In the APSA Public Scholarship Program, graduate students in political science produce summaries of new research in the American Political Science Review. This piece, written by Ewa Nizalowska, covers the new article by Charles H. T. Lesch, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, “Frederick Douglass’s Political Theory of the Powerless: Natural Rights from Below”.
Many of political theory’s key ideas come from elites rather than from the oppressed. The political thought of the American abolitionist, orator, statesman, and writer Frederick Douglass serves as one of a few important exceptions. Douglass was born into slavery and lived as a slave for twenty years and as a fugitive from slavery for nine years. From calling for the abolition of slavery to championing equal citizenship for Black Americans and women’s suffrage, Douglass spent much of his life advocating for, and on behalf of, the dominated.
In recent years, Douglass’s work has grown in popularity among political theorists. However, scholars have disagreed over the meaning and theoretical origins of Douglass’s insights. Some theorists have interpreted Douglass’s thought as essentially in line with the natural rights tradition that emerged in the Enlightenment era. According to theories of natural rights¾most often associated with the 17th-century English philosopher John Locke or with the American Declaration of Independence¾all human beings have certain inalienable rights, such as the rights to life, property, and freedom. However, whereas these rights appeared universal in theory, in practice they were often used to justify domination and colonial violence. For some theorists, Douglass’s references to the laws of human nature and his regard for America’s founding documents place him squarely in the liberal natural rights tradition. However, a second group of theorists see Douglass as a more radical thinker. According to this group, Douglass sought to criticize the foundation of natural rights concepts.
In a recent APSR article, the political theorist Charles Lesch proposes a different reading of Douglass’s thought that builds upon both perspectives. Rather than outright embracing or rejecting natural rights philosophy, Lesch argues, Douglass at once admired natural rights in theory and believed they could not operate in practice under the unjust conditions of the American slave system. Douglass’s project, on Lesch’s reading, was therefore to rebuild natural rights from below¾to subtly correct and revise natural rights concepts to reinforce them with the insights of the oppressed.
Drawing on Douglass’s antebellum and wartime writing, Lesch argues that Douglass accomplishes the task of regrounding natural rights primarily through two techniques: embodiment and redefinition. Through embodiment, natural rights become more than abstract ideals¾they are
made concrete through our social relations. Through redefinition, Douglass shifts the standard definitions of liberalism’s key political concepts, such as freedom, reason, dignity, and moral responsibility. Drawing on the experience of slavery, Douglass both affirms and modifies the substance of natural rights.
“Although Douglass retains the standard natural rights view that individuals have free will and can be held responsible for their actions, he simultaneously contends that slavery can only be uprooted if it is viewed as part of larger societal structures within which individuals make their choices.”Using these two techniques, Lesch argues, Douglass affirms the liberal concept of natural rights to freedom from arbitrary power, but he shows how chattel slavery constitutes a uniquely evil form of that power, sharply distinguishing American slavery from other forms of political and economic servitude. As Lesch further contends, Douglass deploys the language of natural rights to challenge the standard assumption that dehumanization causes domination. Instead, as Lesch shows, Douglass narrates the experiences of slaves through the language of natural rights to show that white slave-owners dehumanized slaves only as they grew accustomed to dominating them. Going further, Lesch writes, Douglass employs slave narratives to argue that slavery causes moral degradation in both the slave and the slave-owner, and to push back against the conventional liberal rights view that one cannot consent to one’s own domination.
In developing a new theory of natural rights, Lesch argues, Douglass also reworks traditional natural rights understandings of dignity and responsibility, asserting that all human beings have a natural right to dignity, but that this right must be acknowledged and sustained by others through ties of mutual recognition. Finally, Douglass’s focus on slavery as a social system leads him to develop a new theory of moral responsibility. Although Douglass retains the standard natural rights view that individuals have free will and can be held responsible for their actions, he simultaneously contends that slavery can only be uprooted if it is viewed as part of larger societal structures within which individuals make their choices.
Through developing a new interpretation of Douglass’s writing, Lesch shows how Douglass’s novel interpretation of natural rights anticipates a number of influential contemporary critiques of liberal thought. Still, Douglass was not a philosopher who sought merely to redefine abstract concepts. Rather, his goal was to jolt the conscience of his readers and persuade them to act against oppression. Douglass’s work serves as a reminder that stories of the oppressed contain their own theoretical insights, speaking to truths that lie beyond philosophy’s grasp.
- Ewa Nizalowska is a PhD candidate in political theory at Cornell University with research interests in American political thought, feminist theory, and theories of political economy and empire. Her dissertation examines how early to mid-twentieth-century radicals theorized the organization of economic power in the United States and strategized for its rearrangement. Her work has been supported by, among others, the American Political Science Association, the College of Arts and Sciences at Cornell University, and the Yan P. Lin Centre at McGill University
- LESCH, CHARLES H. T. 2025. “Frederick Douglass’s Political Theory of the Powerless: Natural Rights from Below.”, American Political Science Review, 1–15.
- About the APSA Public Scholarship Program.