Presidential Quotes - Abraham Lincoln

 

Abraham Lincoln had already prepared a draft of the Emancipation Proclamation when Horace Greeley, editor of the New York Tribune, used his newspaper to address a letter to Lincoln to goad him to outline the policy that Lincoln was pursuing regarding the war, and to get him to recognize that slavery was the root cause of the war.

Lincoln never let on that he had the draft prepared when he responded to Greeley's goading. However, Lincoln chose not to respond in Greeley's New York Tribune newspaper.  This quote is an excerpt of Lincoln's letter which was published in the Daily National Intelligencer on August 22, 1862.

"As to the policy that "I seem to be pursuing" as you say, I have not meant to leave any one in doubt:

"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it. If I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it. If I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that. 

"I have stated my purpose according to my view of official duty. I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men every where could be free."

- August 22, 1862 - Excerpt from Lincoln's reply to Horace Greeley which was published in the Daily National Intelligencer