Frederick Douglas

fredrick douglass

Born into slavery in Tuckahoe, Maryland, as Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey, he was taught to read and write as a child in violation of state laws. After being sold and traded to several different owners, he escaped to freedom at age 20, got married, and adopted the last name Douglass. He soon became active in the incipient abolitionist movement. After making an impromptu speech at the Massachusetts Antislavery Society in 1841, Douglass began to speak more and more on behalf of abolitionism, and eventually embarked upon a three-year speaking tour of Northern cities. His powerful rhetorical style, combining humor and outrage, showed audiences the numerous evils of slavery and built public support for the abolitionist cause.

In 1845, Douglass wrote his autobiography and called it "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave". Written as antislavery propaganda, this powerful book told of his struggle to gain his freedom, identified his owner, and became a national bestseller. It also forced Douglass into exile in England for two years to avoid capture by slave traders. Later he would be freed travel to North America.

Douglass returned to the United States in 1847 to publish The North Star, an abolitionist paper, in Rochester, New York. On the masthead appeared the motto, Right is of no sex...Truth is of no color...God is the Father of us all, and we are all Brethen. Douglass's children helped publish the four-page paper. As the abolitionist movement gained strength in 1850s, Douglass became more directly involved with the Underground Railroad. Harriet Tubman and other conductors often stayed at Douglass's house en route to Canada. In the notorious Dred Scott decision of 1857, the Supreme Court ruled that black people had no rights under the Constitution. This decision infuriated Douglass, and deepened the national debate over slavery.

Abraham Lincoln was elected president in 1860 promising to limit slavery's expansion. Eleven Southern states, built on a slave economy, decided to leave the country. War soon broke out. Douglass welcomed the Civil War in 1861 as an opportunity for a moral crusade to free slaves and establish a true democracy. During the Civil War, Douglass traveled around the country calling on Lincoln to immediately end slavery and enroll black troops in the war effort. After Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, Douglass helped recruit blacks for the Union Army.

Douglass continued to advise Lincoln throughout the Civil War, and pushed for constitutional amendments that would end slavery once and