The preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, a document that put in motion the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments of the U.S. Constitution, will have a temporary home in the New York State Capital for two days.
The four-page draft of the document, handwritten by Abraham Lincoln, will be on display at the New York State Museum. The exhibition offers an unprecedented display of the only surviving version of the document in Lincoln’s handwriting and includes historical background and interpretation of the document.
The First Step to Freedom exhibit also includes the manuscript of a speech written and delivered in New York City in September 1962 by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. for the Proclamation’s centennial.
John King, commissioner of the New York State Education Department, joins us this morning as does Mark Schaming, director of the New York State Museum.
