In the White House, President Lincoln meets with Congressmen representing the border states, and urges, "Let the states which are in rebellion see . . . that, in no event, will the states you represent ever join their proposed Confederacy." Lincoln proposes that border-state slaveholders release their slaves in return for "substantial compensation" from the federal government. He reasons that the "friction and abrasion . . . [and] the mere incidents of the war" will erode "the institution [of slavery] . . . It will be gone, and you will have nothing valuable in lieu of it." Appeal to Border State Representatives to Favor Compensated Emancipation, 12 July 1862, CW, 5:317-19; New York Daily Tribune (NY), 19 July 1862, 12:1; National Republican (Washington, DC), 16 July 1862, 1:3.

Transmits to House of Representatives information regarding relations with foreign powers. Abraham Lincoln to the House of Representatives, 12 July 1862, CW, 5:319.

Signs bill creating national award for valor to be known as Congressional Medal of Honor. Stat. L., XII, 623.

Interviews Gen. Burnside who will leave in evening for Gen. McClellan's headquaters. Marcy to McClellan, 12 July 1862, George B. McClellan Papers, Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

Directs Sec. Stanton to write authorization for Gen. Dix to negotiate general exchange of prisoners. U.S. Congress, Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War, Supplemental Report on the Conduct of the War, 2 vols., 38th Cong., 2d sess. (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1866), 2:Hitchcock Report, 3.

[Mrs. Lincoln and Robert leave New York for West Point, N.Y. N.Y. Tribune, 12 July 1862.]