The Pen That Moved While Millions Waited

On the evening of January 1, 1863, Frederick Douglass stood in Tremont Temple, Boston, surrounded by three thousand people who could do nothing but wait. Across the miles, in a White House study, Abraham Lincoln was signing the Emancipation Proclamation — a document that would break chains the enslaved could never break themselves. Douglass later recalled the unbearable tension of those hours.…