152 years ago today, President Abraham Lincoln signed a joint Congressional resolution proposing the 13th Amendment. When ratified later that year, the 13th Amendment outlawed slavery in the United States. Read the text of the 13th Amendment and see an image of the original document at the Library of Congress.
Fred Korematsu Day
January 30th is Fred Korematsu Day. Mr. Korematsu was a national civil rights hero. He was one of only a handful of Asian Americans who challenged the government’s efforts to incarcerate Japanese Americans from the West Coast in internment camps during World War II. At the age of 23, Mr. Korematsu was arrested and eventually convicted for defying the government’s order to leave California. Undeterred, he appealed his case all the way to the Supreme Court. In 1944, in a decision that remains a stain on the Court’s legacy, the Court ruled against him. As Associate Justice Stephen Breyer declares in our film, Korematsu and Civil Liberties, it is “universally acknowledge that that was an error.” Watch our film and learn more about Mr. Korematsu and his fight for justice.
Commemorate the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act & the Ongoing Struggle for Equal Pay
This week marks the anniversary of the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, the first bill signed into law by President Barack Obama back in 2009. As a new president takes office, there’s still a lot of work to be done to ensure equal pay for equal work becomes a reality. Watch our ABA Silver Gavel Award winning film, A Call to Act and learn about Mrs. Ledbetter’s amazing fight that took her to the Supreme Court, Congress and finally the White House.
Delaware became the first state to ratify the Constitution 229 years ago today
On December 7, 1787, Delaware became the first state to ratify the Constitution. Article VII of the Constitution required that 9 out of the original 13 colonies ratify the document for it to be adopted. On June 21, the following year, New Hampshire became that 9th state. Rhode Island became the last state to ratify the Constitution nearly 2 years later in May of 1790.
Read more about the ratification process at the National Archives.
Elections continue to favor rural areas over urban ones
Every citizens gets to vote in our democracy. That’s how it’s supposed to work, right? But that hasn’t always meant that each vote counts equally. Even today, rural voters have a disproportionate effect on our elections. Watch One Person, One Vote to learn about the ongoing struggle to make sure that all voters have an equal say in our elections.
The Gettysburg Address was delivered 153 years ago today
153 years ago today, President Abraham Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address at the dedication of Solders’ National Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Four months earlier, Gettysburg had been the site of one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War. 51,000 Union and Confederate soldiers were killed or wounded over three days of fighting. Though only three paragraphs long, Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address is considered by many to be one of the greatest speeches in American history.
See an original copy and read the text at the Library of Congress.
The Japanese Internment is a dark period in our history that should never be repeated
Recently, a prominent supporter of the President-elect argued on national television for the creation of a registry for Muslims in America. To support this, he cited the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II as precedent. Please watch our film Korematsu and Civil Liberties about this dark period in our country’s history to see why such policies should never be repeated.
Today is Election Day
The polls are open, so go out and vote (if you’re old enough)!
And when you’re finished at the voting booth, check our our film One Person, One Vote about the landmark voting rights case, Baker v. Carr.
1st of the Federalist Papers published 229 years ago today
On October 27, 1787, the first of 85 essays that would come to known as the Federalist Papers was published in a New York newspaper called The Independent Journal. Using the pen-name “Publius,” Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay wrote the Federalist Papers to gain support for the ratification of the Constitution, which had been signed the month before on September 17, 1787.
Read the Federalist Papers at the Library of Congress.
“Magna Carta and the Constitution” wins a Cine Golden Eagle
Magna Carta and the Constitution has won the Cine Golden Eagle Award for short form Children’s Programing! Thank you to Cine. Click here to watch the film online.
Another film in the Constitution Project Series, Habeas Corpus: The Guantanamo Cases, was a runner up in the category.
