Oration by Hon. Frederick Douglass (1880)

AUTHOR: Douglass, Frederick

SUMMARY (Aïcha Bouchelaghem, edited Deborah Madsen)

As in his 1873 “Address,” Douglass argues that establishing peaceful reciprocal relationships with the land and with farmed animals is paramount in order to ensure socioeconomic progress. Animals, such as horses, should not only be treated well but also should be considered as legal subjects, having both rights (to welfare) and duties (realized through discipline). Douglass emphasizes that his welfarist utopia applies to animals who function as farm subjects – and not pets, for instance.

Douglass consolidates his analogy between horses and humans, arguing that “A Horse ever partakes of the disposition of his master. He will be gentle or turbulent, proud or mean, steady or unsteady like his master” (161). He develops the argument about human-animal harmony into the idea that pets are ontologically continuous with their owners. Harriet Beecher Stowe makes a similar point in regard to pet dogs in “Footsteps of the Master” (1877), the opening section of her Religious Studies: Sketches and Poems (1896). Stowe claims that “The dog is changed by tender treatment and affectionate care; he becomes half human, and seems to struggle to rise out of the brute” (78). For Douglass as well as for Stowe, affection has a humanizing effect upon domestic animals. Douglass refines his previous statement that “A horse is … like a man” (1873, 13), stating: “There is not much difference between horse nature and human nature, both need control, and both need kindness” (1880, 161). He also underlines his point about horses’ legal subjecthood by claiming that the horse “is a creature of law as well as a creature of freedom” (162).

He repeats the metaphor used in his 1873 "Address" -- “All flesh is grass” -- but makes an important amendment to his explanation: “The amount of vegetable matter we obtain from the earth is the measure of the well-being and happiness of animal life, and of man’s life in common with all animal life” (156). It is not clear whether, perhaps, the first mention of “animal life” refers to all animate beings, including humans, as the 1873 version of the speech attributes “life and happiness” to both “men” and “animals.” Either way, Douglass depicts animals as deserving of happiness and reiterates his understanding that harmonious interrelations between humans and other animals are necessary.

Another important addition to the 1873 “Address” emphasizes the importance of knowledge in securing agricultural success and progress. Echoing Transcendentalist notions of the significance of the natural environment Douglass explains: “Life is made up of little things. A drop of rain, a blade of grass, a withered leaf or a blooming flower, may contain a world of thought, and may bring us much wisdom” (159-160).