Edouard de Laboulaye lived in France, but in spirit he was with the Union in the Civil War. The victory over the South and the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment reaffirmed his belief that every man is born with inherent rights. He wanted to represent that spirit with a monument, creating the Franco-American organization to finance the construction, and helped along the way by notables such as Joseph Pulitzer, a newspaper magnate who campaigned in editorials for funds to build the statue; Alexandre-Gustave Eiffel (creator of the Paris tower that bears his name), who gave the statue design; Richard Morris Hunt, famed architect of the New York Tribune Building, who made the pedestal, a work of art in its own right; and Emma Lazarus, who provided the poem inscription on the base.

On this day, October 28, in 1886, in a grand ceremony in front of hundreds of thousands of people, former New York governor turned President Grover Cleveland, dedicated the Statue of Liberty.

Most focus today is on the torch and the crown of the statue, and usually overlooked is a broken chain at the foot, signifying freedom is not limited to any one place, but can move around. And while it remains a beacon to immigrants from all over the world, it has at times taken on a more martial symbol: numerous GIs returning from the front remembered tearing up at the sight of Lady Liberty.