The public announcement of the Emancipation Proclamation in the autumn of 1862 was not greeted with universal approbation in New York State. Northern white Americans, no less so in New York, were deeply divided on the issues of war, race relations and politics. The Proclamation, providing for freedom of all slaves in states or parts of states still in rebellion against the Union on January 1, 1863 and admitting African-Americans North and South into the Union military forces, transformed the war to "preserve the Union" into a revolution to overthrow the old order.
This act was the most explosive and unpopular policy of Lincoln's presidency, and it produced a virtual firestorm. Lincoln's policy angered and dismayed conservatives in Lincoln's Republican Party, fueled opposing partisan political victories in New York State and further complicated the personal meaning of the War for ordinary New Yorkers. In New York City, where racial feelings among Irish immigrants were embittered by fears of black competition, a serious riot erupted on July 13, 1863 --- spanning three days --- and resulted in uncounted numbers of African-Americans being brutally hunted down, lynched, and driven from their homes. Publisher Horace Greeley, an outspoken white abolitionist, was also threatened. The riot revealed both the class and racial tensions lying just below the surface of northern life.
Racial tensions in New York came through in the public and private opinions of New Yorkers regarding the Emancipation. African-Americans generally greeted the announcement as an important step forward to their achievement of full civil rights, and recognized the Proclamation's issuance with celebratory festivals that continued to be held in some New York communities in the following years into the early part of the twentieth century. Few white New Yorkers embraced the Proclamation in the same way as African-Americans. Whites whether in support or against, were greatly influenced by their general belief in the inferiority of blacks.
In the months immediately following Lincoln's announcement of the Proclamation, New Yorkers elected an opposition leader, Horatio Seymour, as governor, and turned half of the Assembly seats over to Democrats. Seymour and his Democrats sought to restore the Union "as it was" and maintain the Constitution "as it is."
In 1865, following the Lincoln's assassination, the New York Legislature recognized the historical significance of the Emancipation when it purchased the manuscript version of the Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation in Lincoln's own handwriting for the State Library. However, this purchase did not resound in a populace acceptance of civil rights for African-Americans. In the years following, the New York electorate voted down a proposed change in their State Constitution that would have afforded blacks voting privileges equal to whites. Only the ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870, advanced under Radical Republican leadership in Congress, corrected this particular inequity. As in other parts of the United States -- both North and South, New Yorkers faced a continuing conflict over the legacy of the Emancipation Proclamation at the war's end.
(Courtesy the New York State Archives)