Stevens knew only a constitutional amendment would ensure slavery's end since the Proclamation was legally a wartime measure. Stevens supported several proposals that failed due to concern for States' rights. Newspapers criticized congressmen who voted against them. Stevens continued pressuring representatives to support the amendment.
“Mr. Stevens was a tyrant in his rule as leader of the House. He was at once able, bold and unscrupulous ... He was an anti-slavery man, a friend to temperance and an earnest supporter of the public school system, and he would not have hesitated to promote those objects by arrangements with friends or enemies.”
(George S. Boutwell Congressman 1863 -1869) To make sure the bill passed, Lincoln and other politicians, tried to convince, intimidate or buy votes. "The greatest measure of the nineteenth century was passed by corruption, aided and abetted by the purest man in America." (Thaddeus Stevens 1865)
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Stevens was the final speaker before the vote. "As the word ran through the Capitol that Stevens was speaking on the Constitutional Amendment, senators came over from the Senate, lawyers and judges from court rooms, and distinguished soldiers and citizens filled every available seat, to hear the eloquent old man speak on a measure that was to consumate the warfare of forty years against slavery." (Isaac Arnold House Republican 1865) |
Stevens' efforts helped pass the 13th Amendment in 1865, officially abolishing slavery. “I will be satisfied if my epitaph shall be written thus, Here lies one who never rose to any eminence, and who only courted the low ambition to have it said that he had striven to ameliorate the condition of the poor, the lowly, the downtrodden of every race and language and color." (Thaddeus Stevens 1865)
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