06/19/2026
This Juneteenth, we're reflecting on the constitutional act that made freedom permanent.
The 13th Amendment abolishing slavery was passed by Congress on January 31, 1865 — and ratified by three-fourths of the states on December 6, 1865, following the Civil War's end. President Lincoln signed the Joint Resolution proposing it as a show of support, even though the Constitution didn't require presidential approval. He would not live to see it enacted.
The 13th was the first of three Reconstruction Amendments that fundamentally reshaped American citizenship — alongside the 14th and 15th Amendments, it laid the constitutional foundation for civil rights in this country.
Nearly a century later, President Truman stood before the NAACP — the first sitting president to do so — and named that legacy directly: "When past difficulties faced our Nation, we met the challenge with inspiring charters of human rights — the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Emancipation Proclamation."
That tradition of confronting hard truths and expanding the promise of American democracy is at the heart of what we do at the Truman Library Institute. The Senate draft of the resolution proposing the 13th Amendment is currently on view at the Library.
