On April 16, 1862, during the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln signed an act freeing the 3000 enslaved people in the District of Columbia. This was nine months before he signed the Emancipation Proclamation freeing slaves in the Confederate states, many of whom actually remained in bondage until the the war’s end in 1865, and 20 months before ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment, which definitively outlawed slavery everywhere in the United States.
Understandably, April 16th is a holiday in the District of Columbia, District Emancipation Day, traditionally celebrated with speeches, concerts, fireworks and parades. There’s a bit of rain on that parade, though, if you take a closer look at history. That 1862 act was called the Compensated Emancipation Act, and it authorized payments to DC slaveowners rather than liberation of enslaved people on moral grounds. It even sought to promote emigration of former slaves outside the borders of the United States.
In any case, black Washingtonians had their freedom. That’s definitely worth celebrating.
More:
“When Slaveowners Got Reparations,” Tera W. Hunter, New York Times
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Tags: 1862, April 16, April 16th, Civil War, DC, DC Emancipation Day, District of Columbia, Emancipation, Emancipation Day, enslaved people, history, holiday, holidays, slavery, Washington DC
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