Frederick Douglass was a prolific writer and an outspoken advocate for social justice. Given this fact, it is remarkable that he never wrote a work that specifically articulated his own political philosophy. Many Douglass scholars have tried to describe the features of his political philosophy. Even though a strong majority of scholars depict Douglass as a political liberal, Douglass commentators have had only limited success in constructing Douglass's political thought from his written corpus. As it turns out, describing Douglass as a “political liberal” is uninformative because American “liberalism” encompasses many different perspectives. Accordingly, debate between Douglass scholars on this topic centers upon how to best characterize Douglass's particular liberal commitments. Nicholas Buccola enters this debate with the goal of clarifying Douglass's position in liberal thought.
Buccola's work occupies a unique position in Douglass scholarship because he claims that Douglass was not simply a “classical liberal.” Generally speaking, classical liberals claim that the protection of an individual's right to life, liberty, and property are the necessary and sufficient conditions for individual autonomy. Certain aspects of Douglass's written work share these views, but Buccola maintains that Douglass was also a dedicated reformer and agitator. For this reason, Douglass must have had some concept of social justice. Buccola argues that such a commitment to social justice can be found in Douglass's writing on liberal reform. Reform liberals believe that individuals can only secure individual rights to life, liberty, and property under conditions of social and economic equality. Douglass's commitment to resisting social injustice through attacking inequality suggests that he had views that encompass both “reform” and “classical” liberal ideals.
Thus The Political Thought of Frederick Douglass: In Pursuit of American Liberty is animated by the theoretical tension between competing ideals of individual autonomy and social justice in Douglass's writing. Buccola claims that Douglass is committed to both the classical liberal ideal of individual freedom and the more communitarian ideal of a mutual obligation between citizens to secure one another's flourishing. Further, he contends that these two elements of Douglass's political thought are captured in two concepts: Douglass's doctrine of “true virtue” and his belief in “universal self-ownership.” The doctrine of true virtue asserts that “each of us has a moral obligation to combat injustice” (158). The concept of universal self-ownership maintains that every person is the rightful owner of her or his own body.
Buccola reconstructs these core elements of Douglass's political commitments through chapter-length studies of Douglass's corpus and secondary literature. Chapters are grouped thematically according to the two key elements of Douglass's thought: individual freedom and mutual responsibility. The first set of three chapters explores the concept of universal self-ownership in an attempt to show both how and why Douglass's work fits into the liberal tradition. The second set of three chapters discusses Douglass's humanitarian commitments and the role of the state in promoting a more humanitarian culture. Buccola concludes by suggesting that Douglass's political thought is exceptionally complex because neither classical liberalism nor reform liberalism accurately captures Douglass's views. Therefore Douglass occupies a theoretical territory “between liberalism and its communitarian and republican critics” (161).
The Political Thought of Frederick Douglass shows a strong effort to be faithful to the complexities of Douglass's philosophy. However, as the reader becomes more acquainted with Douglass's life and work over the course of the book, the question how Douglass fits into the liberal tradition feels increasingly superfluous. This is because the reader cannot help but be struck by Buccola's captivating portrayal of a truly gifted public intellectual and advocate. Hence Buccola's concluding call to take Douglass on his own terms seems stifled by his strong focus on Douglass's relationship with liberalism. After all, by Buccola's own admission, Douglass's political theory cannot be categorized so easily.
Therefore Buccola's best success in The Political Thought of Frederick Douglass is not in showing how Douglass's political thought as a liberal ought to matter to other Douglass scholars. Buccola accomplishes a much more important task. The Political Thought of Frederick Douglass portrays Douglass as a historical intellectual who ought to matter to anyone presently concerned with social justice, politics, or philosophy, regardless of their views on liberalism.
