Frederick Douglas- The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro

Frederick Douglas gave his speech to a white audience in Rochester, New York on July, 5, 1852 (Douglas 336). I thought this was a funny first thing to read, because the title of Douglas' writing made me think that it was going to be all about African Americans, but then it says that he delivered his speech to a room full of just whites. I read a little clip from our Glencoe American Literature books, and I could really get some details that were from the realism writing period.

"The blessing in which you, this day, rejoiced, are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought light and healing to you has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn" (Douglas 336).

I think just this paragraph its self you can tell that this speech that he spoke was obviously a great example of realism. I think that he was just trying to share things that were real in his life, and things that were actually going on for him in his life. He gave this speech to white people to share with them just how it really was for some African Americans at that time. He wanted to know that they should be happy because they are very lucky, because the African Americans on that day were in a mourning state because of all the things that they had to go through in that time. I also see hints of naturalism style in his speech, because he was saying all of his people so therefor it was almost a heredity and environment thing, that made the African Americans the way they were. "The sunlight that brought you light and healing to you has brought stripes and death to me" (Douglas 336).

"What, to the American slave, is your fourth of July? I answer, a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim" (Douglas 336). This sentence in his speech right here says a lot. I think this is a statement that would have stopped me in my tracks if I was there in Rochester, New York on that day. It just shows you how real that things are for them. The African Americans were not treated well at all then, and it was time for some of them to hear that. I think this shows realism because he was sharing his real life examples and giving details of just how exactly the Fourth of July was for them.

"There is not a nation on earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States, at this very hour" (Douglas 336). After I read this statement, I finally realized how the whole speech was just so relative to realism and naturalism. I think he was interested in writing about something that was important to him in his life and talk about things that he knew the most about. I do not think he just pulled this speech out of no where, I think he had been thinking about it for awhile.

Douglas, Frederick. "The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro." Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill, 2009. 336. Print.