Related Online Resources

Additional online information regarding slavery in American can be found on the following sections of the Library's website.

America's Library

America's Story from America's Library is a site designed for elementary and middle school students providing a variety of stories about slavery, including:

Jump Back in Time:

Meet Amazing Americans:

Exhibitions

African American Odyssey: A Quest for Full Citizenship
This exhibition showcases the incomparable African American collections of the Library of Congress. It displays more than 240 items, including books, government documents, manuscripts, maps, musical scores, plays, films, and recordings. It includes a section on slavery.
The African-American Mosaic: African-American Culture and History
This exhibit marks the publication of The African-American Mosaic: A Library of Congress Resource Guide for the Study of Black History and Culture. Covering the nearly 500 years of the black experience in the Western hemisphere, the Mosaic surveys the full range size, and variety of the Library's collections, including books, periodicals, prints, photographs, music, film, and recorded sound.
American Treasures of the Library of Congress - Abolition & Suffrage
View the multi-media Abolition and Suffrage exhibit from the Reason gallery, American Treasures of The Library of Congress.
American Treasures of the Library of Congress - Emancipation Proclamation
View the First draft of the Emancipation Proclamation and the Final version of the Emancipation Proclamation from the Top Treasures gallery, American Treasures of the Library of Congress.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964: A Long Struggle for Freedom
This exhibition, which commemorates the fiftieth anniversary of the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964, explores the events that shaped the civil rights movement. The Prologue includes information about slavery.
The Civil War in America
The Civil War in America assembles more than 200 unique items, many of which have never been seen by the public, to commemorate the sesquicentennial of this nation’s greatest military and political upheaval. Drawing from hundreds of thousands of items from across many collections of the Library of Congress, the materials included in this exhibition attest to the valor, sacrifices, emotions, and accomplishments of those in both the North and South whose lives were affected by the bitter conflict of 1861–1865. The Prologue includes much information about slavery.
Gettysburg Address
Drawn from the Library’s collections, the presentation gathers the key documents linked to Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.
Thomas Jefferson - Life and Labor at Monticello
This section of the exhibition highlights Jefferson's life at Monticello, which includes his lifelong adherence to the plantation-slave system of agriculture.
With Malice Toward None: The Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Exhibition
Commemorates the two-hundredth anniversary of the birth of the nation’s revered sixteenth president. More than a chronological account of the life of Abraham Lincoln, the exhibition reveals Lincoln the man, whose thoughts, words, and actions were deeply affected by personal experiences and pivotal historic events. Through documents and books, broadsides and newspapers, prints and photographs, artifacts and maps, the exhibition charts Lincoln’s growth from prairie politician to preeminent statesman. It provides a window into the Lincoln presidency, his struggle to keep the Union intact, and his attempts to heal the nation’s wounds.

Historic Newspapers

Topics in Chronicling America
Chronicling America provides free access to millions of historic American newspaper pages. The Serial & Government Publications Division has created topic guides to newspapers in Chronicling America.

Included on the topics page are guides for:

Library of Congress Blog

Selected blog posts include compelling stories and fascinating facts written by Library of Congress curators and librarians.

Manuscript Division

African-American History and Culture
Explore treasures from the Manuscript Division’s Words and Deeds Collection. The Library's holdings include information about slavery and the slave trade as well as other aspects of plantation life. Papers of slaveholders provide one view of slavery and slave narratives another.

Prints and Photographs Division

Images of African-American Slavery and Freedom
Illustrations from the holdings of the Library of Congress on the subject of African-American slavery and freedom.
Prints and Photographs Online Catalog (PPOC)
The catalog contains catalog records and digital images representing a rich cross-section of still pictures held by the Prints & Photographs Division and other units of the Library. The Library of Congress offers broad public access to these materials as a contribution to education and scholarship. Find images of contrabands, enslaved, slavery, slaves, slave trade, slave quarters, freedmen, fugitive slaves, the abolition movement, and the underground railroad system.

Related Research Guides

13th Amendment to the Constitution
The 13th Amendment to the Constitution declared that "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude...shall exist within the United States." Formally abolishing slavery in the United States, the 13th Amendment was passed by the Congress on January 31, 1865, and ratified by the states on December 6, 1865.
14th Amendment to the Constitution
The 14th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified on July 28, 1868, and granted citizenship to “all persons born or naturalized in the United States,” which included former slaves recently freed. In addition, it forbids states from denying any person "life, liberty or property, without due process of law" or to "deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of its laws."
15th Amendment to the Constitution
The 15th Amendment to the Constitution granted African American men the right to vote by declaring that the "right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude." Although ratified on February 3, 1870, the promise of the 15th Amendment would not be fully realized for almost a century.
African American Sites in the Digital Collections
This guide highlights contributions by African Americans to the arts, education, industry, literature, politics and much more as represented in the vast online collections of the Library.
Compromise of 1850
The Compromise of 1850 consists of five laws passed in September of 1850 that dealt with the issue of slavery. In 1849 California requested permission to enter the Union as a free state, potentially upsetting the balance between the free and slave states in the U.S. Senate.
Dred Scott v. Sandford
The Supreme Court decision Dred Scott v. Sandford was issued on March 6, 1857. Delivered by Chief Justice Roger Taney, this opinion declared that slaves were not citizens of the United States and could not sue in Federal courts. In addition, this decision declared that the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional and that ongress did not have the authority to prohibit slavery in the territories.
Emancipation Proclamation
Issued by Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation declared "all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." Although the Emancipation Proclamation did not end slavery, it did change the basic character of the Civil War.
Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Kansas-Nebraska Act repealed the Missouri Compromise, allowing slavery in the territory north of the 36° 30´ latitude. Introduced by Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois, the Kansas-Nebraska Act stipulated that the issue of slavery would be decided by the residents of each territory, a concept known as popular sovereignty.
Missouri Compromise
In an effort to preserve the balance of power in Congress between slave and free states, The Missouri Compromise was passed in 1820 admitting Missouri as a slave state and Maine as a free state.

The Teachers Page

The Library of Congress offers classroom materials and professional development to help teachers effectively use primary sources from the Library's vast digital collections in their teaching. Find Library of Congress lesson plans and more that meet Common Core standards, state content standards, and the standards of national organizations.

Features and Activities:

Immigration and Relocation in U.S. History
This feature presentation introduces teachers and students to the topic of Immigration. African immigration is included in the presentation.
U.S. History Primary Source Timeline
A comprehensive look at America's history through primary sources. Explore documents relating to slavery during the National Expansion and Reform Era.

Lesson Plans:

Women in the Civil War: Ladies, Contraband and Spies
This lesson uses primary sources - diaries, letters, and photographs - to explore the experiences of women in the Civil War. By looking at a series of document galleries, the perspectives of slave women, plantation mistresses, female spies, and Union women emerge. Ultimately, students will understand the human consequences of this war for women.

Today in History

Today in History is a Library of Congress presentation of historic events illuminated by items from the Library’s Digital Collections.

March 3
On March 3, 1859, journalist Q. K. Philander Doesticks (Mortimer Thomson) attended an auction of 436 men, women, and children formerly held by Pierce M. Butler. Butler's slaves were auctioned in order to pay debts incurred in gambling and the financial crash of 1857-58.
March 9
The Supreme Court issued a ruling on March 9, 1841, freeing the remaining thirty-five survivors of the Amistad mutiny.
March 18
On March 18, 1782, John C. Calhoun was born near Abbeville, South Carolina. Calhoun served as a congressman, senator, secretary of war, secretary of state, and vice president of the United States. A formidable theorist, Calhoun is remembered for his determined defense of the institution of slavery.
April 16
On April 16, 1862, President Lincoln signed an act abolishing slavery in the District of Columbia, an important step in the long road toward full emancipation and enfranchisement for African Americans.
May 21
Reverdy Johnson was born in Annapolis, Maryland on May, 21, 1796. Johnson, although personally opposed to slavery, was the attorney who represented the slave owner in the Dred Scott case.
June 5
On June 5, 1851, Uncle Tom's Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly began to appear in serial form in the Washington National Era, an abolitionist weekly. Harriet Beecher Stowe's antislavery story was published in forty installments over the next ten months.
June 19
On June 17, 2021, President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. signed into law the bill that established Juneteenth National Independence Day, June 19, as a legal public holiday. Juneteenth commemorates June 19, 1865, the date Major General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas, and delivered General Order No. 3 announcing the end of legalized slavery in Texas. Historically, it has been a holiday celebrated by people of African descent in the United States, as well as people in Canada, Jamaica, Nigeria, the United Kingdom, and other countries throughout the world. Juneteenth is also a “symbolic date” representing the African American struggle for freedom and equality, and a celebration of family and community.
June 29
On June 29, 1852, statesman Henry Clay, known as "the Great Compromiser" for his feats of legislative reconciliation between the North and the South, died at the age of seventy-five at the National Hotel in Washington, D.C. In his will, Clay freed the slaves of "Ashland," his Kentucky plantation.
July 26
Joseph Jenkins Roberts declared Liberia, formerly a colony of the American Colonization Society, an independent republic on July 26, 1847.
July 28
On July 28, 1868, former slaves became citizens when the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified.
September 3
On September 3, 1838, abolitionist, journalist, author, and human rights advocate Frederick Douglass made his dramatic escape from slavery, traveling north by train and boat, from Baltimore, through Delaware to Philadelphia.
September 9
On September 9, 1739, twenty black Carolinians began the Stono Rebellion, the largest slave uprising in the British mainland colonies prior to the American Revolution.
September 20
The United States Congress abolished the slave trade in the District of Columbia on September 20, 1850 as part of the legislative package called the Compromise of 1850.
October 16
On October 16, 1859, abolitionist John Brown and twenty-one armed men took some sixty hostages and seized the federal arsenal at Harper's Ferry in what is now West Virginia.
November 7
On November 7, 1837, Elijah Parish Lovejoy was killed by a proslavery mob while defending the site of his antislavery newspaper The Saint Louis Observer. His death deeply affected many individuals who opposed slavery and greatly strengthened the cause of abolition.
November 26
Preacher, abolitionist, and women's rights advocate Sojourner Truth died in Battle Creek, Michigan on November 26, 1883. The date of Truth's birth is uncertain, but around 1797 she was born a slave called "Isabella" in Ulster, New York.

Webcasts

Anthony Benezet, Father of Atlantic Abolitionism
Maurice Jackson, a former Kluge Fellow at the Library of Congress, teaches Atlantic and African-American history at Georgetown, discussed his recently published book "Let This Voice Be Heard: Anthony Benezet, Father of Atlantic Abolitionism."
Daisy Turner's Kin: An African-American Family Saga
Daisy Turner (1883-1988), born in Grafton, Vermont and the daughter of freed African American slaves, grew up listening to her father, Alec, tell stories of his family's heritage. Over the course of numerous interviews Daisy shared her own life story, one of discrimination, resilience and strength. This talk considers Daisy Turner's narrative in terms of memory and within a larger canvas of social, cultural and historical events. Speaker: Jane Beck (Benjamin Botkin Lecture Series)
Finding Charity's Folk: Public Memory & the Construction of an Enslaved Biography
Jessica Millward discussed her book, "Finding Charity's Folk: Enslaved and Free Black Women in Maryland," where she places enslaved women in Maryland at the center of the long struggle for African American freedom. She is an assistant professor in the history department in the School of Humanities at the University of California, Irvine. Her work focuses on African American history, early America, the African diaspora, slavery and gender.
Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives
Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives kicked off its "One Million Abolitionists Project" where the organization leaders presents copies of Douglass' first autobiography to one million students. Published in 1845, "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave" was Douglass's first and most popular autobiography and contradicted the racist mythology promoted by the business of slavery and helped turn the tide toward emancipation. Frederick Douglass Family Initiatives is an abolitionist organization co-founded by direct descendants of Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington. (Robert J. Benz, Nettie Washington Douglass, Andre Dawson, Kenneth Morris)
From Slave Ship to Harvard: Yarrow Mamout & the History of an African American Family
James H. Johnston discusses his book about Yarrow Mamout, an educated Muslim from Guinea who was brought to Maryland on a slave ship and gained his freedom 44 years later.
Founders & Their Slaves: 2018 National Book Festival
Erica Armstrong Dunbar presents "Never Caught: The Washingtons' Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave, Ona Judge" and Catherine Kerrison presents "Jefferson's Daughters: Three Sisters, White and Black, in a Young America" at the 2018 Library of Congress National Book Festival in Washington, D.C.
The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family
Annette Gordon-Reed discusses "The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family" as part of a special celebration of Thomas Jefferson's Library at the 2015 Library of Congress National Book Festival in Washington, D.C. Annette Gordon-Reed, a professor of law and history at Harvard University, is one of the country's most distinguished presidential scholars. She received the 2009 Pulitzer Prize in history for her book "The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family."
Henry Wiencek: 2015 National Book Festival
Henry Wiencek discusses "Master of the Mountain: Thomas Jefferson and His Slaves" as part of a special celebration of Jefferson's library at the 2015 Library of Congress National Book Festival in Washington, D.C. Wiencek depicts the third president as a cruel slaveholder who valued money much more than the principles he espoused as a founding father. Wiencek holds a fellowship at the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities and has received various other honors and fellowships.
An Imperfect God: George Washington, His Slaves, and the Creation of America
Historian Henry Wiencek discussed his book, which focuses on the life of Washington and explores early slavery in America.
Law Day 2009: Emancipation Proclamation
What effect did the Emancipation Proclamation have on the Civil War? Did it have a broader effect on the slave trade throughout the Americas? In celebration of Law Day, these questions and many more were discussed by Congressman G.K. Butterfield, Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr., Dean Kurt Schmoke and Professor Emeritus Roger Wilkins, with PBS Newshour's congressional correspondent Kwame Holman moderating. The program was presented with support from the Friends of the Law Library of Congress.
The Many Faces of Harriet Tubman
Author Lesa Cline-Ransome and illustrator James E. Ransome discuss the children's book "Before She Was Harriet" to an audience of primarily students from Harriet Tubman Elementary School in Washington, D.C. The program also included remarks by Sen. Chris Van Hollen and Ernestine (Tina) Martin Wyatt, a descendant of the famous abolitionist.
Mary Neighbour: Speak Right On
Award-winning writer Mary E. Neighbour discussed Speak Right On, her novel about Dred Scott, the former slave at the heart of the 1857 decision, in a program sponsored by the Center for the Book.
Mirror to America: The Autobiography of John Hope Franklin
Historian John Hope Franklin discussed his new autobiography, Mirror to America: The Autobiography of John Hope Franklin. Franklin, who helped redirect the social and political course of the United States throughout the twentieth century, is the author and editor of seventeen books, including the best-selling From Slavery to Freedom: A History of African Americans.
Rep. Juanita Millender-McDonald Delivers Keynote Address for African American History Month
Rep. Juanita Millender-McDonald delivered the 2007 African American History Month keynote address at the Library of Congress. The program also featured remarks by John Fleming, national president of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH). ASALH's 2007 theme, "From Slavery to Freedom: Africans in the Americas," honors the work of black historian John Hope Franklin, who recently won the Library's Kluge Prize for lifetime achievement in the study of humanity.

Slavery in America: A Resource Guide

Digital Collections: Ask a Librarian