Why abe lincoln freed the slaves

With the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation freedom for slaves now became a legitimate war aim. Fact 7: The Emancipation Proclamation helped prevent the involvement of foreign nations in the Civil War. Britain and France had considered supporting the Confederacy in order to expand their influence in the Western Hemisphere. However, many Europeans were against slavery. Although some in the United Kingdom saw the Emancipation Proclamation as overly limited and reckless, Lincoln's directive reinforced the shift of the international political mood against intervention while the Union victory at Antietam further disturbed those who didn't want to intervene on the side of a lost cause.

Fact 8: The Emancipation Proclamation paved the way for African-Americans to fight for their freedom. By the end of the war, over , African-Americans would serve in the Union army and navy. Fact 9: The Emancipation Proclamation led the way to total abolition of slavery in the United States. With the Emancipation Proclamation, the aim of the war changed to include the freeing of slaves in addition to preserving the Union. Although the Proclamation initially freed only the slaves in the rebellious states, by the end of the war the Proclamation had influenced and prepared citizens to advocate and accept abolition for all slaves in both the North and South.

The 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery in the United States, was passed on December 6th, Fact Lincoln considered the Emancipation Proclamation the crowning achievement of his presidency. Heralded as the savior of the Union, President Lincoln actually considered the Emancipation Proclamation to be the most important aspect of his legacy. A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure, permanently, half slave and half free.

I do not expect the Union to be dissolved. I do not expect the house to fall. But I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other. Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become lawful in all the States, old as well as new — North as well as South.

The famous Lincoln-Douglas debates of that relied heavily on their argument about the Dred Scott ruling. Douglas accused Lincoln of flirting with anarchy by rejecting what was now a settled, legally binding Supreme Court ruling. Lincoln, pushing his rhetoric beyond the facts, suggested that the next Supreme Court case might rule that no state had the power to prohibit slavery.

The way things were going, he said, Illinois could become a slave state raising the specter to Illini workers that they might have to compete with slave labor. I have never said anything to the contrary, but I hold that notwithstanding all this, there is no reason in the world why the negro is not entitled to all the natural rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence, the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

I hold that he is as much entitled to these as the white man. I agree with Judge Douglas he is not my equal in many respects — certainly not in color, perhaps not in moral or intellectual endowment. But in the right to eat the bread, without leave of anybody else, which his own hand earns, he is my equal and the equal of Judge Douglas, and the equal of every living man.

Douglas played the race card, accusing Lincoln of advocating full equality for blacks, which was an almost unthinkable thought. Lincoln retreated, in a reply during the fourth debate that, to modern ears, sounds incredibly racist.

But it nonetheless captures the fundamental right that Lincoln sought for African-Americans — the right not to be slaves:. I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in anyway the social and political equality of the white and black races — that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality.

And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I, as much as any other man, am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race. I say upon this occasion I do not perceive that because the white man is to have the superior position the negro should be denied everything.

Lincoln narrowly lost the Senate election, but the debates had made him a national figure, and inspired him to imagine that he could be the next Republican nominee for president, which came to pass, and then, in a crazy, four-way presidential race, to be elected with just Publicly, the president-elect maintained silence, but through intermediaries he emphasized his long-standing and oft-stated position that the Constitution granted the federal government no power over slavery in the states where it had long existed.

By Eric Black Columnist. Eric Black Ink. Most important, the freedom it promised depended upon Union United States military victory.

Although the Emancipation Proclamation did not end slavery in the nation, it captured the hearts and imagination of millions of Americans and fundamentally transformed the character of the war. After January 1, , every advance of federal troops expanded the domain of freedom.

Moreover, the Proclamation announced the acceptance of black men into the Union Army and Navy, enabling the liberated to become liberators.

By the end of the war, almost , black soldiers and sailors had fought for the Union and freedom. From the first days of the Civil War, slaves had acted to secure their own liberty. The Emancipation Proclamation confirmed their insistence that the war for the Union must become a war for freedom.