Josiah Gilbert Holland

“ 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. ”

“ No father ever dealt more considerately and carefully with erring children than he did with those who had determined to break up the government. On the twenty-fifth of July, he issued a proclamation, in pursuance of a section in the confiscation act, passed by Congress a few days previously, warning all persons to cease participating in the rebellion, and adjuring them to return to their allegiance to the government, on pain of the forfeitures and seizures provided by the act. ”

“ What we do want is the conclusive evidence that respectable citizens of Louisiana are willing to be members of Congress, and to swear support to the Constitution; and that other respectable citizens there are willing to vote for them and send them. ”

“ There had been men--and there continued to be throughout the war--who believed, or pretended to believe, that peace and Union could be won without war--that friendly negotiation would settle everything. ”

“ So, on the sixteenth of November, he issued a circular letter upon the subject, in which he told the soldiers that "the importance for man and beast of the prescribed weekly rest; the sacred rights of Christian soldiers and sailors, a becoming deference to the best sentiment of a Christian people, and a due regard for the Divine Will, demand that Sunday labor in the army and navy be reduced to the measure of strict necessity." ”

“ Lincoln had before him a document which he knew was to perpetuate his name to all futurity,--a document which involved the liberty of four millions of human beings then living, and of untold millions then unborn,--which changed the policy of the government and the course and character of the war,--which revolutionized the social institutions of more than a third of the nation,--which brought all the governments of Christendom into new relations to the rebellion,--and which involved Mr. ”

“ He had written a proclamation of emancipation, and had determined to issue it. He had not called them together to ask their advice on the general question, because he had determined it for himself. He wished to inform them of his purpose, and to receive such suggestions upon minor points as they might be moved to make. Mr. Chase wished the language stronger with reference to arming the blacks. Mr. Blair deprecated the policy, because it would cost the administration the fall elections ”

“ Lincoln at the Soldier's Home. There he immediately wrote the second draft of the preliminary proclamation, and came back to Washington on Saturday of that week, and held a cabinet meeting, at which he declared that the time for the enunciation of the emancipation policy could no longer be delayed. Public sentiment, he thought, would sustain it; many of his warmest friends and supporters demanded it; "and," said Mr. Lincoln, in a low and reverent tone, "I have promised my God that I will do it." These last words were hardly heard by any one but Mr. Chase, who sat nearest to him. Mr. ”