“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 recognize and maintain the freedom of said persons.”
Abraham Lincoln
Emancipation Proclamation (Primary source)
Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation during the American Civil War, declaring that all persons held as slaves within the states and parts of states then in rebellion against the United States “are, and henceforward shall be free.” The document took effect on January 1, 1863, after Lincoln had first announced a preliminary version on September 22, 1862, giving the Confederate states an opportunity to return to the Union before emancipation became effective.
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“When the conduct of men is designed to be influenced, persuasion, kind, unassuming persuasion, should ever be adopted. It is an old and a true maxim, that a drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gall.”
— Abraham Lincoln Primary source“With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation’s wounds.”
— Abraham Lincoln Primary source“We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
— Abraham Lincoln Primary source“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”
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“A new-born government must dazzle.”
— Napoleon Bonaparte Disputed“There will never be a really free and enlightened State, until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly.”
— Henry David Thoreau Primary source“Virtue and happiness are mother and daughter.”
— Benjamin Franklin Primary source“Freedom is indivisible, and when one man is enslaved, all are not free.”
— John F. Kennedy Primary sourceEnslavement Politics Liberty American Civil War