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July 1, 2024 - Frederick Douglass, rare books at the BPL, and Boston's Harborfest
“What to the American slave is your Fourth of July?”
That is the question Frederick Douglass posed to an audience of abolitionists at an event commemorating the signing of the Declaration of Independence. It was July 5, 1852 in Rochester, New York.
In that speech, Douglass confronted the hypocrisy of a day celebrating freedom in a country that still endorsed the forced labor and bondage of more than 3 million people. It’s a speech with deep resonance today. This is why Mass Humanities sponsors public readings of this speech, which happen across the region. Brian Boyles, executive director of…
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