national identity. A racial definition of national identity, as well as the recognition of black people as a separate entity, makes him a black nationalist.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the selected speeches of Frederick Douglass reflect him as a strong opponent of slavery, who used his subject-position, a specific understanding of freedom, and black nationalist doctrine to form convincing arguments.

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Frederick Douglass as an Anti-Slavery Activist

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