“Lincoln set the tone that America has followed and should follow ever since,” says Lincoln biographer David Herbert Donald in a 2005 interview on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. “That is the dedication to republican principles; the dedication to equality; the dedication to upholding the Declaration of Independence. These are the things he stood for, and as long as we remember them, we are still on the right track … it was Lincoln who saved the Union, and that saving of the Union coupled with the emancipation of the slaves meant that his name was going to last forever.”

His lasting legacy is also due in large part to his mastery of the art of rhetoric. Lincoln “was able to express his views in language that no other American President—indeed hardly anyone else ever—was able to equal. There's no other president who is so quotable, whose words so resonate today.”

Lincoln’s story resonates with so many because he was, in fact, a man of the people, one who, despite enormous obstacles and odds, exemplified the "American dream" at its finest. As Donald explains, “Lincoln's experience gives nearly all of us hope that, no matter how humble our beginnings, one can rise, one can be successful, one can indeed lead an enormously profitable life and one that's invaluable to the country as a whole.”

Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment
On January 1, 1863, in the third year of the Civil War, President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. The proclamation declared free all people held as slaves in rebellious states. The Thirteenth Amendment, which formally abolished slavery in the United States, was ratified December 6, 1865.

Read the text of the Thirteenth Amendment »

Civil War Amendments
The Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments are at the heart of the legacy that Lincoln left to the people of the United States. The Fourteenth Amendment granted citizenship to all people born or naturalized in the United States (including former slaves) and greatly expanded the protection of civil rights to all Americans.

Read the text of the Fourteenth Amendment »

The Fifteenth Amendment, passed by Congress on February 26, 1869, and ratified on February 3, 1870, granted African American men the right to vote. It declared 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.”

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Lincoln Memorial
The Lincoln Memorial, which stands at the western end of the National Mall, was officially dedicated in 1922, although The Lincoln Monument Association was incorporated by the United States Congress in March 1867. The monument, which is considered by many a sacred space, includes the words from two of his most famous speeches: the Gettysburg Address and his second inaugural address. A destination for tourists and locals alike, the Lincoln Memorial has also been the site of many rallies and speeches by those who wish to invoke his legacy.