President Lincoln does not issue the Emancipation Proclamation on the 1st of January, 1863, as he did in OTL; instead, he follows a more conciliatory path with the Confederacy, eager to win them back to the Union. A peace delegation is sent to "bring the South back into the fold" in early 1863. After much negotiation, Confederate President Jefferson Davis rejects Lincoln's proposal. Growing progressivism in the Northeastern states leads to unrest over the lack of change on the issue of slavery, causing a divide within the Union between the border states (which were largely indifferent to slavery) and the states north of Pennsylvania (who opposed the continuation of slavery).