Back to that ex post facto rationalization?
If the South had somehow rallied and successfully repelled the Union Invasion, then the Union would have been left with more Union-slavery Egg on it's face.
You can't use before the fact arguments to justify after the fact results. It's just logically nonsensical.
And here we are, still talking about "Slavery" instead of the main point. That Bill Clinton dodge is still paying dividends 150 years later.
The Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery (at least formally) less than three years after the Emancipation Proclamation.
Lincoln could have done it in the Union States in 1861. Right? Right?
Is this 2015? Or 1862?
Are you really saying that what happened didn't happen because it could have happened differently?
To go from slaveowning guaranteed by law all over the country to slaveowning at the very least put at risk in half the country was a major step.
Are you really saying that having the Emancipation Proclamation and not having the Emancipation Proclamation would have meant the same thing as far as the prospects for slavery were concerned?
Sure, things can always turn out differently, but that doesn't justify ignoring actions that contributed to their turning out as they did.