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Lincoln and Emancipation (Concise Lincoln Library)
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About Lincoln And Emancipation
Product Description In this succinct study, Edna Greene Medford examines the ideas and events that shaped President Lincoln’s responses to slavery, following the arc of his ideological development from the beginning of the Civil War, when he aimed to pursue a course of noninterference, to his championing of slavery’s destruction before the conflict ended. Throughout, Medford juxtaposes the president’s motivations for advocating freedom with the aspirations of African Americans themselves, restoring African Americans to the center of the story about the struggle for their own liberation. Lincoln and African Americans, Medford argues, approached emancipation differently, with the president moving slowly and cautiously in order to save the Union while the enslaved and their supporters pressed more urgently for an end to slavery. Despite the differences, an undeclared partnership existed between the president and slaves that led to both preservation of the Union and freedom for those in bondage. Medford chronicles Lincoln’s transition from advocating gradual abolition to campaigning for immediate emancipation for the majority of the enslaved, a change effected by the military and by the efforts of African Americans. The author argues that many players—including the abolitionists and Radical Republicans, War Democrats, and black men and women—participated in the drama through agitation, military support of the Union, and destruction of the institution from within. Medford also addresses differences in the interpretation of freedom: Lincoln and most Americans defined it as the destruction of slavery, but African Americans understood the term to involve equality and full inclusion into American society. An epilogue considers Lincoln’s death, African American efforts to honor him, and the president’s legacy at home and abroad. Both enslaved and free black people, Medford demonstrates, were fervent participants in the emancipation effort, showing an eagerness to get on with the business of freedom long before the president or the North did. By including African American voices in the emancipation narrative, this insightful volume offers a fresh and welcome perspective on Lincoln’s America. Review "To revisit the proclamation after reading Edna Greene Medford’s Lincoln and Emancipation is also a remarkable experience—a revelation of how deliberate, even strategic, its lawyerly ineloquence really was. . . . To understand it better you might want to read Medford's little dynamite stick of a book."— Scott McLemee, Inside Higher Ed "Edna Green Medford brings to the task a balanced and well-informed perspective...She thus resolves the longstanding and flawed question of whether Lincoln freed the slaves or the slaves freed themselves; the correct answer is both."— Brian R. Dirck, The Annals of Iowa "Medford marshals an impressive array of voices and vignettes to succinctly demonstrate the codependence of Lincoln and African Americans in the emancipation process."— Glenn David Brasher, Civil War Monitor "Medford provides a nuanced view that both demonstrates Lincoln’s evolution from gradual, compensated emancipation to immediate, universal abolition and incorporates the active role played by African Americans in winning their own freedom."— Mark A. Smith, Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association "Part of the succinct yet illuminating Concise Lincoln Library series, Lincoln and Emancipation is a scholarly examination of the evolution of President Lincoln's perspective on slavery, from the beginning of the Civil War (when he was open to a noninterference compromise if it would save the Union) to championing the cause of abolition before the conflict ended. Lincoln and Emancipation explores not only President Lincoln's words and ideology as they evolved over time, but also the voices of those who clamored for slavery's end: abolitionists and Radical Republicans, War Democrats, and both enslaved and free black people. Though
