What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?

Introduction

Douglass gave this speech on 5 July 1852 at Corinthian Hall in Rochester, at the invitation of the Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society. He begins by praising the founders and the principles of the Declaration of Independence, then turns: “What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July?” He answers that it reveals “the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim”, and attacks the domestic slave trade, the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 and the churches that defended slavery. In its last part he argues that the Constitution, read as written, is “a glorious liberty document”, and ends with hope. The speech is one of the most quoted texts of American political rhetoric and is read aloud every year around Independence Day.

More works by Frederick Douglass

• 1845Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave