Barnet Schecter Quotes
The Emancipation Proclamation was really a tool of war.
While Lincoln was morally opposed to slavery, at the time the Civil War was not going well for the Union. The Emancipation Proclamation caused the South great distress in terms of practicality and their morale. The slaves if they escaped could come to a Union State and would be forever free. The South would lose labor that they could ill afford to lose as well as they were forced to devote more white manpower to keeping the slaves in bondage. While most people think the Proclamation freed all the slaves, it did not; it only freed slaves in the rebellious Southern states. Border states such as Maryland, not in rebellion, could keep their slaves legally and did until they were freed later.
Barnet Schecter, Historian, Book TV, January 19, 2006
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Marx followed the American Civil War very closely. The freeing of the slaves caused an immediate social, moral and economic revolution, the results of which we live with today.
At the time, the prevailing federal policy was to return fugitive slaves to their owners. Lincoln was intent on keeping Kentucky and Maryland, both slave states, in the union, even at the cost of returning fugitive slaves. Shortly after, he came up with the policy of always returning fugitive slaves except in the rebellious states of the confederacy where the slaves were legally defined as ‘contraband’—war material, and thus could be seized by Union forces. Many fugitive slaves were thus employed by the Union for construction projects. Later, the Emancipation Proclamation set the slaves of the Confederacy free.
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.”
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.
This quotation is often given by those who argue that Lincoln really did not care about the slavery issue. It is a terrific example of the limitations of quotations where there is artful rhetoric. Douglas, had in the 1st debate posed 7 “interrogatories” to Lincoln asking if he were pledged to certain positions regarding slavery. Douglas was trying to associate Lincoln with the most radical abolitionists in the land. By asking if Lincoln were pledged to the positions, Douglas thought that he had cornered Lincoln. For if Lincoln denied the pledges, he would appear to be backing off his anti slavery positions, and if Lincoln would not, then he would appear to support the most radical elements. Lincoln turned the rhetorical tables on his opponent. He first answered the question literally, emphasizing “pledged”. Just as Douglas thought he had forced Lincoln off his anti-slavery views, Lincoln stated what he would “like to see” as opposed to what he was pledged for. See {615826}.
The Baptist Churches of America were split asunder by the slavery issue. Wayland, who represented both the Northern abolitionist-leaning Baptist Churches and the Southern pro slavery churches, tried to forge a middle ground whereby slavery would end by the moral enlightenment of man and his love for fellow man as opposed to by legislation or economic pressure. He successfully predicted the outcome of the conflict except for one error he made. The conflict DID end slavery. The Baptist Church finally split into southern and northern wings in 1845. To this day, the Southern Church is extremely conservative, and fundamentalist; the Northern, very liberal and modern.
