Fight you, then, exclusively to
save the Union. I issued the proclamation on purpose to aid you in
saving the Union. Whenever you shall have conquered all resistance to
the Union, if I shall urge you to continue fighting it will be an apt
time then for you to declare you will not fight to free negroes. I
thought that, in your struggle for the Union, to whatever extent the
negroes should cease helping the enemy, to that extent it weakened the
enemy in his resistance to you. Do you think differently?
I thought that whatever negroes can be got to do as soldiers, leaves
just so much less for white soldiers to do in saving the Union. Does it
appear otherwise to you? But negroes, like other people, act upon
motives. Why should they do anything for us, if we will do nothing for
them? If they stake their lives for us, they must be prompted by the
strongest motive, even the promise of freedom. And the promise, being
made, must be kept.
The signs look better. The Father of Waters again goes unvexed to the
sea. Thanks to the great Northwest for it; nor yet wholly to them. Three
hundred miles up they met New England, Empire, Keystone, and Jersey,
hewing their way right and left. The sunny South, too, in more colors
than one, also lent a helping hand. On the spot their part of the
history was jotted down in black and white. The job was a great national
one, and let none be slighted who bore an honorable part in it.
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