United States when the revolutionary struggle with Great Britain commenced, and about four-fifths of the whole slave population. The work of emancipation throughout all the borders of the land was completed by victories in the field, and the adoption of the Constitutional Amendment, Article XIII., by which slavery was forever and entirely swept from the Republic.

The reception of the proclamation by the millions who were ranged on the side of their country, praying and fighting for the success of the union cause, was warm and enthusiastic, the feeling being almost universally prevalent that the nation had entered upon a new and auspicious era, and that, under such a banner, heaven would crown our armies with victory, and give perpetuity to our republic among the governments of the earth. Generally, the great document was the theme of earnest and eloquent discourses from the northern pulpits, the current of the preachers' thoughts showing itself in the various subjects or titles under which the event was discussed, such as 'The Conflict between Despotism and Liberty,' 'The duty of uniting with our whole energies in executing the Emancipation Edict of the president, to accomplish, by the blessing of God, its beneficent results, without possibility of failure,' The Jubilee of Freedom,' 'The Influence of Christianity on the Abolition of Slavery,'-these, though but a few among thousands elicited by the proclamation, indicate the hearty appreciation of President Lincoln's course in issuing the decree. From countless pulpits, too, the momentous document was simply read, without comment.

Great public meetings of congratulation and rejoicing were held in almost every large town and city in the various north ern states. At the Cooper Institute, New York, a grand jubilee came off, the colored people of that city and of the surrounding towns for many miles, gathering together to do honor to so great a boon to their race.' The large hall was completely packed, long before the hour at which the proceedings were appointed to take place,

and multitudes had to be turned away from the feast of eloquence and music which was there enjoyed for several hours.

Two days after the issue of the proclamation, a large body of people assembled before the White House, in Washington, with a band of music, and called for the president. He appeared, and made an address of thanks to them for their courtesy, in which, alluding to the proclamation, he said, "What I did, I did after a very full deliberation, and under a heavy and solemn sense of responsibility. I can only trust in God I have made no mistake." From the colored people of Baltimore, Mr. Lincoln was the recipient of a superb copy of the Bible, of the largest size, and bound in violet-colored velvet. The corners were bands of solid gold, and the event carved upon a plate also of gold, not less than one-fourth of an inch thick. Upon the left-hand cover, was a design representing the president in a cottonfield, knocking the shackles off the wrists of a slave, who held one hand aloft as if invoking blessings upon the head of his benefactor,-at whose feet was a scroll upon which was written "Emancipation; " upon the other cover was a similar plate, bearing the inscription: "To Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, the friend of Universal Freedom. From the loyal colored people of Baltimore, as a token of respect and gratitude. Baltimore, July 4, 1864."

But the greatest interest necessarily attaches to the reception which such an amazing document met with on the part of those who were or had recently been slaves. Although by the terms of the proclamation, the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth, Va., were excluded from its operation, the slaves fully believed that 'Massa Lincoln' had emancipated them all; with this view, they refused to work without wages, and, their former masters acceding to this, virtual emancipation was the result in that region. On New Year's day, the slaves of Norfolk, Portsmouth, and Gosport, with the African strangers gathered there, to the number of some

thousands, turned out en masse, and by processions, speeches, hymns and songs of jubilation, and by other demonstrations, celebrated what was ever afterward to be their Fourth of July. The exultation of the slaves was great, and many a noticeable incident presented itself. "Massa," said an old woman to a stranger near by, "I have had twenty children. My Massa and Missus sole 'em all off; one of my gals was sole to buy young Missus her piano. I used to stop my ears when I heard her play on dat ar; I thought I heard my chile a crying out dat it was bought wid her blood. Dey was all sole off,-I'se not got one left to bury me. But I'se free! and my ole heart is glad agin. I'll go happy to my grave." In one of the colored churches in Norfolk, the preacher took for his text, "Stand fast, therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ. has made you free," and with great ingenuity, and without irreverence, the preacher showed how President Lincoln, in emancipating them, had stood in Christ's stead to them, and how it was now their duty to stand fast, and fight for the liberty which he, under God, had given them. Singular enough, there rose from the whole congregation a cry, as if with one voice, "Amen! glory be to God! we'll fight till de cows' tails drop off! ”

In the Department of the South, embracing Port Royal, S. C., and other islands, it was very difficult to convince the colored people that they were free, and that the government, or Yankees, could be in earnest. Christmas was to most of them a sad day. General Saxton, therefore, who spared no effort to disabuse their minds and inspire them with confidence, issued his proclamation inviting the people to assemble at the head-quarters of the First South Carolina Volunteers, on the first of January. Missionaries, ministers, superintendents and teachers, officers and privates, joined heartily in the gathering. The word went out far and near, but the people were suspicious. Mischievous ones had told them it was a trap to force them into the army; others

that they were to be collected on steamboats that would run them to Cuba; others that they were to be got away from their homes and sent into exile. But, at an early hour of the sublimely beautiful day, the people began to arrive at the camping-ground, and, despite their fears, thousands were there. The proceedings opened with prayer and music, after which, Judge Brisbane, of Wisconsin, but a son of South Carolina who, twenty-five years previously, set all his slaves free, read the emancipation act amidst the jubilant shouts of the vast multitude; and when, succeeding this, the proclamation of General Saxton was read, declaring that the great act should be enforced, twelve deafening cheers burst forth from the thousands of grateful and joyous hearts to whom the good tidings of liberty and protection had thus come. An original ode was then sung to the tune of 'Scots wha' ha' wi' Wallace bled," and then came the crowning feature of the day, the presentation by the Rev. Mr. French of a splendid silk flag, with the embroidered inscription: "To the First South Carolina Regiment. The year of jubilee has come."

It was a very elegant flag, a gift from Doctor Cheever's church in the city of New York. As it passed from the hands. of Mr. French, the negroes struck up the national air, "My country, 'tis of thee," with fine effect. Colonel Higginson, who had received the flag, stood waiting his time to reply, with the golden tassels in his hands. After an eloquent speech by the colonel, he called the sergeant of Company A, "Prince Rivers," and a corporal of another company, named Sutton, both black men, and, handing over the flag which had been presented, called upon both to speak, which they did with great acceptance. Other exercises of rejoicing took place, and then attention was paid to the physical wants of the happy throng. For this purpose, ten beeves had been slaughtered and were roasting in their pits; and these, with several hundred gallons of molasses and water,-a favorite beverage of the negroes, and a full supply

of hard bread, awaited the hungry expectants. Thus ended the grand celebration of the emancipation of the slaves of South Carolina.

The observance of the event in other parts of the south, wherever the authority of the union forces was present to permit it, was so similar in its character and enthusiasm to what has already been narrated, that it is unnecessary here to extend the descriptions. By the army and its officers, with here and there an exception, the proclamation was regarded as an act to which things had long been tending, and which, under the circumstances of peril in which the union had so long been placed, was inevitable. Of course, no such proclamation, in time of war, could have any weight in the section of country at which it was aimed, excepting as the union military successes made it effective. Those successes in due time reached every portion of the south, and the fetters of every bondman on American soil were thus broken. Congress subsequently passed an amendment to the constitution, forever prohibiting slavery in any portion of the republic, and this amendment, on being ratified by the requisite number of states, became a part of the organic law of the land.

The original draft of the emancipation proclamation, in the president's handwriting, was presented by Mr. Lincoln to the great Northwestern Sanitary Fair, held at Chicago, in the autumn of 1863. The following letter accompanied the gift:

EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, October 26, 1863. To the Ladies having in charge the Northwestern Fair for the Sanitary Commission, Chicago, Illinois:

According to the request made in your behalf, the original draft of the emancipation proclamation is herewith enclosed. The formal words at the top, and the conclusion, except the signature, you perceive, are not in my handwriting. They were written at the State Department, by whom I know not. The printed part was cut

from a copy of the preliminary proclamation and pasted on, merely to save writing.

I had some desire to retain the paper; but if it shall contribute to the relief or comfort of the soldier, that will be better. Your obedient servant,

A. LINCOLN.

This chief treasure of that great fair was purchased for three thousand dollars, by the Hon. Thomas B. Bryan, for the Chicago Soldiers' Home, of which he was president. Lithographic copies of the document were also sold for the benefit of the same institution, and netted it thousands of dollars.

One of the most important results of this great measure, whether considered from a moral, political, or social point of view, was the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, by which all citizens were made equal before the law.

It was on the twenty-seventh of February, 1869, that congress passed a resolution in the following words:

A resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

Resolved, By the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress . assembled, twothirds of both Houses concurring, that the following article be proposed to the legislatures of the several States as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which, when ratified by threefourths of the said legislatures, shall be valid as a part of the Constitution, namely: -ARTICLE 15, Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States, or by any State, on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

In about one year's time from the passage of this resolution, proclamation was made by the secretary of state, Hon. Hamilton Fish, that the proposed amendment had been ratified by the legislatures of the

states of North Carolina, West Virginia, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Maine, Louisiana, Michigan, South Carolina, Pennsylvania, Arkansas, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, New York, New Hampshire, Nevada, Vermont, Virginia, Alabama, Missouri, Mississippi, Ohio, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Nebraska, and Texas,-twenty-nine in all, and constituting three-fourths of the whole number of states, and thus becoming valid, to all intents and purposes, as a part of the constitution of the United States.

Though not obligatory, as an executive duty, President Grant communicated the fact of the ratification to congress, in a special message, on the thirtieth of March, 1870. The measure"-said the president-" which makes at once four millions of the people voters who were heretofore declared by the highest tribunal in the land not citizens of the United States, nor eligible to become so, with the assertion that at the time of the Declaration of In

dependence the opinion was fixed and universal in the civilized portion of the white. race, and regarded as an axiom in morals as well as in politics, that black men had no rights which white men were bound to respect, is, indeed, a measure of grander importance than any other one act of the kind from the foundation of our free government to the present time. Institutions. like ours, in which all power is derived directly from the people, must depend mainly upon their intelligence, patriotism, and industry. I call the attention, therefore, of the newly enfranchised race to the importance of their striving, in every honorable manner, to make themselves worthy of their new privilege. To a race more favored heretofore by our laws, I would say, withhold no legal privilege of advancement to the new citizens." So great an event was not suffered to pass without public demonstrations of joy commensurate with its grand, beneficent, and elevating scope, in almost all parts of the country.