Talk:Emancipation Proclamation

Inaccurate Information Regarding Exceptions to the Emancipation Proclamation

At present this entry asserts:

"Specific exemptions were stated for areas also under Union control on January 1, 1863, namely . . . New Orleans and 13 named parishes nearby."

While New Orleans was indeed under Union control by 1 January 1863, most if not all of the 13 nearby parishes were not under Union control. Indeed, some of them were not even under partial Union control and never would be except for very short occupations (after which the Confederates would rush back in and retake everything, ad infinitum, until war's end).

The actual reason Lincoln excluded those parishes from the Emancipation Proclamation is because he thought (wishfully or not) that the sugar planters who resided in those 13 parishes -- where, indeed, sugar was the major cash crop, not cotton -- were loyal Unionists . . . in part because they relied on northern sugar refineries to finish processing their sugar crops for commercial sale and export. (Sugar production was a major employer in, for example, Brooklyn, on the eve of the Civil War.)

I cite as evidence this passage from historian Martin Ruef:

"Thirteen parishes in Louisiana were exempted from the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863, as federal authorities sought to gain the support of sugar plantation owners. . . ." (My italics.)

Source: Martin Ruef, Between Slavery and Capitalism, The Legacy of Emancipation in the American South (Princeton University Press, 2014), p. 44.

Note also:

"Nor did the Emancipation Proclamation resolve the dilemma [of enslavement], because the southern Louisiana parishes, with their cohort of Unionist sugar planters, were officially exempt from its provisions." (My italics.)

Stephanie McCurry, Confederate Reckoning: Power and Politics in the Civil War South (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2012), p. 254

In summary, I suggest the entry be amended to state that, in the case of Louisiana, the 13 parishes in question were excluded because Lincoln believed their sugar planters were loyal Unionists and did not wish to alienate that enclave of alleged Union support in otherwise pro-Confederate Louisiana.

(Interestingly, when the Union actually invaded the sugar region of Louisiana along Bayou Teche -- no less than three times in about a year and a half because it could not hold onto the region -- the Union troops completely nullified Lincoln's goodwill gesture by looting and burning the plantations of those supposedly pro-Union sugar planters.)

I would be glad to make the edit myself, but this entry isn't my usual purview. I might make the changes myself if no one objects.

--Skb8721 (talk) 15:45, 19 June 2025 (UTC)

I went ahead after a few days and changed the text in three or four locations where it previously stated that the Louisiana parishes in question had been excluded from the Proclamation because they were Union-held (which they weren't, at the time); and instead added the reason for their exclusion given by historians McCurry and Ruel (i.e., that Lincoln regarded the sugar-growing parishes of Louisiana as pro-Union). --Skb8721 (talk) 16:59, 24 June 2025 (UTC)

No mention of the Battle of Stones' River?

Contrary to popular belief, it wasn't Antietam which allowed Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation to go through, it was Stones' River, which the contemporaries then recognized. Yourlocallordandsavior (talk) 04:34, 15 July 2023 (UTC)

Then why don’t you edit it Jiaxi9 (talk) 22:35, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

Inserting page numbers

In the first paragraph under "Political impact," which begins "The Proclamation was immediately denounced," I corrected the quotation (the original does have "an utopian"). The two "page needed"s in that paragraph, after the two "note 107"s, is page 64 (it's at Google Books), but I don't know how to enter it. If someone will do that, then I'll know how and I will be able to enter the page numbers of subsequent footnotes. Maurice Magnus (talk) 13:43, 8 February 2024 (UTC)

Note a

Note a, as I've just edited it, reads: The 48 counties then in the process of becoming West Virginia were Hancock, Brooke, Ohio, Marshall, Wetzel, Monongalia, Preston, Marion, Taylor, Tyler, Dodridge, Harrison, Barbour, Tucker, Pleasants, Wood, Ritchie, Lewis, Upshur, Randolph, Wirt, Calhoun, Gilmer, Braxton, Webster, Jackson, Roane, Clay, Nicholas, Mason, Putnam, Kanawha, Fayette, Cabell, Boone, Raleigh, Wayne, Logan, Wyoming, Pocahontas, Greenbrier, Monroe, Mercer, McDowell, Hampshire, Hardy, Highland, and Morgan. Frederick, Berkeley, and Jefferson counties had been invited to join as well. Berkley County was exempted, and Jefferson County was the only West Virginia county whose slaves the proclamation freed.

Why is Berkley County singled out in the second sentence instead of being included in the first? Is Berkley County different from Berkeley County, which is included in the first sentence, or is one of them a misspelling? Maurice Magnus (talk) 09:54, 25 October 2025 (UTC)