5.3+Emancipation+Proclamation

From the beginning of the Civil War, Lincoln insisted that the goal was to preserve the union, not to free the slaves. In part, he took this position to retain the loyalty of the four Border States, Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri. As the war progressed, the Confederacy used slave labor to supply their cause—for example, to build fortifications or work in factories—and Lincoln changed his policy. On September 22, 1862, Lincoln issued the first part of the Emancipation Proclamation, which stated that in any state that had not returned to the union by the following January, the slaves would be declared free. Then, on January 1, 1963, he issued the document below, following through on his promise. As you read, try to determine why Lincoln freed the slaves. Out of a sincere opposition to slavery? As a strategic move to help win the war and preserve the Union?

The Emancipation Proclamation
//Source: The Emancipation Proclamation, January 1, 1863.//(Figure below). > **By the President of the United States of America:** > A Proclamation. > Whereas, on the twenty-second day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, a proclamation was issued by the President of the United States, containing, among other things, the following, to wit: > “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.” > Now, therefore I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, by virtue of the power in me vested as Commander-in-Chief, of the Army and Navy of the United States in time of actual armed rebellion against the authority and government of the United States, and as a fit and necessary war measure for suppressing said rebellion, do, on this first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and in accordance with my purpose so to do publicly proclaimed for the full period of one hundred days, from the day first above mentioned, order and designate as the States and parts of States wherein the people thereof respectively, are this day in rebellion against the United States, the following, to wit: > Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, (except the Parishes of St. Bernard, Plaquemines, Jefferson, St. John, St. Charles, St. James Ascension, Assumption, Terrebonne, Lafourche, St. Mary, St. Martin, and Orleans, including the City of New Orleans) Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia, (except the forty-eight counties designated as West Virginia, and also the counties of Berkley, Accomac, Northampton, Elizabeth City, York, Princess Ann, and Norfolk, including the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth[)], and which excepted parts, are for the present, left precisely as if this proclamation were not issued. > And by virtue of the power, and for the purpose aforesaid, I do order and declare that all persons held as slaves within said designated States, and parts of States, are, and henceforward shall be free; and that the Executive government of the United States, including the military and naval authorities thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of said persons. > And I hereby enjoin upon the people so declared to be free to abstain from all violence, unless in necessary self-defence; and I recommend to them that, in all cases when allowed, they labor faithfully for reasonable wages. > And I further declare and make known, that such persons of suitable condition, will be received into the armed service of the United States to garrison forts, positions, stations, and other places, and to man vessels of all sorts in said service. > And upon this act, sincerely believed to be an act of justice, warranted by the Constitution, upon military necessity, I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind, and the gracious favor of Almighty God. > In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. > Done at the City of Washington, this first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty three, and of the Independence of the United States of America the eighty-seventh. > By the President: ABRAHAM LINCOLN > WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.

Questions:

 * 1) The Civil War ended in 1865. According to the Emancipation Proclamation, why did Lincoln decide to free the slaves before the war had even ended?
 * 2) Lincoln lists many of states but leaves out the following four slave states: Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri. These states had slaves but were not part of the Confederacy (they were not fighting against the Union). What happened to the slaves in these states? You may use your outside sources to answer this question.
 * 3) **Close Reading:** Why do you think he calls the act a “military necessity” and “invoke the considerate judgment of mankind” in the last section?

From The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass – Frederick Douglass
//Source: Excerpt from The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass, 1881.// > //In mid-1863, after the Emancipation Proclamation had been announced, President Lincoln called Frederick Douglass to the White House to speak with him. Douglass recounts the event here in his autobiography.// > It was when General Grant was fighting his way through the Wilderness to Richmond... that President Lincoln did me the honor to invite me to the Executive Mansion for a conference on the situation.... The main subject on which he wished to confer with me was as to the means most desirable to be employed outside the army to induce the slaves in the rebel states to come within the federal lines. The increasing opposition to the war, in the North, and the mad cry against it, because it was being made an abolition war, alarmed Mr. Lincoln, and made him apprehensive that a peace might be forced upon him which would leave still in slavery all who had not come within our lines. What he wanted was to make his proclamation as effective as possible in the event of such a peace. He said, in a regretful tone, `The slaves are not coming so rapidly and so numerously to us as I had hoped.'I replied that the slaveholders knew how to keep such things from their slaves, and probably very few knew of his proclamation. `Well,' he said, `I want you to set about devising some means of making them acquainted with it, and for bringing them into our lines.' He spoke with great earnestness and much solicitude.... He said he was being accused of protracting the war beyond its legitimate object and of failing to make peace when he might have done so to advantage. He was afraid of what might come of all these complaints, but was persuaded that no solid and lasting peace could come short of absolute submission on the part of the rebels, and he was not for giving them rest by futile conferences with unauthorized persons, at Niagara Falls, or elsewhere. He saw the danger of premature peace, and, like a thoughtful and sagacious man as he was, wished to provide means of rendering such consummation as harmless as possible. I was the more impressed by this benevolent consideration because he before said, in answer to the peace clamor, that his object was to //save the Union//, and to do so with or without slavery. What he said on this day showed a deeper moral conviction against slavery than I had ever seen before in anything spoken or written by him. I listened with the deepest interest and profoundest satisfaction, and, at his suggestion, agreed to undertake the organizing of a band of scouts, composed of colored men, whose business should be... to go into the rebel states, beyond the lines of our armies, and carry the news of emancipation, and urge the slaves to come within our boundaries.... > I refer to this conversation because I think that, on Mr. Lincoln's part, it is evidence conclusive that the proclamation, so far at least as he was concerned, was not effected merely as a ‘necessity.’

Questions:

 * 1) **Sourcing:** When did Douglass write this document? When did the meeting and the Emancipation take place? How might that affect Douglass’s memory of Lincoln and his evaluation of the Emancipation Proclamation?
 * 2) **Contextualization:** According to Douglass, what was happening in the North in 1863?
 * 3) **Close Reading:** According to Douglass, what was Lincoln concerned about?
 * 4) **Close Reading:** What is Douglass’s conclusion about Lincoln and the Emancipation Proclamation?

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