Douglass, Frederick | Research & Encyclopedia Articles

Frederick Douglass

Born c. February 1817
Easton, Maryland

Died February 20, 1895
Washington, D.C.

Writer and activist

"Rebellion has been subdued, slavery abolished, and peace proclaimed, and yet our work is not done.… We are face to face with the same old enemy of liberty and progress."

Frederick Douglass was an eloquent spokesperson for abolition (the end of slavery) and equality. He persevered through an early life of slavery to become a celebrated speaker and writer. Relating his experiences as a victim of cruelty, Douglass maintained a strongly moral conviction in undoing the evil of slavery and establishing equality for people of both sexes and all races. He wrote celebrated autobiographical works, beginning with Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave (1845), and founded newspapers, including the North Star in 1847. The masthead of the North Star featured the motto, "Right is of no sex. Truth is of no color. God is the Father of us all, and we are all Brethren." During the Reconstruction era (1865–77), Douglass was a leader in supporting passage of the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870, which extended voting rights to African American males, and the efforts of Congress to ensure protection of the rights of freedmen.

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