Only two members of the cabinet concurred in the proposal. Secretary Chase favored this plan of military emancipation, but could not approve the method of execution. Blair, the Postmaster General, deprecated this policy on the ground that it would cost the administration the fall elections. Secretary Seward approved it and yet questioned the expediency of its issue at that stage of the war, owing to the depression of the public mind and the repeated reversals for the Union armies. He further deemed it to be a last measure of an exhausted government that was crying for help, stretching forth its arms to Ethiopia instead of awaiting a reverse appeal from Ethiopia. Consequently he urged a postponement of the issue of the proclamation until the country was supported by military success. Lincoln, struck by the wisdom of Seward's views, which he had entirely overlooked, laid it away and postponed the proclamation on July 22 until the Union forces reported a victory. Instead, after a three-day interval, he issued a short announcement that contained warnings as required by the provisions of the Confiscation Act.
Lincoln's postponement of the issue of the proclamation was wise. Military reversals made the situation more serious for the President's supporters. The radicals and the conservatives, resorted to incessant criticism, railing against him and his policy. Lincoln, however, kept up appearances of indecision, even though his own course had been clearly and inalterably mapped out; but circumstances did not admit a revelation. His main object was to restrain impatience and zeal, and yet maintain the loyalty of both factions.[41]
Horace Greeley attacked Lincoln unmercifully in The New York Tribune and accused him of being responsible for the deplorable results coming from his failure to enforce the Confiscation Act. Lincoln, on the contrary, lost no time in replying to Greeley, and declared that he intended to save the Union by the shortest possible way in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution; that his paramount object in the struggle was to preserve the Union and not either to preserve or destroy slavery; that he would save the Union, either without liberating any slaves, or by freeing all the slaves, or by freeing some and leaving others in servitude; that, at any rate, he would save the Union; and that his efforts at emancipation would be determined by its bearing on the more important question of saving the Union.
The expected easy victory did not follow; but, on the contrary, came sad and humiliating defeat of Pope in the second battle of Bull Run in August, 1862. At this juncture Lincoln was urged by both individuals and delegations to follow one or the other decision relative to emancipation, but his attitude remained the same. On September 13, he informed a Chicago delegation that he was unable to free slaves by the Constitution, especially when the Constitution could not be enforced in the rebel States, and declared that any emancipation proclamation would at that time be as effective and operative as "the Pope's bull against the comet."[42] What the antislavery group wanted was not granted; but wholesale emancipation was going on by virtue of the provisions of the Confiscation Act, slavery had been abolished in the District of Columbia, and the territories had been restored to freedom. Lincoln, moreover, left himself a margin for action according to his declaration, in his interview with the Chicago delegation, that, as Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy, he had the right to take any measure which might best subdue the enemy.[43]
Upon hearing of the Union victory at Antietam three days after, Lincoln immediately seized this opportunity to announce the policy upon which he had already decided. He had promised to withhold his Emancipation Proclamation until the rebels were out of Frederick. Now that they had been driven from Maryland and Pennsylvania, Lincoln was ready to carry out his plan. On September 22, 1862, therefore, he announced, read, and published his preliminary Emancipation Proclamation.[44] It embraced propositions that provided for the renewal of the plan of compensated emancipation, voluntary colonization, military emancipation of all slaves in rebellious States on January 1, 1863, and the ultimate recommendation of compensation to loyal owners.
Although this proclamation was endorsed by an assembly of Governors from the Northern States, who had already convened at Altoona, Pennsylvania, to consider emergency measures for the protection of their respective States,[45] the political test of this announcement of military emancipation came, as expected, in the autumn elections. Popular discontent had arisen as the result of military failure. The Democrats boldly declared that the war of the Union had been changed to a war for abolition of slavery. Party conflicts became bitter and resulted in a loss to the Republicans although they still retained a majority.
In his next annual message, however, President Lincoln did not discuss the Emancipation Proclamation, but he renewed his argument for compensated emancipation. On December 11, 1862, George H. Yeaman of Kentucky introduced in the House of Representatives a resolution dubbing the President's proclamation as unwarranted by the Constitution and a useless and dangerous war message. This resolution was tabled by a vote of ninety-four to forty-five. Four days later Representative S. C. Fessenden of Maine, on the contrary, offered a resolution putting into affirmative form the identical phraseology of Mr. Yeaman's proposition, and secured its passage by a test vote of seventy-eight to fifty-four. No other action of consequence then followed except a manifestation of interest in compensated emancipation in Missouri.
At a cabinet meeting on the last day of December, 1862, Lincoln read the final draft of the Emancipation Proclamation and invited criticism. He made some revision of a minor nature but rejected the proposal to eliminate from the order the provision that the freedmen be armed. In this form the Proclamation was issued the following day, January 1, 1863. The constitutionality of this document has been questioned. It is conceded, however, that it did actually abolish slavery within the rebellious area and as a moral stimulus to the struggle for freedom, it proved to be of great value.
Harry S. Blackiston