13th Amendment: Abolishing Slavery

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I believe the 13th Amendment was very effective, this Amendment abolished slavery, and with little opposition in the north and south, it was easy to enforce and extremely effective. Between this amendment and the end of the Civil War, slavery was effectively ended in 1865 when the 13th Amendment was passed. It completed the task of the Emancipation Proclamation which had been written up in 1863. In 1864 the Party based its platform on abolishing slavery completely, “That as slavery was the cause, and now constitutes the strength of this Rebellion, and as it must be, always and everywhere, hostile to the principles of Republican Government, justice and the National safety demand its utter and complete extirpation from the soil of the Republic… …show more content…
It provided for equal protection of the laws for all citizens by stipulating that, “All persons born or naturalized in the United States...are citizens.” It also declares that states may not deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. (loc.gov) The "Jim Crow" laws however provided a by-pass to the 14th Amendment with obstacles that deprived them of the right to vote, the right to serve on juries, the right to own or carry weapons, and, in some cases, even the right to rent or lease land. The Black Codes, a set of laws Southern states began passing in 1865, after slavery' ended and the 13th amendment was passed, were a precursor to Jim Crow. The codes imposed curfews on blacks, required unemployed blacks to be jailed and mandated that they get white sponsors to live in town or passes from their employers, if they worked in agriculture. While the 13th Amendment abolished slavery, the 14th gave blacks rights of people and not property or Civil Rights, though even with these, the south started to become fully