Unit 16:: Reconstruction (1863–1877)
A Milestone Documents E-text
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Abstract

The process of rebuilding the Union began long before the fighting ended in the Civil War. On January 1, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln issued the final version of the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring that slaves held in areas in rebellion against the United States were to be free. But the Emancipation Proclamation was effective only in those areas where it could not be enforced. Its primary effect was to keep Great Britain and France from intervening on the side of the South. It also turned the Union Army into an army of liberation; Union soldiers carried freedom and an end to slavery with them on their invasions of the South. In the end, the proclamation marked an important step toward rebuilding the Union by making the end of slavery a goal of the war.

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