President Abraham Lincoln
Photograph by Gardner, 1865, Smithsonian.

By 1838, the ongoing resistance of the Black Seminoles had prompted the U.S. Army to offer them freedom in exchange for surrender. This was the only emancipation of rebellious African Americans prior to Lincoln's famous emancipation of the southern slaves in 1863. Fittingly, Lincoln's 1863 action drew legal precedence from the Black Seminole liberation.

• More on Jesup's Proclamation
• War Power: The Black Seminole precedent for the 1863 emancipation
  

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