Yes, it re-imagined the war as being about subjugation. The Emancipation Proclamation, or Proclamation 95, was a presidential declaration and official request issued by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863. It changed the government lawful status of more than 3 million subjugated individuals in the assigned zones of the South from slave to free. When a slave got away from the control of the Confederate government, by fleeing or through advances of elected troops, the slave turned out to be lawfully free.