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Jaymi Davis December 9, 2023 His 330:Civil War and Reconstruction Professor Satterfield-Price The Emancipation Proclamation: Freedom’s Effects on the Civil War

The Emancipation Proclamation brought forth a multitude of changes that some believe acted as fuel during the Civil War. “And by virtue of the power, and for the purpose aforesaid, I do order and declare that all persons held as slaves within said designated States, and parts of States, are, and henceforward shall be free.” 1 These words would strike fear into the southern states and have them worried about the potential impacts the Emancipation Proclamation would have on their lives. As the Civil War waged on between the Confederate and the Union Armies, the introduction of the Emancipation Proclamation became a turning point for the Union. They always supported the abolishment of slavery and when the Emancipation Proclamation was set into place it made the popularity of the northern states grow because they sympathized with enslaved people and wanted to put a stop to that. Ultimately, the Union gained victory over the Confederates in the Civil War because of their manpower and access to better transportation, but the Emancipation Proclamation afforded them a thrust in the right direction to securing victories over the Confederate Army. The Emancipation Proclamation was a pivotal turning point during the Civil War as it shifted the focus of the Civil War to that of freedom, afforded military opportunities within the Union Army to newly freed black men, and was the initial steppingstone toward the total abolition of slavery within the United States. Abraham Lincoln was elected president on November 6, 1860 and was a candidate for the newly formed Republican Party. Lincoln and his administration had the goal of limiting the expansion of slavery with the ultimate goal of ending slavery altogether. Lincoln’s election would spark rage among southern states, with some of them threatening to leave the Union in the event of his election. The Republican party tousled with the decision to possibly remove Lincoln and find a different candidate that would not be as controversial and there were several Republicans from New York who suggested removing Lincoln in hopes that it would save the 1 National Archives. “Emancipation Proclamation,” May 5, 2017.

Union. The Republican party was also fearful that southern states who wanted to succeed would boycott the Electoral College process so that Lincoln’s presidency would not be certified. Ultimately, southern states would participate in the election, but not before seven states left the Union. Lincoln’s presidency would become official in February 1861, with him taking office on March 4, 1861. A decade before the election of Abraham Lincoln, The Compromise of 1850 was set into place, which added California to the Union as a free state, allowed New Mexico and Utah to decide for themselves if they wanted to be slave states, created the Texas-New Mexico border, called for the abolishment of slavery in Washington DC, and introduced the Fugitive Slave Act. 2 Congress believed that The Compromise of 1850 and its statutes would bring peace between the northern and southern states while ending the crisis that was caused by territorial expansion. What The Compromise of 1850 ended up doing was making the divide between the two even greater, leading to the Civil War and both sides fighting to protect what they believed to be right. The introduction of the Fugitive Slave Act required all citizens to return fugitive slaves back to their masters, while also placing heavy fines and punishments on those who harbored or helped escaped slaves to freedom. The North simply refused to abide by this law which generated greater tensions between the northern and southern states, and following the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln, southern senators began to resign from their seats to draft up ordinances of secession. One such senator, James Hammond of South Carolina pledged to support the Confederacy “with all the strength I have.” 3 On January 9, 1861 Mississippi voted to secede and issued a warning to the Senate “If 2 National Archives. “Compromise of 1850 (1850),” May 10, 2022. 3 “U.S. Senate: Civil War Begins,” September 8, 2023.

you will not have it thus . . . , a war is to be inaugurated the like of which men have not seen.” 4 By the time Lincoln would take office only 41 of the 66 senators would remain and the Union was wounded but still established the Committee of Thirteen. The Committee of Thirteen’s goal was to consider all peace proposals but this was a failure and the Confederates attack on Fort Sumter was imminent. The Confederates would fire shots upon Fort Sumter causing the Union forces to surrender. Lincoln heard the call for action by the North to reinforce Fort Sumter with supplies but it was to no avail, Fort Sumter fell marking the beginning of the Civil War. The lines were clearly laid out for both north and south, as Senator Stephen Douglas proclaimed “every man must be for the United States or against it, there can be no neutrals in this war.” 5 Early on in the Civil War the northern states were forced to look at addressing the issues surrounding emancipation. One of the first instances we see of this happened in May 1861, when three slaves escaped from Hampton, Virginia where they had been placed to work for the Confederacy. These slaves were owned by Confederate Colonel Charles K. Mallory and upon their escape they sought protection from the Union soldiers at Fortress Monroe, before their owner sent them any further south. 6 Colonel Mallory demanded that his slaves be returned under the Fugitive Slave Law, but instead Union General Benjamin F. Butler appropriated the slaves because of their value, labeled them “contraband of war”. Butler’s actions led to the creation of the First Confiscation Act, enacted on August 6, 1861, which stated that “fugitive slaves were declared to be "contraband of war" if their labor had been used to aid the Confederacy in anyway. If found to be contraband, they were declared free.” 7 “The Contraband Policy, still recognized slaves as property in principal, led to the liberation of those slaves who managed to 4 Ibid 5 Ibid 6 The Library of Congress. “Abraham Lincoln and Emancipation | Articles and Essays | Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress | Digital Collections | Library of Congress,” n.d. 7 “Living Contraband - Former Slaves in the Nation’s Capital during the Civil War (U.S. National Park Service),” n.d.

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