Which of the following best describes the relationship between Emma Lazarus and the Statue of Liberty?

• A. She funded the statue's construction.
• B. She was the statue's designer.
• C. She was a political aide to the statue's commissioning.
• D. She authored The New Colossus, a poem inscribed on the Statue of Liberty's pedestal.

Answer: (D)

Emma Lazarus is connected to the Statue of Liberty mainly because she wrote The New Colossus, a poem created to help raise funds for the statue’s pedestal. The poem, with its famous lines about welcoming the weary and poor, was later inscribed on a bronze plaque mounted on the pedestal, shaping the statue’s enduring symbolic message as a beacon for immigrants. The statue itself was a gift from France, designed by sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi, and the pedestal was funded by American donors. Lazarus did not fund the statue, design it, or serve as a political aide to its commissioning. The key link is that her poem became the inscription on the pedestal, giving the statue its iconic immigrant-welcome meaning.