“On December 31, 1862 President Lincoln signed the West Virginia statehood bill on the condition that the new state provide some type of emancipation.”
I knew West Virginia was added to the Union as a slave state. Thank you for the confirming citation.
After the emancipation proclamation, the United States was the most powerful slave nation in North America, perhaps the world.
And Lincoln lived long enough to see West Virginia abolish slavery in February 1865.