Abraham Lincoln issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation on September 22nd, 1862. It stipulated that if the Southern states did not cease their rebellion by January 1st, 1863, then Proclamation would go into effect. When the Confederacy did not yield, Lincoln issued the final Emancipation Proclamation on January 1st, 1863. Lincoln declared in the Proclamation that African-Americans of “suitable condition would be received into the armed service of the United States.” Five months after the Proclamation took effect; the War Department of the United States issued General Orders No. 143, establishing the United States Colored Troops (USCT). By the end of the war, over 200,000 African-Americans would serve in the Union army and navy. With …show more content…
The time of that session of Congress and the previous one had been consumed for weeks by abolition petitions. These had literally flooded the Congress. An entire large room in the National Archives, which I have visited, is needed to contain them. There had been interminable wrangling in both houses about how to deal with this unprecedented situation. We should be clear that nobody, North or South, Democrat or Whig, except for a tiny minority led by John Quincy Adams, intended to respond to these petitions. Calhoun wanted to hold up to public view the nature of this new movement and to confront what he regarded as the politicians’ irresponsible avoidance of a grave issue. Calhoun’s primary goal, I believe, was to convince the South that a lukewarm defense was no longer a proper …show more content…
He tells the audience that they have gathered to celebrate the Fourth of July, but he reminds them that the nation is young, and, like a young child, it is still impressionable and capable of positive change. He touches on the history of the American Revolutionaries' fight for freedom against their legal bondage under British rule. He tells the audience that he supports the actions of these revolutionaries. Douglass praises and respects the signers of the Declaration of Independence, people who put the interests of a country above their own. He concedes, however, that the main purpose of his speech is not to give praise and thanks to these men, for he says that the deeds of those patriots are well known. Instead, he urges his listeners to continue the work of those great revolutionaries who brought freedom and democracy to this