Life and Times of Frederick Douglass

Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | Adult | Published in 1881

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Part 2, Chapters 13-15Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 2: “Second Part”

Part 2, Chapter 13 Summary: “Vast Changes”

With slavery abolished, Douglass wonders what his future holds. That great cause, happily victorious, has called forth and directed all of his energies for nearly a quarter-century. Soon it becomes clear, however, that the Freedmen—the recently emancipated slaves—need advocates. With this in mind, Douglass focused his lectures on securing voting rights. A brief interview in February 1866 with the dull-minded President Andrew Johnson, Abraham Lincoln’s unworthy successor, leaves Douglass even more convinced of the need for continued agitation on the subject of equal rights.

The citizens of Rochester elect Douglass to represent them at the National Loyalist’s Convention, which meets in Philadelphia in September 1866. Skittish Republicans, “with every respect for me personally, were unable to see the wisdom of such a course. They dreaded the clamor of social equality and amalgamation which would be raised against the party” in light of Douglass’s election to a national convention (326). Douglass experiences a cool reception in Philadelphia, albeit with notable exceptions, including from General Benjamin Butler, who always showed “a courage equal to his conviction,” and newspaper editor Theodore Tilton, who, on the march through Philadelphia, “seized me by the hand in a most brotherly way, and proposed to walk with me in the procession” (328-29). Remarkably, the citizens of Philadelphia who line the streets cheer Douglass “repeatedly and enthusiastically” (329). Even more remarkably, along the parade route Douglass meets Amanda Sears, formerly Amanda Auld, daughter of Lucretia Auld, his former mistress who showed him so much kindness. Amanda has followed his career and has come to Philadelphia to watch him walk in the procession.

Part 2, Chapter 14 Summary: “Living and Learning”

Douglass briefly considers a political career. The 14th and 15th Amendments have made such thoughts possible, and the prospect of a Union rescued from the slaveholders’ grip and now directed by Northern men, at least for the foreseeable future, makes those thoughts somewhat palatable. He quickly abandons the idea, however, expressing “small faith in my aptitude as a politician” (335).

Rejecting politics, Douglass nonetheless moves to Washington, DC, where, at the urging of friends, he establishes a newspaper, the New National Era. At the same time, he serves on the Board of Trustees of the Freedmen’s Savings and Trust Company, also known as The Freedmen’s Bank, and before long he is elected bank president. Both enterprises fail, the former through poor funding due to unfulfilled promises and the latter through corrupt dealings and exhausted reserves. Their failures cost Douglass much grief and embarrassment.

Part 2, Chapter 15 Summary: “Weighed in the Balance”

In his bid to annex Santo Domingo, President Ulysses S. Grant encounters strong resistance from Senator Charles Sumner, the abolitionist-turned-radical-Republican, who fears that annexation will annihilate an independent Black republic. Douglass sides with President Grant and even makes a voyage to Santo Domingo aboard a US warship. In a speech at Arlington on Decoration Day 1871, with President Grant in attendance, Douglas urges Americans not to effect reconciliation with the late rebels at the cost of forgetting what they tried to do, for “victory to the rebellion meant death to the republic” (349).

In April 1872, Douglass presides over a Black citizens’ political convention in New Orleans, an important event given the Republican Party’s deepening disunity at the national level. Douglass campaigns for President Grant, who wins a second term with a resounding victory over Liberal Republican Horace Greeley. Though he “neither received nor sought office” from Grant (352), Douglass does receive an appointment as United States Marshal of the District of Columbia from Grant’s successor, Rutherford B. Hayes. His long-established fame as an escaped slave, abolitionist, and civil-rights activist makes Douglass a respected voice on behalf of the Freedmen, though it also makes him a frequent target of criticism from other Black leaders, and he was “never […] more at variance with leading colored men of the country” than when he “opposed the effort to set in motion a wholesale exodus of colored people from the South to the Northern States” (361).

Part 2, Chapters 13-15 Analysis

The drama of the war years concludes with President Lincoln’s assassination. From there, Douglass turns his focus to securing citizenship and voting rights for Freedmen. With Republicans and the Union Army in control of the vanquished South, with the hostile President Andrew Johnson neutralized by a Republican majority in Congress, and with Johnson’s noble successor, President Ulysses S. Grant, committed to enforcing federal civil-rights laws, the Freedmen’s prospects appear bright.

Misfortune nonetheless dims Douglass’s own prospects and, with them, however unfairly, prospects for Black people as a whole. In the course of an ordinary life, the failure of Douglass’s New National Era newspaper, followed by the collapse of the Freedmen’s Bank, of which Douglass was president, would amount to devastating setbacks, but the responsibility for these failures, insofar as circumstances warranted, would fall upon the individual and extend no further. Douglass, however, always bears the added burden of representing his “race.” When he succeeds, in the minds of many, his glory redounds to others of similar complexion. When he fails, his failure casts doubts on the capacity of Black people as a whole.