July 4th, Whose Holiday Is It Anyway?

By Jade Henry
FWIS Youth Writer

July 4, 1776, The Declaration of Independence was adopted.  Written mostly by Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States, this document was meant to liberate the United States from Great Britain.  This independence was to protect individual rights and promote freedom, however nothing was mentioned about the freedom of the slave.  The guaranteed rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness were the main points of this Declaration.  Unfortunately, these “guaranteed” rights were denied to many.   

Throughout the 1800s, Black Americans used the Fourth of July to protest for emancipation and full citizenship. Their goal was to ensure that Black citizens, free and enslaved, had as much right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as white people.

The Rochester Ladies Anti-Slavery Society asked Frederick Douglass, a well-known activist and abolitionist, to deliver a Fourth of July speech with the subject "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" Mr. Douglass made this speech in Rochester, New York, on July 5, 1852. In this famous speech, Mr. Douglass says “What, to the American slave, is your Fourth 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.” In this speech, Mr. Douglass talks about the existence of slavery in America, and that we should always remember our past and where we originated from.

Mr. Douglass gives the Black American a justifiable reason why many choose not to celebrate the Fourth of July. The alternative holiday for Black Americans is Juneteenth. Juneteenth is a day of commemoration marked on June 19th to mark the end of slavery in the US. The holiday was first observed in Galveston Texas, where enslaved people were granted freedom on that date in 1865, because of the 1862 Emancipation Proclamation. This is our celebration of independence.

July 4, 2023.  Where will you be?  How will you celebrate?  Does the Fourth of July excite you?

We should never forget our history. Let us be knowledgeable and have a better future.