Thirteenth Amendment To The United States Constitution
The Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution outlaws slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. It was passed by the Senate on April 8, 1864, by the House on January 31, 1865, and adopted on December 6, 1865. On December 18, Secretary of State William H. Seward proclaimed it to have been adopted. It was the first of the three Reconstruction Amendments adopted after the American Civil War.
President Lincoln and other Republicans were concerned that the Emancipation Proclamation, which in 1863 declared the freedom of slaves in ten Confederate states then in rebellion, would be seen as a temporary war measure, since it was solely based on Lincoln's war powers. The Proclamation did not free any slaves in the border states nor itself make slavery illegal.
Read more about Thirteenth Amendment To The United States Constitution: Text, History, Proposal and Ratification, Earlier Proposed Thirteenth Amendments
Famous quotes containing the words thirteenth, amendment, united, states and/or constitution:
“The thirteenth fairy,
her fingers as long and thin as straws,
her eyes burnt by cigarettes,
her uterus an empty teacup,
arrived with an evil gift.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)
“[Asserting] important First Amendment rights ... why should [executions] be the one area that is conducted behind closed doors?... Why shouldn’t executions be public?”
—Phil Donahue (b. 1935)
“In one notable instance, where the United States Army and a hundred years of persuasion failed, a highway has succeeded. The Seminole Indians surrendered to the Tamiami Trail. From the Everglades the remnants of this race emerged, soon after the trail was built, to set up their palm-thatched villages along the road and to hoist tribal flags as a lure to passing motorists.”
—For the State of Florida, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“It may be said that the elegant Swann’s simplicity was but another, more refined form of vanity and that, like other Israelites, my parents’ old friend could present, one by one, the succession of states through which had passed his race, from the most naive snobbishness to the worst coarseness to the finest politeness.”
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922)
“Our Constitution ... was not a perfect instrument, it is not perfect yet; but it provided a firm base upon which all manner of men of all races, colors and creeds could build our solid structure of democracy.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)