Although the book by Bruce Levine is titled “Confederate Emancipation,” emancipation is not what Confederate leaders had in mind when they began considering proposals to arm slaves to fight for the Confederacy. The Southern proponents of “emancipation” like Cleburne, Benjamin, Lee, and Davis, did not actually envision giving blacks true freedom if they fought for the Confederacy. Rather, as Levine points out: “Blacks would no longer be slaves, but they would be free only in the narrowest possible sense of that word.” Slaves would stop being personal property and would gain the rights to marry and own property, but they would still lack the right to vote or hold office (Levine 154). This cannot be construed as true emancipation. In fact, it was nothing more than attempt by the crumbling Confederacy to salvage what could still be saved. The hope was that arming slaves might solve the Confederate Army’s manpower shortage and then, if they survived the war, former slaves would’ve had no property or ability to escape a life working for white landowners in conditions similar to slavery (Levine 159).
Confederate notions of emancipation were very different than those outlined in the Emancipation Proclamation and other Union policies. Although the Emancipation Proclamation did not immediately free any slaves, as Union troops advanced or escaped slaves reached Union lines, they were freed permanently (Levine 118). Additionally, slaves were never required to serve in the Union army. The Emancipation Proclamation and the second Confiscation Act suggested the use of contraband slaves in the Union Army, but their service was voluntary, not a mandatory condition for emancipation. In contrast, Confederate proposals for “emancipation” required slaves to obtain permission from their masters and then risk their lives serving in the Confederate army. The power of emancipating slaves was still up to individual slave owners (Levine 120). Essentially, most of the Confederate proposals were toothless because it was still necessary to gain slave-owners’ cooperation. Gaining the compliance of slave-owners was a difficult task and the Confederate government was unwilling or unable to make any of their emancipation plans mandatory (Levine 157).
Basically, Confederate “emancipation” was a desperate plan by the South to win a war they were losing and still maintain an amount of control over Southern blacks. The plan failed for a number of reasons, including slave-owners adamant refusal to let go of slavery even in the face of Confederate defeat.
I thought this book was really interesting. I had never read anything about Confederate proposals to “emancipate” the slaves. I was initially a little shocked that the proposals occurred since slavery was so central to the South’s secession, but Levine did a good job of illuminating the true motivation behind Confederate “emancipation” proposals and explaining how they weren’t really emancipation proposals at all.