Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation 150 Years ago on January 1, 1863. As noted by historian Harold Holzer in an article at the Daily Beast, 4 million African-American slaves and thousands of white abolitionists awaited word of the signing of the document. The signing was delayed by a New Year’s party held in the White House was attended by the diplomatic corps, military elite and members of Congress. When the official party was over, White House guards opened the doors to allow several thousand members of the general public join in the revelry.

Waiting for the signing were several anti-slavery activists who had been praying in Northern churches since midnight on New Year’s Eve. Many wondered if the delay meant that Lincoln would renege on the promise made in the preliminary proclamation of September 22, 1862 that if Confederate States did not return to the Union within 100 days, their slaves would be considered forever free.

Pro-slavery advocates and newspapers in the United States and in Europe derided Lincoln for  fomenting “servile insurrection,” abandoning his “constitutional moorings,” and threatening the American social order. The stock market went into decline after the preliminary proclamation. Army desertions rose and enlistment fell. Many wondered if Lincoln had the backbone to actually sign the official proclamation.

Lincoln had recently assured a delegation of Union men from his native Kentucky, “he would rather die than take back a word of the Proclamation of Freedom.” By Christmas, abolitionist Senator Charles Sumner was convinced that the president “would not stop the Proclamation if he could, and could not if he would.”

From the Holzer article

Lincoln had not intended to make America’s freedom community wait those tense extra hours while he attended his annual holiday reception. A typographical error made him do it. Earlier that day, the president had unrolled and meticulously proofread the official copy of the final proclamation, as painstakingly “engrossed” on a vellum scroll by a professional scribe. Unfortunately, a dismayed Lincoln spotted a tiny error within the boilerplate language at the bottom of this initial copy—the “hereunto set his hand” phrase had been mistakenly transcribed as “set his name.” Insisting that the document must be absolutely perfect because it would be so closely scrutinized, he ordered that the scribe create a new version—holiday notwithstanding. Not until mid-afternoon was the revised scroll finally ready. As soon as the annual reception ended, Lincoln quickly headed from the East Room upstairs to his private office, where he commenced patiently inspecting it. This time, he found no mistakes at all. But another delay—albeit a brief one—would now follow.

Lincoln had been shaking hands since the morning and found his hands so weak and numb that his handwriting would have appeared erratic and suggest hesitation if he signed the bill at the time. He massaged his hands to regain strength. When sensation returned, Abraham placed the now famous signature on the bill saying,: “That will do”.

The argument about whether the Proclamation did anything than serve as a mechanism to keep England from recognizing the Confederacy has been raging since the signing others feel that 50,000 slaves mostly along the Carolina coast immediately gained there freedom. The Emancipation Proclamation can be viewed as the first step in the decision by the government to end slavery in the United States. Union troops encountered thousands of slaves yearning to be free as they moved through the South. After initial reluctance to arbor the newly freed slaves, the decision was made to actually carry out the measure called for in the Proclamation. The property owned by Jefferson Davis was used as a safe harbor for his former slaves when Grant began attacking the nearby town of Vicks burg.

In its own time, Union charity organizer Mary Livermore called it “the sheet anchor of hope, the rainbow of promise, to the oppressed of every land, at home and abroad.” Harriet Beecher Stowe, whose novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin had galvanized Northern opposition to slavery, likened Lincoln to “Moses leading his Israel through the wilderness.” And America’s freedom poet John Greenleaf Whittier suggested that Lincoln’s document, once considered banal, had been divinely inspired: “The mighty word / He spake was not his own; / An impulse from the Highest stirred / These chiseled lips alone.”

The Proclamation only addressed slavery in Confederate states. Slave states that remained in the Union like Delaware, were unaffected by the law.  Black troop recruitment increased after the Proclamation.

Just as the Declaration of Independence did not free the colonists, the Emancipation Proclamation did not free the slaves. Both documents wound up beginning the process of freedom. For African-Americans official freedom came in the 13^th Amendment to the Constitution.

Happy 2013. the sesquicentennial of the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation.