Title: What were the losses and gains of the civil war? - American History
Headings: 
What were the losses and gains of the civil war?
Arjun Rajesh
Jessica Reed
jiayi diao
molly
lalalu
ss
Kelly Rose
Kelly Rose
jasmine
Leave a Reply.

Content: The Emancipation Proclamation, issued on January 1, 1863, demonstrates clearly the role that the Civil War played in the abolition of slavery. The Proclamation, issued via the Executive authority of President Abraham Lincoln, stated, “all persons held as slaves within said designated States, and parts of States, are, and henceforward shall be free” (Emancipation Proclamation). Lincoln used his status as President to free the slaves within the Southern states that had seceded from the Union. Crucially, this proclamation makes no mention of slavery in general and is not founded on a philosophical opinion of the morality of slavery. Indeed, slavery remained a legal practice within Union states, where approximately one million slaves remained in captivity (PBS). Rather, this proclamation appears to be grounded in military needs of the Civil War. Indeed, Lincoln’s tactic is designed to specifically weaken, and punish, the Confederate States through removing the valuable economic resource and manpower that slaves provided to the Confederate States in the early years of the war. Furthermore, Lincoln’s legal basis for the unprecedented maneuver of creating laws regarding the status of Southern slaves without Congressional approval, is rooted in his war-time powers as vested to the President in the Constitution. In the Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln states that his actions are legal “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” (Emancipation Proclamation). In addition to the clear attempt to weaken the Confederacy, Lincoln also explicitly states the military benefit to the Union of freeing Southern slaves.