Dr. Lucas Morel presenting his speech, “Frederick Douglass, Free Speech, and ‘The Right of the Hearer’” on Sept. 15, 2025. Credit: Trevor Voigt | Lantern Reporter
The 11th floor of the Thompson Library was filled with conversation about Frederick Douglass, free speech and the constitution on Monday.
Lucas Morel, who has a Ph.D. in political science and is a professor from Washington and Lee University, gave a speech titled “Frederick Douglass, Free Speech, and ‘The Right of the Hearer,’” in the campus reading room on the 11th floor. He also took pointed questions and pushback from some audience members once the speech concluded.
In celebration of Constitution Day — which is observed on Sept. 17 — the Salmon P. Chase Center for Civics, Culture, and Society hosted the event for “a unique opportunity to reflect on the enduring relevance of [Frederick] Douglass’s ideas in today’s civic discourse.”
Heather Morris, Chase Center’s project manager, greeted attendees at the door where copies of Morel’s book, “Measuring The Man: The Writings of Frederick Douglass on Abraham Lincoln” were offered, as well as pocket-sized copies of the United States Constitution.
Shortly after 4 p.m., Chase Center Executive Director Lee Strang welcomed the audience of around 60 people from the podium, highlighting both the significance and history of the Constitution, its defects — most notably its non-abolition of slavery — and abolitionist and statesman, Frederick Douglass.
“Today’s Constitution Day lecture highlights a great American, Frederick Douglass, whose thought, oratory, writing and advocacy, was crucial to healing that most disfiguring scar of our constitution by utilizing the constitution’s own tool to do so; the freedom of speech,” Strang said, before introducing Morel to the podium.
Morel approached the stand and said that he doesn’t know if he could “be speaking about a more important subject today.”
Morel said that the focus of his talk was Frederick Douglass’s belief in the power of words and civil discourse.
“At a time when bullets took precedence over ballots with the attempt by some Americans to secede from the Constitution of the union, Frederick Douglass had faith that speech had to prevail over violence for a free people to maintain their constitutional way of life,” Morel said. “Who better to teach us about free speech?”
Morel said that Douglass not only highlighted the importance of both the rights of the speaker, but also the “hearer” — referring to a quote from an 1860 Douglass speech.
“Douglass insisted that the right to speak was meaningless without remembering and therefore protecting the right to hear,” Morel said. “In doing so, he reminded us that free speech seeks an audience. It is not an end in itself but a means to an end, an appeal to reason in the public mind in order to persuade.”
Morel said government by consent is a two-way street of thoughts and arguments between a government and citizens, where each side should speak and listen to each other in turn.
“Some of those opinions are going to be wrong, they may even be offensive,” Morel said. “But through public debate and exchange ‘the public will be able to tell the difference and choose wisely.’”
On threats to free speech, Morel said that physical dangers are a risk when holding unpopular opinions and should “motivate citizens to strengthen protections of the right to speak.”
“Nowhere, I believe, is this more important than in American colleges and universities,” Morel said.
Morel said that universities are the “last place one should expect prejudices to be reinforced,” and equally “the last place propaganda and indoctrination should thrive.”
Morel said that in the current state of civil discourse on university campuses, “colleges in many cases have failed to protect visiting speakers from verbal harassment and physical intimidation.”
Such instances, Morel said, have included “protestors shouting them down, commandeering the microphone, showing up in large groups, chanting from a script, amplifying [their] voice[s] with bullhorns.”
Morel said that these protests but “not all protests” are “simply attempts to disrupt, not to engage — plenty of conviction but pitifully few arguments.”
“They are mighty in numbers and moral indignation, but almost devoid of evidence and logic, in a word: bullying,” Morel said.
Morel said that “the disruption is the point” in those instances, and that it is “an expression of power, not an invitation to argue, reason or debate.”
Douglass said in the same 1860 speech from which the lecture took its name, “When a man is allowed to speak because he is rich and powerful, it aggravates the crime of denying the right to the poor and humble.”
Morel said that for student protestors who they feel have not been listened to or silenced, to argue that other voices have had the opportunity to speak, it is now their turn.
“I think the strongest argument they could make is that ‘other voices have been privileged and it’s now our turn’ and therefore, of all voices, you should privilege those who haven’t had the mic,” Morel said.
Morel said that when protestors “make it difficult” for a situation to avoid escalation into physical altercations, citing a 2024 incident on the campus of UCLA resulting in a $6 million lawsuit after pro-Palestine protestors blocked students from getting to class, “at that point they are imposing their will and they are not interested in engagement.”
Morel said this example is one where individuals claim their voices aren’t being heard, but are forgetting the purpose of appealing to the listener.
“The optics on the way they’re doing it are not conducive to reason and engagement, and in my mind, it actually looks like it will backfire,” Morel said.
After concluding the presentation, Morel took pointed questions from the audience, and received pushback from audience members, notably on the Constitution’s role in keeping slavery established, which sparked a heated back-and-forth between Morel and Hasan Jeffries, an associate professor in history.
Jeffries argued that the Constitutional Congress made concessions that allowed slavery to continue, and “the people that wrote [The Constitution] did not believe in equal rights, did not believe in human rights, did not believe in all those things that they are saying, Douglass recognized that and [said] ‘we’re going to use your words, even though [Douglass knew] when [the framers] said all men are created equal, you weren’t talking about me.’”
Information on upcoming events from the Chase Center can be found on their website.
