Emancipation Proclamation
(1863)
Dieses Dokument datiert vom 1. Januar 1863.
Bei Adolf Rock (Hrsg.), Dokumente der amerikanischen Demokratie, Wiesbaden 1947, S. 162-165, findet sich eine
gedruckte Fassung sowie eine
deutsche Übersetzung.
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A PROCLAMATION by the
President of the United States of America
WHEREAS, on the twenty-second
day. of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and
sixty-two, a proclamation was issued by the President of the United States,
containing, among other things, the following, to wit:.
"That on the first day of
January in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three,
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 States,
shall be then, thenceforward, and forever, free; and the Executive Government
of the United States, including the military and naval authority thereof,
will recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will do no
act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they
may make for their actual freedom.
"That the Executive will,
on the first day of January aforesaid, by proclamation, designate the states
and parts of states, if any, in which the people thereof,. respectively,
shall then be in rebellion against the United States; and the fact that
any state, or the people thereof, shall on that day be in good faith represented
in the Congress of the United States, by members chosen thereto at elections
wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such states shall have participated,
shall in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclusive
evidence that such state, and the people thereof, are not then in rebellion
against the United States."
Now, therefore, 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, do, on this first day of January, in the year of our Lord
one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and in accordance with my purpose
so to do, publicly proclaimed for the full period of one hundred days from
the day first above mentioned, order and designate as the states and parts
of states wherein the people thereof, respectively, are this day in rebellion
against the United States, the following, to wit:
Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana,
(except the parishes of St. Bernard, Plaquemines, Jefferson, St. John,
St. Charles, St. James, Ascension, Assumption, Terre Bonne, Lafourche,
St. Mary, St. Martin, and Orleans, incIuding the city of New Orleans.)
Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina,
and Virginia, (except the forty-eight counties designated as West Virginia,
and also the counties of Berkeley, Accomac, Northampton, Elizabeth City,
York, Princess Ann, and Norfolk, including the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth,)
and which excepted parts are for the present left precisely as if this
proclamation were not issued.
And by virtue of the power
and for the purpose aforesaid, I do order and declare that all persons
held as slaves within said designated states and parts of states are, and
henceforward shall be, free; and that the Executive Government of the United
States, including the military and naval authorities thereof, will recognize
and maintain the freedom of said persons.
And I hereby enjoin upon
the people so declared to be free to abstain from all violence, unless
in necessary self-defence; and I recommend to them that, in all cases when
allowed, they labor faithfully for reasonable wages.
And I further declare and
make known that such persons, of suitable condition, will be received into
the armed service of the United States {o garrison forts, positions, stations,
and other places, and to man vessels of all sorts in said service.
And upon this act, sincerely
believed to be an act of justice, warranted by the Constitution upon military
necessity. I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind and the gracious
favor of Almighty God.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
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