What Frederick Douglass meant when he gave his Speech

Tony Trani
Period 5 English 3p
2-17-17
In the speech, What to the Slaves is the Fourth of July, Frederick Douglass purpose is
to humanize the slaves of America and make the slave owners of America realize that slaves
are people too, not property. He uses pathos to support his claim when he states, To forget
them, to pass lightly over their wrongs, and to chime in with the popular theme, would be
treason most scandalous and shocking (Douglass, Paragraph 5). This resembles the people
on how they need to allow the slaves their freedom and let them experience the Fourth of July
the way it should be, with the free people of America coming together and celebrating the birth
of their great nation. This helps persuade his audience by reaching out to the slave owners and
tries to make them see their actions, hopefully convincing them to release their slaves to give
them their freedom. He also uses ethos when he explains, To him, your celebration is a sham;
your boasted liberty, and unholy license (Douglass, Paragraph 12). What he means by this is
that the slaves are seeing the holiday as a form of hypocrisy since the slaves have to endure
going through their lives without freedom. This is persuasive because it shows the slave owners
what they have done, on how they speak of freedom and yet the slaves suffer their whole lives
without experiencing freedom. It is important to use ethos, pathos, logos in a speech because
these literary tools reach out to the people and make them think a little on the current subject be
spoken of and take things into a deeper understanding of what the possible outcome of the
future can come true.