Relations with Europe--Foreign Views of the War--The
Slaves--Proclamation of Emancipation--Arrest of Rebel
Commissioners--Black Troops.
With so much to call for his care in the field, President Lincoln was
not less busy in the Cabinet. The relations of the Federal Government
with Europe were of great importance. “The rebels,” says Arnold,
with truth, “had a positive, vigorous organisation, with agents all
over Europe, many of them in the diplomatic service of the United
States.” They were well selected, and they were successful in creating
the impression that the Confederacy was eminently “a gentleman’s
government”--that the Federal represented an agrarian mob led by
demagogues--that Mr. Lincoln was a vulgar, ignorant boor--and that the
war itself was simply an unconstitutional attempt to force certain
states to remain under a tyrannical and repulsive rule. The great
fact that the South had, in the most public manner, proclaimed that
it seceded _because the North would not permit the further extension
of slavery_, was utterly ignored; and the active interference of the
North with slavery was ostentatiously urged as a grievance, though,
by a strange inconsistency, it was deemed expedient by many foreign
anti-slavery men to withdraw all sympathy for the Federal cause, on the
ground that its leaders manifested no eagerness to set the slaves free
until it became a matter of military expediency. Thus the humane wisdom
and moderation, which inspired Lincoln and the true men of the Union
to overcome the dreadful obstacles which existed in the opposition of
the Northern democrats to Emancipation, was most sophistically and
cruelly turned against them. To a more cynical class, the war was but
the cleaning by fire of a filthy chimney which should have been burnt
out long before, and its Iliad in a nutshell amounted to a squabble
which concerned nobody save as a matter for amusement. And there were,
finally, not a few--to judge from the frank avowal of a journal of
the highest class--who looked forward with joy to the breaking up of
the American Union, because “their sympathies were with men, not with
monsters, and Russia and the United States are simply giants among
nations.” All this bore, in due time, its natural fruit. Whether people
were to blame for this want of sympathy, considering the ingenuity with
which Southern agents fulfilled their missions, is another matter.
Time, which is, happily, every day modifying old feelings, cannot
change truths. And it cannot be denied that hostilities had hardly
begun, and that only half the Slave States were in insurrection, when
the English and French Governments, acting in concert, recognised the
government at Montgomery as an established belligerent power. As to
this recognition, Mr. Charles F. Adams, the United States Minister
to England, was instructed by Mr. Seward to the effect that it, if
carried out, must at once suspend all friendly relations between the
United States and England. When, on June 15th, the English and French
ministers applied to Mr. Seward for leave to communicate to him their
instructions, directing them to recognise the rebels as belligerents,
he declined to listen to them. The United States, accordingly,
persisted until the end in regarding the rebellion as a domestic
difficulty, and one with which foreign governments had no right to
interfere. At the present day, it appears most remarkable that the two
great sources of encouragement held out to the rebels--of help from
Northern sympathisers, and the hope of full recognition by European
powers--proved in the end to be allurements which led them on to ruin.
Had it not been for the defeat at Bull Run, slavery would perhaps
have still existed; and but for the hope of foreign aid, the South
would never have been so utterly conquered and thoroughly exhausted
as it was. It must, however, be admitted that the irritation of the
Union-men of the North against England at this crisis was carried much
too far, since they did not take fully into consideration the very
large number of their sincere friends in Great Britain who earnestly
advocated their cause, and that among these were actually the majority
of the journalists. To those who did not understand American politics
in detail, the spectacle of about one-third of the population, even
though backed by constitutional law, opposing the majority, seemed to
call for little sympathy. And if the motto of Emancipation for the
sake of the white man offended the American Abolitionists, who were
unable to see that it was a _ruse de guerre_ in their favour, it is
not remarkable that the English Abolitionists should have been equally
obtuse.
A much more serious trouble than that of European indifference
soon arose in the negro question. There were in the rebel states
nearly 4,000,000 slaves. In Mr. Lincoln’s party, the Republican,
were two classes of men--the Abolitionists, who advocated immediate
enfranchisement of all slaves by any means; and the much larger number
of men who, while they were opposed to the extension of slavery, and
would have liked to see it _legally_ abolished, still remembered
that it was constitutional. Slave property had become such a sacred
thing, and had been legislated about and quarrelled over to such an
extent, that, even among slavery-haters, it was a proof of honest
citizenship to recognise it. Thus, for a long time after the war had
begun, General M‘Clellan, and many other officers like him, made it a
point of returning fugitive slaves to their rebel masters. These slaves
believed “the Yankees” had come to deliver them from bondage. “They
were ready to act as guides, to dig, to work, to fight for liberty,”
and they were welcomed, on coming to help their country in its need, by
being handed back to the enemy to be tortured or put to death. So great
were the atrocities perpetrated in this way, and so much did certain
Federal officers disgrace themselves by hunting negroes and truckling
to the enemy, that a bill was soon passed in Congress, declaring it was
no part of the duty of the soldiers of the United States to capture
and return fugitive slaves. About the same time, General B. F. Butler,
of the Federal forces, shrewdly declared that slaves were legally
property, but that, as they were employed by their masters against the
Government, they might be seized as _contraband of war_, which was
accordingly done; nor is it recorded that any of the slaves who were by
this ingenious application of law confined within the limits of freedom
ever found any fault with it. From this time, during the war, slaves
became popularly known as contrabands.
It should be distinctly understood that there were now literally
millions of staunch Union people, who, while recognising the evils of
slavery, would not be called Abolitionists, because slavery was as
yet _legal_, and according to that constitution which they properly
regarded as the very life of all for which were fighting. And they
would not, for the sake of removing the sufferings of the blacks,
bring greater misery on the whites. Badly as the South had behaved, it
was still loved, and it was felt that Abolition would bring ruin on
many friends. But as the war went on, and black crape began to appear
on Northern bell-handles, people began to ask one another whether it
was worth while to do so much to uphold slavery, even to conciliate
the wavering Border States. Step by step, arguments were found for
the willing at heart but unwilling to act. On the 1st January, 1862,
the writer established in Boston a political magazine, called “The
Continental Monthly,” the entire object of which was expressed in the
phrase, _Emancipation for the sake of the white man_, and which was
published solely for the sake of preparing the public mind for, and
aiding in, Mr. Lincoln’s peculiar policy with regard to slavery. As
the writer received encouragement and direction from the President and
more than one member of the Cabinet, but especially from Mr. Seward,
he feels authorised, after the lapse of so many years, to speak
freely on the subject. He had already, for several months, urged
the same principles in another and older publication (the New York
“Knickerbocker”). The “Continental” was quite as bitterly attacked
by the anti-slavery press as by the pro-slavery; but it effected its
purpose of aiding President Lincoln, and the editor soon had the
pleasure of realising that many thousands were willing to be called
Emancipationists who shrunk from being classed as Abolitionists.
In this great matter, the President moved with a caution which cannot
be too highly commended. He felt and knew that the emancipation of
the slaves was a great and glorious thing, not to be frittered away
by the action of this or that subordinate, leaving details of its
existence in every direction to call for infinite legislation. It is
true that for a time he temporised with “colonisation;” and Congress
passed a resolution that the United States ought to co-operate with
any state which might adopt a gradual emancipation of slavery, placing
600,000 dollars at the disposition of the President for an experiment
at colonisation. Some money was indeed spent in attempts to colonise
slaves in Hayti, when the project was abandoned. But this was really
delaying to achieve a definite purpose. On August 22nd, 1862, in reply
to Horace Greeley, Mr. Lincoln wrote:--
“My paramount object is to save the Union, and not to either
save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without
freeing any slave, I would do it; if I could save it by freeing
all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could do it by freeing
some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.... I have
here stated my purpose according to my views of official duty,
_and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal
wish, that all men everywhere could be free_.”
He had, meanwhile, his troubles with the army. On May 9th, 1862,
General Hunter issued an order, declaring the slaves in Georgia,
Florida, and South Carolina to be for ever free; which was promptly
and properly repudiated by the President, who was at the time urging
on Congress and the Border States a policy of gradual emancipation,
with compensation to loyal masters. General Hunter’s attempt at such
a crisis to take the matter out of the hands of the President, was a
piece of presumption which deserved severer rebuke than he received in
the firm yet mild proclamation in which Lincoln, uttering no reproof,
said to the General--quoting from his Message to Congress--
“I beg of you a calm and enlarged consideration of the signs
of the times, ranging, if it may be, far above partisan and
personal politics.
“This proposal makes common cause for a common object, casting
no reproaches upon any. It acts not the Pharisee. The change
it contemplates would come gently as the dews of heaven, not
rending or wrecking anything. Will you not embrace it?”
General J. C. Fremont, commanding the Western Department, which
comprised Missouri and a part of Kentucky, had also issued an
unauthorised order (August 31st, 1861), proclaiming martial law
in Missouri, and setting the slaves, if rebels, free; which error
the President at once corrected. This was taken off by a popular
caricature, in which slavery was represented as a blackbird in a
cage, and General Fremont as a small boy trying to let him out, while
Lincoln, as a larger boy, was saying, “That’s _my_ bird--let him
alone.” To which General Fremont replying, “But you said you wanted him
to be set free,” the President answers, “I know; but _I’m_ going to let
him out--not you.”
To a deputation from all the religious denominations in Chicago, urging
immediate emancipation, the President replied, setting forth the
present inexpediency of such a measure. But, meanwhile, he prepared a
declaration that, on January 1st, 1863, the slaves in all states, or
parts of states, which should then be in rebellion, would be proclaimed
free. By the advice of Mr. Seward, this was withheld until it could
follow a Federal victory, instead of seeming to be a measure of mere
desperation. Accordingly, it was put forth--September 22nd, 1862--five
days after the battle of Antietam had defeated Lee’s first attempt at
invading the North, and the promised proclamation was published on the
1st January following. The text of this document was as follows:--
BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
A Proclamation.
_Whereas_, on the twenty-second day of September, in the
year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, a
proclamation was issued by the President of the United States,
containing, among other things, the following, to wit:--
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 for ever, free; and
the Executive Government of the United States, including the
naval and military authority thereof, will recognise 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 this United States, by
members chosen thereto at elections wherein a majority of the
qualified voters of such state shall have participated, shall,
in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed
conclusive evidence that such state, and the people thereof,
are not then in rebellion against the United States.
_Now therefore_, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the
United States, by virtue of the power in me vested as
commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States,
in time of actual armed rebellion against the authority and
Government of the United States, and as a fit and necessary
war-measure for suppressing said rebellion, do, on this first
day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight
hundred and sixty-three, and in accordance with my purpose
so to do, publicly proclaimed for the full period of one
hundred days from the day first above-mentioned, order and
designate as the states and parts of states wherein the people
thereof, respectively, are this day in rebellion against the
United States, the following, to wit--ARKANSAS,
TEXAS, LOUISIANA (except the parishes of St
Bernard, Plaquemines, Jefferson, St. John, St. Charles, St.
James, Ascension, Assumption, Terre Bonne, Lafourche, St. Mary,
St. Martin, and Orleans, including the City of New Orleans),
MISSISSIPPI, ALABAMA, FLORIDA,
GEORGIA, SOUTH CAROLINA, NORTH
CAROLINA, and VIRGINIA (except the forty-eight
counties designated as West Virginia, and also the counties
of Berkeley, Accomac, Northampton, Elizabeth City, York,
Princess Ann, and Norfolk, including the cities of Norfolk and
Portsmouth), and which excepted parts are left for the present
precisely as if this proclamation were not issued.
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; and that the Executive Government of the United
States, including the military and naval authorities thereof,
will recognise and maintain the freedom of said persons.
And I hereby enjoin upon the people so declared to be free, to
abstain from all violence, unless in necessary self-defence;
and I recommend to them that, in all cases where allowed, they
labour faithfully for reasonable wages.
And I further declare and make known that such persons, of
suitable condition, will be received into the armed service of
the United States, to garrison forts, positions, stations, and
other places, and to man vessels of all sorts in said service.
And upon this act, sincerely believed to be an act of justice
warranted by the Constitution upon military necessity, I invoke
the considerate judgment of mankind and the gracious favour of
Almighty God.
In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the
seal of the United States to be affixed.
L. S. Done at the CITY OF WASHINGTON this
first day of January, in the year of our
Lord one thousand eight hundred and
sixty-three, and of the Independence of
the United States of America the eighty-seventh,
By the President,
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
WILLIAM H. SEWARD, _Secretary of State_.
A true copy, with the autograph signatures of the President and
the Secretary of State.
JOHN G. NICOLAY,
_Priv. Sec. to the President_.
The excitement caused by the appearance of the proclamation of
September 22nd, 1862, was very great. The anti-slavery men rejoiced
as at the end of a dreadful struggle; those who had doubted became at
once strong and confident. Whatever trials and troubles might be in
store, all felt assured, even the Copperheads or rebel sympathisers,
that slavery was virtually at an end. The newspapers teemed with
gratulations. The following poem, which was the first written on
the proclamation, or on the day on which it appeared, and which was
afterwards published in the “Continental Magazine,” expresses the
feeling with which it was generally received.
THE PROCLAMATION.--SEPT. 22, 1862.
Now who has done the greatest deed
Which History has ever known?
And who in Freedom’s direst need
Became her bravest champion?
Who a whole continent set free?
Who killed the curse and broke the ban
Which made a lie of liberty?--
You, Father Abraham--you’re the man!
The deed is done. Millions have yearned
To see the spear of Freedom cast
The dragon roared and writhed and burned:
You’ve smote him full and square at last
O Great and True! _you_ do not know--
You cannot tell--you cannot feel
How far through time your name must go,
Honoured by all men, high or low,
Wherever Freedom’s votaries kneel.
This wide world talks in many a tongue--
This world boasts many a noble state;
In all your praises will be sung--
In all the great will call you great.
Freedom! where’er that word is known--
On silent shore, by sounding sea,
‘Mid millions, or in deserts lone--
Your noble name shall ever be.
The word is out, the deed is done,
The spear is cast, dread no delay;
When such a steed is fairly gone,
Fate never fails to find a way.
Hurrah! hurrah! the track is clear,
We know your policy and plan;
We’ll stand by you through every year;
Now, Father Abraham, you’re our man.
The original draft of the proclamation of Emancipation was purchased by
Thos. B. Bryan, of Chicago, for the Sanitary Commission for the Army,
held at Chicago in the autumn of 1863. As it occurred to the writer
that official duplicates of such an important document should exist, he
suggested the idea to Mr. George H. Boker, subsequently United States
Minister to Constantinople and to St. Petersburg, at whose request
the President signed a number of copies, some of which were sold for
the benefit of the Sanitary Fairs held in Philadelphia and Boston
in 1864, while others were presented to public institutions. One of
these, bearing the signatures of President Lincoln and Mr. Seward,
with the attesting signature of John Nicolay, Private Secretary to
the President, may be seen hanging in the George the Third Library in
the British Museum. This document is termed by Mr. Carpenter, in his
history of the proclamation, “the third great State paper which has
marked the progress of Anglo-Saxon civilisation. First is the Magna
Carta, wrested by the barons of England from King John; second, the
Declaration of Independence; and third, worthy to be placed upon the
tablets of history by the first two, Abraham Lincoln’s Proclamation of
Emancipation.”
On the 7th November, Messrs. J. M. Mason and John Slidell, Confederate
Commissioners to England and France, were taken from the British mail
steamer _Trent_ by Commodore Wilkes, of the American frigate _San
Jacinto_. There was great rejoicing over this capture in America, and
as great public irritation in England. War seemed imminent between the
countries; but Mr. Lincoln, with characteristic sagacity, determined
that so long as there was no recognition of the rebels as a nation,
not to bring on a war. “One war at a time,” he said. In a masterly
examination of the case, Mr. Seward pointed out the fact that “the
detention of the vessel, and the removal from her of the emissaries
of the rebel Confederacy, was justifiable by the laws of war, and the
practice and precedents of the British Government itself; but that,
in assuming to decide upon the liability of these persons to capture,
instead of sending them before a legal tribunal, where a regular
trial could be had, Captain Wilkes had departed from the rule of
international law uniformly asserted by the American Government, and
forming part of its most cherished policy.” The Government, therefore,
cheerfully complied with the request of the British Government, and
liberated the prisoners. No person at all familiar with American law
or policy could doubt for an instant that this decision expressed the
truth; but the adherents of the Confederacy, with their sympathisers,
everywhere united in ridiculing President Lincoln for cowardice. Yet
it would be difficult to find an instance of greater moral courage and
simple dignity, combined with the exact fulfilment of what he thought
was “just right,” than Lincoln displayed on this occasion. The wild
spirit of war was by this time set loose in the North, and it was felt
that foreign enemies, though they might inflict temporary injury,
would soon awake a principle of union and of resistance which would
rather benefit than injure the country. In fact, this new difficulty
was anything but intimidating, and the position of President Lincoln
was for a time most embarrassing. But he could be bold enough, and
sail closely enough to the law when justice demanded it. In September,
1861, the rebels in Maryland came near obtaining the passage of an
act of secession in the Legislature of that state. General M‘Clellan
was promptly ordered to prevent this by the arrest of the treasonable
legislators, which was done, and the state was saved from a civil
war. Of course there was an outcry at this, as arbitrary and
unconstitutional. But Governor Hicks said of it, in the Senate of the
United States, “I believe that arrests, and arrests alone, saved the
State of Maryland from destruction.”
When Mr. Lincoln had signed the Proclamation of Emancipation, he
said, “Now we have got the harpoon fairly into the monster slavery,
we must take care that, in his extremity, he does not shipwreck the
country.” But the monster only roared. The rebel Congress passed a
decree, offering freedom and reward to any slave who would kill a
Federal soldier; but it is believed that none availed themselves of
this chivalric offer. On the contrary, ere long there were brought into
the service of the United States nearly 200,000 black troops, among
whom the loss by all causes was fully one-third--a conclusive proof
of their bravery and efficiency. Though the Confederates knew that
their fathers had fought side by side with black men in the Revolution
and at New Orleans, and though they themselves raised negro regiments
in Louisiana, and employed them against the Federal Government, they
were furious that such soldiers should be used against themselves,
and therefore in the most inhuman manner put to death, or sold into
slavery, every coloured man captured in Federal uniform.