"Let me say one thing more: I think you should admit that we already have an important principle to rally and unite the People, in the fact that Constitutional Government is at stake. This is a fundamental idea going down about as deep as anything!
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"Do not misunderstand me because I have mentioned these objections. They indicate the difficulties that have thus far prevented my action in some such way as you desire.
"I have not decided against a Proclamation of Liberty to the Slaves, but hold the matter under advisement. And I can assure you that the subject is on my mind, by day and night, more than any other. Whatever shall appear to be God's will I will do.
"I trust that in the freedom with which I have canvassed your views I have not in any respect injured your feelings."
On the 22d day of September, 1862, not only the Nation, but the whole World, was electrified by the publication—close upon the heels of the Union victory of Antietam—of the Proclamation of Emancipation—weighted with consequences so wide and far-reaching that even at this late day they cannot all be discerned. It was in these words:
"I, ABRAHAM LINCOLN, President of the United States of America, and Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy thereof, do hereby proclaim and declare that hereafter, as heretofore, the War will be prosecuted for the object of practically restoring the Constitutional relation between the United States and each of the States and the people thereof, in which States that relation is or may be suspended or disturbed.
"That it is my purpose, upon the next meeting of Congress, to again recommend the adoption of a practical measure tendering pecuniary aid to the free acceptance or rejection of all Slave States, so called, the people whereof may not then be in Rebellion against the United States, and which States may then have voluntarily adopted, or thereafter may voluntarily adopt, immediate or gradual abolishment of Slavery within their respective limits; and that the effort to colonize Persons of African descent with their consent upon this continent or elsewhere, with the previously obtained consent of the Governments existing there, will be continued.
"That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all Persons held as Slaves within any State or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in Rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever Free; and the Executive Government of the United States, including the Military and Naval authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the Freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual Freedom.
"That the Executive will, on the first day of January aforesaid, by Proclamation, designate the States and parts of States, if any, in which the people thereof respectively, shall then be in Rebellion against the United States; and the fact that any State, or the people thereof, shall on that day be, in good faith, represented in the Congress of the United States by members chosen thereto at elections wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such States shall have participated, shall, in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclusive evidence that such State, and the people thereof, are not in Rebellion against the United States.