Frederick Douglass

While Frederick Douglass’s career made an enormous impact on the fight for freedom and equality for Black Americans during the 19th century, by the 1890s, the backlash against these fundamental societal changes was gaining momentum and heralded new decades of challenges in the civil rights fight. Dunbar was part of the first generation of Black Americans born free—who never lived under the threat of slavery, but who would have heard stories of it from surviving family members. Still, Dunbar’s generation faced a rise in violence and legislation that sought to segregate whites and blacks, to deprive blacks of voting rights and education, and worked to keep them as second-class citizens.

One of those changes was a movement among southern states to disenfranchise Black male voters (as women did not yet have the right to vote) by placing restrictions on who could vote: Poll taxes targeted the poor by taxing voting; literacy tests eliminated the uneducated from voting; and property tests eliminated those who did not own property. These restrictions would have targeted poor whites as well but had less of an impact than they did on African Americans. Another change was an increase in violence against African Americans—particularly lynching, which was designed to scare the community into submission. Finally, Jim Crow laws were established to segregate blacks and whites, claiming to assure separate but equal facilities, but without ever enforcing those standards.

With these social changes in mind, what is the significance of Dunbar’s rallying cry? Published during this time of profound loss, from the passing of Frederick Douglass, to increasing threats of white supremacist legislation and social action set to last for decades, Dunbar’s poem inspires current and future generations to pick up the mantle in the fight into the next century. The elegy seeks to capture the magnitude of Douglass’s contribution, to lament the loss of this important public figure, and to inspire his contemporaries and future generations to heed Douglass’s “battle-cry” (Line 52). It does so with full knowledge that “the gale” (Line 56) still rages on and the fight to end oppression of African Americans in the United States is far from over. However, Dunbar insists that someday, empowered by Douglass’s “guardian spirit” (Line 60), that freedom will eventually be had, and his race will rise “from beneath the chast’ning rod” (Line 61).