The proclamation was first announced on September 22, 1862 by Abraham Lincoln, but did not take effect until Lincoln issued it for the second time on the 1st January 1863 The Emancipation Proclamation freed all slaves within the Confederate states. In addition to freeing slaves from rebellious states, he also allowed freed African Americans to join the U.S. Army. The Union and the Confederacy were both affected by the Emancipation Proclamation in different ways. For the Confederacy, many slaves were lost on plantations once freed. This made things especially difficult for those men who joined the army and left their plantations in the hands of their families and slaves. As Lincoln had stated in the Emancipation Proclamation (1863), the government was to “recognize and maintain the liberty of the people” freed by the bill, meaning that all freed African Americans were to be recognized as American citizens since they were not recognized as such. Before. While free African Americans have recently been able to remain in the South, many have migrated to the North to start new lives. As many plantations abandoned the South, both the Confederate and Union armies gained numerous numbers of freed African Americans on the battlefield. The Union gained more African Americans than the Union