From New York, this is democracy now.

What to the American slave is your fault of July?

I answer a day that reveals to him more than all other days of the year the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is a constant victim.

To him, your celebration is a sham.

What to the slave is your fourth of July?

We'll hear Frederick Douglass' 1852 Independence Day address, read by James Earl Jones

that are performance and voices of a people's history of the United States based on the late historian Howard Zins landmark book.

We'll also discuss a new book inspired by Zim, voices of a people's history of the United States in the 21st century, and hear dramatic readings from it,

including Rosario Dawson reciting a message from 700,000 female farm workers to Hollywood and Kerry Washington reading the words of Angela Davis.

Let us remind ourselves that we, the hundreds of thousands, the millions of women, trans people, men, and youth who are here at the women's march.

We represent the powerful courses of change that are determined to prevent the dying cultures of racism and heteropetriarchy from rising again.

All that and more coming up.

This is Democracy Now, Democracy Now.org, the Warren Peace Report. I'm Amy Goodman.

Today in this special broadcast, we begin with the words of Frederick Douglass.

Born into slavery around 1818, Douglass became a key leader of the abolitionist movement.

On July 5th, 1852 in Rochester, New York, Frederick Douglass gave one of his most famous speeches. What to the slave is your fourth of July?

He was addressing the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society. This is James Earl Jones reading the historic address during a performance of voices of a people's history of the United States.

It was co-edited by Howard Zins. The late great historian introduced the address.

Frederick Douglass, once a slave, became a brilliant and powerful leader of the anti-slavery movement. In 1852, he was asked to speak in celebration of the Fourth of July.

Fellow citizens, pardon me, and allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here today?

What have I or those I represent to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice embodied in that declaration of independence extended to us?

And am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar and to confess the benefits and express without gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us?

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