Jan 28, 2018 3 min read

“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 13th Amendment

When Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 declaring that slaves residing in any state then in rebellion against the United States shall be “forever free,” he knew he could not guarantee that. He knew succeeding administrations might question the legality of his proclamation. He knew there would be legal arguments questioning its application to the progeny of the slaves he emancipated, and countless other legal challenges yet to be concocted. His solution was passage of a constitutional amendment that would settle the question once and for all.

That amendment, our 13th, easily passed the Senate in April 1864, mostly because there were few pro-slavery senators – the vast majority being from Southern states that had left the Union to join the Confederacy at the start of the Civil War. But the House of Representatives was another matter. In that chamber, opponents, mostly Democrats, still held enough seats to block the necessary two-thirds majority needed for passage.

So Lincoln resorted to some old-fashioned horse-trading. He made it clear to his allies in the House, and to those Democrats in opposition, that should votes be changed, he would be properly appreciative in the form of plumb government jobs, powerful political appointments, lucrative government contracts, and even campaign contributions for “loyal” – meaning supportive – House members. As one example, the Democratic representative from Brooklyn, N.Y., Moses Odell, switched his vote in support of the amendment and later received a lucrative government post in his home state.

Naturally, when the amendment was voted on this week in 1865, the House was packed, with every member in attendance and an overflowing gallery that included Supreme Court justices and foreign dignitaries. Once the vote was taken, all eyes were on House Speaker Schuyler Colfax, who finally declared in a trembling voice, “The ayes have 119, the noes 56. The constitutional majority of two thirds having voted in the affirmative, the joint resolution has passed.”

Did the sainted Lincoln have qualms about engaging in what, in some instances, amounted to bribery? Perhaps, but it’s more likely Lincoln believed the ends justified the means, the ends being the eradication of one of America’s great wrongs, human bondage, which it had suffered since its creation and over which it had fought a civil war that cost the lives of some 680,000 Americans.

It was one of Lincoln’s greatest triumphs. It was also his last. Just 10 weeks after the House approved the 13th Amendment, Lincoln was assassinated.