Frederick Douglass: Spirit of the Law Textualist

Frederick Douglass is noted for performing a “180” in his interpretation of the U.S. Constitution—from a Garrisonian Constitution-as-pro-slavery view to his Constitution-as-anti-slavery view. This paper seeks to illuminate his methodology by way of uncovering the distinctions and the consistencies throughout most of Douglass’s interpretation of the Constitution and Supreme Court decisions on constitutionality. It especially considers Douglass’s Scripture-heavy hermeneutic of reading “letter and spirit” of the text, his consistent conception of the moral, “higher law”, and his aspirational view of the morally educative function of positive law. Drawing on Douglass’s speeches, editorials (especially in The North Star and Frederick Douglass’ Paper), correspondence and debates, this study traces his 1849 method of reading the Constitution through historical practice and implied intentions, through his 1851 shift to his matured public-meaning reading oriented by the Constitution’s harmony with higher law—its stated ends of justice and liberty. Douglass thus models a form of Constitutional Interpretation which meets moral-reading with originalism: viewing the true meaning of text, Scripture or Constitution, as law necessarily oriented towards the highest principles of humanity.