Frederick Douglass: Critical Race Theorist?

In the midst of his career, abolitionist and public intellectual Frederick Douglass experienced a change of mind regarding the Constitution’s relation to slavery, declaring it a “GLORIOUS LIBERTY DOCUMENT” rather than the irredeemably pro-slavery charter he had once believed it to be along with many of his contemporaries.  This about-face has moved some, past and present, to suspect his reading was ultimately dictated by interest rather than principle, and also to suspect that he really was much more condemnatory of the Founders' Constitution than he later let on.  If those suspicions are correct, then he would stand as something of an early progenitor of what is known as critical race theory, or CRT.  Peter C. Myers, Professor of Political Science at University of Wisconsin – Eau Claire, will join us to discuss this charge and his position that it is ultimately incorrect.  In Dr. Myers’ view, Douglass stands as a…