Lincoln, Slavery, and Race

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Lincoln, Slavery, and Race

• by John Davenport
• Department of Philosophy
• Fordham University
• davenport_at_fordham.edu
• Feb. 27, 2009

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Two more artist interpretations of Lincoln
entering Richmond onApril 4, 1865 (just a month
after his second inauguration, 5 days before
Appomattox, and10 days before Booth assassinated
him)
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The most important document that Lincoln ever
signed
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Another version of the document(1) What did it
do?(2) Why is it strange, from a legal
standpoint, that Lincoln signed it?(3) What
sort of actions did Lincoln take to get is passed?
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Lincolns role in passage of the 13th Amendment

• In his reconstruction plan, Lincoln makes
  acceptance of the Emancipation Proclamation a
  condition for the reentry of southern states into
  the Union.
• Jan. 1864 Senator Henderson of Missouri
  (probably at Lincolns behest) introduced the
  joint resolution. It passed the Senate by more
  than 2/3 majority, April 1864.
• But it failed in the House by 93 yea / 65 nay (13
  votes short of a 2/3 majority).
• March 1864 with the help of his friend Charles
  Dana, Lincoln buys off a handful of House members
  to secure admission of Nevada as a new state,
  thus ensuring enough pro-amendment states to
  secure ratification by at least 3/4 of the
  states!
• May 1864 Lincoln insists that the 13th Amendment
  be added to the Republican party platform,
  risking alienating voters who opposed
  emancipation, and making it harder for him to win
  reelection in the doubtful fall season of 1864.
• Dec. 6, 1864 After Lincoln wins reelection and
  the Republican majority grows in Congress, he
  asks the lame-duck House to pass the 13th
  Amendment now, before the new Congress is seated
  and takes it up again.
• On Feb. 1, 1865, the House of Representatives
  passesthe 13th Amendment.
• December 1865, 13th Amendment declared ratified
  by 3/4 of the states.

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From Charles Danas Diary

• He came in and shut the door. 'Dana,' he said,
  'I am very anxious about this vote. It was got to
  be taken next week. The time is very short. It is
  going to be a great deal closer than I wish it
  was.' There are plenty of Democrats who will
  vote for it,' I replied. 'There is James E.
  English, of Connecticut I think he is sure,
  isn't he?''Oh, yes he is sure on the merits of
  the question. ''Then,' said I, 'there's 'Sunset'
  Cox, of Ohio. How is he?''He is sure and
  fearless. But there are some others that I am not
  clear about. There are three that you can deal
  with better than anybody else, perhaps, as you
  know them all. I wish you would send for them.'
  He told me who they were it isn't necessary to
  repeat the names here. One man was from New
  Jersey and two from New York. 'What will they be
  likely to want?' I asked. 'I don't know,' said
  the President 'I don't know. It makes no
  difference, though, what they want. here is the
  alternative that we carry this vote, or be
  compelled to raise another million, and I don't
  know how many more, men, and fight no one knows
  how long. It is a question of three votes or new
  armies. Well, sir,' said I, 'what shall I say
  to these gentlemen? ''I don't know,' said he
  'but whatever promise you make to them I will
  perform.' I sent for the men and saw them one by
  one. I found that they were afraid of their party
  They said that some fellows in the party would be
  down on them. Two of them wanted internal revenue
  collector's appointments. 'You shall have it,' I
  said. Another one wanted a very important
  appointment about the custom house of New York. I
  knew the man well whom he wanted to have
  appointed. He was a Republican, though a
  congressman was a Democrat. I had served with him
  in the Republican county committee of New York.
  The office was worth perhaps twenty thousand
  dollars a year. When the congressman stated the
  case, I asked him, 'Do you want that? Yes,
  said he. 'Well,' I answered, 'you shall have
  it.' I understand, of course,' said he, 'that
  you are not saying this on your own
  authority?''Oh, no,' said I 'I am saying it on
  the authority of the President. Well, these men
  voted that Nevada be allowed to form a State
  government, and thus they helped secure the vote
  which was required. The next October the
  President signed the proclamation admitting the
  State. In the February following Nevada was one
  of the States which ratified the Thirteenth
  Amendment, by which slavery was abolished by
  constitutional prohibition in all of the United
  States. I have always felt that this little piece
  of side politics was one of the most judicious,
  humane, and wise uses of executive authority that
  I have ever witnessed.

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Passage of the 13th Amendment in the House
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But it went well beyond the 13th Amendment. By
his last months, Lincoln favored suffrage for
black men and near-social equality!

• How did he get to there in 1865, when in 1858
  during the Lincoln-Douglas debates he often said
  things like the following?
• If all earthly power were given to me, I should
  not know what to do, as to the existing
  institution of slavery in the old south. My
  first impulse would be to free all the slaves and
  send them to Liberia to their own native land
  in Africa (First Joint Debate at Ottawa, Aug.
  21, 1858 p.61)
• I have no purpose to introduce political and
  social equality between the white and black
  races (Sixth Joint Debate at Quincy, Oct. 13,
  1858 p.284)
• I protestagainst the counterfeit logic which
  presumes that because I do not want a negro woman
  for a slave, I do necessarily want her for a
  wife (Chicago, July 10, 1858)

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Six Take-Home Points about Lincoln, Slavery
Race(useful for AP exams!)

• By todays standards, Lincoln would count as a
  racist he was not sure that blacks had
  capacities equal to whites on average, or that
  the races could live together. This is evident
  in his famous debates with Stephen Douglas in the
  Illinois campaign for a federal senate seat in
  1958. It is also evident in many other writings
  and speeches.
• Unlike a few more radical abolitionists, he was
  not for full social equality, although his views
  changed dramatically in the last two years of his
  life. (Well ask why).
• But Lincoln was personally opposed to slavery
  from early youth, and in his speeches always
  affirmed that slavery was immoral a violation
  of inherent natural rights. By the standards of
  the 1850s, that made him highly progressive.

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Six Take-Home Points about Lincoln, Slavery
Race(useful for AP exams!)

• By todays standards, Lincoln would count as a
  racist he was not sure that blacks had
  capacities equal to whites on average, or that
  the races could live together. This is evident
  in his famous debates with Stephen Douglas in the
  Illinois campaign for a federal senate seat in
  1958. It is also evident in many other writings
  and speeches.
• Unlike a few more radical abolitionists, he was
  not for full social equality, although his views
  changed dramatically in the last two years of his
  life. (Well ask why in a couple slides).
• But Lincoln was personally opposed to slavery
  from early youth, and in his speeches always
  affirmed that slavery was immoral a violation
  of inherent natural rights. By the standards of
  the 1850s, that made him highly progressive.

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(continued)

• 4. Despite this personal opposition, he
  accepted that the US Constitution of 1787
  contained a compromise allowing slavery in the
  states of the old South.
• Two caveats
• (a) Lincoln thought all the main founders
  (including Jefferson) intended to prevent the
  spread of slavery to new states and thus to allow
  it die out gradually.
• (b) From 1854 on, he denied any natural
  democratic right of peoples to enact slavery
  laws. This implied that slavery in the old South,
  while constitutional, was undemocratic.
• With these two caveats, Lincoln felt bound to
  uphold the 1787 Constitution.
• Thus it is technically true that Lincoln issued
  the final Emancipation Proclamation of Jan. 1,
  1863 with the official intention only to aid the
  Union war effort the justification for violating
  the Constitution was that emancipation of slaves
  in areas of the South under insurrection but
  not under Union control was necessary to win the
  war.
• But this often-made point can be misleading,
  because by this time, Lincoln was already
  convinced that the Constitution had to be changed
  to eradicate slavery everywhere in the United
  States, forever. By the 13th Amendment, he would
  finally resolve the painful conflict between his
  own sense of natural right and the basic written
  law of his beloved land.

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Giving up on Gradual Compensated Emancipation
Colonization

• Lincoln had tried to avoid the Civil War by
  promising not to interfere with slavery in the
  established southern states but in 1861 S.
  Carolina started the war anyway.
• In early 1862, he tries to get the South in
  general, and the border states in particular, to
  accept gradual compensated emancipation a
  process that could have taken until 1900! But no
  states took up his offer.
• In July 1862, the draft Preliminary Emancipation
  Proclamation presented only to the cabinet again
  asks Congress to fund compensated emancipation in
  loyal states.
• August 14, 1862 Lincoln receives the first ever
  delegation of African-American leaders at the
  White House. He asks them to consider separation
  of the races by voluntary colonization overseas
  (pp.251-52). But only 38,000 of the available
  600,000 is ever spent, suggesting that this was
  mostly a sop to white fears.
• The September 22 Preliminary Emancipation
  Proclamation pledges again to ask Congress for
  compensated emancipation and voluntary
  colonization (p.257), even extending the promise
  of compensation to loyal citizens in the old
  South (p.260).
• Dec. 1, 1962 as promised, Lincoln asks Congress
  to adopt a constitutional amendment offering
  compensation to slaveowners in states adopting
  gradual emancipation process ending before 1900
  (p.265). The second article of the proposed
  amendment begins with language that anticipates
  the wording of the 13th Amendment, but still
  promises compensation to loyal slaveowners in the
  Confederate States. Congress never seriously
  considers this proposal.
• August 1863 after the Final Emancipation
  Proclamation, Lincoln writes to James Conkling
  that all chance for gradual compensated
  emancipation is gone. Freedmen and emancipated
  slaves are joining the Union Army. He will never
  retract his edict.

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Recruiting poster, 1863
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New Experiences with Black Americans

• The Final Emancipation Proclamation included no
  reference to compensated emancipation, and
  instead invited black Americans into the armed
  forces of the United States (p.272)
• After emancipation, in August 1863, Frederick
  Douglass met President Lincoln for the first time
  in person. He urged Lincoln to offer equal pay to
  black soldiers (finally granted by Congress in
  June 1864). But most importantly, Douglass felt
  received as an equal, and Lincoln was impressed
  with him as well.
• Since Sept. 1862, black regiments had slowly been
  recruited. Thousands were in arms and
  demonstrating their courage by the time that
  Lincoln met Douglass. The process sped up after
  the final Emancipation Proclamation.
• In his December 1863 message to Congress, Lincoln
  reported almost 100,000 black troops
  strengthening the Union forces.
• Over 180,000 black soldiers in 163 units
  eventually served in the Union army, and many
  more in the Navy, which had enlisted freedmen
  earlier than the army.
• The most famous of their many engagements, the
  near-suicidal frontal assault on Fort Wagner,
  S.C., has been portrayed in the award-winning
  film, Glory.
• Given his words in the Gettysburg Address, there
  can be no doubt that Lincoln was personally moved
  by these sacrifices.

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Colored Army and Navy Units
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1863-65 Lincoln moves towards equal civil rights

• By August of 1863, the great victories at
  Gettysburg and Vicksburg are passed. Lincoln
  believes that God is finally favoring his course
  in the war, following the Emancipation
  Proclamation. In a letter to his friend Conkling,
  he praises black soldiers, condemns white men who
  hinder his war effort, and says that Peace does
  not appear so distant as it did (p.292).
• Lincoln is also shepherding the reconstruction of
  Louisiana towards a new state government with a
  constitution banning slavery. He writes to his
  commanding General Banks in New Orleans,
  proposing that the new plan include "education
  for young blacks" (p.287).
• Nov. 19, 1863 in the Gettysburg Address, Lincoln
  vows that the honored dead will not have died
  in vain their sacrifices will lead to the
  flourishing of democracy across the earth! (the
  humbler object of restoring the union isnt even
  mentioned)
• In his December 1863 message to Congress, Lincoln
  notes that black troops now number 100,000 or
  more (p.309) and says the whole world stands
  indebted to Union soldiers for saving the home
  of freedom, disenthralled, regenerated,
  perpetuated (p.311).
• Jan. 1864 Letter to General Wadsworth saying
  that if the South wants general amnesty to former
  pro-secession citizens, then they must accept
  universal suffrage for all black men in return
  (p.313)!
• April 11, 1865 returning from his visit to
  conquered Richmond, Lincoln gives a public
  address from the White House calling for
  admission of the reconstructed state of Louisiana
  as a free state. He added that he wished it gave
  the vote to all former black soldiers and any
  black man meeting some unspecified intelligence
  test (p.347). For this, John Wilkes Booth is
  determined to kill Lincoln.
• This is an olive branch to radical republicans
  like Thaddeus Stevens who want universal suffrage
  and equal protection of the laws from black
  Americans (anticipating the 14th and 15th
  amendments).

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The Gettysburg Address as most people imagine it
(with a high formal platform)
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The real scene. But wheres Lincoln at this
famous Gettysburg battlefield dedication?
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Hes in the middle of the vast circle around the
small platform, with hat off to the fallen.
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The full picture