Slavery was formally abolished across the United States in December 1865, when the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified.

Key dates in one glance

  • 1 January 1863 – Emancipation Proclamation declared enslaved people in Confederate states to be free, but it did not end slavery everywhere in the USA.
  • 19 June 1865 – Juneteenth: Union troops reached Galveston, Texas, and announced freedom for enslaved people in the last Confederate state where slavery still operated.
  • 31 January 1865 – Congress passed the Thirteenth Amendment, sending it to the states for ratification.
  • 6 December 1865 – Required number of states ratified the Thirteenth Amendment, abolishing slavery nationwide (except as punishment for a crime).

So if someone asks “when was slavery abolished in USA,” the constitutional, nationwide end date is 6 December 1865 , with Juneteenth (19 June 1865) often remembered as the day freedom was first enforced in the last Confederate state.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.