"That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, 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; and the Executive Government of the United States, including the military and naval authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom."
Emancipation Proclamation, 1 January 1863
Introduction
How was it that a nation founded on ideals of freedom and equality was also, from its birth, home to slavery? The University Libraries of the University at Buffalo are proud to host the traveling exhibition "Forever Free: Abraham Lincoln's Journey to Emancipation," 2 March through 15 April 2005 . By tracing Lincoln 's journey from an anti-slavery moderate to the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation, this exhibit explores the events and ideas which gave birth to the Proclamation, which forever transformed our nation. The Emancipation Proclamation was the death blow to the "peculiar institution." Slavery was finally abolished as an American institution with the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment in December 1865.
Organized by the Huntington Library, San Marino , California , and the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, New York City, in cooperation with the American Library Association (ALA), this traveling exhibit is made possible through a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). It consists of 150 feet of exhibit panels that contain reproductions of rare historical documents, period photographs, and illustrative material, such as engravings, lithographs, cartoons, and political ephemera. Attention is directed to Lincoln 's life and thought, sectional differences and stresses, slavery, racial attitudes, the Civil War and the role of African American troops in the Civil War, and the Proclamation. The exhibit shows that slavery was the underlying cause of the Civil War.
For further exhibit and special event information contact: etc@buffalo.edu or call (716) 645-7700.
