Rosa D Quispe
History 1301-81250
Mrs. Roberson
Sep 21, 2014
Abraham Lincoln “the movie”

The film depicts Abraham Lincoln’s arm-twisting and political maneuvering in January 1865 to secure approval of the 13th Amendment, which, when ratified by three-quarters of the states, abolished slavery throughout the nation. This was indeed an important moment in political history. The first scene is involving: Two black soldiers speak with the president about their experiences in combat. One, a corporal, raises the problem of unequal promotions and pay in the Union Army. Two white soldiers join them, and the scene concludes as the corporal walks away, movingly reciting the final lines of the Gettysburg Address.
Unfortunately it is all downhill from there, at least as far as black characters are concerned. It’s disappointing that in a movie devoted to explaining the abolition of slavery in the United States, African-American characters do almost nothing but passively wait for white men to liberate them. For some 30 years, historians have been demonstrating that slaves were crucial agents in their emancipation; Mr. Spielberg’s “Lincoln” gives us only faithful servants, patiently waiting for the day of freedom.
The film grossly exaggerates the possibility that by January 1865 the war might have ended with slavery still intact. The Emancipation Proclamation had already declared more than three million of the four million slaves free, and Louisiana, Maryland, Missouri, Tennessee and West Virginia, exempted in whole or part from the proclamation, had decreed abolition on their own. Emancipation resulted from events at all levels of society, including the efforts of social movements to change public sentiment and of slaves themselves to acquire freedom. The 13th Amendment originated not with Lincoln but with a petition campaign early in 1864 organized by the Women’s National Loyal League, an organization of abolitionist feminists. Moreover, from the beginning of the Civil War, by escaping to Union lines, blacks forced the fate of slavery onto the national political agenda. Even as the House debated, Sherman’s army was marching into South Carolina, and slaves were sacking plantation homes and seizing land. Slavery died on the ground, not just in the White House and the House of Representatives.
The film Lincoln also reminded me of the powerful, long-lasting legacy of leadership principles Abraham Lincoln left behind. Lincoln is a