"The plan proposed is one of the most potent and swift measures of ending the war. Let the States which are in rebellion see definitely and certainly that in no event will the States you represent ever join their proposed Confederacy, and they cannot much longer maintain the contest. But you cannot divest them of their hope to ultimately have you with them, so long as you show a determination to perpetuate the institution within your own State. Beat them at elections as you have overwhelmingly done, and, nothing daunted, they still claim you as their own. You and I know what the lever of their power is. Break that lever before their faces, and they can shake you no more forever.

"Most of you have treated me with kindness and consideration, and I trust you will not now think I improperly touch what is exclusively your own, when, for the sake of the whole country, I ask, 'Can you, for your States, do better than to take the course I urge?' Discarding punctilio and maxims adapted to more manageable times, and looking only to the unprecedentedly stern facts of our case, can you do better in any possible event? You prefer that the constitutional relations of the States to the Nation shall be practically restored, without disturbance of the institution; and if this were done, my whole duty in this respect under the Constitution, and my oath of office would be performed. But it is not done, and we are trying to accomplish it by war. The incidents of the war cannot be avoided. If the war continues long, as it must, if the object be not sooner attained, the institution in your States will be extinguished by mere friction and abrasion by the mere incidents of the war. It will be and gone you will have nothing valuable in lieu of it. Much of its value is gone already. How much better for you and for your people to take the step which at once shortens the war, and secures substantial compensation for that which is sure to be wholly lost in any other event! How much better to thus save the money which else we sink forever in the war! How much better to do it while we can, lest the war ere long render us pecuniarily unable to do it! How much better for you as seller, and the Nation as buyer, to sell out and buy out that without which the war could never have been, than to sink both the thing to be sold and the price of it in cutting one another's throats!

"I do not speak of emancipation. at once, but of a decision, at once, to emancipate gradually. Room in South America for colonization can be obtained cheaply and in abundance, and where numbers shall be large enough to be company and encouragement for one another, the freed people will not be so reluctant to go.

"I am pressed with a difficulty not yet mentioned, one which threatens division among those, who, united, are none too strong. An instance of it is known to you. General Hunter is an honest man. He was, and I hope is still my friend. I valued him none the less for his agreeing with me in the general wish that all men everywhere could be freed. He proclaimed all men free within certain States, and I repudiated the proclamation. He expected more good and less harm from the measure than I could believe would follow. Yet, in repudiating it, I gave dissatisfaction, if not offence, to many, whose support the country cannot afford to lose. And this is not the end of it. The pressure in this direction is still upon me and is increasing. By conceding what I now ask, you can relieve me, and much more, can relieve the country in this important point.

"Upon these considerations, I have again begged your attention to the Message of March last. Before leaving the Capitol, consider and discuss it among yourselves. You are patriots and statesmen, and as such I pray you consider this proposition; and at the least, commend it to the consideration of your States and people. As you would perpetuate popular government for the best people in the world, I beseech you that do in nowise omit this. Our common country is in great peril, demanding the loftiest views and boldest action, to bring a speedy relief. Once relieved, its form of government is saved to the world, its beloved history and cherished memories are vindicated, and its happy future fully assured, and rendered inconceivably grand. To you more than to any others, the privilege is given to assure that happiness and swell that grandeur, and to link your own names therewith forever."

you

This appeal was received by some with apathy, caviling and opposition; by a few with sympathy. But no action— no efficient action; nothing practical was done, on the part of the border slave States. No! slavery had so entwined itself in the social fabric that nothing but the violence, force, and fire of war could tear it away. The communities would not yet voluntarily relinquish it.

The intense feeling of Mr. Lincoln on this subject was expressed by him to two members of Congress, old friends, from Illinois, (Owen Lovejoy and the Author,) who called upon him Sunday evening, July 13th, at his Summer residence at the "Soldiers' Home." He conversed freely with them of his late interview with the border State members. "Oh," said he in conclusion, "if the border States would

accept my proposition! Then," said he, "you Lovejoy and Arnold, and all of us, would not have lived in vain! The labor of your life, Lovejoy, would be crowned with success -you would live to see the end of slavery." Such was his passionate desire that slavery might end. The President, in his message, again pressed the subject upon the consideration of Congress; but his closing remarks indicate the . advance of his mind towards the necessity of universal and immediate emancipation. He says, "In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free, honorable alike in what we give and what we preserve. * Other means may succeed; this could not fail. ful, generous, just; a way which, if followed, the world will forever applaud, and God must forever bless."

* *

The way is plain, peace

Meanwhile, the public sentiment in the North was growing stronger and more intense, demanding of the President, immediate, and unconditional emancipation. A large party in the loyal States had all along insisted that the most direct way of crushing the rebellion, was to crush slavery. They insisted that the commander-in-chief, by proclaiming liberty, would bring hundreds and thousands of colored men to the ranks of the Union armies. It was insisted that to accept the distinct issue tendered by the slaveholders between liberty and slavery, would bring a moral power to the support of the Government, which would be felt both at home and abroad. The Republican press of the loyal States, with some exceptions, earnestly and importunately demanded that the President, availing himself of the occasion and provisions of the confiscation act, should proclaim instant liberation to every slave belonging to a rebel master. The more violent of the press and of the Republican partisans denounced the President for his remissness. The distinguished editor of the New York Tribune, whose writings had contributed as much, if not more than those of any other man towards the formation of the Republican party, and the elec tion of Mr. Lincoln, addressed the President under his own nathe in the Tribune, urging emancipation, and remonstrating severely for the failure of Mr. Lincoln to adopt a more vigorous and determined policy.

This letter was published on the 19th of August, and on the 22d, Mr. Lincoln issued from the Executive Mansion a reply. This answer, frank, open, generous and conscientious, unfolded to the people the motives which controlled his conduct. Mr. Lincoln was criticised for replying to the latter, as an act wanting in dignity. But this being a government of the people, he as their President, wished them fully to understand his motives. He said:

แ My paramount object is to save the Union, and not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; 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 do it."

He was not yet quite prepared to issue a proclamation fraught with such momentous consequences; yet his mind was anxiously revolving the subject; he discussed it with all from whom he supposed he could obtain new suggestions or arguments, or from whom he could learn the drift of public opinion. He would often make suggestions, and argue the case against emancipation to obtain the views of others.

To personal friends of the Illinois delegation in Congress, who conferred with him on the subject, he said that, in his letter to Mr. Greeley, he meant that he would proclaim freedom to the slave just as soon as he felt assured he could do it effectively; that the people would stand by him, and that, by doing so, he could strengthen the Union cause. He was assured by them in reply, that the people would stand by him, and that they were impatient for it.

On the 13th of September, 1862, he received a delegation of the clergy of nearly all the religious denominations of Chicago, who waited upon him with a memorial, urging immediate emancipation.

For the purpose of fully eliciting their views, he started objections to the policy they urged, and in accordance with his old practice at the bar, he made an argument against his own views, and against the policy he had nearly or quite concluded to pursue. After a full conference and free discussion, the President said, "I have not decided against a

proclamation of liberty to the slaves, but hold the matter under advisement; and I can assure you the matter is on my mind by day and by night, more than any other. Whatever shall appear to be God's will, I will do."

While this momentous question was thus agitating the mind of the President, involving the existence of slavery in North America, while the civilized world was watching with interest the result, the intense feeling and anxiety on the subject, found expression in daily prayers, sent up from church, cottage, and cabin, all through the loyal North, beseeching the great God to guide the President to the right conclusion. Thousands believed that the fate not only of African slavery, but also of the Republic hung upon the issue. The friends of freedom from Europe, from France, Italy, Germany and Great Britain, sent messages to their friends on this side of the water, saying that recognition and intervention were iminent, and that the best and most effi cient means of prevention, was to make the distinct issue with slavery. Some of our representatives at foreign Courts, advised the Secretary of State, that there was danger of intervention by foreign Governments, and that such danger could be best averted by emancipation.

The friends of the Union abroad had become somewhat indifferent. The organs of the rebellion in Europe, represented everywhere, that it was a mere struggle for empire, involving, no great principle. The policy of several of the military commanders towards the slaves, the concessions constantly made to the border slave States, disgusted many ardent friends of liberty at home and abroad; as a remedy for this, the friends of the Union and liberty urged that the President should proclaim "freedom throughout the land to all the inhabitants thereof."

What, meanwhile, was the action and feelings of the negroes? They had long prayed for, hoped for freedom. The North star had often guided the panting fugitive to liberty. Armies had come to the slave from the free States, fighting their masters. The starry flag they now believed was to be the emblem of their liberty, as well as that of the white man. The Union soldiers had been always welcomed by the