My middle school students understand that I have high expectations and that I’ll show up consistently and authentically—whether we’re working together in class or running into each other at church. And even though they yearn for independence, I know they also crave that relationship. It’s a priority for me too. Trust is key to ensuring my classroom is a place where they can feel safe honing their ideas and trying out new ones. That’s what civics—and the Civic Star Challenge—is all about, especially as we near the country’s 250th birthday.
This is a moment to consider the ways we’re living up to the ideals in the Declaration of Independence and our other founding documents. That’s what two great American writers were doing in 1852. It’s the year Harriet Beecher Stowe published Uncle Tom’s Cabin and Frederick Douglass delivered his speech “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” These were two people with starkly different backgrounds, but who shared a faith in their nation’s potential.
Drawing on a lesson from the Four Question Method, my 8th grade US history class analyzed key passages from each text.
Students were especially struck by what pushed Stowe to write Uncle Tom’s Cabin. After losing her young son to cholera, she reflected on the grief enslaved mothers experienced when their children were taken from them.
We discussed Stowe’s admission that she had once avoided thinking deeply about slavery because it felt too painful to confront. By the end of the novel, she directly challenges readers to act against the Fugitive Slave Act, appealing to them as parents and Christians.
It’s as if she’s looking her readers directly in the eye.
That was what Douglass was doing as he delivered his landmark speech to the Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society. He is blistering in his critique of the July 4th holiday, calling it “a sham,” its “shouts of liberty and equality” nothing but “hollow mockery.” But what surprised students most was how the speech ended.
“I do not despair of this country. There are forces in operation, which must inevitably work the downfall of slavery. “The arm of the Lord is not shortened,” and the doom of slavery is certain. I, therefore, leave off where I began, with hope. While drawing encouragement from the Declaration of Independence, the great principles it contains, and the genius of American Institutions, my spirit is also cheered by the obvious tendencies of the age. No abuse, no outrage … can now hide itself from the all-pervading light.”
My students immediately recognized that Douglass was opening himself up to great personal risk by speaking out, and they marveled at his decision to use his public platform in this way. We also discussed how Douglass was able to criticize his country, while loving it ardently. This ability to consider two competing truths simultaneously—with rigor and respect—is one of the most valuable lessons civics can offer us.
Ultimately, my goal is to help my students notice that both Stowe and Douglas are profoundly hopeful. They refused to turn away from the darkness of their time and in facing it, helped push our country forward. To me, hope is a theme that is woven throughout our nation’s story. Even – or perhaps especially—when it is difficult to see, these great American voices remind us and future generations it’s worth declaring.
