It's often said that Frederick Douglass objected to the kneeling slave in the sculpture known as the Freedmen's Memorial in Washington, D.C. (also known as the Emancipation Memorial), which some protestors are now demanding be taken down on that account. This news story, for example, claims that "Frederick Douglass spoke critically of the freed slave's depiction as kneeling before Lincoln." But in fact, the evidence for this claim is rather slim, and I find it implausible.
Douglass, of course, gave the dedication speech for the monument when it was dedicated in 1876. It was one of the most important speeches of his career, being in front of an audience that included President Grant, Supreme Court Justices, and other important dignitaries. Douglass's speech that day was notably critical of Abraham Lincoln, or rather, it offered a notably objective and balanced assessment of Lincoln's character. But no remark on the kneeling posture is to be found in Douglass's speech.
Instead, the earliest source for this claim is in a book published 40 years after the fact, Emancipation and The Freed in American Sculpture by Freeman Murray. The book quotes a letter (see p. 199) sent to Murray by John Wesley Cromwell, who was then 70 years old and who told Murray that he had been present, only fifteen feet or so from Douglass, when the remarks came. Cromwell acknowledged that the remark was not in Douglass's written speech, so he said "evidently it was an extempore utterance." He claimed that Douglass said "that he did not like the attitude; it showed the Negro on his knees, when a more manly attitude would have been more indicative of freedom." That is all the evidence we have. Douglass made no remark on the statue's pose in any other writing that we know of, and the newspapers did not report any such remark.
Now, it's true that the kneeling posture was controversial in the black community at the time. And it's possible that Douglass would have objected to it. We can't tell if Douglass knew that in fact in 1865, when Lincoln visited Richmond, Virginia, a freedman had in fact knelt before him, and Lincoln had told him to stand--saying that he should no longer kneel to any man. But what are we to make of Cromwell's recollection?
My own suspicion is that if Douglass did say something to this effect, it was likely one of two things. Either Douglass merely indicated in some vague terms his agreement with someone else who had objected, the way you'll sometimes do at a public event, when you're trying to be nice but non-committal, or, more likely, Douglass said something to the effect that while he did not object to the sculpture, he also thought that in the post-Civil War era, he looked forward to sculptures that depicted black Americans standing, as indeed Lincoln himself had more or less said in Richmond...or something like that. You can easily picture how an orator might make such a remark.
It would have been extremely unlike Douglass to have spoken derisively or critically of the monument at the event. He was exceedingly polite and careful in his utterances. On the other hand, if he had objected to it, it would have been extremely unlike him not to say so straight out, at length, in some written or spoken remarks that might preserve his views clearly. When Douglass disagreed with you, he let you know it and he didn't mince words or toss off some remark he wasn't willing to back up. In fact, in his speech on that day, he did criticize Lincoln himself quite openly. It's not plausible that he would have ommitted clear remarks about the monument, too, if that had been his view.
That is all speculation, of course. What we can say is this: the evidence that Douglass objected to the posture of the monument is quite thin, and the claim really should not be repeated.
Update: See the update!
Comments policy