-.-cC^-' /'"\ --^r/ y\'°- ^ ^. < o .0^ ,^ ^o *,,-.• .0-' w .<^^"\ '•.: •• .^' < o A ^^.. ..^ >^^3?^^ "?^S^^5 '^ FREEDOM NATIONAL. THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION ^nSTDIC^TEID. H^:^ 9^^ THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, ISSUED JANUARY 1st, 1863, LETTER OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE U. S. TO THE UNION CONVEN- TION, HOLDEN AT SPRINGFIELD, (III.,) SEPT. 3d, 1863. i^ t-u'^--f./•■''A/L' Officially Revised, and. Corrected. -^ 1863. FROM THE PRESS OF THE NATIONAL REPUBLICAN, AVASHINGTON, D. C. Gideon & Pe.vrson, Printers, 511 9th Street. FREEDOM NATIONAL. THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION "XriltTIDIOJ^TEr). THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION BY THE PRESIDEJJT OF THE UNITED STATES, ISSUED JANUARY 1st, 1863, LETTER OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE U. S. TO THE UNION CONVEN- TION, HOLDEN AT SPRINGFIELD, (III.,) SEPT. 3d, 1863. ^.l.«^ cC ^Cv.<>^^ ' Officially Revised and, Correoted. 1863. FROM THE PRESS OF THE NATIONAL REPUBLICAN, WASHINGTON, D. C. Gideon & Pearson, Printers, 511 9th Street. ■ L7B k r« BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. A PROCLAMATION. Whereas, on the 22d day of September, in the year x)f 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 Jan- uary, 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 eftbrts 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 wliich the people tliereoi respectively, shall then be in rebellion against the United States ; and the fact tjiat any State, or the people thereof, shall on that day in good faith be re- presented in the Congress of the United States, by members chosen thereto at elections wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such States shall have participated, shall, in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclusive evi- dence 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 Goverment 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 respec- tively 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, Terre Bonne, Lafourche, St. Marie, St. Martin, and Orleans, including the city of New Orleans,) Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia, (except the forty-eight coun- ties designated as West Virginia, and also the coun- ties of Berkeley, Accomac, Northampton, Elizabeth City, York, Princess Ann, and Norfolk, including the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth,) and which ex- cepted 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, in- cluding the military and naval authorities thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of said per- sons. And I hereby enjoin upon the people so declared to be free, to abstain from all violence, unless in ne- cessary self-defence ; and I recommend to them that, in all cases when allowed, they labor faithfully for reasonable wages. 6 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 mili- tary necessity, I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind, and the gracious favor of Almighty God. In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my name 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 thou- [l. s.] sand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-seventh. ABRAHAM LINCOLN By the President : William H. Seward, Secretary of State, THE EMANCIPATIOI PROCLAMATIOI Executive Mansion, Washington, Aug. 26, 1863. Hon. James C. Conlding : My Dear Sie: Your letter, inviting me to attend a mass meeting of Unconditional Union men, to be held at the capitol of Illinois on the 3d day of Sei3tember, has been received. It would be very agreeable to me to thus meet my old friends at my own home, but I cannot just now be absent from here so long as a visit there would require. The meeting is to be of all those who maintain un- conditional devotion to the Union, and I am sure my old political friends will thank me for tendering, as I do, the N'ation's gratitude to those other noble men whom no partisan malice or partisan hope can make false to the !N'ation's life. There are those who are dissatisfied with me. To such I would say. You desire peace, and you blame me that we do not have it. But how can we attain it? There are but three conceivable ways: First, to suppress the rebellion by force of arms. This I am 8 trying to do. Are you for it? If you are, so far we are agreed. If you are not for it, a second way is to give up the Union. I am against this. Are you for it? If you are, you should say so plainly. If you are not for force, nor yet for dissolution, there only remains some imaginable comiwomise. I do not believe any compromise embracing the maintenance of the Union is now possible. All I learn leads to a directly opposite belief. The strength of the rebel- lion is its military — its army. That army dominates all the country and all the people within its range. Any offer of terms made by any man or men within that range, in opposition to that army, is simply nothing for the present, because such man or men have no power whatever to enforce their side of a compromise if one were made with them. To illustrate : suppose refugees from the South and peace men of the JSTorth get together in conven- tion, and frame and proclaim a compromise, em- bracing a restoration of the Union, in what way can that compromise be used to keep Lee's army out of Pennsylvania? Meade's army can keep Lee's army out of Pennsylvania, and I think can ultimately drive it out of existence. But no paper compromise to which the controllers of Lee's army are not agreed, can at all affect that army. In an effort at such 9 compromise, we should waste time wliicli the enemy would improve to our disadvantage, and that would be all. A compromise, to be effective, must be made either with those who control the rebel army, or with the people first liberated from the domination of that army, by the successes of our own army. Now, allow me to assure you that no word or intimation from that rebel army, or from any of the men controlling it, in relation to any peace compromise, has ever come to my knowledge or belief. All charges and insinua- tions to the contrary are deceptive and groundless. And I promise you that if any such proposition shall hereafter come, it shall not be rejected and kept a secret from you. I freely acknowledge myself the servant of the people, according to the bond of service — the United States Constitution — and that as such I am responsible to them. But to be plain, you are dissatisfied with me about the negro. Quite likely there is a difference of opin- ion between you and myself upon that subject. I certainly wish that all men could be free, while I suppose you do not. Yet I have neither adopted nor proposed any measure which is not consistent with even your view, provided you are for the Union. I suggested compensated emancipation, to which you replied you wished not to be taxed to buy negroes. 10 But I had not asked you to be taxed to buy negroes, except in such way as to save you from greater tax- ation to save the Union exclusively by other means. You dislike the emancipation proclamation, and perhaps would have it retracted. You say it is un- constitutional. I think differently. I think the Con- stitution invests its Commander-in-Chief with the law of war in time of war. The most that can be said — if so much — is that slaves are property. Is there, has there ever been, any question that by the law of war property both of enemies and friends may be taken when needed? And is it not needed when- ever taking it helps us, or hurts the enemy ? Armies, the world over, destroy enemies' property when they cannot use it, and even destroy their own to keep it from the enemy. Civilized belligerents do all in their power to help themselves or hurt the enemy, except a few things regarded as barbarous or cruel. Among the exceptions are the massacre of vanquished foes and non-combatants, male and female. But the proclamation, as law, either is valid or is not valid. If it is not valid, it needs no retraction. If it is valid, it cannot be retracted, any more than the dead can be brought to life. Some of you pro- fess to think its retraction would operate favorably for the Union. Why better after the retraction 11 than before the issue? There was more than a year and a half of trial to snj)press the rebellion before the proclamation issued ; the last one hundred days of which passed under an explicit notice that it was coming, unless averted by those in revolt return- ing to their allegiance. The war has certainly pro- gressed as favorably for us since the issue of the proclamation as before. I know, as fully as one can know, the opinions of others, that some of the com- manders of our armies in the field, who have given us our most important successes, believe the emanci- pation policy and the use of colored troops constitute the heaviest blow yet dealt to the rebellion, and that at least one of those important successes could not have been achieved when it was but for the aid of black soldiers. Among the commanders holding these views are some who have never had any affinity with "svhat is called Abolitionism, or with Eepublican party politics, but who hold them purely as military opinions. I submit these opinions as being entitled to some weight against the objections often urged that emancipation and arming the blacks are unwise as military measures, and were not adoi)ted as such in good faith. You say you will not fight to free negroes. Some of them seem willing to fight for you, but no matter. Fight you, then, exclusively to 12 save the Union. I issued the proclamation on pur- pose to aid you in saving the Union. Whenever you shall have conquered all resistance to the Union, if I shall urge you to continue fighting, it will be an apt time then for you to declare you will not fight to free negroes. I thought that in your struggle for the Union, to whatever extent the negroes should cease helping the enemy, to that extent it weakened the enemy in his resistance to you. Do you think differently? I thought that whatever negroes can be got to do as soldiers, leaves just so much less for white soldiers to do in saving the Union. Does it appear otherwise to you ? But negroes, like other people, act upon mo- tives. Why should they do anything for us if we will do nothing for them? If they stake their lives for us, they must be prompted by the strongest motive, even the promise of freedom. And the ijromise being made, must be kept. The signs look better. The Father of Waters again goes unvexed to the sea. Thanks to the great ISTorthwest for it. I^or yet wholly to them. Three hundred miles up they met IsTew England, Empire, Keystone, and Jersey, hewing their way right and left. The sunny South, too, in more colors than one, also lent a hand. On the spot, their part of the 13 history was jotted down in black and white. The job was a great national one, and let none be banned who bore an honorable part in it. And while those who have cleared the great river may well be proud, even that is not all. It is hard to say that anything has been more bravely and well done than at Anti'e- tam, Muifreesboro', Gettysburg, and on many fields of lesser note. I^or must Uncle Sam's web-feet be forgotten. At all the watery margins they have been present. JN'ot only on the deep sea, the broad bay, and the rapid river, but also up the narrow, muddy bayou ; and wherever the ground was a little damp they have been, and made their tracks. Thanks to all. For the great Republic, for the principle it lives by and keeps alive — for man's vast future — • thanks to all. Peace does not appear so distant as it did. I hope it will come soon, and come to stay, and so come as to be worth the keeping in all future time. It will then have been proved that among free men there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet, and that they who take such appeal are sure to lose their case and pay the cost. And then there will be some black men who can remember that with silent tongue and clenched teeth, and steady eye and well poised bayonet, they have helped 14 maiikiud on to this great consummation ; while I fear there will be some white ones unable to forget that with malignant heart and deceitful speech they strove to hinder it. Still let us not be over sanguine of a speedy final triumph. Let us be quite sober. Let us diligently apply the means, never doubting that a just God, in His own good time, will give us the rightful result. Yours, very truly, A. LIJSrCOLN. f ?J> C, vP ^^-;^, 0' 'bV" " °' ^ 4> %,<>* M *' ^^'% \^iW: ^\; U K^^ ^b^ "o ^'>^:^ . ~^- > %,