Which 1863 wartime proclamation declared enslaved people free in areas rebelling against the United States?

The Emancipation Proclamation declared enslaved people free in areas rebelling against the United States beginning January 1, 1863.

President Abraham Lincoln issued the preliminary proclamation on September 22, 1862, after the Union victory at Antietam. The final proclamation took effect on January 1, 1863. It applied to enslaved people in states or parts of states in rebellion, but it did not immediately free enslaved people in the loyal border states or in Union-controlled areas.

The proclamation changed the Civil War’s official purpose by linking Union victory to emancipation. It also authorized Black men to serve in the Union Army and Navy. Nearly 200,000 African American men eventually served Union forces during the war.

The proclamation did not itself abolish slavery everywhere. The Thirteenth Amendment, ratified in 1865, ended slavery throughout the United States except as punishment for a crime after conviction. The document is therefore both a wartime measure and a major step toward constitutional abolition.