An Act for the release of certain persons held to service or labor in the District of Columbia

The District of Columbia Emancipation Act was signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln on April 16, 1862. Introduced during the thirty-seventh Congress in 1861, the Act granted the immediate emancipation of slaves in the District of Columbia, compensation to loyal Unionist slaveholders of up to $300 for each slave, and voluntary emigration of former slaves to colonies outside of the United States. The April 16 act stipulated that emancipation and compensation applied only to slaves working and slaveholders residing in the District of Columbia as of that date.

National Archives at Washington, DC. View original.

4/16/1862

Thirty-seventh Congress of the United States of America.

At the second Session,

Begun and held at the city of Washington on Monday, the second day of December, one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one.

An Act

For the release of certain persons held to service or labor in the District of Columbia.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled that all persons held to service or labor within the District of Columbia by reason of African descent are hereby discharged and freed of and from all claim to such service or labor, and from and after the passage of this act neither slavery nor involuntary servitude except for crime whereof the party shall be duly convicted shall hereafter exist in said District.