sometimes that gets exaggerated what they were really debating was whether to enlist

slaves in the confederate army

and if they did

would those slaves and maybe their families earn freedom

%uh fighting for the confederacy

%uh and the confederate congress in march eighteen sixty five did pass a bill called

the negro soldier bill

%uh providing for the enlistment of a certain number of slaves

but %uh

they could not free those slaves that would have to be up to the states themselves

or to the masters

%uh to free the slaves

and and there was a lot of ambiguity an ambivalence in the south about whether this really was an

emancipation measure maybe if a hundred thousand slaves

help us turn this war around

%uh they might earn their freedom as a reward for it but that wont in the institution of

slavery

and so there was actually a pro slavery dimension

to this argument well we'll free some of the slaves in order to win this war

but this was

this was a last gasp act of desperation

and even then it passed by only one vote in the confederate senate one vote

in march of eighteen sixty five when the enemy was thundering at the gates

so it doesn't necessarily represent %uh confederate repudiation of slavery

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