The declaration in 1863 aimed at freeing enslaved people in the Confederate states was the Emancipation Proclamation. Issued by President Abraham Lincoln, this executive order declared that all enslaved people in the states rebelling against the Union were to be freed. The proclamation aimed not only to undermine the Confederate war effort but also to redefine the Civil War as a struggle for freedom. While it did not immediately free all enslaved individuals, it laid the groundwork for the eventual abolition of slavery and added a moral imperative to the Union cause.