Justice Long Delayed

[David Lockmiller]

In reference to the first meeting that Frederick Douglass had with President Lincoln at the White House (to which Steve's post refers), Douglass wrote as follows regarding this meeting in his Chapter IX contribution to the book Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln by Distinguished Men of His Time (Collected and edited by Allen Thorndike Rice, Editor of the North American Review) pages 184 - 195:

"I was introduced to Mr. Lincoln on this occasion by Senator Pomeroy, of Kansas; I met him at the Executive Mansion." (page 185)

"Before leaving Mr. Lincoln, Senator Pomeroy said: 'Mr. President, Mr. Stanton is going to make Douglass Adjutant-General to General Thomas, and is going to send him down the Mississippi to recruit.'

Mr. Lincoln said in answer to this: 'I will sign any commission that Mr. Stanton will give Mr. Douglass.'

At this point we parted." (page 189)

There is no mention whatsoever in the Douglass chapter of the same book as to why the commission
was not issued and signed by President Lincoln.

There is no mention whatsoever in the Douglass chapter regarding their meeting on August 19, 1864, [when] Lincoln and Douglass met for the second time.

So, it remains a great mystery regarding the outcome of the second meeting request made by President Lincoln in the following manner:

With “great earnestness and much solicitude,” the president said: “I want you to set about devising some means of making them acquainted with it, and for bringing them into our lines.” (from the unabridged transcript on the Knox College website)

If Frederick Douglass had complied with President Lincoln's urgent request, the slaves in Galveston, Texas would have learned much sooner than they did that their bonds of slavery had been broken by the Emancipation Proclamation.