Newspapers, Lincoln, Opinions, Oh My!

[unionblue]

"All men are created equal..."

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[thea_447]

One British periodical (Feb. 1, 1862) carried an article about Lincoln's colonization scheme: "He [Lincoln] tries to accommodate himself to the vulgar prejudice of colour by taking for granted that the negroes must all go away somewhere. He openly declares that he hopes the free blacks will go away with the slaves, and he holds this
out as the great recommendation of the [emancipation] plan to the citizens of the North....The people are, by Congress, to give money to buy a territory somewhere, outside of their own country; and there the four millions of slaves are to be transported, with as many free blacks as can be induced or compelled to go with them. There they are to be colonised, at the expense, and by the care of the people of the United States. Such is Mr. Lincoln's pretended scheme...The four millions of negroes would be carried away from shelter and food, to be set down in a wilderness to starve.......[This] looks like insanity." ("The Slave Difficulty in America", Once A Week, p.145-148.)

[thea_447]

Concerning Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation:

On Feb. 20, 1863, the Manchester Guardian condemned the Emancipation Proclamation: "To the few surviving chiefs of that great anti-slavery struggle in England [1834], and the representatives of those who are gone, will have nothing to do with the hypocritical adoption of their cherished principles as a pretext in the last resort for further shedding of human blood."

On Sept, 22, 1862, Lincoln warned the world that on Jan. 1, 1863, emancipation would go into effect. He thus gave the Confederacy a little over three months to surrender and keep their slaves or face enforced emancipation if they continued their war for secession from the Union Although the Constitution left the matter of slavery for the states and thus denied the federal government the right to interfere, Lincoln felt that he could bypass the Constitution by emancipating under his power as commander in chief of the military. This was within his war powers, or so he believed. Many lawyers and scholars disagreed.

Secretary Seward spoke for the Emancipation Proclamation: "All the good and wise men of all countries," would approve of the proclamation as "a just and proper military act." There were, in fact, few if any "wise men" who saw it that way, and just as few in the North. Abolitionists saw it as a fraud, as it only applied to the territory over which the North had no control! The army hated it because they "didn't want to fight for the Negroes freedom."

In Europe, even though they favored emancipation, they looked upon the document as a travesty. Why did this document, so revered today, stir up such a hornet's nest in 1862-1863?

The November 1862 issue of London's Blackwood's Magazine (p.640) said this: "It is the most atrocious act of war-policy ever adopted by a civilized state." Yet, this magazine, like all periodicals in Europe, was strongly for emancipation. Why such contempt? Because they believe it would set off a slave uprising. Armed slaves could turn against their masters in a huge blood bath. General McClellan, who became the Democratic candidate for president in 1864, said he could not be a party to "such an accursed doctrine of servile insurrection." It appeared to most people to call for the arming of the black population in the South, and with women, children and old people all that was left on farms and plantations, it would be impossible for them to put down such an insurrection. So, Lincoln, facing the wrath and disapproval of a large segment of people, deleted from his early draft of the proclamation language calling for a violent uprising.
The Nat Turner affair in Virginia of 1831 still loomed large in many people's thoughts. Turner and his 5 members soon grew to 53 and massacred 24 white children, 18 women, and 13 men before being put to flight by local militiamen.

Horatio Seymour,a fanatical Unionist, on th eve of his election as governor of New York, called the proclamation an act of unparalleled atrocity. Seymour said: "The scheme for an immediate emancipation and general arming of the slaves throughout the South is a proposal for the butchery of women and children, for scenes of lust and rapine, arson and murder, unparalleled in the history of the world. Its effect would not be confined to the walls of cities, but there would be a widespread scene of horror over the vast expanse of great States, involving alike the loyal and the seditious. Such malignity and cowardice would invoke the interfence of civilized Europe. History tells of the fires kindled in the name of religion, of atrocities committd under the pretext of order or liberty; it is now urged that scenes bloodier than the world has yet witnessed shall be enacted in the name of philanthropy." (Found in "Crisis in the American War", Blackwood's Magazine, 640,642.)

[samgrant]

Thea, I noticed that you and other were slugging this out back in March thru June, at which point an informal truce appeared to ensue.

I am wondering, especially in light of the fact that you initiated the thread concerning 'northern opinion' and 'northern editorials', you would suddenly reach clear across the Atlantic Ocean in order to revive the debate.

[unionblue]

samgrant,

Perhaps Thea likes using the foreign press because of what Charles Francis Adams, US Minister to the Court of St. James observed in December25, 1862.

"The privileged classes all ove Europe rejoice in the thoughts of the ruin of the great experiment in popular government."

Or maybe a statement by Walt Whitman in 1864 might say it better.

"There is certainly not one government in Europe but is watching the war in this country with the ardent prayer that the United States may be effectually split, crippled, and dismembered by it. There is not one but would help toward that dismemberment, if it dared."

So of course you are bound to find a lot of articles in the foreign press that are down and critical of the Union during this time and for their own reasons.

Of course, if one wanted to be even-handed in the matter, you would also find articles in the foreign press that supported the Union and decried the Confederacy and slavery. You will even find such comments from British government officials in Parlament. But they would have to be presented.

Sincerely,
Unionblue

[Alabaman]

Neil,
Perhaps one could even suggest that Great Britain, by setting the precedence as per their Parliament in January, 1831, the act of compensating slaveholders in the West Indies the tidy sum equivocating to $100 million U.S. dollars, when the slaves were manumitted. Some of those same English eyes might have awaited the U.S. Government to avoid war by spending some money to end the dispute. Who knows?;-)
After all, what is more important to the mother of a dead soldier, her son's life or money?

Sincerely,
Rob Adams (Alabaman)

[unionblue]

Alabaman,

You are aware of course their were attempts before and during the war to abolish slavery in the United States by Henry Clay and Lincoln?

Even in 1864, Lincoln was willing to offer compensation to slaveowners, if they would return to the Union. Except by that time Jeff Davis and Lincoln's cabinet said things had gone to far.

Thea and others I think have commented that she felt Lincoln and his administration didn't offer the slaveholders enough for their property any of the times he made the offer.

And another thing, when you read up on the history of the British compensating those slaveholders, all of them felt cheated as they felt they had been promised more for their slave property.

Sincerely,
Unionblue