The Emancipation Proclamation brought about by the Civil War led to important milestones in ending slavery in the US. Abraham Lincoln’s ideology and effort were to ensure everyone operated within the constitutional boundaries. At the beginning of his administration, radicals pressured him to issue an Emancipation Proclamation (Cramer, 2019, p. 232). Lincoln hated slavery and felt confined through the constitutional authority since he was the president. He also felt that it would bring ideological friction to those surrounding the border who stated that legalized slavery. Therefore, Lincoln started by summoning the Border States by saying that he hoped to have Kentucky accept his plans about emancipation (Cramer, 2019, p. 233). When Lincoln began his term in office, he was not committed to eradicating slavery but halfway leading in 1863. He decided to transform from the extension of slavery to the eradication of the Peculiar Institution.
In 1862, Lincoln convinced Congress to ensure there was financial support to the Union slave states (Kentucky, Delaware, Maryland, and Missouri). Financial support would be availed to the four-state if they embraced gradual emancipation. Equally, Congress abolished slavery in Columbia through the compensation scheme. The modest anti-slavery gestures became famous during the 1862 era. Lincoln further ensured that his cabinet was informed about his ideologies on freeing slaves. Lincoln issued a retention scheme whereby the emancipation proclamation would cover enslaved people within the Confederate area once the military achieved victory. Two months after the Battle of Antietam, Lincoln issued a preliminary Emancipation Proclamation (Cramer, 2019, p. 248). He further offered to avail financial assistance to the slave states on the condition that the enslaved people would be released gradually or through immediate emancipation.
During the last three months of 1862, no Confederate state had surrendered to emancipation. The army began by recruiting black soldiers. Enslaved African-Americans in Tennessee, Missouri, and Maryland gave the government an option of buying their freedom by joining the Union Army (Ghosh, 2021, p. 8). According to the Gettysburg Address, Lincoln issued a Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction, whereby he offered the Confederate to take an oath of loyalty to the US after they accepted the emancipation of all enslaved people. Arkansas’ unionists started by adopting a new state’s constitution that Lincoln approved due to the logic of abolishing slavery (Ghosh, 2021, p. 11). The Senate also advanced the 13th Amendment to revoke any slavery within the US.
The total abolition of slavery was in 1865 when the 13th Amendment became law. This happened eight months after Lincoln’s assassination. According to Gettysburg Address, Lincoln’s ideology was to envision and reunite the US. Horace Greeley assisted Lincoln to test the public on the reaction they hard toward emancipation as a measure of war (Ghosh, 2021, p. 14). Lincoln also wrote a letter to Greeley telling him that the logic of emancipation was to administer policies that could save the union. Lincoln also noted that he represented the official position of having a democratic country where everyone was free to live and work. Lincoln provided a cabinet to solicit opinions and neutralize any rebellion in the final emancipation anticipation. These areas include Virginia, New Orleans, and Louisiana (Ghosh, 2021, p. 16). He further stated that everyone that was freed from proclamation should abstain from any form of violence. Lincoln managed to end the civil war and enslaved people started enjoying their democratic rights.
References
Cramer, A. J. (2019). Lincoln’s emancipation proclamation and the failure to comply with the Fifth Amendment taking requirement. Lincoln Mem’l UL Rev., 6, 1.
Ghosh, N. K. (2021). American democracy on trial. IUP Journal of English Studies, 16(1), 7-17.