Emancipation Proclamation

In 1863, President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing enslaved people in the states that had rebelled.

“This is where the first reading of the Emancipation Proclamation took place in the South,” I’d tell the girls in a voice I’d lower to a whisper to reflect my reverence of the place.

When Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in January 1863—declaring enslaved people in the rebellious states “forever free” and opening the Union Army to black enlistment—Douglass and other skeptics were electrified.

With the Emancipation Proclamation in place, Douglass’s confidence in Lincoln deepened.

The Emancipation Proclamation, followed by the 13th Amendment and Lincoln’s unprecedented public call for black suffrage, confirmed his place at the forefront of progress.