In Douglass’s speech he is arguing that the experience of the white man is not the same as the black man. His example of this is The Fourth Of July. For many white Americans, the 4th is a day of celebration because it’s the day America gained independence. But, for Black Americans this is a day of sadness and a day of mourning. It is a mockery to celebrate being free in the faces of those enslaved. The celebration is supposed to be about how great America is and that America is the land of the free. While you wear your red, white, and blue face paint, so many Black Americans are still healing their scars as a direct affect of America’s wrong doings. The fourth is a slap in the face to Black Americans and their ancestors.
Quote: What, to the American slave, is your 4th 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. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciations of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade, and solemnity, are, to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy—a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices, more shocking and bloody, than are the people of these United States, at this very hour. (Douglass, 10)
Paraphrase: What to me and my people who have been slaves in America is the 4th of July? My answer is that it’s a day where we all recognize and acknowledge the horrible crimes that are always being acted upon us. To the slaves your happiness and pride on this day is fake. All of which you celebrate is in vain and a mockery to we, who have been enslaved. There is no country on this earth as horrible and heinous to minorities than the United States, right now.
Response: This quote explains that on the 4th of July American slaves and Black Americans feel pain and injustice from the decades of crime America has committed against them. Everything that the White American celebrates on that day is a mockery to them. They are celebrating things that aren’t true about America at the end of the day. They celebrate living in the land of the free when this country has treated Black Americans as slaves since slavery. To be so joyous about your freedom in the faces of people who have endless wounds from being trapped under the hand of the White man is ironic and cruel.
Good work overall, but I especially appreciate where you explain that Douglass is saying of the audience that, ” They are celebrating things that aren’t true about America at the end of the day. ” They are so proud of what they have accomplished and he’s swiping that out from under them and telling them its not true and explaining why.