Emancipation Proclamation Painting

Near the Senate's west stairway is an immense painting which commemorates a landmark Lincoln event. The First Reading of the Emancipation Proclamation Before the Cabinet by Francis Carpenter depicts President Lincoln reading the proclamation's initial draft to his stunned Cabinet on July 22, 1862.

Exactly two years later, Lincoln showed them the completed painting in the White House. Some Cabinet members disliked how Carpenter arranged them, but Lincoln pronounced the portraiture "absolutely perfect."

<Click on picture to continue.