Importance Of The 13th Amendment

First, Abraham Lincoln wasn’t a fan of slavery. He thought that slavery should be abolished. According to document 5 it says “Abraham Lincoln, who had declared “Government cannot endure permanently half slave, half free…”. Lincoln also thought that it should be “Free Speech, Free Homes, and Free Territory”. He thought that blacks should have the right to talk in public and blacks should own their own homes and property. Lincoln wanted all blacks to be free and didn't want racism.

He still did not think blacks should have the right to vote, hold political offices, or marry white people. He also still believed physical differences between the two races would prevent them from living together socially and politically (186). Lincoln was against whites benefitting from slave labor and did feel that blacks should be able to benefit from the fruits of their own labor. According to Dinesh D’Souza in her article “Abraham Lincoln: Tyrant, Hypocrite, or Consummate Statesman”, he was not, however, an abolitionist. Abolitionists wanted an immediate end to slavery and believed the rights of slaves should not be compromised and that they “had a duty to defend freedom, unreservedly, and careless of the consequences” (3).

The 13th amendment abolished slavery and freed millions of African Americans. This was supposed to improve their lives and give them a new beginning. However, more than 30 years after the abolishment, their situation has not improved. Their right to vote was revoked in many southern states during the early 1890s. Less than 40% of black children were enrolled in schools in Georgia by 1880. Between 1880 and 1918, over 2400 African Americans were hanged. Africans had the lowest paying jobs and very few owned land. Jim Crow laws were established in many southern states to legalize segregation. Their situation was disastrous and wasn’t improving. Four respected spokespersons presented their ideas to fix this racial inequality crisis. The four courageous people who offered their alternatives were Ida B Wells, Booker T. Washington, Henry Turner and W.E.B Du Bois.

In sequence with these events, Abraham Lincoln returned to politics in 1854 because of the success of Douglas’ Kansas-Nebraska act, and he quickly became the voice of the newly formed Republican Party. Shortly after he accepted the nomination from his party he said, “A housed divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free.” This quote is very important because Americans became aware that they would soon have to choose either to favor or oppose slavery, there was no middle ground. In Abraham Lincoln’s eyes, freedom meant the opposition to slavery. Unfortunately for the Republican party, Lincoln lost the election of 1858 and Douglas was reelected, but Lincoln would soon be back.

The freedom of America’s slaves has always been accredited to Abraham Lincoln, but he was not always the complete abolitionist as he is commonly portrayed. The “house divided”, as Lincoln depicts it in his famous ‘House Divided’ speech, of the United States during the Civil War, was not always lead towards the freedom of all mankind, and there is sufficient evidence to support this claim. The sixteenth president is most commonly remembered for inducing the courage and determination to end the Civil War, with the Emancipation Proclamation, although when it more closely studied he did not cross the great divide of enslavement vs. freedom with the submittal of that fabled document. When following the many famous quotes and speeches of Lincoln’s life, it appears that he was against all slavery and bondage. At the same time, when more closely examined, the quotes and speeches actually leaned towards his lack of strong opinion on the outcome of slavery. Lincoln is perceived as the most famous revolutionary of American history, but he does not live up to his legacy of being the eradicator of forced servitude.

The 13th Amendment abolished slavery in the United States and would essentially free an entire people from the chains of bondage. Many of the framers of the constitution were in fact slave owners. It is believed that as many as twenty five of the fifty members of the continental convention were slave holders at one time or another. Could the Constitution have been written in such a way that it would support slavery? The author, Steven Mitz writes: "Thurgood Marshall, the first African American to sit on the Supreme Court, said that the Constitution was 'defective from the start.' He pointed out that the framers had left out a majority of Americans when they wrote the phrase, 'We the People.'". Aside from the Bill of Rights, the Thirteenth Amendment is one of the most important amendments to the Constitution, in the fact that it effectively ended slavery in the United States.

The Constitution of the United States and the amendments that follow established the principles of our country. After the north won the civil war, reconstruction began in the south and several new laws were passed to support African American equality. In 1865, the 13th amendment was passed, which resulted in slavery being abolished. These newly freed men were made many promises. Among them were the promises of political, social, and economic justice. It seemed as though these promises would be kept as violating them was deemed unconstitutional. For example, the 14th amendment granted 3 rights to all men: the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, states cannot pass laws to abridge these rights, and the right that all men were seen equal before the law. Also, the 15th amendment was passed, which established the right to vote for all men, and thereby gave African Americans political power. In reality, however, these newly freed African Americans were still treated as inferior members of society. Reconstruction did not provide political, social, or economic justice to freed slaves.

The trail to the Thirteenth Amendment is covered in the bloodshed caused by the ideological split between the Northern and Southern American states. Because of the South’s plantation-based economy, longstanding European traditions of chattel slavery had a stronger grip on farmers seeking to increase the profit margin of their harvests. With the growth of abolitionist agitation and the election of Abraham Lincoln, the Southern states seceded from the union and thus the Civil War began, and with it the stronger push for African-American rights. Upon the war’s conclusion, Lincoln, persuaded further by African-American participation in the war, put an emphasis on ending slavery that led to the Thirteenth Amendment.

The thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments are all important; they each deal with fundamental human rights and are unique in their own ways. Each amendment is special in the sense that they each deal with different scenarios brought on by early American racism and the unstable government. The thirteenth amendment deals with the abolition of slavery, the fourteenth amendment deals with civil rights, and the fifteenth amendment deals with voting. The thirteenth amendment is important because it states that we cannot have slaves or servants that do not want to work for you. This is good because it gives people a law regarding slavery and it abolished slavery as a whole.

The thirteenth amendment was the first to abolish slavery, or so people say. The thirteenth amendment reads, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude except as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction,” the constitution. This amendment could easily fool people into believing that all was right within the world. However, soon after this amendment was added to the constitution unjust laws started to pop up within the states, “When slavery was legally abolished. A new set of laws called Black Codes emerged to criminalize legal activity for African Americans. Through the enforcement of these laws, acts such as

Lincoln suggests that the institution of slavery be contained by preventing the spread of it to the new territories and Free states, although he had no interest in interfering with the already entitled slave states. He agrees that it was the right of the state to make its own decisions, not the federal government. Although Lincoln did not favor getting involved with abolishing slavery in the already declared slave states, he did favor total abolition in the distant future. He was first worried about stopping the expansion of slavery and then the next step to be taken would have been the "ultimate extinction" of it throughout the states. Lincoln did believe that every white man had no more equality than another. For this is one of the main reasons why at this time a resolution needed to be found in order to keep this equality in the new territories. Lincoln made a valid point in his speech that if slave holders were to settle in a new territory along with people opposed to slavery, which party has the right to decide what type of territory and future state it will be declared as? As for the rights of slaves, Lincoln agreed with Douglas that slaves did not have the same individual rights as everyone else, but he did believe that the liberties given under the Declaration of Independence involved such slaves. It is obvious that the Republicans of this time find slavery as being a "moral, social, and political wrong",

As a Republican President, Abraham Lincoln opposed slavery. He believed it was unnecessary to everyone-including Negros and Whites. However, with his stand on slavery, he held back by declaring that he had no reason to disrupt slavery where it existed. The constitution had protected states where citizens wanted slavery to exist. Lincoln knew he would not get enough support and that the four slave-holding states in the North would turn against him. As a result, the Civil War began in 1861 with more of a political purpose in keeping the union together rather than a battle for human freedom. Slaveholders could not turn to the Union’s side because slaves were valuable and played a vital role to

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th president of the United States of America he was frequently referred to as the ‘’The great emancipator’’ and yet although he didn’t publicly call for the emancipation of the entire life. Lincoln established his public career by declaring that he was antislavery against slavery’s increasing but not for announcing immediate emancipation. However, the man who began as ‘’antislavery’’ eventually announced the emancipation proclamation in which freed all slaves in states that were in rebellion. Abraham Lincoln actively supported the 13th amendment in which abolished slavery throughout

150). Clearly, Lincoln was an undecided politician who was merely looking for votes. He never had any intention of ending slavery, but was rather looking for his own personal gains, and by appealing to both ideologies; he gained the necessary support to elect his president. From the beginning of his presidency, at Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address, it is clear to see he was not the “Great Emancipator,” but a man trying to maintain the unity of the nation.

When he first started in politics Lincoln expressed his dislike for slavery. He joined the Whig party and was a loyal participant for most of his political career. “But not until late in 1855 did Lincoln commit his political future to a sectional antislavery party” (Foner 73). When he joined the new Republican party, it was more relatable to his own credence.