Lincoln: The Constitution and the Civil War - A Traveling Exhibition to Libraries

FAIN: LL-50090-10

Houghton Lake Public Library (Houghton Lake, MI 48629)
Donna Jean Alward (Project Director: February 2009 to December 2022)

Using the Constitution as the cohesive thread, the 1,000-square-foot panel exhibition offers a perspective on Abraham Lincoln that focuses on his struggle to meet the political and constitutional challenges of the Civil War. Organized thematically, the exhibition explores how Lincoln used the Constitution to confront three intertwined crises of the war - the secession of Southern states, slavery, and wartime civil liberties. Reproductions of significant documents signed by Lincoln, including the Emancipation Proclamation, the Thirteenth Amendment, and the Order to Blockage the Southern Ports - the official start of the Civil War - are included in the exhibition.