(HOST) One hundred and forty-five years ago this week, Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing the slaves and fulfilling the promise of the Declaration of Independence. As a teacher and historian, commentator Vic Henningsen thinks the emancipation story is especially relevant in this season of presidential primaries.
(HENNINGSEN) This isn’t the anniversary of actual freedom for the slaves – that came with the 13th amendment. What we celebrate is presidential leadership.
We forget that, although the Great Emancipator hated slavery, his original intent wasn’t to end it, but to contain it; to prevent it from spreading into the western territories. After all, slavery was protected by the Constitution Lincoln swore to uphold. And four slave states – Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri – remained loyal and sent troops to save the Union. To retain their support, Lincoln had to leave slavery alone.
But events made him reconsider. First, when slave states left the Union, they were no longer protected by the Constitution.
Second, southern cotton depended on slavery and Great Britain, dependent on that cotton, threatened to support the Confederacy. Finally, northern enlistments didn’t replace battle losses. Enrolling blacks in Union forces grew increasingly appealing.
To win the war, he must act on slavery; but doing so would cost him the support of the loyal slave states, which he needed to win the war.
He proposed a compromise, a gradual emancipation program in which loyal slave states would have until 1900 to free slaves voluntarily and the government would compensate slaveowners for their losses. When the border states rejected this plan Lincoln realized he’d have to move forward anyway. He issued the Emancipation Proclamation on New Year’s Day, 1863
It’s a curious document. Lincoln declared slaves free only in areas in active rebellion. In Union-controlled areas, slavery remained. That’s right: where he could free slaves, he didn’t; where he couldn’t, he declared them free. The Emancipation Proclamation itself didn’t free a single slave.
That was political genius. By preserving slavery where it existed in the Union, Lincoln kept his promise not to interfere where it was protected by the Constitution – namely the loyal border states. Freeing slaves in rebellious areas forced the point that the South fought to preserve slavery. That kept anti-slavery Britain from aiding the Confederacy. Enlisting black troops guaranteed valuable manpower to Northern forces. Finally, as advancing Union armies began freeing southern slaves, border states couldn’t hope to preserve slavery.
Ending it once and for all required a Constitutional amendment: difficult given northern unhappiness with Emancipation. We forget that even anti-slavery northerners feared black equality. Lincoln faced intense political pressure to reverse his stand but refused to back down, finally pushing the 13th amendment through Congress in early 1865.
Lincoln didn’t start out planning to free slaves but, when he concluded that emancipation would save the nation, he had the sense to change his mind and the courage to see his new course through to completion. The complexity of the Emancipation story suggests how difficult political change is – and how much leadership matters.