Summary Of What To The Slaver Is The Fourth Of July

One of Frederick Douglass’ most famous speeches is What to the Slaver Is the Fourth of July? In his speech, Douglass invites his audience to view the Fourth of July from the perspective of a slave to expand the understanding of the black experience. In my critical approach to his piece, I will introduce the dialogue regarding the literary approach to Douglass’s speech and the different approaches to his speech. Then, I will continue with a demonstration of the key points of agreement and disagreement to his speech in the secondary literature. Finally, I will offer my personal interaction with Douglass’ speech and the secondary literature. Modern scholars do not approach the message of Douglass’ speech, but rather the construction of the

Terrill, author of Irony, Silence, and Time: Frederick Douglass on the Fifth of July, argues that Douglass’ interesting use of irony that makes his speech famous and impactful. The author writes, “Douglass demonstrates a temporal management of irony, locating some moments when irony is necessary and others when it is impossible. . . . In this speech, in other words, Douglass models a way to exploit the broadened inventional horizons that irony offers while enforcing limits that keep the ironic attitude from political impotence. In and through this speech, Douglass fashions a relationship between irony and its antidote,” (Terrill 217). Terrill explains that Douglass intentionally uses irony to exploit the hypocrisy demonstrated by the American nation. An example of this is Douglass’ reference to the Declaration of Independence. He states, “Would you have me argue that man is entitled to liberty? that he is the rightful owner of his own body? You have declared it,” (597). Douglass reminds his audience of how the Declaration of Independence, a document claiming independence from another entity, ironically does not apply to the

Benjamin Quarles, author of Antebellum Free Blacks and the "Spirit of '76, wrote of several black abolitionists that were disappointed by the Fourth of July.
Charles Lenox Remond remarked that he was tired of reading Fourth of July speeches, effusions which he branded an insult.38 In her diary for July 4, 1857, the young and sensitive Charlotte Forten, then a teacher at the Salem (Massachusetts) Normal School, posted a bitter entry: "The celebration of this day! What a mockery it is! My soul sickens of it."3 9According to William Wells Brown, in a speech at Framingham in 1859, the soul of the slave was also sickened on the Fourth, "the great day of sale in the Southern states." To the slave, explained Brown, the firing of cannons and the ringing of bells on that morning were "the signals of separation from each other and from their