“What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?” Frederick Douglass July 5, 1852 Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens:



He who could address this audience without a quailing sensation, has stronger nerves than I have. I do not remember ever to have appeared as 1/

a speaker before any assembly more shrinkingly, nor with greater distrust of my ability, than I do this day. A feeling has crept over me, quite unfavorable to the exercise of my limited powers of speech. 2/