Raynors HCA 2019-01
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 2/21/2019
Newspaper, a complete and authentic issue of the Richmond Whig, Richmond, Va., August 30, 1862. 2 pp., VG. On the front page under “News from the North” is the text of Abraham Lincoln’s reply to New York Tribune editor Horace Greeley. Greeley’s letter urging Lincoln to emancipate all slaves in Union-held territory was known as “The Prayer of Twenty Millions.” It was first published on August 20, 1862. Lincoln responded on August 22, declaring that his paramount goal is to save the Union, regardless of its effect on slavery, as well as his personal views that all men should be free. In large part, “…As to the policy I ‘seem to be pursuing,’ as you say, I have not meant to leave any one in doubt.... I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored the nearer the Union will be ‘the Union as it was.’ If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could, at the same time, save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them—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, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.—What I do about slavery and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save this Union, and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views.... I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty; and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men every where could be free.”
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