Museum to display 13th Amendment, Emancipation Proclamation

CINCINNATI » Rare copies of the 13th Amendment and the Emancipation Proclamation will be on display at a downtown Cincinnati museum about 150 years after it was passed.

Officials at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center announced this past week that beginning in January they will display the handwritten amendment that abolished slavery and involuntary servitude. President Abraham Lincoln signed both documents.

The Freedom Center’s director of museum experience says the documents are rarely kept at museums for more than a few days, but that the museum’s stature and mission allowed it to keep the pair together for the first half of 2016.

“The 13th Amendment document is very much a part of our legacy of freedom and figures in on the focus we have to today on the right the vote and the right to participate in electing those we prefer,” said Clarence Newsome, president of the Freedom Center.

The document, which will be on loan from David Rubenstein, managing director of The Carlyle Group, is currently on display at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia. It

“The 13th Amendment document is very much a part of our legacy of freedom and figures in on the focus we have to today on the right the vote and the right to participate in electing those we prefer.” — Clarence Newsome, president of the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati

is one page in length and about 15 by 20 inches. It will be paired with the Emancipation Proclamation in a third floor gallery.

Of the original 48 copies of the Emancipation Proclamation signed by Lincoln, 26 still exist today. Copies of the document were typeset, printed and authentically signed by Lincoln. They were then sold for $10 each to raise money for wounded Union Army soldiers at the Philadelphia Great Central Sanitary. They are valued at about $3 million each today.