The Last Day of Slavery

If there be those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not 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 to destroy slavery.
– Abraham Lincoln, August 22nd, 1862Show more

While Lincoln wrote those words in 1862, following them up with his Emancipation Proclamation, the reality was that he had no viable way to actually enforce them. Days earlier, the Union had “won” the Battle at Antietam Creek, although “win” might generous. On the bloodiest day in American history, the Army of the Potomac had blunted Robert E Lee’s army’s advance into Maryland. Alas, it had failed to win a decisive victory, or to follow up on the matter.

The battle had been just enough to give Lincoln the opening he needed. Believing that the nation needed a better reason to continue the war, he saw the permanent end of slavery as that reason. On January 1, 1863, the Proclamation went “into effect,” although, as noted already, the Union had almost no power to enforce it.

Although the Proclamation had virtually no effect initially, more and more slaves heard of it. But it would take two and a half long years before the last group of now free men heard the news.

But that September day, would be the last day of slavery. Nearly three years later, the last slaves held in the United States would at last learn that they were free at last.