A STERN REMINDER: "BEWARE OF DECLARING PREMATURE VICTORY"
In cleaning out some old files, I came upon a review of a book I read a decade ago: Giants, the Parallel Lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln by John Stauffer. An element of that review reminds me of a painful lesson I have learned over the years: “Beware of declaring premature victory.” I’ve seen that in business; I’ve seen it in the life of our nation; I’m seeing the risk of it today. The extract below, which draws directly from Stauffer’s fine book, refers particularly to the belief that the Emancipation of the slaves was leading to true “freedom.” Of course, that was not the case; the fight for freedom continues today.
In 1876, Douglass gave a talk to commemorate the unveiling of the Freedmen’s Monument in Lincoln Park, Washington. He encapsulated there Lincoln’s principles beautifully. “In organizing the loyal American people for the tremendous conflict before them, and bringing them safely through that conflict,” Lincoln had succeeded. “Had he put the abolition of slavery before the salvation of the Union” he would have alienated large numbers of people “and rendered resistance to rebellion impossible.”
As Douglass stood there that day, it had already become clear that “the slave was sinking back to his knees after standing in ‘brief moment in the sun’.” Douglass’ worst fears from the Civil War years had been realized, yet he remained largely silent. Why was this? Like most other black and white abolitionists, Douglass saw the end of the war as the end-point of an era and of his life’s work. It also marked the end of his continual self-making. After the war “a strange and perhaps perverse feeling came over me. I felt I had reached the end of the noblest and best part of my life; my school was broken up, my church disbanded and the congregation dispersed, never to come together again.” His life’s work was now “among the things of memory.”
It was an astonishing confession, as Stauffer says. Douglass himself in 1852 had summarized the uses of history by saying: “We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and to the future.” But now, the past had become the main theme. His Freedman’s Monument speech totally ignored what was happening to blacks in the present. They were being systematically murdered and terrorized by former Confederates, who sought to re-establish slavery in form if not name. In this sense, he resembled a retired athlete or political leader, whose life work and great achievements were behind him, unable to re-enter the fray with the same passion and in the same way. Freedom had represented for Douglass and most other abolitionists a glorious culmination rather than the beginning of new struggles. Emancipation had been the “key to a promised land” but the dream soon turned into a nightmare and the promised land was nowhere in sight. In the face of growing doubts and disappointments, Douglass (and most of his fellow abolitionists) turned to the past as a source of solace.
There is a very important message for us here.
Recognize that battles won are often just laying the foundation for a new battle to be won. A message that major undertakings will not proceed on automatic pilot. A message that new champions need to come forth to replace those that started it. For, like it or not, energy is not unflagging despite the best effort of those involved. This is no excuse to give up sooner than one can and should. But it does underscore the importance of respecting that admonition from Douglass in 1852. “We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and to the future.” I don’t agree with that in every dimension, but I do in its basic thrust.
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