The spirit of the Emancipation Proclamation is under attack again today

Wednesday, Jan. 1, begins the new year. It also marks the anniversary of a new America.

On Jan. 1, 1863, as the Civil War, the bloodiest of America’s wars, approached the end of its second year, President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring “that all persons held as slaves” within the rebellious states “are and henceforward shall be free.”

The Proclamation was limited to fit wartime necessities. It applied only to the states that had seceded from and were at war with the United States, leaving slavery untouched in loyal border states. It also exempted the parts of the Confederacy that had already come under Northern control. And, of course, the freedom it promised depended on the victory of the North.