President Lincoln used his powers to threaten the South and originally wasn't even going to make the States in the North that still practiced slavery give up theirs. President Lincoln had actually proposed his emancipation proclamation twice. He First proposed the Emancipation Proclamation to his Cabinet in July 1862, but Secretary of State William Seward suggested waiting for a Union victory so that the government could prove that it could enforce the Proclamation. Although the Battle of Antietam resulted in a draw, the Union army was able to drive the Confederates out of Maryland – enough of a “victory,” that Lincoln felt comfortable issuing the Emancipation just five days later. Another reason why the proclamation emancipation was only a tool of war that was used by the Union to focus on the South was because, Britain and France had considered supporting the Confederacy in order to expand their influence in the Western Hemisphere. However, many Europeans were against slavery. Although some in the United Kingdom saw the Emancipation Proclamation as overly limited and reckless, Lincoln's directive reinforced the shift of the international political mood against intervention while the Union victory at Antietam further disturbed those who didn't want to intervene on the side of a lost cause.

http://www.civilwar.org/education/history/emancipation-150/10-facts.html

-patrick yurek

The President shouldn't be allowed to use executive power for the following reasons: There is no constitutional provision or statute in the constitution. It has been abused in the past by presidents like, FDR and George Bush. Now that Congress no longer has the legislative veto, Congress has to rely on other ways to override executive orders, like refusing to fund it, however this doesn't always work.

FDR made Executive order 9066, which forced Japanese Americans to be placed in internment camps which were similar to concentration camps. Then George Bush issued executive order 13233, which restricted access of the public, to the papers of former Presidents.

Executive orders have been used to limit the rights and even take rights away from US citizens by presidents through the years and no body should be allowed to have that power.

-patrick