Emancipation Day- All Will Be Well

Today is the 150th anniversary of “the first time the [U.S.] government...officially liberated any group of slaves”.  On Apil 16, 1862 President Abraham Lincoln signed a bill that abolished slavery in the District of Columbia and today, the residents of D.C. celebrated it as "Emancipation Day": a bonified schools-libraries-and-other-government-offices-closed holiday.

So, what's the history of Emancipation Day, you ask?  I thought you might.  ;)

As this article in the Washington Post points out, slavery was abolished, but slave-owners not entirely punished by a loss of "property".  The bill allowed for slave-owners to be compensated for their loss.  Two "experienced dealer[s] in slaves" were commissoned to determine each slave's worth.  The ledger these two dealers kept is quite telling.  Not only does the paperwork detail the objectification of the worth of hundreds of human beings, it also offers an insight into ninetheenth century D.C. culture and society.  Take, for example, "Henry Hatton, one of several petitioners described in the ledgers as “colored”.  Henry "sought compensation for three slaves, Martha, Henry and George Hatton, who could have been members of his family, according to Archives expert Damani Davis." 

I am deeply intrigued by this record.  Who were the Hattons?  Were slaves Martha, Henry and George related to the owner Henry or did they simply happen to share a last name?  How did Henry come to own these people?  What did he (they?) do with the money he recevied in compensation?  It is a curious notation.  Finally, you'll notice the slaves aren't reduced (as in other records) to being labeled as mere posessions, but are written down as human beings with full first and last names.

I'm fascinated by this notion of paying slave owners for the loss of their slaves.  To me, this compensation is offensive.  It signals the goverment espousing the view that black people are property, which justifies the slave-owner's, rather than the emancipator's, claims.   That the government, in the act of emancipating slaves, used the very practice of reducing the value of a human being to a (usually low) dollar amount is, at the very least, ironic.

However, I cannot ignore the very real economic climate of the 1860s.  Even today I've heard (usually white) people say that the Civil War was about "economics, not slavery".  Slaves were a free labor force and their emancipation changed the country in many ways, including economically.  Before declaring the official U.S. Emancipation Proclimation, Lincoln offered southern states compensation in exchange for freely accepting the abolition of slavery, but they rejected the offer.  I doubt that much of the racist resentment expressed by many white Americans would have been remarkably reduced if southern slave owners had been compensated for their economic loss.  And yet I can't help but wonder. Would "compensation" have made a difference?  The tremendous sense of hurt and loss many white southerners felt impacted their ideology as well as their actions.  They passed those beliefs down to their progeny so that many in this country still hold a longing for a south they've never known.

Before I disappear entirely into impossible historical wonderings, I want to return to the joy of Emancipation Day for the end of this post.
The The District of Columbia's website has records of residents' reactions from 1862.  I'd like to end my thoughts today with the tremendous recollections of one man (emphasis is mine):

"One black District citizen wrote to a friend in Baltimore, 'This indeed has been a happy day to me sights have I witnessed that I have anticipated.'

He then described how he gave the happy news to two female friends of his, one of whom had an enslaved son:

When I entered they perceived that something was ahead and emmediately [sic] asked me “What’s the news?” The District’s free says I pulling out the “National Republic” and reading its editorial. When I had finished the chambermaid had left the room sobbing for joy. The slave women clapped her hands and shouted, left the house saying, “let me go and tell my husband that Jesus has done all things well.” While the cook who is free retired to another room to offer thanks for the blessing sent. Should I not feel glad to see so much rejoicing around me? Were I a drinker I would get on a Jolly spree today, but as a Christian I can but kneel in prayer and bless God for the privilege I’ve enjoyed this day….Would to God that the Law applied also to Baltimore but a little patience and all will be well."

Here's to moments which give us hope that one day "all will be well".