Douglas – Popular Politics in Early America

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A few things jumped out at me after reading David Blight’s account of Fredrick Douglas and the competing historical memories of Civil War. Particularly, I wondered why the Lost Cause narrative became so much more prevalent in in American society than a memory of the Civil War that praised emancipation. There is certainly the possibility that the reintegration was judged to be more valuable than celebrating it as the emancipation of former slaves, but I wonder if part of the reason stemmed from the tactics used some of the early leaders of the emancipation narrative such as Fredrick Douglas. For instance Douglas’s comment, “may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth if I forget the difference between the parties to that … bloody conflict … I may say if this war is to be forgotten, I ask in the name of all things sacred what shall men remember” (Blight 1160). When read in conjunction with Faust work, The Civil War Soldier and the Art of Dying, which highlighted the traumatic nature of the conflict and how that trauma extended far beyond limits of the battlefield, Douglas’ decision to remember the war through its horrors and the bloody nature could have lessened his position’s appeal in the American public. As AJ pointed out, Douglas’ failure to participate in the war may have hurt his credibility and I think it goes farther than that. His distance from the conflict may have blinded him to the reality of this trauma not only in the returning soldiers but people throughout American society.

In “For Something Beyond the Battlefield,” David W. Blight writes about Frederick Douglass’ efforts to preserve the memory of the ideological background of the Civil War. More specifically, Douglass wanted to make sure that the Civil War would be remembered in the American consciousness as a moral struggle between Northern abolition as an absolute good and Southern slavery as an absolute evil. Blight confirms Douglass’ perpetuation of that idea by quoting a speech in which Douglass urges Americans not to remember the Southern cause with any of the admiration afforded to the Northern one. (1160) A big part of Blight’s thesis has to do with the practical reasons for Douglass’ desire for this ideological narrative to persist—in other words, Douglass did not want to perpetuate these ideas simply because he believed them to be true. Blight posits that Douglass believed that those who shaped historical interpretations of the Civil War would be the ones to shape the fate of African-Americans in the post-war period. That is why, according to Blight, Douglass looked at the Supreme Court’s overturning of the 1875 Civil Rights Acts as a result of Americans forgetting that the Civil War was at its core a war fought to free people of color from bondage. AJ’s post does a good job of further delving into the specific factors which, according to Blight, drove Douglass to take this view.

I definitely see the merits of Blight and Douglass’ view of the effect of what kind of history the nation generally accepts on its policies going forward. I think a good example of this idea in effect is in the reception of the 1915 film Birth of a Nation. It is one of the most well known films of all times, due in equal parts to both its innovations in filmmaking as an art and, unfortunately, its racist message. The story of Birth of a Nation takes an extremely biased look at Reconstruction in the South, indignantly claiming that white Southerners were stripped of their voting rights and made to live under governments made up entirely of unqualified, lazy African-Americans. In the film, the main character fights back against Reconstruction by establishing the Ku Klux Klan as a force for good that puts whites back in power (where the filmmaker would say they belong). Birth of a Nation was the highest grossing film of its time. Its popularity suggests that many Americans accepted the idea that Reconstruction was fundamentally unfair to whites and upset a power balance that it should not have. That is confirmed by the fact that by 1915 Southern Democrats had long before managed to stop Reconstruction and establish Jim Crow laws. Furthermore, many scholars believe that the film directly contributed to the 20th century revival of the KKK as an institution to harass African-Americans. Thus, we see that the film was a powerful enough influence on American collective consciousness to impact the future of race relations. In this way, Birth of a Nation’s reception and aftermath reflects Douglass’ and Blights’ argument.

Tag: Douglas

Competing Memories

An Example of Blight's and Douglass' Thinking