When the Civil War began, Douglass began working to recruit freed blacks into the Union army. He had an audience with President Lincoln and urged him to persuade President Davis of the Confederate States to forbid the South from executing black prisoners of war. He also asked Lincoln to mandate that black soldiers be paid the same wages as white soldiers. Lincoln didn't offer such guarantees. Instead, he told Douglass that black soldiers had more to gain from this war than whites and should therefore accept lower wages, at least for the time being. In his memoirs, Douglass expresses great admiration for Lincoln's compassion and humanity, but he disagrees with Lincoln on several points. For Douglass, Lincoln was more concerned about the preservation of the Union than he was with the issue of slavery. He suggests that Lincoln was even ready to allow slavery to continue — if the South would abandon the war and pledge loyalty to the Union. Following his meeting with the president, Douglass met with Secretary of War Stanton, who promised him a commission as assistant adjutant to the army's General Thomas. The army commission never arrived, and Douglass tells us that Stanton, after due consideration, probably changed his mind and felt that the Union was not ready for a high-ranking black officer. Interestingly, a small number of black soldiers were commissioned as officers during the Civil War, with a select few even reaching the rank of major.
Lincoln made public his intention to free all slaves in a speech on September 22, 1862. The Emancipation Proclamation took effect a few months later, on January 1, 1863. In Life and Times, Douglass says that this New Year's day will probably remain "a memorable day in the progress of American liberty and civilization." After the defeat of the South, Douglass lobbied hard to have Congress grant freed slaves citizenship. In the emotional period after Lincoln's death and the defeat of the South, Congress passed the Thirteenth Amendment (abolishing slavery), the Fourteenth Amendment (defining citizenship), and the Fifteenth Amendment (granting suffrage, voting rights, to blacks — a right denied American women until 1920).
