LINCOLN AS AN ABOLITIONIST: AN ANALYSIS OF THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION AND THE HISTORY SURROUNDING IT BY CHIEN-JU YANG (楊茜如) ADVISOR: PROFESSOR MICHAEL JENKS Department of Applied English of Yuanpei University January 2010 Hsinchu Taiwan This thesis, by Yang Chien-ju, is accepted in its present from by the Department of Applied English of Yuanpei University. Advisor ___________________________ Chairman ___________________________ January 2010 ABSTRACT The purpose of this paper was to show Lincoln as an abolitionist and the history surrounding it. It introduces the biography of Abraham Lincoln, evidence of why Lincoln changed his compromising attitude toward slavery and whether or not he was an abolitionist even before the Emancipation Proclamation. Abraham Lincoln was 16th president of the United States. He was born on Feb 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky and began his political career in 1832. Before the American civil war Lincoln claimed that he was not an abolitionist; he just hated slavery, pointing to slaves as being one of the main labor forces in the Unite States since early American times. As president, Lincoln believed maintaining the union was more important than anything else, and he avoided mentioning the slavery problem. The American Civil War began in 1861; Lincoln still limited his war efforts to saving the union and he told Southerners if they changed their stance on the Union they could return to the Union with slavery unchanged. Lincoln later changed his stance because disrupting slavery through emancipation might weaken the South’s war efforts. He delivered the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, clearly showing himself as an abolitionist; he had previously said he did not want to emancipate slaves as a political tactic. INTRODUCTION This paper analyzes the Emancipation Proclamation with the intent to understand Abraham Lincoln’s precise position on slavery. The Emancipation Proclamation was issued by Lincoln in 1863 at the height of the American Civil War; this made him an abolitionist beyond doubt. Abraham Lincoln was born on Feb 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. His background is considered to be rather ordinary, considering the time and place of his birth. Abraham Lincoln is seen by many to have given his whole life to ending slavery and maintaining the union of the United States of America. An interesting point about Lincoln is that he claimed he was not an abolitionist before the civil war; he was just against slavery. During the American civil war Lincoln tried to compromise on the issue of slavery. He avoided the war as much as possible and he seemed to hope that he could preserve the Union if he did not focus on slavery. As the military situation got worse and worse, Lincoln apparently came to realize that he shouldn’t limit the war to preserving the Union. Lincoln changed his compromising attitude toward slavery and he issued the Emancipation Proclamation. Was Lincoln an abolitionist? This paper indicates Lincoln was an abolitionist from early on; it argues herein that he said he did not want to emancipate slaves as a political tactic. The paper introduces the biography of Abraham Lincoln, why Lincoln changed his compromising attitude toward slavery and whether or not Lincoln was an abolitionist even before the Emancipation Proclamation. Lincoln’s Background Abraham Lincoln was the sixteenth President of the United States. He was born on Feb 12, 1809 in Hardin County, Kentucky. His parents were farmers and Lincoln’s family became impoverished after losing their land through legal action. His mother died when he was nine. After that, the Lincoln family moved to Illinois. Lincoln's formal education consisted of about 18 months of schooling, but he was largely self-educated and an avid reader. On November 4, 1842 Lincoln married Mary Todd and they eventually had four sons (Lorant, 1961). Lincoln had to struggle for a living and for learning. He was a country lawyer, an Illinois state legislator, a member of the United States House of Representatives, and twice an unsuccessful candidate for election to the U.S. Senate. Lincoln started his Republican political life in 1854 (Whitehouse.gov, 2009). In 1854, Illinois Democrat Stephen A. Douglas proposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act, an attempt to get the senate to stop interfering with the slavery problem. Lincoln hated slavery and he was so against it that he made his "Peoria Speech" in response (Northern Illinois University, 2002). A few years later Lincoln was chosen as the Republican candidate for the 1860 presidential election and he was elected as the 16th President of the United States, beating the Democratic candidate Stephen A. Douglas. After that, the American Civil War began in 1861 (Wilson, 2009). During the war Lincoln tried to compromise on the issue of slavery; he told southerners if they changed their stance on the Union they could return to the Union unhurt, with slavery intact (Jones, 1999). It is seen that Lincoln avoided the war as much as possible and he just hoped that he could preserve the Union. Lincoln’s Views of Slavery Before the War Slavery in the United Sates started in 1607. Slaves were brought to the United States from Africa. Slaves didn’t have any human rights in the United Sates; they couldn’t go against their owner even though they received unfair treatment. Slavery increased in 1787 because it became a legal institution in the U.S. At that time, the majority of slaveholders were in the southern United States and slaves were one of the main labor forces there until the American civil war (Sylvester, 1998). In 1854, as stated before, Douglas proposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act as an attempt to stop the senate from interfering with the slavery problem because southern states wanted to expand slavery into the newly established states. Lincoln made his “Peoria Speech” in response (Northern Illinois University, 2002). This is the first time Lincoln publicly declared that he hated slavery. Lincoln believed slavery was the main reason the United States was divided; he said: “I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world — enables the enemies of free institutions, with plausibility, to taunt us as hypocrites — causes the real friends of freedom to doubt our sincerity, and especially because it forces so many really good men amongst ourselves into an open war with the very fundamental principles of civil liberty — criticizing the Declaration of Independence, and insisting that there is no right principle of action but self-interest.” (Abraham Lincoln, 1854) He also told southern states in this speech that having slaves was not their fault; he would not fight against southern people and he said it was impossible to free all slaves immediately or give them equal treatment because they were not as equal as white people and that would make the situation even worse (Abraham Lincoln, 1854). After the “Peoria Speech”, Lincoln represented the Republican Party in running for a senatorial seat; his competitor was Stephen A. Douglas. They held seven debates in the congressional districts in Illinois. During the debates Douglas wanted to prove that Lincoln was an abolitionist. Douglas said that Lincoln agreed to give Negroes equal rights and the privileges of citizenship and would abrogate the Illinois State Constitution in doing so. Douglas also quoted a couple of passages from Lincoln’s speech saying that “all man are created equal” because he wanted to show that Lincoln would try to make Negroes equal to white people (Wikipedia, 2009). One of the Lincoln passages used by Douglas follows: “I should like to know, if taking this old Declaration of Independence, which declares that all men are equal upon principle, and making exceptions to it, where will it stop? If one man says it does not mean a Negro, why may not another man say it does not mean another man? If that declaration is not the truth, let us get this statute book in which we find it and tear it out.” (Abraham Lincoln, 1858) Lincoln denied the abolitionist accusation by Douglas and he disagreed that he would give black people the right to vote and allow black people to intermarry with white people because he knew that Negroes were generally inferior to white men (Abraham Lincoln, 1858). He directly responded to Douglas’s accusations when he said he meant everyone was equal in the right to choose their own path in life but not equal in intellectual, moral, social or physical ways. They “intended to include all men, but they did not mean to declare all men equal in all respects. They did not mean to say all men were equal in color, size, intellect, moral development or social capacity. They defined with tolerable distinctness in what they did consider all men created equal — equal in certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ...” (Abraham Lincoln, 1858) Lincoln’s Change from Political Compromise When Lincoln was elected as the 16th President of the United States in 1860 seven states, South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas, declared that they would depart from the union and create a new nation, the Confederate States of America. (Son of the South, 2003-2008). Lincoln refused to recognize the new nation because he bitterly opposed separating the Union; he also tried to avoid the war between the two sides. In his inauguration he said: “I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so…… I therefore consider that in view of the Constitution and the laws the Union is unbroken...” (Abraham Lincoln, 1861) Lincoln was still compromising between stating he hated slavery, and denying he was an abolitionist.