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VII

EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION

HE Emancipation Proclamation was the product of a severe struggle between the radical and conservative elements of the nation. That struggle continued with constantly increasing vigor during the first year and a half of Mr. Lincoln's Presidency, and ceased when that Proclamation was issued on the 22nd of September, 1862. After that date the conservative element with decreased and decreasing severity opposed the Emancipation policy of the administration, but the victory of the radicals was practically won when the preliminary proclamation was issued.

President Lincoln became the unwilling captive of the radical element, and with very great and painful reluctance accomplished by the Emancipation Proclamation what he diligently sought to avoid. He ardently desired the abolishment of slavery by state action and not by edict of the General Government. After the preliminary Proclamation was issued he stated to Hon. Edwin Stanley, Military Governor of North Carolina, "that he had prayed to the Almighty to save him from this necessity, adopting the very language of our Saviour, 'If it be possible, let this cup pass from me,' but the prayer had not been answered." 1

To the representatives from the Border States, on July 12th, 1862, the President said: "I am pressed with a difficulty not yet mentioned-one which threatens division among those who, united, are none too strong." In this President Lincoln referred to the Proclamation of Emancipation which had been issued by General Hunter, and said: "In repudiating it, I gave dissatisfaction, if not offense, to many whose support the 1 Thorndyke Rice, Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln, p. 533.

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." 2

The next day after that conference, in his conversation. with Secretaries Seward and Welles, according to the testimony of the latter, Mr. Lincoln declared that Emancipation "was forced upon him as a necessity," "was thrust at him from various quarters," and "had been driven home to him. by the conference of the preceding day."

The conference to which President Lincoln here refers was the one with the Border State men, and it was their rejection of his proposition for compensated emancipation that had "driven home to him" the necessity of an Emancipation Proclamation. He realized that a crisis had been reached and that what he designated as "Military Emancipation" had become an indispensable necessity. The struggle by which that decision was evolved began when he became President. The Fremont Emancipation movement was an eruption from the volcano of antislavery sentiment among the loyal masses and the contest which that movement precipitated added to the influences arrayed in hostility to slavery. On the 15th of November, 1861, eight months after Mr. Lincoln's inauguration, Hon. George Bancroft addressed a letter to the President in which he said:

"Your administration has fallen upon times which will be remembered as long as human events find a record. I sincerely wish to you the glory of perfect success. Civil war is the instrument of Divine Providence to root out social slavery. Posterity will not be satisfied with the result unless the consequences of the war shall effect an increase of free States. This is the universal expectation and hope of men of all parties."

In reply to Mr. Bancroft's letter the President wrote: "The main thought in the closing paragraph of your letter is one which does not escape my attention, and with which I 2 Complete Works of Abraham Lincoln, Vol. VII., pp. 272-273

must deal in all due caution, and with the best judgment I can bring to it." 3

Mr. Bancroft's high standing in public esteem, his great wisdom and discretion and his large experience in public life, gave much weight to his declaration respecting slavery, and Mr. Lincoln's reply to that portion of his letter is a milestone marking his progress toward the conclusion announced by him eight months later in his conversation with two members of his Cabinet, as already cited.

During the months immediately preceding Emancipation Mr. Lincoln's mail was loaded with letters similar to the one received by him from Mr. Bancroft. Many conservative people of prominence in business activities and professional pursuits very earnestly counselled the President as did Mr. Bancroft, not to delay but to hasten the execution of the edict of destiny against slavery. People distinguished for their moderation and for their affiliation with conservative organizations and movements were emphatic in their declarations to the President, by letters and otherwise, that slavery should not be permitted to survive the war it had brought upon the nation. Leading democrats like Hon. Robert J. Walker of Mississippi and Gen. Benjamin F. Butler of Massachusetts assured the President of their conviction that, as slavery had drawn the sword it should speedily perish by the sword. People of strong antislavery views were earnest and untiring in their demands that slavery should be slain that it might not slay the nation. All these insisted that as slavery was the Rebellion's main pillar of strength it should be destroyed as a means for suppressing the Rebellion. They would not permit the President nor the loyal people to forget, that shortly before the war Representative Ashmore of South Carolina had declared in Congress that "the South can sustain more men in the field than the North can. Here four millions of slaves alone will enable her to support an army of half a million."

3 Complete Works of Abraham Lincoln, Vol. VII., pp. 20-21.

Similar declarations were made by other prominent Southern men, and the Southern disloyal press teemed with editorials and contributed articles calling attention to the great advantage to the South of having such a vast force of toiling men and women to conduct agricultural and other activities of the South while the white men were at the front fighting against the Union armies.

The sentiments of the loyal people who remembered these boasts were faithfully represented by the declaration of Governor Andrew of Massachusetts to the President in May, 1862, when he said: "The people of Massachusetts have come to feel it a heavy draft on their patriotism to be asked to fight Rebels without being permitted to fire on their magazines."

In a like vein, but with greater bitterness, Horace Greeley said: "On the face of this wide earth, Mr. President, there is not one disinterested, determined, intelligent champion of the Union cause who does not feel that all attempts to put down the Rebellion and at the same time uphold its inciting cause are preposterous and futile."

While declarations favorable to emancipation were pouring in upon President Lincoln by letters, newspaper articles and interviewers, church gatherings and reform associations were passing strong antislavery resolutions and sending delegations to the White House to declare their loyalty to the Union and to plead for the overthrow of slavery. No delegations from church bodies or from organizations engaged in reform work during those months of agitation and strife asked that slavery be left undisturbed, but all espoused the cause of emancipation. Many loyal people, however, feared that any interference with slavery by the General Government would be harmful to the Union cause and all who were pro-slavery at heart were watchful and vigilant in "safeguarding the peculiar institution." On the 13th of September, 1862, in addressing a delegation from the religious bodies of Chicago, President Lincoln said: "I am approached with the most opposite opinions and advice, and that by religious men who are equally

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certain that they represent the divine will. is difficult and good men do not agree. also that the last session of Congress had a decided majority of antislavery men, yet they could not unite upon this policy. The same is true of the religious people."

The struggles between those contending forces were constant and at times very severe; but as resistlessly as the coming of the day the antislavery movement advanced. Mr. Lincoln recognized the growth of public sentiment in favor of emancipation and realized that he was rapidly approaching the time when he would be compelled by his own sense of duty to proclaim freedom to the slaves. A few days before the Emancipation Proclamation was issued in an interview with Rev. William Henry Channing and M. D. Conway he said: "Perhaps we may be better able to do something in that direction. after awhile than we are now. I think the country is growing in this direction daily and I am not without hope that something of the desire of you and your friends may be accomplished. When the hour comes for dealing with slavery I trust I shall be willing to do my duty though it costs my life."

While the growth of public sentiment against slavery, to which in the foregoing interview President Lincoln referred, was being accomplished, there were going on in his own mind and heart some very remarkable changes of conviction and purpose. In his letter to Senator Browning, at the time of the Fremont Emancipation movement, already cited, Mr. Lincoln said: "Can it be pretended that it is any longer the Government of the United States-any government of constitution and law-where any 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. I do not say I might not as I may have Congress vote for it. What I object to is that I, as President, shall expressly or 4 Complete Works of Abraham Lincoln, Vol. VIII., pp. 28-29.