President Lincoln’s main aim was the preservation of
the Union, but as the Civil War went on, he realized the importance of the
black emancipation, also for a military strategy against the rebelling states
of the Confederacy (= Southern states).
In Sept. 1862 Lincoln allowed Confederate states not
more than 100 days to surrender without forfeiting their slaves.
1st January 1863
Lincoln’s Emancipation gave freedom to all black slaves living in the South,
while in war against the North. Such a measure increased support for the Union
both at home and abroad (France, Great Britain).
The Emancipation, however, did not set free all the
slaves, but only those who lived in the seceded states of the South.
Consequently, the slaves living in the states still in the Union did not
benefit from Emancipation. It was a measure to weaken the Confederacy in war
against the Union, because its economy strongly depended on slave labour (in
fact almost half a million blacks left the plantations of the South to join
the Union lines in the following three years).
European immigrants in the North (Irish, German) and many other poor
workers did not welcome the black Emancipation as they feared a worsening in
their living standard an account of the massive wave of black immigration
Northward è race
riots broke out in many northern cities in 1862.
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