Frederick Douglass delivered a keynote address on July 5, 1852, at an Independence Day celebration. While there, he posed a question: “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” Independence Day, otherwise known as the Fourth of July, did not represent freedom for enslaved African Americans, although it acknowledged the passage of the Declaration [] The content of Douglass's speech has been widely studied and referenced, confirming the historical context of his remarks about the Fourth of July and the ongoing struggles against slavery. Furthermore, Douglass's own life experience as a formerly enslaved person gives his arguments authenticity and underscores the importance of addressing social inequality. On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass gave a keynote address at an Independence Day celebration and asked, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” Douglass was a powerful orator, often traveling six months out of the year to give lectures on abolition. Final answer: The Fourth of July represented to Frederick Douglass the hypocrisy of a nation that celebrated liberty while perpetuating slavery.The option A is correct. Explanation: To Frederick Douglass, the Fourth of July represented the hypocrisy of a nation that proclaimed liberty but sanctioned slavery. Douglass, a famed abolitionist and former slave, delivered an impactful speech on July Independence Day: In America, July 4th remembers and celebrates the day that the colonial Continental Congress decided to officially declare its independence from Great Britain with the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Although it began the American Revolution, it led to the start of the United States as an independent nation. However, as Americans celebrated the anniversary of this This means that Douglass was only thirty-four years old when he delivered one of the greatest political speeches in American history. It was July 5, 1852. Douglass delivered this speech before a crowd in Rochester, NY on July 5, 1852. The poem at the end was written by famed abolitionist and colleague William Lloyd Garrison, and published on March 17, 1845 in the Signal of Liberty an anti-slavery newspaper. On July 5, 1852, eminent African American abolitionist Frederick Douglass delivered a brilliant speech that was a powerful indictment of American slavery and racism. Read the speech as printed within days in his own newspaper. Over 200 years after Frederick Douglass questioned “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?” in an act of resistance to Independence Day, Black Americans are still grappling with how to Explore the speech "What, To The Slave, Is The Fourth Of July" delivered by Frederick Douglass in 1852, including full text and historical context. Frederick Douglass was born an enslaved person in Maryland, later escaping into freedom and emerging as one of the leading abolitionist voices in the nineteenth century. In June 1852, he delivered this Independence Day address to the Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society. Speaking that day before the mostly white audience gathered under the auspices of the Rochester Ladies Anti-Slavery Society, Douglass delivered a Fourth of July oration that still has much to What, to the American slave, is your 4th 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. On Monday, July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass gave a speech to the “ Ladies of the Rochester Anti-Slavery Sewing Society, ” which arguably became his most famous public oration. Rather than a celebration of the Independence Day holiday, Douglass asked an obvious, simple and damning question: What, to the slave, is the Fourth of July? An official form of the United States government. Provided by Touchpoints Constitution 101 resource for 12.3 Primary Source: Frederick Douglass, What to the Slave is the Fourth of July (1852) For over fifty years, citizens have made the pilgrimage to Frederick Douglass's estate known as "Cedar Hill," where speakers have quoted, recited, or performed the words from the great abolitionist and orator's most famous speech. Frederick Douglass escaped slavery and became a leading abolitionist in the Antebellum era. One of his most famous speeches was made to the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society for Independence Day (Fourth of July) in 1852. What did the Fourth of July represent to Frederick Douglass? A. the hypocrisy of a nation that proclaimed liberty but sanctioned slavery B. the anniversary of the day he ran away from his master and claimed freedom C. an opportunity for slaves to join in a mass rebellion against their masters D. the ultimate celebration of freedom Frederick Douglass had moved to Rochester in 1847 in order to publish his newspaper The North Star. [9][10] He had previously lived in Boston, but did not want his newspaper to interfere with sales of The Liberator, published by William Lloyd Garrison. [10] Douglass had spoken at Corinthian Hall in the past.
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