Lincoln actually issued the Emancipation Proclamation twice.
Abraham Lincoln issued the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation on September 22nd, 1862. It stipulated that if the Southern states did not cease their rebellion by January 1st, 1863, then Proclamation would go into effect. When the Confederacy did not yield, Lincoln issued the final Emancipation Proclamation on January 1st, 1863.
Lincoln considered the Emancipation Proclamation the crowning achievement of his presidency.
Heralded as the savior of the Union, President Lincoln actually considered the Emancipation Proclamation to be the most important aspect of his legacy. “I never, in my life, felt more certain that I was doing right, than I do in signing this paper,” he declared. “If my name ever goes into history it will be for this act, and my whole soul is in it."
John Pope was a significant player in the lead up to the most important event of the war, the Emancipation Proclamation. Unknowingly and unintentionally, his actions would be instrumental in moving the country toward this event. Making him among the top ten most influential figures of the war.
The Battle of Antietam provided the necessary Union victory to issue the Emancipation Proclamation.
President Lincoln had first proposed the Emancipation Proclamation to his Cabinet in July 1862, but Secretary of State William Seward suggested waiting for a Union victory so that the government could prove that it could enforce the Proclamation. Although the Battle of Antietam resulted in a draw, the Union army was able to drive the Confederates out of Maryland – enough of a “victory,” that Lincoln felt comfortable issuing the Emancipation just five days later.