Comments on: Lincoln and the 13th Amendment (1861 version)

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 19:01:35 +0000

Donald,

He didn’t just forward the Corwin Amendment to the states – the idea was his from the very beginning. He explicity supported it in his first inaugural address, “”I understand a proposed amendment to the Constitution . . . has passed Congress, to the effect that the Federal Government shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the states, including that of persons held to service.” Then, while “holding such a provision to be implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable.”

His true feelings toward slavery were apathetic. His solution to slavery was to forcibly deport slaves to Africa – he sat on committees for years in this very cause. If emancipation were his true goal, then why did he not fight against slavery in Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland – or in New Jersey. All he cared about was power – and using that power to enrich himself. His entire political career was in his own words, “My politics are short and sweet, like the old woman’s dance. I am in favor of a national bank … in favor of the internal improvements system and a high protective tariff.”

It was not slavery, but the tarriff and corporatism that drove the rich railroad lawyer into politics.

By: Donald R. Shaffer

Donald R. Shaffer — Sun, 13 Jan 2013 22:26:24 +0000

Hi Charles. Lincoln forwarded the Corwin Amendment (as the 1861 version of the 13th amendment is commonly known) to the states, as was his constitutional duty. However, I don’t think he ever signed it. Abraham Lincoln definitely signed the later 13th amendment, ending slavery, before forwarding it to the states, even though it did not require his signature. I think that says a lot about Lincoln’s true feelings concerning slavery.

Don Shaffer

By: Charles Bahmueller

Charles Bahmueller — Sun, 13 Jan 2013 22:02:34 +0000

The (first version of the) Thirteenth Amendment, signed by Lincoln, was the only amendment ever signed by a president. It was soon passed by Lincoln’s home state of Illinois and guaranteed the legality of slavery in the South in perpetuity.

By: Margaret D. Blough

Margaret D. Blough — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 17:48:12 +0000

While the view that the Constitution affirmatively endorsed slavery was very much in the minority outside the slave states, I don’t think there was much dispute that, at the minimum, the original constitution tolerated the continued presence of slavery in those states where it already existed at the time of the Constitutional Convention and left the issue of whether or not to end slavery to each state. Individual states had already ended or begun the process of ending slavery before the Constitutional Convention. The Corwin Amendment essentially made this explicit. It also appears to be an attempt to assuage slave state fears that, as more free states joined the Union, there would eventually be enough to amend the Constitution to end slavery nationally. If indeed, all the South wanted was to be left alone, the Corwin amendment addressed that. The flat rejection of it by the states that had or were about to join the rebellion puts the lie to the “just wanted to be left alone” claim. For good or ill, the time for the Corwin Amendment, if it ever existed, had passed before it even was submitted to the states.