The Thirteenth Amendment was ratified on December 6, 1865, abolishing slavery and involuntary servitude in the United States except as criminal punishment.
Congress proposed the amendment after the Civil War. The Senate approved it on April 8, 1864, and the House of Representatives approved it on January 31, 1865. Ratification required approval from three-fourths of the states; Georgia supplied the decisive 27th ratification on December 6, 1865.
Secretary of State William H. Seward certified the amendment as part of the Constitution on December 18, 1865. Those dates are sometimes confused: December 6 marks the required state ratification, while December 18 marks the federal proclamation certifying adoption.
The amendment differed from the Emancipation Proclamation. Lincoln’s 1863 proclamation applied primarily to areas in rebellion and was a wartime measure. The Thirteenth Amendment created a nationwide constitutional prohibition. It became the first of the three Reconstruction Amendments, followed by the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments.