Document-Based Essay – Pretest
Biography – Abraham Lincoln
How much did Abraham Lincoln lead the nation toward Emancipation (freedom of slaves)?
Document A
On June, 16, 1858, Abraham Lincoln gave a speech to the Illinois legislature to accept the Republican Party’s
nomination to run for US Senate against “little giant” Stephen Douglas. This famous speech became known as
Lincoln’s “A House Divided” speech.
…A house divided against itself cannot stand.
I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free.
I do not expect the Union to be dissolved – I do not expect the house to fall – but I do expect it
will cease to be divided.
It will become all thing, or all the other.
Either the opponents of slavery, will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public
mind shall rest in the belief that it is in course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates* will push
it forward, till it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new – North as well as
South.
Have we no tendency to the latter* condition?
*advocates: someone who defends another
*latter: later, or the second item listed, in this case, slavery in all of the states
Document B
Note: In a letter from President Lincoln to General John C. Fremont, Lincoln responds to Fremont’s
proclamation* to shoot Confederate prisoners and confiscating slaves from traitorous owners.
Two points in your proclamation* of August 30th give me some anxiety. First, should you shoot a man,
according to the proclamation*, the Confederates very certainly shoot our best man in their hands in
retaliation. And so, man for man, indefinitely. It is therefore my order that you allow no man to be
shot, under the proclamation, without first having my approbation* or consent.
Secondly, I think there is great danger that the closing paragraph, in relation to the confiscation* of
property, and the liberating slaves of traitorous owners, will alarm our southern union friends, and turn
them against us perhaps ruin our rather fair prospect for Kentucky*. Allow me therefore to ask, that you
will as of your own motion, modify that paragraph so as to conform to the first and fourth sections of the
act of Congress, entitled, “An Act to Confiscate Property used for Insurrectional Purposes,” approved
August 6th, 1861, in a copy of which act I herewith send you. This letter is written in spirit of caution
and not of censure*.
*proclamation: official public announcement
*approbation: approval
*confiscation: the act of taking by the government
*Kentucky: 1 of 4 slave states that remained loyal to the Union during the Civil War
*reprimand: disapproval
Document C
Source: Harper’s Weekly (a northern newspaper). 11 October 1862.
Document D
Abraham Lincoln’s Meeting with African Americans in the White House during which he argued for
colonization* of those of African descent, 1862.
You and we are different races. We have between us a broader difference than exists
between any other races. Whether it right or wrong I need not discuss, but this physical
difference is a great disadvantage to us both, as I think your race suffers very greatly,
many of them by living among us, while ours suffer from your presence. . . . If this is
admitted, it affords a reason at least why we should be separated.
*Colonization: the idea of sending freed slaves to the colony of Liberia in Africa
Document E
Horace Greeley's Letter
On the editorial page of the New York Tribune of August 20, 1862, Horace Greeley published an open
letter to President Abraham Lincoln entitled, “THE PRAYER OF TWENTY MILLIONS.” Greeley was
an abolitionist * who was adamant in his demand that the president do something about slavery.
Following are excerpts from that letter:
“To ABRAHAM LINCOLN, President of the United States:
“DEAR SIR: ...
“We complain that the Union cause has suffered and is now suffering immensely, from mistaken
deference* to Rebel Slavery. Had you, Sir, in your Inaugural Address, unmistakably given notice that,
in case the Rebellion already commenced were persisted in, and your efforts to preserve the Union and
enforce the laws should be resisted by armed force, you would recognize no loyal person as rightfully held
in Slavery by a traitor, we believe that the Rebellion would have received a staggering, if not fatal
blow....”
Yours,
HORACE GREELEY
NEW YORK, August 19, 1862
*deference: acceptance
In this letter, Greeley complained that Lincoln had not proclaimed emancipation as he was required to
do by the Second Confiscation Act, and asserted that all attempts to put down the rebellion while at the
same time upholding slavery were "preposterous and futile."
Document F
Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress. Transcribed and Annotated by the Lincoln Studies Center,
Knox College. Galesburg, Illinois.
From Abraham Lincoln to Horace Greeley [Newspaper Clipping]1, August 22, 1862
EXECUTIVE MANSION,
Washington, August 22, 1862.
DEAR SIR: …
My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery.
If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the
slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do
that. What I do about slavery and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save th ise Union;
and what I forbear*, I forbear* because I do not believe it would help to save the Union.
Yours,
A. LINCOLN.
*forbear: stop
Document G
The Emancipation Proclamation
January 1, 1863
A Transcription
By the President of the United States of America:
A Proclamation.
"That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three,
all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall
then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free; and the
Executive Government of the United States, including the military and naval authority thereof, will
recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress such persons,
or any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom.
Now, therefore I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, 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, do, on this first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight
hundred and sixty-three, and in accordance with my purpose so to do publicly proclaimed for the full
period of one hundred days, from the day first above mentioned, order and designate as the States and
parts of States wherein the people thereof respectively, are this day in rebellion against the United
States, the following, to wit:
Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, (except the Parishes of St. Bernard, Plaquemines, Jefferson, St. John, St.
Charles, St. James Ascension, Assumption, Terrebonne, Lafourche, St. Mary, St. Martin, and Orleans,
including the City of New Orleans) Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North
Carolina, and Virginia, (except the forty-eight counties designated as West Virginia, and also the
counties of Berkley, Accomac, Northampton, Elizabeth City, York, Princess Ann, and Norfolk,
including the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth[)], and which excepted parts, are for the present, left
precisely as if this proclamation were not issued.
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.
By the President: ABRAHAM LINCOLN
WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.
Document H
CIRCULAR
*erroneous: incorrect, wrong.
*parish: in Louisiana it is equal to a county