PART II. Chapter IX.

THE elections, prior to the autumn of 1862, had shown large majorities for the Administration. Brilliant successes had been won by its armies in the West, until, in June, the tide of victory paused before Yicksburg. In the East, military inefficiency had culminated on the Peninsula and before Washington. Lee had invaded Maryland, and leisurely retired, unpursued. Political defeat followed military disaster. Ohio and Pennsylvania gave small majorities against the Administration in October. New York, in the next month, followed the example. The lower House of the next Congress was already claimed as secured by the Opposition. Popular discontent and despondency were every-where manifest. Opposition politicians held the President responsible before the people for the non-action of their favorite Greneral, whom they did not cease to lament when removed. Peace Democrats rallied behind banners inscribed, " For a more vigorous prosecution of the war; " yet their repre entative man was the one who, evading orders of the Administration, and thwarting the President's wishes, had wasted lavish preparations and abundant military forces, during a whole year, in organizing failure.

Long before this disheartening epoch, however, President Lincoln, as seen in previous pages, had earnestly directed his thoughts to the proper mode of dealing with slavery, in its necessary relations to the war. His final speech to the Border State men on compensated emancipation, as we have seen, plainly indicated that, as early as July, his mind was made up to wrest this element of military power from the support of the Rebellion.

In the month of May, 1862, Gen. Hunter, then commanding the Department of the South, issued an unauthorized order, in

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which he attempted, by logical deduction from the premise of Secession, to establish the conclusion that, in his military department, all slaves had become manumitted. As a result of this logical exercise, he declared such persons to be " forever free." This order, like the rhapsody on Slavery and Romanism, issued by Gen. Phelps, in his proclamation at Ship Island, might have been suffered to pass without public notice by the Executive, had it not emanated from a commanding general in whose department were two of the States in which slaves were the most numerous, and had it not the appearance of an authentic announcement of a new policy, which Gen. Hunter. had lately been sent out to put in operation. The President felt constrained to set aside this order, which he did in the following well-considered proclamation:

WHEREAS, There appears in the public prints what purports to be a proclamation of Major General Hunter, in the words and figures following, to wit:

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OP THE SOUTH, HILTON HEAD, S.

C., May 9, 1862,

General Orders No. 11.

The three States of Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina, comprising the Military Department of the South, having deliberately declared themselves no longer under the protection of the United States of America, and having taken up arms against the said United States, it becomes a military necessity to declare them under martial law. This was accordingly done on the twenty-fifth day of April, 1862. Slavery and martial law in a free country are altogether incompatible. The persons in these three States, Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina, heretofore held as slaves, are therefore declared forever free.

DAVID HUNTER, Major

General Commanding.

Official: ED. W. SMITH, Acting Assistant Adjutant General.

AND WHEREAS, The same is producing some excitement and misunderstanding.

There/ore, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the "United States, proclaim and declare that the Government of the United States had no knowledge or belief of an intention, on the part of Gen. Hunter, to issue such a proclamation, nor has it yet any authentic information that the document is genuine; and, further, that neither Gen. Hunter nor any other commander, or

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person, has been authorized by the Government of the United States to make proclamation declaring the slaves of any State free, and that the supposed proclamation now in question, whether genuine or false, is altogether void, so far as respects such declaration.

I further make known that, whether it be competent for me, as Commander-in-chief of the Army and Navy, to declare the slaves of any State or States free, and whether, at any time, or in any case, it shall have become a necessity indispensable to the maintenance of the Government to exercise such supposed power, are questions which, under my responsibility, I reserve to myself, and which I can not feel justified in leaving to the decision of commanders in the field. These are totally different questions from those of police regulations in armies and camps.

On the sixth day of March last, by a special message, I recommended to Congress the adoption of a joint resolution, to be substantially as follows:

" Resolved, That the United States ought to cooperate with any State which may adopt a gradual abolishment of slavery, giving to such State in its discretion to compensate for the inconveniences, public and private, produced by such change of systsm."

The resolution, in the language above quoted, was adopted by large majorities in both branches of Congress, and now stands an authentic, definite, and solemn proposal of the nation to the States and people most immediately interested in the subject, matter. To the people of these States I now earnestly appeal. I do not argue ; I beseech you to make the arguments for yourselves. You can not, if you would, be blind to the signs of the times. I beg of you a calm and enlarged consideration of them, ranging, if it may be, far above personal and partisan politics. This proposal makes common cause for a common object, casting no reproaches upon any. It acts not the Pharisee. The change it contemplates would come gently as the dews of Heaven, not rending or wrecking any thing. Will you not embrace it ? So much good has not been done by one effort in all past time, as, in the Providence of God, it is now your high privilege to do. May the vast future not have to lament that you have neglected it.

In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this nineteenth day of May, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty- two, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty- sixth.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

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The policy on which the Government had been acting, in the Slave districts, was substantially that repeated in an Executive order, under date of July 22, 1862 :

That military and naval commanders shall employ as laborers, within and from said States, so many persons of African descent as can be advantageously used for military or naval purposes, giving them reasonable wages for their labor.

That, as to both property, and persons of African descent, accounts shall be kept sufficiently accurate and in detail to show quantities and amounts, and from whom both property and such persons shall have come, as a basis upon which compensation can be made in proper cases ; and the several departments of this Government shall attend to and perform their appropriate parts toward the execution of these orders.

In August, Mr. Greeley, of New York, published in his journal, the Tribune, an editorial article on this subject, in the form of a letter addressed to the President, severely criticising his action, and complaining, in no very gentle terms, of various matters, wherein the Administration had, in his opinion, fallen short of the just expectations of " twenty millions" of loyal people. The whole letter proceeded from the mistaken assumption that the President had not, all along, reflected as earnestly, and felt as deeply, in regard to the question of emancipation, as any man living. It was written in ignorance of the fact that the President had already fully matured and resolved upon a definite policy in regard to Slavery, and was only awaiting the fitting moment for its announcement.

Mr, Lincoln thought proper to address Mr. Greeley the following letter, in reply to his complaints:

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, August 22, 1862.

Hon. HORACE GREELEY—Dear Sir: I have just read yours of the 19th, addressed to myself through the New York Tribune. If there be in it any statements or assumptions of fact which I may know to be erroneous, I do not now and here controvert them. If there be in it any inferences which I may believe to be falsely drawn, I do not now and here argue against them. If there be perceptible in it an impatient and dictatorial

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tone, I waive it in deference to an old friend, whose heart I have always supposed to be right.

As to the policy I " seem to be pursuing," as you say, I have not meant to leave any one in doubt.

I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way tinder the Constitution. The sooner the National authority can be restored, the nearer the Union will be " the Union as it was." If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time save Slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy Slavery, I do not agree with them. My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or 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 do 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 this Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views. I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty, and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men, every-where, could be free.

' Yours,

A. LINCOLN.

Although the proclamation of Emancipation had been prepared sometime before this letter was written—in fact as early as July —it was not deemed a fitting occasion to announce this great measure, when our army was recoiling from before Richmond, or when our Capital itself was threatened and Maryland invaded. The battle of Antietam, followed by the withdrawal of Lee's army into Virginia, occurred on the 17th day of September. The President, five days later, issued the following

PROCLAMATION OF EMANCIPATION.

I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, and Commander-in-chief of the Army and Navy thereof, do hereby proclaim and declare that hereafter, as heretofore, the war will be prosecuted for the object of practically restoring the constitutional relation between the United States and the people

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thereof in those States in which, that relation is, or may be, suspended or disturbed ; that it is my purpose upon the next meeting of Congress to again recommend the adoption of a practical measure tendering pecuniary aid to the free acceptance or rejection of all the Slave States, so-called, the people whereof may not then be in rebellion against the United States, and which States may then have voluntarily adopted, or thereafter may voluntarily adopt, the immediate or gradual abolishment of Slavery within their respective limits, and that the effort to colonize persons of African descent, with their consent, upon the continent or elsewhere, with the previously obtained consent of the government existing there, will be continued; 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 any 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 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 actual freedom; that the Executive will, on the first day of January aforesaid, by proclamation, designate the States and parts of States, if any, in which the people thereof respectively shall then be in rebellion against the United States ; and the fact that any State, or the people thereof, shall on that day be in good faith represented in the Congress of the United States by members chosen thereto, at elections wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such State shall have participated, shall, in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclusive evidence that such State and the people thereof have not been in rebellion against the United States.

That attention is hereby called to an act of Congress entitled. "An act to make an additional article of war," approved March 13, 1862, and which act is in the words and figures following:

"Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, That here-after the following shall be promulgated as an additional article of war for the government of the Army of the United States, and shall be observed and obeyed as such :

"ARTICLE —. All officers or persons of the military or naval service of the United States are prohibited from employing any of the forces under their respective commands for the purpose of returning fugitives from service or labor who may have escaped from, any persons to whom such service or labor is claimed to be due, and any officer who shall be found guilty by

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a court-martial of violating this article, shall be dismissed from the service.

"SEC. 2. And he it further enacted, that this act shall take effect from and after its passage."

Also to the ninth and tenth sections of an act entitled, "An act to suppress insurrection, to punish treason and rebellion, to seize and confiscate property of Rebels, and for other purposes," approved July 17, 1862, and which sections are in the words and figures following:

" SEC. 9, And be it further enacted, that all slaves of persons who shall hereafter be engaged in rebellion against the Government of the United States, or who shall in any way give aid or comfort thereto, escaping from such persons and taking refuge within the lines of the army; and all slaves captured from such persons or deserted by them, and coming under the control of the Government of the United States, and all slaves of such persons found on (or being within) any place occupied by Rebel forces and afterward occupied by the forces of the United States, shall be deemed captives of war, and shall be forever free of their servitude and not again held as slaves.

"SEC. 10. And be it further enacted, that no slave escaping into any State, Territory or the District of Columbia, from any of the States, shall be delivered up, or in any way impeded or hindered of his liberty, except for crime, or some offense against the laws, unless the person claiming said fugitive shall first make oath that the person to whom the labor or service of such fugitive is alleged to be due, is his lawful owner, and has not been in arms against the United States in the present rebellion, nor in any way given aid or comfort thereto ; and no person engaged in the military or naval service of the United States shall, under any pretense whatever, assume to decide on the validity of the claim of any person to the service or labor of any other person, or surrender up any such person to the claimant, on pain of being dismissed from the service."

And I do hereby enjoin upon, and order all persons engaged in the military and naval service of the United States to observe, obey and enforce within their respective spheres of service the act and sections above recited.

And the Executive will, in due time, recommend that all citizens of the United States who shall have remained loyal thereto throughout the rebellion, shall (upon the restoration of the constitutional relation between the United States and their respective States and people, if the relation shall have been sus-pended or disturbed) be compensated for all losses by acts of the United States, including the loss of slaves.

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In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this twenty-second day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-seventh,

By the President:

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

WM. H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.

This proclamation, inaugurating a new era in the progress of the war, and constituting a landmark in the nation's history for all time, was received with great satisfaction throughout the loyal States, reassuring the faith and reviving the confidence of those who now saw the only hope of a complete overthrow of the slaveholders' conspiracy, in the titter eradication of its mischievous and immoral cause. This decree flashed a new light across the Atlantic, and gave cheer to the friends of American republicanism abroad, affording them a firm foothold among the nations of the Old World, so many of whose ruling men had manifested a positive affinity for Davis and the inhuman revolt against freedom and civilization which he had inaugurated. From this time onward, that portion of the European population in sympathy with the constitutional government of this nation began steadily to advance, until its power has come to be strongly felt, and its influence controlling. In Europe, the line was now distinctly drawn between the grand principles of universal freedom and the usurpations of slaveholding barbarism ; between legitimate authority on the side of liberty, and organized revolt to perpetuate oppression.

On the 1st day of January, the expected proclamation, completing this great work and giving it actual vitality, was promulgated in the following terms :

WHEREAS. On the twenty-second day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, a proclamation was issued by the President of the United States, containing, among other things, the following, to-wit.

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 any designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the

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United States, shall be 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 :

That the Executive will, on the first day of January afore-said, by proclamation, designate the States and parts of States, if any, in which the people thereof respectively shall then be in rebellion against the United States, and the fact that any State, or the people thereof, shall on that day be in good faith represented in the Congress of the United States by members chosen thereto at elections wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such State shall have participated, shall, in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclusive evidence that such State and the people thereof are not then in rebellion against the United States :

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 repressing 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 of the 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, Terre Bonne, 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 Berkeley. 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.

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And I hereby enjoin upon the people so declared to be free, to abstain from all violence, unless in necessary self-defense, and I recommend to them, that in all cases, when allowed, they labor faithfully for reasonable wages.

And I further declare and make known that such persons of suitable condition will be received into the armed service of the United States to garrison forts, positions, stations, and other places, and to man vessels of all sorts in said service.

And upon this, sincerely believed to be an act of justice, warranted by the Constitution, upon military necessity, I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind and the gracious favor of Almighty God.

In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight [ L. S. ] hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the United States of America the eighty-seventh.

By the President: ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.

The power exercised by President Lincoln in suspending the writ, of habeas corpus, in certain cases, gave some uneasiness to a class of men whose efforts to obstruct the Government in putting down the rebellion had been pursued under the assumption that they would escape punishment on a formal trial, for the treason of which they were morally guilty. The people, however, fully sustained this course of the Executive, in a time of great public peril, and his prompt action therein tended materially to strengthen the Government. His proclamation on this subject, issued on the 24th day of September, 1862, contained the following orders:

That during the existing insurrection, and as a necessary measure for suppressing the same, all Eebels and insurgents, their aiders and abettors, within the United States, and all persons discouraging volunteer enlistments, resisting militia drafts, or guilty of any disloyal practice affording aid and comfort to the Rebels against the authority of the United States, shall be subject to martial law, and liable to trial and punishment by courts-martial or military commissions.

That the writ of habeas corpus is suspended in respect to all persons arrested, or who are now, or hereafter during the rebellion shall be, imprisoned in any fort, camp, arsenal, military

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prison, or other place of confinement, by any military authority, or by the sentence of any court-martial or military commission.

In noticing these measures, which have occupied so large a place in the public mind, it is fitting also to mention the order issued by President Lincoln, in response to an appeal made to him by many Christian men. in regard to the better observance of Sunday as a day of rest and religious devotion. " In revolutionary times," this reverence for the day can seldom be maintained in that strictness which is required even by human laws; but that a great improvement in this respect was practicable, could not be denied. The President's order on this subject, issued on the 16th of November, 1862, is one which deserves a perpetual remembrance. It is here subjoined :

The President, Commander-in-chief of the Army and Navy, desires and enjoins the orderly observance of the Sabbath, by the officers and men in the military and naval service. 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.

The discipline and character of the National forces should not suffer, nor the cause they defend be imperiled, by the profanation of the day or name of the Most High. "At this time of public distress," adopting the words of Washington in 1776, "men may find enough to do in the service of God and their country, without abandoning themselves to vice and immorality." The first general order issued by the Father of his Country, after the Declaration of Independence, indicates the spirit in which our institutions were founded and should ever be defended: "The General hopes and trusts that every officer and man will endeavor to live and act as becomes a Christian soldier defending the dearest rights and liberties of his country"

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

The Thirty-seventh Congress convened, for its last session, on the first day of December, 1862. The annual message of the President was transmitted to both Houses on that day. In view of the marked events of the preceding season, this docu ment was looked for with unusual interest; nor was its favor-

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able reception disproportioned to the public expectation. The material portions of this State paper are as follows:

MR. LINCOLN'S ANNUAL MESSAGE, 1862.

FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES : Since your last annual assembling, another year of health and bountiful harvests has passed, And, while it has not pleased the Almighty to bless us with a return of peace, we can but press on, guided by the best light He gives us, trusting that, in His own good time, and wise way, all will yet be well.....

If the condition of our relations with other nations is less gratifying than it has usually been at former periods, it is certainly more satisfactory than a nation so unhappily distracted as we are, might reasonably have apprehended. In the month of June last there were some grounds to expect that the maritime powers which, at the beginning of our domestic difficulties, so unwisely and unnecessarily, as we think, recognized the insurgents as a belligerent, would soon recede from that position, which has proved only less injurious to themselves than to our own country. But the temporary reverses which afterward befell the National arms, and which were exaggerated by our own disloyal citizens abroad, have hitherto delayed that act of simple justice.

The civil war, which has so radically changed, for the moment, the occupations and habits of the American people, has necessarily disturbed the social condition, and affected very deeply the prosperity of the nations with which we have carried on a commerce that has been steadily increasing throughout a period of half a century. It has, at the same time, excited political ambitions and apprehensions which have produced a profound agitation throughout the civilized world. In this unusual agitation we have forborne from taking part in any controversy between foreign States, and between parties or factions in such States. We have attempted no propagandism, and acknowledged no revolution; But we have left to every nation the exclusive conduct and management of its own affairs. Our struggle has been, of course, contemplated by foreign nations with reference less to its own merits, than to its supposed, and often exaggerated, effects and consequences resulting to those nations themselves. Nevertheless, complaint on the part of this Government, even if it were just, would certainly be unwise.

The treaty with Great Britain for the suppression of the slave-trade has been put into operation, with a good prospect

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of complete success. It is an occasion of special pleasure to acknowledge that the execution of it, on the part of Her Majesty's Government, has been marked with a jealous respect for the authority of the United States, and the rights of their moral and loyal citizens.....

Applications have been made to me by many free Americans of African descent to favor their emigration, with a view to such colonization, as was contemplated in recent acts of Con-gress. Other parties, at home and abroad—some from interested motives, others upon patriotic considerations, and still others influenced by philanthropic sentiments—have suggested similar measures; while, on the other hand, several of the Spanish-American republics have protested against the sending of such, colonies to their respective territories. Under these circumstances, I have declined to move any such colony to any State, without first obtaining the consent of its Government, with an agreement on its part to receive and protect such emi-grants in all the rights of freemen; and I have, at the same time, offered to the several States situated within the tropics, or having colonies there, to negotiate with them, subject to the advice and consent of the Senate, to favor the voluntary emigration of persons of that class to their respective territories, upon conditions which shall be equal, just and humane. Liberia and Hayti are, as yet, the only countries to which colonists of African descent from here, could go with certainty of being received and adopted as citizens; and I regret to say such persons, contemplating colonization, do not seem so willing to migrate to those countries, as to some others, nor so willing as I think their interest demands. I believe, however, opinion among them in this respect, is improving; and that, ere long, there will be aa augmented and considerable migration to both these countries, from the United States......

I have favored the project for connecting the United States with Europe by an Atlantic telegraph, and a similar project to extend the telegraph from San Francisco, to connect by a Pacific telegraph with the line which is being extended across the Russian Empire.

The Territories of the United States, with unimportant exceptions, have remained undisturbed by the civil war; and they are exhibiting such evidence of prosperity as justifies an expectation that some of them will sooa be in a condition to be organized as States, and he constitutionally admitted into the Federal Union.

The immense mineral resources of some of those Territories ought to be developed as rapidly as possible. Every step in that direction would have a tendency to improve the revenues

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of the Government, and diminish the burdens of the people. It is worthy of your serious consideration whether some extra-ordinary measures to promote that end can not he adopted. The means which suggest itself as most likely to be effective, is a scientific exploration of the mineral regions in those Territories, with a view to the publication of its results at home and in foreign countries—results which can not fail to be auspicious.

The condition of the finances will claim your most diligent consideration. The vast expenditures incident to the military and naval operations required for the suppression of the rebellion, have hitherto been met with a promptitude and certainty unusual in similar circumstances ; and the public credit has been fully maintained. The continuance of the war, however, and the increased disbursements made necessary by the augmented forces now in the field, demand your best reflections as to the best modes of providing the necessary revenue, without injury to business, and with the least possible burdens upon labor.

The suspension of specie payments by the banks, soon after the commencement of your last session, made large issues of United States notes unavoidable. In. no other way could the payment of the troops, and the satisfaction of other just demands, be so economically, or so well provided for. The judicious legislation of Congress, securing the receivability of these notes for loans and internal duties, and making them a legal tender for other debts, has made them an universal currency ; and has satisfied, partially, at least, and for the time, the long felt want of an uniform circulating medium, saving thereby to the people immense sums in discounts and exchanges.

A return to specie payments, however, at the earliest period compatible with due regard to all interests concerned, should ever be kept in view. Fluctuations in the value of currency • are always injurious, and to reduce these fluctuations to the lowest possible point will always be a leading purpose in wise legislation. Convertibility, prompt and certain convertibility into coin, is generally acknowledged to be the best and the surest safeguard against them ; and it is extremely doubtful whether a circulation of United States notes, payable in coin, and sufficiently large for the wants of the people, can be permanently, usefully and safely maintained.

Is there, then, any other mode in which the necessary provision for the public wants can be made, and the great advantages of a safe and uniform currency secured?

I know of none which promises so certain results, and is, at the same time, so unobjectionable, as the organization of banking associations, under a general act of Congress, well guarded

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in its provisions. To such associations the Government might furnish circulating notes, on the security of the United States bonds deposited in the treasury. These notes, prepared under the supervision of proper officers, being uniform in appearance and security, and convertible always into coin, would at once protect labor against the evils of a vicious currency, and facilitate commerce by cheap and safe exchanges.

A moderate reservation from the interest on the bonds would compensate the United States for the preparation and distribution of the notes, and a general supervision of the system, and would lighten the burden of that part of the public debt employed as securities. The public credit, moreover, would be greatly improved, and the negotiation of new loans greatly facilitated by the steady market demand for Government bonds which the adoption of the proposed system would create.

It is an additional recommendation of the measure of considerable weight, in my judgment, that it would reconcile, as far as possible, all existing interests, by the opportunity offered to existing institutions to reorganize under the act, substituting only the secured uniform national circulation for the local and various circulation, secured and unsecured, now issued by them.

The receipts into the treasury, from all sources, including loans, and balance from the preceding year, for the fiscal year ending on the 30th June, 1862, were $588,885,247 06, of which sum $49,056,397 62 were derived from customs; $1,795,331 73 from the direct tax; from public lands $152,203 77; from miscellaneous sources, $931,787 64; from loans in all forms, 1529,692,460 50. The remainder, $2.257,065 80, was the balance from last year.

The disbursements daring the same period were for congressional, executive, and judicial purposes, $5,939,009 29; for foreign intercourse, $1,339,710 35 ; for miscellaneous expenses, including the mints, loans, post office deficiencies, col- , lection of revenue, and other like charges, $14,129,771 50; for expenses under the Interior Department, $8,102,985 52; under the War Department, $394,368,407 36; under the Navy Department, $42,674,569 69; for interest on public debt, $13,190,324 45; and for payment of public debt, including reimbursement of temporary loan, and redemptions, $96,096,922 09; making an aggregate of $570,841,700 25, and leaving a balance in the treasury on the first day of July. 1862, of $13,043,546 81.

It should be observed that the sum of $96,096,922 09, expended for reimbursements and redemption of public debt, being included also in the loans made, may be properly deducted, both from receipts and expenditures, leaving the actual

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receipts for the year, $487,788,324 97 ; and the expenditures, $474,744,778 16. . . . .

On the 22d day of September last a proclamation was issued by the Executive, a copy of which is herewith submitted.

In accordance with the purpose expressed in the second paragraph of that paper, I now respectfully recall your attention to what may be called "compensated emancipation."

A nation may be said to consist of its territory, its people and its laws. The territory is the only part which is of certain durability. "One generation passeth away and another generation cometh, but the earth abideth forever." It is of the first importance to duly consider, and estimate, this ever-enduring part. That portion of the earth's surface which is owned and inhabited by the people of the United States, is well adapted to be the home of one national family ; and it is not well adapted for two, or more. Its vast extent, and its variety of climate and productions, are of advantage, in this age, for one people, whatever they might have been in former ages. Steam, telegraphs and intelligence have brought these to be an advantageous combination for one united people.

In the inaugural address I briefly pointed out the total inadequacy of disunion, as a remedy for the differences between the people of the two sections. I did so in language which I can not improve, and which, therefore, I beg to repeat:

" One section of our country believes Slavery is right, and ought to be extended, while the other believes it is wrong, and ought not to be extended. This is the only substantial dispute. The fugitive slave clause of the Constitution, and the law for the suppression of the foreign slave-trade, are each as well enforced, perhaps, as any law can ever be in a community where the moral sense of the people imperfectly supports the law itself. The great body of the people abide by the dry legal obligation in both cases, and a few break over in each. This, I think, can not be perfectly cured ; and it would be worse in both cases after the separation of the sections, than before. The foreign slave-trade, now imperfectly suppressed, would be ultimately revived without restriction in one section ; while fugitive slaves, now only partially surrendered, would not be surrendered at all by the other.

" Physically speaking, we can not separate. We can not remove our respective sections from each other, nor build an impassable wall between them. A husband and wife may be divorced, and go out of the presence, and beyond the reach of each other; but the different parts of our country can not do this. They can not but remain face to face ; and intercourse, either amicable or hostile, must continue between them. Is it

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possible, then, to make that Intercourse more advantageous, or more satisfactory, after separation than before f Can aliens make treaties easier than friends can make laws ? Can treaties be more faithfully enforced between aliens, than laws can among friends? Suppose you go to war, you can not fight always; and when, after much loss on both sides, and no gain on either, you cease fighting, the identical old questions, as to terms of intercourse, are again upon you."

There is no line, straight or crooked, suitable for a National boundary, upon which to divide. Trace through, from east to west, upon the line between the free and slave country, and we shall find a little more than one-third of its length are rivers, easy to be crossed, and populated, or soon to be populated, thickly, upon both sides; while nearly all its remaining length are merely surveyors' lines, over which people may walk back and forth without any consciousness of their presence. No part of this line can be made any more difficult to pass, by writing it down on paper, or parchment, as a national boundary. The fact of separation, if it comes, gives up, on the part of the seceding section, the fugitive slave clause, along with all other constitutional obligations upon the section seceded from, while I should expect no treaty stipulation would ever be made to take its place.

But there is another difficulty. The great interior region, bounded east by the Alleghanies, north by the British Dominions, west by the Rocky Mountains, and south by the line along which the culture of corn and cotton meets, and which includes part of Virginia, part of Tennessee, all of Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Iowa, Minnesota, and the Territories of Dakotah, Nebraska, and part of Colorado, already has above ten millions of people, and will have fifty millions within fifty years, if not prevented by any political folly or mistake. It contains more than one-third of the country owned by the United States—certainly more than one million of square miles. Once half as populous as Massachusetts already is, it would have more than seventy-five millions of people. A glance at the map shows that, territorially speaking, it is the great body of the Republic. The other parts are but marginal borders to it; the magnificent region sloping west from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific, being the deepest, and also the richest, in undeveloped resources. In the production of provisions, grains, grasses, and all which proceed from them, this great interior region is naturally one of the most important in the world. Ascertain from the statistics the small proportion of the region which has, as yet, been brought into cultivation, and also the large and rapidly increas-

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ing amount of its products, and we shall be overwhelmed with the magnitude of the prospect presented. And yet this region has no sea-coast, touches no ocean any-where. As part of one nation, its people now find, and may forever find, their way to Europe by New York, to South America and Africa by New Orleans, and to Asia by San Francisco. But separate our common country into two nations, as designed by the present rebellion, and every man of this great interior region is thereby cut off from some one or more of these outlets, not, perhaps, by a physical barrier, but by embarrassing and onerous trade regulations.

And this is true,wherever a dividing or boundary line may be fixed. Place it between the now free and slave country, or place it south of Kentucky, or north of Ohio, and still the truth remains, that none south of it can trade to any port or place north of it, and none north of it can trade to any port or place south of it, except upon terms dictated by a government foreign to them. These outlets, east, west, and south, are indispensable to the well-being of the people inhabiting, and to inhabit, this vast interior region. Which of the three may be the best, is no proper question. All are better than either; and all, of right, belong to that people, and to their successors forever. True to themselves, they will not ask where a line of separation shall be, but will vow, rather, that there shall be no such line. Nor are the marginal regions less interested in these communications to, and through them, to the great outside world. They, too, and each of them, must have access to this Egypt of the West, without paying toll at the crossing of any national boundary.

Our National strife springs not from, our permanent part; not from the land we inhabit; not from our National homestead. There is no possible severing of this, hut would multiply, and not mitigate, evils among us. In all its adaptations and aptitudes, it demands union, and abhors separation. In fact, it would, ere long, force reunion, however much of blood and treasure the separation might have cost.

Our strife pertains to ourselves—to the passing generations of men ; and it can, without convulsion, be hushed forever with the passing of one generation.

In this view, I recommend the adoption of the following resolution and articles amendatory to the Constitution of the United States:

"Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, (two-thirds of both Houses concurring,) That the following articles be proposed to the Legislatures (or conventions) of the several States

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as amendments to the Constitution of the United States, all ox any of which articles, when ratified by three-fourths of the said Legislatures (or conventions), to be valid as part or parts of the said Constitution, viz.:

"ARTICLE — Every State, wherein slavery now exists, which shall abolish the same therein, at any time, or times, before the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand and nine hundred, shall receive compensation from the United States as follows, to-wit:

" The President of the United States shall deliver, to every such State, bonds of the United States, bearing interest at the rate of ——— per cent, per annum, to an amount equal to the aggregate sum of for each slave shown to have been therein, by the eighth census of the United States, said bonds to be delivered to such State by installments, or in one parcel, at the completion of the abolishment, accordingly as the same shall have been gradual, or at one time, within such State; and interest shall begin to run upon any such bond, only from the proper time of its delivery as aforesaid. Any State, having received bonds as aforesaid, and afterward re-introducing or tolerating slavery therein, shall refund to the United States the bonds so received, or the value thereof, and all interest paid thereon.

"ARTICLE —. All slaves who shall have enjoyed actual freedom by the chances of the war, at any time before the end of the rebellion, shall be forever free; but all owners of such, who shall not have been disloyal, shall be compensated for them, at the same rates as is provided for States adopting abolishment of slavery, but in such way, that no slave shall be twice accounted for.

"ARTICLE —. Congress may appropriate money, and otherwise provide for colonizing free colored persons, with their own consent, at any place or places without the United States,"

I beg indulgence to discuss these proposed articles at some length. Without slavery, the rebellion could never have existed ; without slavery, it could not continue.

Among the friends of the Union, there is great diversity of sentiment, and of policy, in regard to slavery, and the African race among us. Some would perpetuate slavery; some would abolish it suddenly, and without compensation; some would abolish it gradually, and with compensation; some would remove the freed people from us, and some would retain them with us; and there are yet other minor diversities. Because of these diversities, we waste much strength in struggles among ourselves. By mutual concession we should harmonize, and act together, This would be compromise; but it would be

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compromise among the friends, and not with the enemies of the Union. These articles are intended to embody a plan of such mutual concessions. If the plan shall be adopted, it is assumed that emancipation will follow, at least in several of the States.

As to the first article, the main points are: first, the emancipation ; secondly, the length of time for consummating it— thirty-seven years; and, thirdly, the compensation.

The emancipation will be unsatisfactory to the advocates of perpetual slavery; but the length of time should greatly mitigate their dissatisfaction. The time spares both races from the evils of sudden derangement—in fact, from the necessity of any derangement—while most of those whose habitual course of thought will be disturbed by the measure, will have passed away before its consummation. They will never see it. Another class will hail the prospect of emancipation, but will deprecate the length of time. They will feel that it gives too little to the now living slaves. But it really gives them much. It saves them from the vagrant destitution which must largely attend immediate emancipation in localities where their numbers are very great; and it gives the inspiring assurance that their posterity shall be free forever. The plan leaves to each State, choosing to act under it, to abolish slavery now, or at the end of the century, or at any intermediate time, or by degrees, extending over the whole or any part of the period; and it obliges no two States to proceed alike. It also provides for compensation, and, generally, the mode of making it. This, it would seem, must further mitigate the dissatisfaction of those who favor perpetual slavery, and especially of those who are to receive the compensation. Doubtless, some of those who are to pay, and not to receive, will object. Yet the measure is both just and economical. In a certain sense, the liberation of slaves is the destruction of property—property acquired by descent, or by purchase, the same as any other property. It is no less true for having been often said, that the people of the South are not more responsible for the original introduction of this property, than are the people of the North; and when it is remembered how unhesitatingly we all use cotton and sugar, and share the profits of dealing in them, it may not be quite safe to say, that the South has been more responsible than the North for its continuance. If, then, for a common object, this property is to be sacrificed, is it not just that it be done at a common charge?

And if, with less money, or money more easily paid, we can preserve the benefits of the Union by this means, than we can by the war alone, is it not also economical to do it? Let us

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consider it then. Let us ascertain the sum we have expended in the war since compensated emancipation was proposed last March, and consider whether, if that measure had been promptly accepted, by even some of the slave States, the same sum would not have done more to close the war, than has been otherwise done. If so, the measure would save money, and, in that view, would be a prudent and economical measure. Certainly it is not so easy to pay something as it is to pay nothing; but it is easier to pay a large sum, than it is to pay a larger one. And it is easier to pay any sum when we are able, than it is to pay it before we are able. The war requires large sums, and requires them at once. The aggregate sum necessary for compensated emancipation, of course, would be large. But it would require no ready cash ; nor the bonds even, any faster than the emancipation progresses. This might not, and probably would not, close before the end of the thirty-seven years. At that time we shall probably have a hundred millions of people to share the burden, instead of thirty-one millions, as now. And not only so, but the increase of our population may be expected to continue for a long time after that period, as rapidly as before; because our territory will not have become full. I do not state this inconsiderately. At the same ratio of increase which we have maintained, on an average, from our first .National census, in 1790, until that of 1860, we should, in 1900, have a population of 103,208,415. And why may we not continue that ratio far beyond that period ? Our abundant room— our broad National homestead—is our ample resource. Were our territory as limited as are the British Isles, very certainly our population could not expand as stated. Instead of receiving the foreign born, as now, we should be compelled to send part of the native bora away. But such is not our condition. We have two millions nine hundred and sixty-three thousand square miles. Europe has three millions and eight hundred thousand, with a population averaging seventy-three and one-third persons to the square mile. Why may not our country, at some time, average as many? Is it less fertile? Has it more waste surface, by mountains, rivers, lakes, deserts, or other causes? Is it inferior to Europe in any natural advantage? If, then, we are, at some time, to be as populous as Europe, how soon ? As to when this may be, we can judge by the past and the present; as to when it will be, if ever, depends much on whether we maintain the Union. Several of our States are already above the average of Europe—seventy-three and a third to the square mile. Massachusetts has 157; Rhode Island, 133; Connecticut. 99; New York and New Jersey, each, SO. Also two other great States, Pennsylvania and Ohio,

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are not far below, the former having 63 and the latter 59. The States already above the European average, except New York, have increased in as rapid a ratio, since passing that point, as ever before ; while no one of them is equal to some other parts of our country, in natural capacity for sustaining a dense population.

Taking the nation in the aggregate, and we find its population and ratio of increase, for the several decennial periods, to be as follows:

1790............ 3,929,827

1800............ 5,305,937 35.02 per cent, ratio of increase.

1810............ 7,239.814 36.4.5 " "

1820............ 9,638',131 33.13 " "

1830............ 12,866,020 33.49 " "

1840............ 17,069.453 32.67 " "

1850............ 23,191,876 35.87 " "

1860............ 31,443,790 35.58 " "

This shows an average decennial increase of 34.60 per cent, in population through the seventy years from our first, to our last census yet taken. It is seen that the ratio of increase, at no one of these seven periods, is either two per cent, below, or two per cent, above, the average, thus showing how inflexible, and, consequently, how reliable, the law of increase, in our case, is. Assuming that it will continue, gives the following results:

1870....................................................... 42,323,341

1880....................................................... 56,967,216

1890....................................................... 76,677,872

1900....................................................... 103,208,415

1910....................................................... 138,918,526

1920....................................................... 186,984.335

1930....................................................... 251,680,914

These figures show that our country may be as populous as Europe now is, at some point between 1920 and 1930 — say about 1925 — our territory, at seventy-three and a third persons to the square mile, being the capacity to contain 217,186,000.

And we will reach this, too, if we do not ourselves relinquish the chance, by the folly and evils of disunion, or by long and exhausting war, springing from the only great element of National discord among us. While it can not be foreseen exactly how much one huge example of secession, breeding lesser ones indefinitely, would retard population, civilization, and prosperity, no one can doubt that the extent of it would be very great and injurious.

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The proposed emancipation would shorten the war, perpetuate peace, insure this increase of population, and proportionately the wealth of the country. With these, we should pay all the emancipation would cost, together with our other debt, easier than we should pay our other debt, without it. If we had allowed our old National debt to run at six per cent per annum, simple interest, from the end of our Revolutionary struggle until to-day, without paying anything on either principal or interest, each man of us would owe less upon that debt now than each man owed upon it then; and this because our increase of men, through the whole period, has been greater than six per cent, ; has run faster than the interest upon the debt. Thus, time alone relieves a debtor nation, so long as its population increases faster than unpaid interest accumulates on its debt.

This fact would be no excuse for delaying payment of what is justly due ; but it shows the great importance of time in this connection—the great advantage of a policy by which we shall not have to pay until we number a hundred millions, what, by a different policy, we would have to pay now, when we number but thirty-one millions. In a word, it shows that a dollar will be much harder to pay for the war, than will be a dollar for emancipation on the proposed plan. And then the latter will cost no blood, no precious life. It will be a saving of both.

As to the second article. I think it would be impracticable to return to bondage the class of persons therein contemplated. Some of them, doubtless, in the property sense, belong to loyal owners; and hence, provision is made in this article for compensating such.

The third article relates to the future of the freed people. It does not oblige, but merely authorizes, Congress to aid in colonizing such as may consent. This ought not to be regarded as objectionable, on the one hand, or on the other, in so much as it comes to nothing, unless by the mutual consent of the people to be deported, and the American voters, through their representatives in Congress.

I can not make it better known than it already is, that J strongly favor colonization. And yet I wish to say there is an objection urged against free colored persons remaining in the country, which is largely imaginary, if not sometimes malicious.

It is insisted that their presence would injure, and displace white labor and white laborers. If there ever could be a proper time for mere catch arguments, that time surely is not now. In times like the present, men should utter nothing for which they would not willingly be responsible through time and in eternity. Is it true, then, that colored people can displace

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any more white labor by being free, than by remaining slaves? If they stay in their old places, they jostle no white laborers: if they leave their old places, they leave them open to white laborers. Logically, there is neither more nor less of it. Emancipation, even without deportation, would probably enhance the wages of white labor, and, very surely, would not reduce them. Thus, the customary amount of labor would still have to be performed; the freed people would surely not do more than their old proportion of it, and very probably, for a time, would do less, leaving an increased part to white labor-ers, bringing their labor into greater demand, and, consequently, enhancing the wages of it. With deportation, even to a limited extent, enhanced wages to white labor is mathematically certain. Labor is like any other commodity in the market—increase the demand for it, and you increase the price of it. Reduce the supply of black labor, by colonizing the black laborer out of the country, and, by precisely so much, you increase the demand for, and wages of, white labor.

But it is dreaded that the freed people will swarm forth, and cover the whole land ? Are they not already in the land? Will liberation make them any more numerous? Equally distributed among the whites of the whole country, and there would be hut one colored to seven whites. Could the one, in any way, greatly disturb the seven ? There are many communities now, having more than one free colored person to seven whites ; and this without any apparent consciousness of evil from it. The Dis -trict of Columbia, and the States of Maryland and Delaware, are ail in this condition. The District has more than one free colored to six whites; and yet, in its frequent petitions to Congress, I believe it has never presented the presence of free colored persons as one of its grievances. But why should emancipation South send the freed people North? People, of any color, seldom run, unless there be something to run from. Heretofore, colored people, to some extent, have fled North from bondage ; and now, perhaps, from both bondage and destitution. But if gradual emancipation and deportation be adopted, they will have neither to flee from. Their old masters will give them wages, at least until new laborers can be procured ; and the freed men, in turn, will gladly give their labor for the wages, till new homes can be found for them, in congenial climes, and with people of their own blood and race. This proposition can be trusted on the mutual interests involved. And, in any event, can not the North decide for itself, whether to receive them?

Again, as practice proves more than theory, in any case, has

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there been any irruption of colored people northward, because of the abolishment of slavery in this District last spring?

What I have said of the proportion of free colored persons to the whites, in the District, is from the census of 1860, having no reference to persons called contrabands, nor to those made free by the act of Congress abolishing slavery here.

The plan consisting of these articles is recommended, not but that a restoration of the National authority would be accepted without its adoption.

Nor will the war, nor proceedings under the proclamation of September 22, 1862, be stayed because of the recommendation of this plan. Its timely adoption, I doubt not, would bring restoration, and thereby stay both.

And, notwithstanding this plan, the recommendation that Congress provide by law for compensating any State which may adopt emancipation, before this plan shall have been acted upon, is hereby earnestly renewed. Such would be only an advance part of the plan, and the same arguments apply to both.

This plan is recommended as a means, not in exclusion of, but in addition to, all others for restoring and preserving the National authority throughout the Union. The subject is presented exclusively in its economical aspect. The plan would, I am confident, secure peace more speedily, and maintain it more permanently, than can be done by force alone; while all it would cost, considering amounts, and manner of payment, and times of payment, would be easier paid than will be the additional cost of the war, if we rely solely upon force. It is much—very much—that it would cost no blood at all.

The plan is proposed as permanent constitutional law. It can not become such without the concurrence of, first, two-thirds of Congress, and, afterward, three-fourths of the States. The requisite three-fourths of the States will necessarily include seven of the slave States. Their concurrence, if obtained, will give assurance of their severally adopting emancipation, at no very distant day, upon the new constitutional terms. This assurance would end the struggle now, and save the Union forever.

I do not forget the gravity which should characterize a paper addressed to the Congress of the nation, by the Chief Magistrate of the nation. Nor do I forget that some of you are my "eniors; nor that many of you have more experience than I the conduct of public affairs. Yet I trust that, in view of the great responsibility resting upon me, you will perceive BO Want of respect to yourselves, in any undue earnestness I may seem to display.

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Is it doubted, then, that the plan I propose, if adopted, would shorten the war, and thus lessen its expenditure of money and of blood? Is it doubted that it would restore the National authority and National prosperity, and perpetuate both indefinitely ? Is it doubted that we here—Congress and Executive— can secure its adoption ? Will not the good people respond to a united and earnest appeal from us ? Can we, can they, by any other means, so certainly, or so speedily, assure these vital objects? We can succeed only by concert. It is not, "Can any of us imagine better?" but, "Can we all do better?" Object whatsoever is possible, still the question recurs, " Can we do better?" The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disinthrall ourselves, and then we shall, save our country.

Fellow-citizens, we can not escape history. We, of this Congress and this Administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation. We say we are for the Union. The world will not forget that we say this. We know how to save the Union. The world knows we do know how to save it. We—even we here—hold the power, and bear the responsibility. In giving freedom to the slace, we assure freedom to the free—honorable alike ia what we give, and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth. Other means may succeed ; this could not fail. The way is plain, peaceful, generous, just—a way which, if followed, the world will forever applaud, and God must forever bless.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

DECEMBER 1, 1862.

During the session, the Opposition leaders, elated with their recent successes in the elections, assumed a greater boldness of hostility to the Administration, some of them defiantly avowing their desire that further resistance to armed rebellion should cease. Throughout the country, the mask under which so many Congressional districts had lately been carried, began to be gradually withdrawn.

Among the principal transactions of this session, aside from the necessary appropriations, were : The admission of the new State of West Virginia, by an act approved Dec. 31,1862; the

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organization of the new territory of Arizona Feb 24, 1863; the passage of a stringent act to prevent and punish frauds upon the Government, March 2, 1863; the enactment of a law for enrolling and calling out the National forces (sometimes called the "conscription act;") an authorization of the issue of letters of marque and reprisal; the organization of the new territory of Idaho ; and the passage of an act to provide for the collection of abandoned property in insurrectionary districts • the last four measures having been approved on the 3d of March, 1863, when the session closed.

Soon after the adjournment of Congress, a closely contested election occurred in New Hampshire, in which the Opposition spared no exertion to secure a popular verdict against the Administration. It was soon manifest, however, that a change was taking place in the public mind—a strong reaction from that tone of sentiment which brought political defeat in the preceding autumn. The election had a highly favorable result Connecticut and Rhode Island, also, in the following month," emphatically indorsed President Lincoln and Ms policy. The most trying period had passed.