The Constitution did not say “slavery” out loud until it was abolished nationwide via the Thirteenth Amendment. Congress had earlier tried to prevent the Civil War by using a thirteenth amendment to protect slavery. That didn’t work. This time, using language from the Northwest Ordinance, the stain of slavery was firmly addressed. The lingering effects required additional amendments. We are still trying to completely honor its revolutionary potential. We also continue to debate its application to multiple modern-day controversies.
A Pro-Slavery Amendment
The first attempt to ratify a thirteenth amendment to the Constitution was a short-lived response to the Napoleonic Era, involving grants of nobility. The second came as a final attempt to prevent the country from breaking apart. It would defend slavery.
No amendment shall be made to the Constitution which will authorize or give to Congress the power to abolish or interfere, within any State, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State.
Compromise repeatedly provided a solution to sectional divisions over slavery (“domestic institution”). Senator Corwin (Republican from Ohio) hoped in 1861 that it would happen one more time. He proposed the “Corwin Amendment.”
President-Elect Lincoln accepted the proposal. He argued Republicans did not want to interfere with slavery in states where it now existed. They wished to prevent its spread into the territories. Congress passed the amendment. Compromise would not work this time.
Only a few states ultimately ratified the amendment.
What Was The Civil War About?
Many people, on both sides, firmly understood that this was a war over slavery. Congress and President Lincoln, however, at first stated that the war was about reuniting the country.
The Union winning the war was eventually clearly understood to mean the end of slavery. The Civil War made the argument that the federal government had no power to interfere with slavery in the states where it now existed appear impractical.
The Confederacy used slaves to fight the war. The Union would, in response, use slavery as a weapon to stop the rebellion. The Confederacy’s fears about the Lincoln Administration threatening slavery became an ironic self-fulfilling prophecy.
Emancipation Proclamation
Congress passed laws confiscating slaves used to support the rebellion.
President Lincoln announced that if the rebellion continued into 1863, “all persons held as slaves within any State, or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free.”
Lincoln had continuously argued that slavery was wrong. He personally hoped it would ultimately be abolished. Nonetheless, constitutionally, he argued that the slave states had the power to retain slavery. His party’s concern was the spread of slavery into new territories.
The Civil War changed the equation.
Dominoes Start to Fall
Slavery would continue in other areas. An institution in place for centuries, however, began to look doomed. Congress ended slavery in D.C. in 1862. The Republican Party’s goal was accomplished two years later with the abolition of slavery in the territories.
Maryland and Missouri, slave states that did not secede, abolished slavery. The new state of West Virginia began gradual emancipation. Union-controlled areas of Confederate states began to pass new anti-slavery constitutions. Kentucky and Delaware did remain slave states.
What Would Happen After the War Ended?
President Lincoln declared that emancipated slaves must never be returned to slavery. There was a promise of “forever” freedom. The nation had an obligation to keep that promise.
Was the Emancipation Proclamation only a war measure? What would happen when peace arrived? Republicans wished to make the matter moot with the ratification of a new amendment.
The New Thirteenth Amendment
Senator Charles Sumner supported an amendment declaring that all persons are equal under the law. Many Republicans argued that it was too radical. They came together around language first included in the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, which banned slavery in that territory:
Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a 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 barrier against “involuntary servitude” broadens the protection of freedom of labor. The amendment is universal in its scope, including protecting new Chinese immigrant labor.
A second section gave Congress the power to enforce the amendment. Some opponents flagged the enforcement power as an open-ended threat to federalism.
Others argued that ending slavery should wait until after the war. Each state did not currently have congressional representation. Was an amendment now appropriate?
Opponents also used racist appeals. Democrats were strong enough in the House of Representatives to block passage in Congress until early 1865.
Ratification came on December 6, 1865.
The Reach and Limits of the Amendment
The first time the Constitution openly discussed “slavery,” it did so to abolish the institution. The amendment did not just limit governmental power. It also barred private action.
Republicans in Congress debated how far the Thirteenth Amendment went. Did it protect black citizenship? Voting rights? Some did not think so. Two new amendments were ratified.
The Supreme Court would declare that all the “badges and incidents” of slavery are prohibited. Nonetheless, this did not include racial segregation in public accommodations. The Supreme Court struck down a federal law barring such segregation as unconstitutional.
(The Court in the 1960s agreed that such a law was acceptable under the Commerce Clause.)
Thirteenth Amendment Today
People continue to debate about the outer limits of the Thirteenth Amendment.
Does it ban laws against abortion? Are racist monuments a “badge and incident” of slavery? What about prison labor? Some argue the amendment should have no exceptions.
The end of slavery and the passage of amendments to protect citizenship, equality, and voting rights did not end racism. The effects of slavery lingered on. They still are with us.
Slavery itself continues worldwide in various forms. We are not yet “forever free.”