Emancipation, Proclamation of, in American history, a state document setting free all slaves of such states and parts of states as were in rebellion against the authority of the national government. It was made January 1, 1863. It was issued by President Lincoln as a military measure, acting in his capacity as commander-in-chief of the army and navy. It set free all slaves in Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana (except certain parishes including the city of New Orleans), Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia,--West Virginia and certain counties excepted. The slaves were enjoined to "labor faithfully for reasonable wages wherever they were permitted to do so." It was written New Year's morning by President Lincoln in his own hand. The penmanship is firm and neat. The signature is scraggly. The president explained that he was not particularly agitated when he signed, but that a stream of New York callers had come in ere he completed the task, and that his grasp of the pen had become tremulous through excessive handshaking. The official proclamation was, of course, drawn up at the State Department. The original copy on four sheets of foolscap was presented to the managers of a fair held in Chicago for the benefit of the soldiers. It sold for $3,000. It was destroyed in the great Chicago fire. Fortunately photographic copies are in existence. The memorable pen, a steel affair in a plain colored cedar handle--the two together not worth to exceed six cents--passed into the hands of a citizen of Boston. See NEGRO; LINCOLN.