Of course, there are two sides to this issue, one right and one wrong. You decide which is right and which is wrong. David Dodge, the principle researcher, argues that this 13th Amendment was ratified in 1819 and then subverted from the Constitution near the end of the Civil War. U.S. Senator George Mitchell of Maine, and Mr. Dane Hartgrove (Acting Assistant Chief, Civil Reference Branch of the National Archives) have argued that the Amendment was never properly ratified and only published in error.
There is some agreement. Both sides agree that the Amendment was proposed by Congress in 1810. Both sides also agree that the proposed Amendment required the support of at least 13 states to be ratified. Both sides agree that between 1810 and 1812 twelve states voted to support ratification.
The pivotal issue is whether Virginia ratified or rejected the proposed Amendment. Dodge contends Virginia voted to support the Amendment in 1819, and so the Amendment was truly ratified and should still be a part of the Constitution. Senator and Mr. Hartgrove disagree, arguing that Virginia did not ratify.
Unfortunately, several decades of Virginia's legislative journals were misplaced or destroyed (on purpose?) possibly during the Civil War, possibly during the 1930's). Consequently, other than the aforementioned Virginia State Act passed by the Virginia Legislature establishing the March 12, 1819 official publishing date containing the True Thirteenth Amendment therein, neither side has found, at this time, absolute proof that the Virginia legislature voted for (or against) ratification. However, it should be considered noteworthy to point out that in view of the March 12, 1819 publication issue, it is prima facie that there is more evidence that was in fact passed by Virginia than there is evidence that it did not, for there is absolutely no evidence, other than a certain lawyerís speculation and the Secretary of Stateís flawed theory, that it did not.
A series of letters exchanged in 1991 between David Dodge, Senator Mitchell, and Mr. Hartgrove illuminate the various points of disagreement.
After Dodge's initial report of a "missing" Amendment in the 1825 Maine Civil Code, Senator Mitchell explained that the edition was a one-time publishing error:
"The Maine Legislature
mistakenly printed the proposed Amendment in the Maine
Constitution as having
been adopted. As you know, this was a mistake, as it was
not
ratified."
Further, "all editions of the Maine Constitution printed after 1820 [sic] exclude the proposed amendment; only the originals contain this error." Dodge dug deeper, found other editions (there are 30, to date) of state and territorial civil codes that contained the missing, but now found, Amendment, and thereby demonstrated that the Maine publication was not a "one-time" publishing error.