Servant Leadership: Frederick Douglass

I am honored to include portions of Benjamin Lichtenwalner’s Black History Servant Leadership posts as features on Leadership Days (Wednesdays) of our Christians Celebrate Black History Series this month.

Ben is the Founder of Modern Servant Leadership, adviser to www.philanthropist.org, and Senior Manager of Internet and eCommerce at Whirlpool Corporation. The mission of Modern Servant Leadership is to spread servant leadership awareness, adoption, and action and these posts combine his passion for Servant Leadership and African American history.

I’m glad Ben took time to compile a list of several Black American servant leaders. His list is not comprehensive, but he does feature the life stories of Sojourner Truth, Harriet Jacobs, Harriet Tubman, W.E.B. Du Bois, Ralph Bunche, and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I will only highlight a few of these servant leaders on my blog, so I encourage you to head over to Ben’s blog throughout the year to read the other stories. We can all learn from the examples of these servant leaders.

Today, I highlight the life and legacy of Frederick Douglass:

Frederick Douglass was an outspoken abolitionist, prominent speaker and respected author who fought for slavery freedom, women’s suffrage and equal rights for all. Douglass believed that the United States Constitution was, effectively, an anti-slavery document and used this and his powerful oratory skills to argue for the freedom of slaves and equal rights for all. He also believed education was critical for African Americans to achieve equality – to the point he even contended education was more important than suffrage. Find out more about what Frederick Douglass did, read some of his quotes, and why he is a servant leader here.

“If there is no struggle, there is no progress.” – Frederick Douglass