Emancipation Proclamation goes into effect

Back in September, after the Union army had won the victory (or near victory) at Antietam, Abraham Lincoln had issued the Emancipation Proclamation. In it he said that the slaves in the states in rebellion would be freed if the states were still in rebellion on January 1st, 1863. That day had come, the war was still continuing, and so the Proclamation went into effect. However, only a small number of slaves were actually freed on this day. The Proclamation was declaring the slaves free in areas over which the government had no control, so until the armies pushed forward and recaptured the southern states, they would remain in slavery. However, there was a fraction of slaves that were immediately effected by the proclamation. The status of the “contraband of war,” slaves which had either escaped their masters or been released as the Union armies advanced, was made clear. They would be free. It appears that about 20,000 to 50,000 of the 4,000,000 slaves of the south were officially freed by this proclamation.

Not everyone in the north was pleased by this course of events. The war had begun as a fight to restore the Union. Although it was given as a war measure, Lincoln, with this proclamation, turned the purpose of the war to ending slavery. Many Northern Democrats disagreed with this measure, and some state legislatures even officially condemned Lincoln's course. However, the Republicans retained political power, so they would be the ones who would prosecute the war as they saw fit.

Lincoln Issues the Emancipation Proclamation

Lincoln reads the Emancipation Proclamation

150 years ago today Abraham Lincoln issued he most important document of the Civil War, the Emancipation Proclamation. When Lincoln was elected president he was clearly anti-slavery, but he said he had no intention of interfering with slavery where it existed, only choking it by stopping it's spread into the territories. When the war, came he said that it was only to save the Union, and “if I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it...." At this point, however, Lincoln's intentions are hard to know. He may have been saying this because he actually meant it, or he might have just being trying to gain popular support for emancipating the slaves. We don't know, because although he may be called Honest Abe, he was not actually honest when it came to politics.

Lincoln had been planning for some time to issue an emancipation proclamation, but he had been waiting for a Union victory so that it would not look like a last ditch attempt to win. Antietam, although not as great a victory has he hoped for, gave him the opportunity he was looking for.

Lincoln's proclamation said:

I, ABRAHAM LINCOLN, President of the United States of America, and commander-in-chief of the army and navy thereof, do hereby proclaim and declare that hereafter, as heretofore, the war will be prosecuted for the object of practically restoring the constitutional relation between the United States and each of the states and the people thereof, in which states that relation is or may be suspended or disturbed.

That it is my purpose, upon the next meeting of Congress, to again recommend the adoption of a practical measure tendering pecuniary aid to the free acceptance or rejection of all slave states, so called, the people whereof may not then be in rebellion against the United States, and which states may then have voluntarily adopted, or thereafter may voluntarily adopt, immediate or gradual abolishment of slavery within their respective limits; and that the effort to colonize persons of African descent with their consent upon this continent or elsewhere....

That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any state or designated part of a state, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free; and the Executive Government of the United States, including the military and naval authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom.

That the Executive will, on the first day of January aforesaid, by proclamation, designate the states and parts of states, if any, in which the people thereof, respectively, shall then be in rebellion against the United States; and the fact that any State, or the people thereof, shall on that day be, in good faith, represented in the Congress of the United States by members chosen thereto at elections wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such state shall have participated, shall, in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclusive evidence that such state, and the people thereof, are not then in rebellion against the United States.

Lincoln said he had authority to do this because it was a war measure. However, the whole war for the preservation of the Union was based upon the principle that the states attempting to secede were really part of the Union. If that is true the president did not have the right do emancipate the property of southerners if he could not do it in peace time.

The Emancipation Proclamation was not a humanitarian document. It only declared the slaves free in territory not under the control of the United States. Therefore, unless the Union army was victorious in the war, the slaves would remain in their servitude. It also gave the Confederates the chance to save their slaves by returning to the Union before January 1st, 1863. or receive compensation for them through an (unconstitutional) act of Congress.

Lincoln

This proclamation had vast impact. It changed the cause of the war in the mind of the world from preservation of the Union into a war to abolish slavery. Everyone was not happy that. Some soldiers, in fact, deserted because they did not want to fight to end slavery. In any event the Union army eventually supported it, as it gave them a higher motive to fight for than to coerce the southern states. The impact in foreign policy was also great. European nations had been considering recognizing the Confederate States. But with the proclamation Lincoln was able to change their perception of the war to one over slavery, and although they might have been willing to aid in the separation of the Union, they would not aid in the preservation of slavery. The Emancipation Proclamation destroyed the south's best hope for victory – foreign recognition. From then on they would have to look to their own armies for victory.

Lincoln on Freeing the Slaes

Around this time, 150 years ago, Abraham Lincoln sent a letter to Horace Greeley, who had much influence through his paper, the New York Tribune, explaining his reasoning as to freeing the slaves. Greeley had published on August 19th an open letter to Lincoln in his paper called "A Prayer of Twenty Millions." He was urging Lincoln to make more efforts to free the slave, including enforcing the Confiscation Act, which allowed the confiscation of any property of the rebels including slaves.

Lincoln

Executive Mansion,
Washington, August 22, 1862.

Hon. Horace Greeley:
Dear Sir.

I have just read yours of the 19th. addressed to myself through the New-York Tribune. If there be in it any statements, or assumptions of fact, which I may know to be erroneous, I do not, now and here, controvert them. If there be in it any inferences which I may believe to be falsely drawn, I do not now and here, argue against them. If there be perceptable in it an impatient and dictatorial tone, I waive it in deference to an old friend, whose heart I have always supposed to be right.

As to the policy I "seem to be pursuing" as you say, I have not meant to leave any one in doubt.

I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored; the nearer the Union will be "the Union as it was." If there be those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views.

I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty; and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men every where could be free.

Yours,
A. Lincoln.

Lincoln's letter was not all it seemed to be. For even as he wrote this letter he was considering an emancipation proclamation to aid in the restoration of the Union. With this letter he was skillfully laying the ground work for public opinion to support him when the time came.

Greeley

Frémont Proclaims the South's Slaves Free

John C. Fremont

Today John C. Frémont issued a proclamation declaring the slaves in his military district free. Frémont was a famous explorer, and earned the name “The Pathfinder” for mapping a trail across the Rocky Mountains. Although he was from Georgia, he was the first presidential candidate of the Republican party. The Republican party was founded on the idea of opposing slavery. He lost the election, but four years later Lincoln won the election. Frémont was appointed a Major General, and appointed commander of the Department of the West, with his attention focused on the fighting in Missouri. Today Frémont issued a proclamation declaring martial law in Missouri. This was the most controversial part:

All persons who shall be taken with arms in their hands, within these lines, shall be tried by Court Martial, and, if found guilty, will be shot. The property, real and personal, of all persons in the State of Missouri, who shall take up arms against the United States, or who shall be directly proven to have taken active part with their enemies in the field, is declared to be confiscated to the public use, and their slaves, if any they have, are hereby declared free men.

Abraham Lincoln

The most debated part was saying the Confederates' slaves would be freed. As we will see, Lincoln was not ready for this. Although he would release a similar Emancipation Proclamation less than a year and a half later, at the time he wrote:

You speak of [Fremont's proclamation] as being the only means of saving the government. On the contrary it is itself the surrender of the government. Can it be pretended that it is any longer the government of the U.S.—any government of Constitution and laws,—wherein a General, or a President, may make permanent rules of property by proclamation?

I do not say Congress might not with propriety pass a law, on the point, just such as General Fremont proclaimed ...What I object to, is, that I as President, shall expressly or impliedly seize and exercise the permanent legislative functions of the government.