better than its own self-respect, or their admiring confidence. For our Government even to seek, after war has been made on it, to dispel the affected apprehensions of armed traitors that their cherished privileges may be assailed by it, is to invite insult and encourage hopes of its own downfall. 5 The rush to arms of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, is the true answer at once to the Rebel raids of John Morgan, and the traitorous sophistries of Beriah Magoffin.

V. We complain that the Union Cause has suffered, and is now suffering immensely, from mistaken-deference to Rebel 10 Slavery. Had you, Sir, in your Inaugural Address,1 unmistakably given notice that, in case the Rebellion already commenced were persisted in, and your efforts to preserve the Union and enforce the laws should be resisted by armed force, you would recognize no loyal person as rightfully held in 15 Slavery by a traitor, we believe the Rebellion would therein have received a staggering if not fatal blow. At that moment, according to the returns of the most recent elections, the Unionists were a large majority of the voters of the Slave States. But they were composed in good part of 20 the aged, the feeble, the wealthy, the timid, -the young, the reckless, the aspiring, the adventurous, had already been lured by the gamblers and negro-traders, the politicians by trade and the conspirators by instinct, into the toils of Treason. Had you then proclaimed that Rebellion would 25 strike the shackles from the slaves of every traitor, the wealthy and the cautious would have been supplied with a powerful inducement to remain loyal. As it was, every coward in the South soon became a traitor from fear; for Loyalty was perilous, while Treason seemed comparatively 30 safe. Hence the boasted unanimity of the South a unanimity based on Rebel terrorism and the fact that immunity and safety were found on that side, danger and probable death on ours. The Rebels from the first have been eager to confiscate, imprison, scourge and kill: we have fought $5

1 See p. 228.

wolves with the devices of sheep. The result is just what might have been expected. Tens of thousands are fighting in the Rebel-ranks to-day whose original bias and natural leanings would have led them into ours.

5 VI. We complain that the Confiscation Act which you approved is habitually disregarded by your Generals, and that no word of rebuke for them from you has yet reached the public ear. Fremont's proclamation and Hunter's Order favoring Emancipation were promptly annulled by you; 10 while Halleck's No. 3, forbidding fugitives from Slavery to Rebels to come within his lines an order as unmilitary as inhuman, and which received the hearty approbation of every traitor in America, with scores of like tendency, have never provoked even your remonstrance. We complain that the 15 officers of your Armies have habitually repelled rather than invited the approach of slaves who would have gladly taken the risks of escaping from their Rebel masters to our camps, bringing intelligence often of inestimable value to the Union cause. We complain that those who have escaped to 20 us, avowing a willingness to do for us whatever might be required, have been brutally and madly repulsed, and often surrendered to be scourged, maimed and tortured by the ruffian traitors, who pretend to own them. We complain that a large proportion of our regular Army Officers, with 25 many of the Volunteers, evince far more solicitude to uphold Slavery than to put down the Rebellion. And finally, we complain that you, Mr. President, elected as a Republican, knowing well what an abomination Slavery is, and how emphatically it is the core and essence of this atrocious Re30 bellion, seem never to interfere with these atrocities, and never give a direction to your Military subordinates which does not appear to have been conceived in the interest of Slavery rather than of Freedom.

VII. Let me call your attention to the recent tragedy in 35 New Orleans, whereof the facts are obtained entirely through Fro-Slavery channels. A considerable body of resolute, able

bodied men, held in slavery by two Rebel sugar-planters in defiance of the Confiscation Act which you have approved, left plantations thirty miles distant and made their way to the great mart of the South-West, which they knew to be in the undisputed possession of the Union forces. They made 5 their way safely and quietly through thirty miles of Rebel territory, expecting to find freedom under the protection of our flag. Whether they had or had not heard of the passage of the Confiscation Act, they reasoned logically that we would not kill them for deserting the service of their life- 10 long oppressors, who had through treason become our implacable enemies. They came to us for liberty and protection, for which they were willing to render their best service: they met with hostility, captivity, and murder. The barking of the base curs of Slavery in this quarter deceives no 15 one, — not even themselves. They say, indeed, that the negroes had no right to appear in New Orleans armed (with their implements of daily labor in the cane-field); but no one doubts that they would gladly have laid these down if assured that they should be free. They were set upon and 20 maimed, captured and killed, because they sought the benefit of that Act of Congress which they may not specifically have heard of, but which was none the less the law of the land which they had a clear right to the benefit of which it was somebody's duty to publish far and wide, in order 2; that so many as possible should be impelled to desist from serving Rebels and the Rebellion and come over to the side of the Union. They sought their liberty in strict accordance with the law of the land they were butchered or reenslaved for so doing by the help of Union soldiers enlisted to fight against Slaveholding Treason. It was somebody's fault that they were so murdered if others shall hereafter suffer in like manner, in default of explicit and public direction to your generals that they are to recognize and obey the Confiscation Act, the world will lay the blame on you Whether you will choose to hear it through future History and at the bar of God, I will not judge. I can only hope.

VIII. On the face of this wide earth, Mr. President, there is not one disinterested, determined, intelligent champion of the Union Cause who does not feel that all attempts to put down the Rebellion and at the same time to uphold its incit5 ing cause are preposterous and futile — that the Rebellion if crushed out to-morrow, would be renewed within a year if Slavery were left in full vigor - that Army officers who remain to this day devoted to Slavery can at best be but halfway loyal to the Union and that every hour of deference 10 to Slavery is an hour of added and deepened peril to the Union. I appeal to the testimony of your Embassadors in Europe. It is freely at your service, not at mine.

Ask them to tell you candidly whether the seeming subserviency of your policy to the slaveholding, slavery-upholding interest, is not 15 the perplexity, the despair of statesmen of all parties, and be admonished by the general answer!

IX. I close as I began with the statement that what an immense majority of the Loyal Millions of your countrymen require of you is a frank, declared, unqualified, ungrudging 20 execution of the laws of the land, more especially of the Confiscation Act. That act gives freedom to the slaves of Rebels coming within our lines, or whom those lines may at any time inclose we ask you to render it due obedience by publicly requiring all your subordinates to recognize and 25 obey it. The Rebels are everywhere using the late antinegro riots in the North, as they have long used your officers' treatment of negroes in the South, to convince the slaves that they have nothing to hope from a Union success - that we mean in that case to sell them into a bitterer bondage to 30 defray the cost of the war. Let them impress this as a truth on the great mass of their ignorant and credulous bondmen, and the Union will never be restored never. We cannot conquer Ten Millions of People united in a solid phalanx against us, powerfully aided by Northern sympa35 thizers and European allies. We must have scouts, guides, spies, cooks, teamsters, diggers and choppers from the

Blacks of the South, whether we allow them to fight for us or not, or we shall be baffled and repelled. As one of the Millions who would gladly have avoided this struggle at any sacrifice but that of Principle and Honor, but who now feel that the triumph of the Union is indispensable, not only to 5 the existence of our country but to the well-being of mankind, I entreat you to render a hearty and unequivocal obedience to the law of the land.

Yours,

HORACE GREELEY. 1Ο

NEW YORK, August 19, 1862.

III b.

PRESIDENT LINCOLN

To Horace Greeley.

[“Mr. Lincoln always sought, and generally with success, to turn a dilemma into an advantage; and shrewdly seizing the opportunity that Mr. Greeley had created, he in turn addressed him the following open letter through the newspapers in reply, by which he not merely warded 15 off his present personal accusation, but skilfully laid the foundation in public sentiment for the very radical step he was about to take on the slavery question. . . .

When Mr. Lincoln wrote the letter, the defeat of General Pope at the second battle of Bull Run had not yet taken place; on the contrary, 20 every probability pointed to an easy victory for the Union troops in the battle which was plainly seen to be impending. We may therefore infer that he hoped soon to be able to supplement the above declarations by issuing his postponed proclamation, which would give the country knowledge of his final designs respecting the slavery question. 25 But instead of the expected victory came a sad and demoralizing defeat, which prolonged, instead of shortening, the anxiety and uncer tainty hanging over the intentions of the Administration.” The Emancipation Proclamation was not published till September 23.

Abraham Lincoln. Nicolay & Hay, Century Co., VI, 152-154.]