The motivation for declaring slaves in the Confederacy to be free was to create confusion and trouble for the Confederacy by encouraging slaves to rebel and act as a sort of Guerrilla force behind Confederate lines.
The proclamation was also a sop to the Abolitionists who were exerting great political pressure on Lincoln to do something.
The primary reason for not freeing slaves in the other areas was to keep the border slave states from joining the Confederacy.
Exactly right. It was underhanded, deceitful and cynical, and even Secretary of State William Seward was appalled by it.
"We show our symapthy with slavery by emancipating slaves where we cannot reach them and holding them in bondage where we can set them free."
That alone ought to be proof that the Union reasons for war had nothing to do with slavery, and everything to do with stopping Independence for Southern states.
"We show our sympathy with slavery by emancipating slaves where we cannot reach them and holding them in bondage where we can set them free."
Great reference - Thank you.
Historians and teachers have made Lincoln into a near-god. But at heart he was in the presidency because he was a politician, not a humanitarion.