Causes Of The Emancipation Proclamation

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On January 1, 1863, President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation making the declaration "that all persons held as slaves" within the rebellious states "are, and henceforward shall be free" (The Emancipation Proclamation, n.d.). The Emancipation Proclamation did not actually free all the slaves being that it only applied to the states in rebellion. However, it did help lead the way to total abolition of slavery. The Emancipation Proclamation shaped the civil war by increasing the shape of the Union, changed foreign powers support for the Confederacy, and changed the meaning of the war from just preserving the Union to also freeing the southern slaves and not just the northern ones. In 1861, the American Civil war began and lasted 4 years long. It was a battle between the North and South or, also known as, The Union and The Confederacy. There were many causes of the war because the North and South had different views when it came to tariffs, states’ rights, trade but the biggest cause was the want to end slavery. President Lincoln …show more content…
It freed only those living in Confederate states that could manage to flee and make their way behind Union lines. It was known that Lincoln did not approve of slavery but he sanctioned it to preserve the Union being that some Union states still had established slavery themselves and he did not want to upset them. So, the aim of the war started as just preserving the Union to total abolition of slavery when the Proclamation was signed. This was important for African Americans because it “fundamentally transformed the character of the war from a war for the Union into a war for freedom. Moreover, the proclamation announced the acceptance of black men into the Union army and navy, enabling the liberated to become liberators. By the end of the war, almost 200,000 black soldiers and sailors had fought for the Union and freedom.” (The Emancipation Proclamation,
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