On This Day in 1863, a Proclamation was Issued

Happy New Year. On this day in 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. He had informed his cabinet as early as July, 1862, that he intended to free the slaves in the Confederate states. However, his cabinet persuaded him to wait until a Northern victory because it would seem less like a desperate measure. Antietam served that purpose. Five days afterward, on September 22, Lincoln issued the first, or preliminary, Emancipation Proclamation.

The final proclamation, issued on January 1, 1863, freed the slaves only in the states that had rebelled: Arkansas, Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and parts of Louisiana and Virginia.

The president issued the proclamation under the powers granted during war to seize the enemies’ property. Ironically, Lincoln only had the authority to end slavery in the Confederate states, and then the slaves were freed only as the Union armies made their way throughout the South. In the states remaining loyal to the Union, slavery was protected by the Constitution. Slavery was only completely abolished in the United States by the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which was ratified in 1865.

Many see the Emancipation Proclamation as a political statement only, since it did not immediately free any slaves. However, it is questionable that the 13th amendment would have come about at all if the the goal of the Civil War had not been so eloquently redefined by this single most important document.

In its wake, black soldiers were accepted on an equal par with their white colleagues. By the end of the war, some 200,000 freed Blacks had enlisted as soldiers and sailors in the Union army and navy.

Merry Christmas from the Lincoln White House, even if it is 140 years too late

This portrait is actually Lincoln's last reception at the White House and has nothing to do with Christmas. But isn't it festive looking? I like it a lot.

It's never too late to celebrate Christmas with Abraham Lincoln. He lives in our hearts forever, like the baby born in the manger on this day. May the joy and peace of the season be yours throughout the year.

And if you're looking for a terrific Lincoln place to visit, try the Logan County Courthouse. It was placed on the National Register December 24, 1985, and here is a great website about it.

Logan County Courthouse

Lincoln's address at Cooper Union targets the expansion of slavery

The Cooper Union Address was among the earliest of Lincoln’s speeches denouncing slavery and its expansion into Western territories. Not as popular as his other writings because of its length and detailed examination of the Constitution (Herndon compared it to a lawyer’s brief), it is perhaps the least understood, yet most politically crucial speech of Lincoln’s career.
In it, Lincoln examines the views of the 39 signers of the Constitution and notes that a majority of 21 of them believed Congress should control slavery in the territories, not allow it to expand.

Exposing the inconsistent positions of Senator Stephen Douglas and Chief Justice Roger Taney, Lincoln urges fellow Republicans not to give in to Southern demands to recognize slavery as being right, but to "stand by our duty, fearlessly and effectively."

Though he delivered the speech in February of 1860, Lincoln accepted the invitation to write it in October of 1859. It was originally intended to be a lecture at Henry Ward Beecher’s Church in Brooklyn, but the Young Men's Republican Union, which assumed sponsorship, moved its location to the Cooper Institute by the time Lincoln arrived in New York.

The Union Board included members such as Horace Greeley and William Cullen Bryant, who opposed William Seward for the Republican Presidential nomination. As an unannounced presidential candidate, Lincoln attracted a capacity crowd of 1,500 curious New Yorkers.

Though Lincoln disappointed spectators at first with his almost too-tall appearance, he soon electrified the crowd with his passion for all things anti-slavery. Some recognize that the long road to emancipation, which ended January 1, 1863, began here, February 27th, 1860, at Cooper Union.