Control of the Border States allowed emancipation to be used as a tool against the Confederacy through "property" confiscation, the use of freedmen in the armed forces and, ultimately through the demoralization of Johnny Reb and his Confederate supporters.  
 

 
  The fact that slaves were already emancipating themselves presented an opportunity for the Lincoln administration to use for the Union’s benefit by issuing a presidential proclamation ending slavery in those areas of rebellion.  
 

 
  Pressure from abolitionists and Lincoln’s own convictions to bring the slave states in line with the principle in the Declaration of Independence that all men are created equal.  
 

 
  Since emancipation was popular with the British working class, the policy helped convince the British government not to recognize the Confederacy diplomatically.  

The Lincoln administration and the Republican-controlled Congress had been chipping away at the institution of slavery since the beginning of the war, and the Emancipation Proclamation was a logical next step in that process.
 

 

     
 

 

 
     
 

 

 
     

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