Slavery And Douglass

By 1850 slavery represented the most important issue in American politics. Slavery lead to sectional conflict between its supporters and detractors, conflict rooted in incompatible ideological convictions. James Henley Thornwell’s The Rights and the Duties of Masters and Frederick Douglass’ What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? illustrate, respectively, pro-slavery and anti-slavery beliefs that could not coexist. Thornwell asserts that because slaves fulfill their duty to god by embracing their civil conditions, slaves gain divine freedom through human bondage, making slavery a divinely sanctioned institution. Douglass deplores the contradiction between the depredations of human bondage and the founding American principles of freedom. Thornwell and Douglass both view slaves as …show more content…
While Thornwell, a minister, uses religion to justify slavery, Douglass endorses atheism over the church that serves as “the engine of tyranny, and barbarous cruelty” . True Christianity, demonstrated in countries like England , cannot but oppose slavery. Once Douglass dismisses any religious justification for slavery, he seeks to legally condemn slavery on constitutional grounds. By his interpretation, “the Constitution according to its plain reading…will be found to contain principles and purposes, entirely hostile to the existence of slavery” , namely its absence of any mention slavery, slaveholding, or slaves . Rather than arguing the morality of slavery, Douglass flippantly states, “I have better employments for my time and strength than such arguments would imply” , citing instead the “eternal principles” espoused by the founding fathers: justice, liberty, and humanity . The existence of American Slavery therefore rendered “[American] humanity a base pretense, and [American] Christianity a lie…it destroys [American] moral power abroad”