How does one free slaves in another country? How does one free slaves over which one has no control?
President
Abraham Lincoln attempted to do just that, when he issued the two-part
Emancipation Proclamation in 1862 and 1863. Criticized by Northerners,
sneered at by Southerners, the Emancipation Proclamation evidenced more
than anything Lincoln's foresight and conviction that the Union would
be once again be the United States of America - all states of America.
The
beginnings of the Emancipation Proclamation were in the Fugitive Slave
Law, enacted in 1850. The Fugitive Slave Law demanded that fugitive
slaves, as property, be returned to their owners if they escaped, even
if in escaping they made it to a free state. The Fugitive Slave Law
became controversial as abolitionism gained ground in the North;
abolitionists, flouting the law, often refused to comply and return
escaped slaves to their southern owners.
While the Fugitive Slave
Law caused uproar both North and South, it caused even larger problems
once Civil War was declared. When Union troops encountered runaway
slaves, there was no consensus as to how to treat them; while a few
returned them to their owners, many considered slaves who were living
in occupied areas war contraband. Others still freed the slaves, often
resulting in their own dismissal.
Treating the slaves as
contraband did not sit well with President Lincoln, as treating them as
contraband was, in a sense, recognizing the Confederate States of
America as a separate nation. Lincoln flatly refused to recognize the
Confederacy as anything but a band of infidels, and as such, decided to
attack the issue of slavery as an act of war, knowing that by doing so,
he would both decide the issue of slavery and attack the South where it
was most vulnerable.
Thus a series of events began to both free
slaves and place a stranglehold on the South, still reliant on slavery
to support their largely agricultural economy, events that resulted in
the Emancipation Proclamation:
- March 13, 1862: Lincoln forbids officers of the Union Army officers from returning fugitive slaves to their owners.
- April
10, 1862: Congress decides that the federal government will compensate
slave owners who free their slaves; this begins in Washington, D.C. On
April 16, when slaveowners are compensated upon the release of their
slaves.
- June 19, 1862: Slavery is prohibited by Congress in
United States territories. This decision opposes the 1857 ruling in the
Dred Scott Case that stated Congress did not have the authority to
regulate slavery in the United States.
- January, 1862:
Republican leader of the House of Representatives Thaddeus Stevens
calls for total war against the perceived Southern rebellion, including
the emancipation of slaves, in an attempt to destroy the Confederate
economy.
- July, 1862: Lincoln signs Congress' "Second Confiscation Act" which liberates slaves held by southern "rebels."
- September
22, 1862: President Lincoln issues the first executive order of the
Emancipation Proclamation, declaring freedom for all slaves in any
state of the Confederacy that did return to the Union January 1, 1863.
- January
1, 1863: President Lincoln issues the second executive order of the
Emancipation Proclamation, which specifies that slaves in Arkansas,
Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South
Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia were free.
Yet
the Emancipation Proclamation did not free all slaves; exempted from
the Proclamation were the contested states of Kentucky and Missouri,
the soon-to-be West Virginia, and two Union slave states, Maryland and
Delaware. It would be 1865, the conclusion of the war, before all
slaves were emancipated in these states.
In fact, it would be
1865 before the majority of the slaves held in the states addressed by
the Emancipation Proclamation were freed. Until the Confederacy was
defeated, many of these slaves remained under the control of their
masters.
While the Emancipation Proclamation did not immediately
free all slaves, it did finally address the major schism between the
North and the South - slavery. It was President Abraham Lincoln's
message to the Confederacy that slavery was indeed a matter of war, and
that their short-lived rule would not outlast the Union.
