As someone who has read the book this documentary is based on, it leaves out a great deal of information. For starters, he chose his name as Frederick Douglass when he was coming into his own. He struggled greatly with who his family, and specifically who his father was. Ultimately moving on from this unknown. The most amazing aspect was his forgiveness. He started his career with full of passion and fight in him to change America to the point of him stating this wasn't his country. He changed this thought as stating "This is our country" and to go even further to forgive his slave master.
As for his political association, he didn't believe in any of them before Lincoln. He needed to see proof the Republican Party could measure up to their promises made. He wholly despised the Democratic Party due to their stance on slavery. And after the war was ended, he was against reparations to previous slaves as he wanted them to find their own confidence that he himself found as a free, thinking man.
In the book it also states the relation to Andrew Johnson and how AJ gave way to the rise of the KKK thus beginning the unravel of all the work that was accomplished during Lincoln's presidency.
