Frederick Douglass was a former slave who escaped slavery in Maryland and ultimately became the leader of the abolitionist movement in Massachusetts and New York. He gave incisive speeches that quickly gained both attention and notoriety, and he was particularly vocal about his opposition to slavery. The pamphlet entitled What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? began its existence as a speech given by Douglass to the Rochester Ladies Anti-Slavery Society on July 5, 1862, and it became one of his best known orations and writings. Douglass refused to speak on July 4th, feeling that he could not endorse the celebration of American independence while slaves still suffered throughout the American south.
The pamphlet explores the constitutional and empirical arguments against the existence of slavery in the United States. Douglass argues that the admirable American traits of liberty, freedom, and the American Dream should also be afforded to slaves, so that no man is ultimately enslaved to another. He lambasts the nation for its hypocrisy in celebrating such values while continuing to advance an internal slave trade that strips people of their freedom, families, and lives. The speech is an example of what is known as the paradox of the positive, because Douglass uses the positive characteristics of America's founding to emphasize the inhumanity of American slavery.
Douglass wrote prolifically about his life as a slave, and his three-volume autobiography covered his life from childhood to just after the Civil War. As well as being a fervent abolitionist, Douglass was also a supporter of women's suffrage. He became the first African American to be nominated for Vice President. In his life he received a great deal of criticism from other abolitionist organizers for his willingness to talk to those who had supported slavery. He felt that dialogue was the catharsis for change, and said, "I would unite with anybody to do right, and with nobody to do wrong."
