If I remember my history correctly, Lincoln only freed the slaves in the states which had seceded, not in the states that remained in the union. His concern was for politics, not for freeing the slaves.
You are correct.
“If I remember my history correctly, Lincoln only freed the slaves in the states which had seceded, not in the states that remained in the union. His concern was for politics, not for freeing the slaves.”
Exactly.
Lincoln, as President, had no legal authority to ‘free’ the slaves, a duty held only by congress. Congress refused. The Emancipation Proclamation was executed as Commander in Chief by order of the Executive, Lincoln. The document freed only the slaves in the South joined with the Confederacy, not throughout the entire Union, though freedom was often offered to Northern slaves who served with Union forces.
“That on the 1st day of January, A.D.1863, all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United Stead shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free.
I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, by virtue of the power in me vested as Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States in time of actual armed rebellion against the authority and government of the United States, and as a fit and necessary war measure for suppressing said rebellion....And upon this act, sincerely believed to be an act of justice, warranted by the Constitution upon military necessity.”