Abraham Lincoln Quotes
Neither General Hunter, nor any other commander, or person, has been authorized by the Government of the United States, to make proclamations declaring the slaves of any State free; and that the supposed proclamation, now in question, … is altogether void, so far as respects such declaration.
General David Hunter had unilaterally freed all the slaves in the Southern Department. See {619331}. Lincoln rescinded Hunter’s proclamation instantly. Lincoln would issue the first Emancipation Proclamation 4 months later, but did not want each Army Department setting its own policy on such a touchy and serious subject. Also, Lincoln did not want to offend the two slave states that had remained loyal to the Union, Kentucky and Maryland. Some Lincoln critics claim that there was little or no moral motivation for Lincoln, and he was pressured into the Emancipation Proclamation. See {619335} for the Confederate Government reaction to Hunter’s Emancipation.
Abraham Lincoln, 1809-1865, 16th President of the United States (Republican, IL), Proclamation #90, May 19, 1862
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
More than a decade before the Civil War there were many proposals and plans for ending slavery in America without war. Many of these debates took place amongst major religious institutions. John Price Durbin, an eminent Methodist clergyman and former president of Dickinson College proposed one. His plan called for compensation to slaveholders and the relocation of the freed slaves to Africa—a form of ethnic cleansing. Brown disagreed with forced colonization to Africa. Instead, he suggested California as a voluntary option. Brown’s idea received about 9 months of serious consideration, but in January of 1848, gold was discovered in California and the Gold Rush was on. Black colonization of California was off the table.
This is a very important quotation historically. There are a few historians and many politicians who claim that the rebellion of the South in the Civil War was motivated by a number of principles having little or nothing to do with slavery, while most historians have found that slavery was the only major issue. This quote further supports that view. This is the only Union General Officer would be executed if captured by the South. What crimes did he perform to warrant such exceptional treatment? He issued an order Emancipating the Slaves of the Southern Department of which he was the Commanding General. See {619331} . Lincoln quickly countermanded the order, but the act of freeing slaves was to the Southern government so heinous that it deserved the death penalty.
Lincoln had promised amnesty to Southerners who would pledge loyalty to the Union. What many feared was that this would include slave owners re-enslaving their former "property," or that the government would allow them to do so in order to stop the rebellion.
Lincoln was then a Whig campaigning for his party.
In the early days of the Civil War slaves who escaped and reached the Northern lines were routinely returned to their Southern owners as the Fugitive Slave Act required. The first actual emancipation of the Civil war was not the President’s proclamation but was Butler who as a Union General ordered that the slaves escaping from Virginia no longer be returned. He was accused of violating the then existing law, however he had a legal rationale which hoisted Virginia on its own petard.
Note that Lincoln did not justify the emancipation proclamation on moral or humanitarian grounds, but on the grounds of military necessity.
Essentially, the case of moral hazard was made against paying the slave owners. Lincoln took a pragmatic approach. However, not only was Northern opposition too strong for this proposal, but the Southern slave holders would never agree to selling their slaves. What Lincoln and most “pragmatic” Northerners did not realize is that even if the slave owners would get a fair market price for the slaves, they would be left with land and no way to work it. Their families would have no servants. They might have to work themselves like Northern farmers did, and their entire standard and style of living would be destroyed. Their sons were not well educated as many Northern young men were and were brought up to be gentlemen, politicians, and occasional soldiers—not work with their hands. They could not compete. And the slaveholders were right as the whole history of Reconstruction and backwardness demonstrated for more than 100 years.
This Civil War recruiting poster was described by the Free Library of Philadelphia as “Civil War recruitment print targeting African Americans by evoking the freedoms granted by the Emancipation Proclamation. Depicts a montage of symbolic scenes centered around an African American Union soldier triumphantly holding up a sword and an American flag with the banner "Freedom to the Slave." He stands near broken shackles upon a tri-color flag adorned with a coiled snake. The flag is tugged upon by one of three joyous slaves freed by an African American soldier. Other scenes depict an African American man reading a newspaper on a rocking chair near a plow and child, African American children entering a "Public School" near a church, and a regiment of "U.S. Colored Troops" marching across a battlefield strewn with dead bodies.”
President Lincoln and Several of the Commanding Union Generals had declared that black slaves were free during the midst of the Civil War under the legal theory that if the slaves were property of the rebels, then they cold be seized as “contraband” and removed from the control of those who had committed treason. The question was, what would happen to those now free Negroes after the war? Many Negro leaders were anxious that if there were surrender, then the status quo ante might prevail and the Negroes—many have who had fought for the Union might be returned to slavery. This speech by the Secretary of State alarmed them further. This is why the Emancipation Proclamation was so important and even that might have been overturned by a subsequent President. This is why Lincoln, the white radical Republicans and the Black leadership placed so much emphasis on passing the 13th Amendment.
- Born: February 12, 1809
- Died: April 15, 1865
- Nationality: American
- Profession: President
Abraham Lincoln was an American politician and lawyer who served as the 16th President of the United States from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. Lincoln led the United States through its Civil War—its bloodiest war and its greatest moral, constitutional, and political crisis. In doing so, he preserved the Union, abolished slavery, strengthened the federal government, and modernized the economy.
