of the President in these conflicting cases as they
arose, if not condemned, was not fully approved. Many, if not a
majority, in Congress were undetermined what course to take. Democrats
insisted that the laws must be obeyed in all cases, in war as in peace.
The radical portion of the Republicans began to take extreme opposite
grounds, and claim that the laws were inoperative in regard to
slavery--that slavery was at all times inconsistent with a republican
government, and should now be extinguished. Among the revolutionary
resolutions of Senator Sumner of the 11th of February were some on the
subject of slavery. Other but not dissimilar propositions, antagonistic
to slavery, found expression, increasing in intensity as the war was
prolonged. While it was evident to most persons that one of the results
of the insurrection would be, in some way or form, the emancipation of
the slaves, there was no person who seemed capable of devising a
constitutional, practical plan for its accomplishment, except by
subjugation and violence. To these the President was unwilling to
resort; yet the necessity of doing something that did not transcend the
law, was morally right, and would tend to the ultimate freedom of the
slaves was felt to be an essential and indispensable duty. Unavailing
but seductive appeals continued in the mean time to be made by the
secessionists to the people of the border slave States to unite with the
further South for the security and protection of slavery, in which they
had a common interest, and against which there was increasing hostility
through the North. It was under these circumstances, with a large and
growing portion of the North in favor of abolition--the slave States,
including the border States, opposed to the measure and for the
preservation of the institution--that the President was to prescribe a
policy on which the government in the disordered state of the country
was to be administered.

To surmount the difficulties, without setting aside the law, or giving
just offence to any, the President, with his accustomed prudence and
regard for existing legal rights, devised a course which, if acquiesced
in by those most in interest, would, he believed, in a legal way open
the road to ultimate, if not immediate, emancipation. Instead of
assenting to the demands of the radical extremists that he should, by
arbitrary proceedings, and in disregard of law and Constitution, decree
freedom to all slaves, he p