Phil Leigh’s Civil War Chat

Emancipation Proclamation Anniversary

(September 23, 2024) One-hundred-and-sixty-two years ago yesterday, Lincoln announced the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation.  Shortly thereafter the British *Spectator* read it and concluded: “The principle is not that a human being cannot justly own another, but that he cannot own him unless he is loyal to the USA.”

The proclamation freed no slaves within Union lines. That came with the end of the Civi War and passage of the Thirteenth Amendment, which a majority of the pre-carpetbag Southern states voted to ratify.