One significant effect of the Emancipation Proclamation was that it weakened the Confederacy's economy.

Issued by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, the Proclamation declared that all enslaved individuals in Confederate-held territory were to be freed. Although it did not immediately liberate all enslaved people, it disrupted the labor force that the South relied upon for its agricultural economy. Encouraging enslaved individuals to escape and join Union forces, not only diminished Confederate resources but also transformed the Civil War into a fight for freedom and human rights.