Lincoln And Slavery example essay topic

The Civil War was fought for many reasons, one of which, were for the rights of slaves in America. For four years, 1861-1865, America fought America. One of the opposing sides was the confederates or the southern states. They seceded from the union and tried to form their own country. The states were South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina, Louisiana, and Texas.

Those 11 states wanted to keep slavery. The other army was the union or the northern states. These states wanted to abolish slavery. The President of the union, Abraham Lincoln wrote a policy to abolish slavery in the union in hopes to weaken the confederates. This policy was called the Emancipation Proclamation. Abraham Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation as a strategic military move rather then a personal viewpoint.

Everyone in America knows Abraham Lincoln was the great president who wrote a policy and abolished slavery. That document was the Emancipation Proclamation. Some people think it was his adverse beliefs on slavery when he was a kid that led him to write the Emancipation Proclamation, but this is not all true. In Lincoln's inaugural speech he said "I have no purpose, directly or indirectly to interfere with slavery in the states where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so".

Even before Lincoln was inducted as president, he didn't favor abolishing slavery. In the famous Lincoln versus Douglas debate Lincoln stated: "I will say then that I am not, nor have ever been in the favor if bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races... There must be a position of superior and interior, and I... am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race... I do not perceive that because the white man is to have the superior position that the negroe should be deprived everything". On August 19th, 1862 Horace Greeley wrote an open letter in the New York Tribune. Greeley criticized Lincoln for failing to make slavery the dominant issue of war and compromising moral principles for political motives.

Lincoln replied three days later with a letter that said, "if there be those who would save the union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery. I do not agree with them. My paramount object in this struggle is to save the union, and is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union with out freeing any slave, I would do it; and 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". In September 1862, after the Union's victory at Antietam, Lincoln issued a preliminary decree stating that "Unless the rebellious states returned to the Union by January 1st, freedom would be granted to slaves within those states". The decree also left room for a plan of compensated emancipation.

No Confederate states took the offer, and on January 1st Lincoln presented the Emancipation Proclamation. The Proclamation declared, "all persons held as slaves within any states, or designated part of the state, the people whereof shall be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then thenceforward, and forever free". The Emancipation Proclamation did not free all slaves in the USA. It declared free only those slaves living in the confederate states. After the Emancipation Proclamation was announced, the Union started to recruit African American men, which was legal, although segregation still existed in the ranks. The union made all-black units headed by a white officer.

All of this information shows that Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation to win the war rather than what he wanted and thought was good as a person. Cunningham, Kendra. "Lincoln and Slavery". web Schaefer, Jamie. "Lincoln's Changing Views on Slavery". web "Emancipation Proclamation". Teaching history online. web.