Kmarion wrote:
No the majority of people in the south did not own slaves. But they supported it. Like most wars that are fought, they are fought for a cause.
Lincoln-Douglas debate:
October 15, 1858
That is the real issue. That is the issue that will continue in this country when these poor tongues of Judge Douglas and myself shall be silent. It is the eternal struggle between these two principles -- right and wrong -- throughout the world. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time; and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity and the other the divine right of kings. It is the same principle in whatever shape it develops itself. It is the same spirit that says, "You work and toil and earn bread, and I'll eat it." No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle.
Speech at Cincinnati, Ohio
September 17, 1859
I think Slavery is wrong, morally, and politically. I desire that it should be no further spread in these United States, and I should not object if it should gradually terminate in the whole Union.
October 15, 1858
And when this new principle [that African Americans were not covered by the phrase "all men are created equal"] -- this new proposition that no human being ever thought of three years ago, -- is brought forward, I combat it as having an evil tendency, if not an evil design; I combat it as having a tendency to dehumanize the negro -- to take away from him the right of ever striving to be a man. I combat it as being one of the thousand things constantly done in these days to prepare the public mind to make property, and nothing but property of the negro in all the States of the Union.
Lincoln To Henry L. Pierce
April 6, 1859
This is a world of compensations; and he who would be no slave, must consent to have no slave. Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it.
August 1, 1858
As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy.
He opened the eyes of a great many people... whether you are prepared to admit it or not.
Firstly the war was about preserving the union at the start of the war, and later slavery became an issue. Secondly Lincoln was a racist warmonger in my opinion, and did everything he could to further his historical legacy.
Thomas DiLorenzo wrote:
Slave owners in the border states occupied by the U.S. Army were allowed to keep their slaves. Whenever any of Lincoln's generals, such as Gen. Fremont, took it upon themselves to emancipate some slaves early in the war he rebuffed them, reversed their decisions, and demoted them. The Emancipation Proclamation itself very specifically exempted all areas of the country that were controlled by the U.S. Army, guaranteeing that no slaves would be emancipated by the Proclamation.
In his first inaugural address Lincoln referred to the proposed "Corwin Amendment" to the Constitution that would have prohibited the federal government from ever interfering with slavery. He said that he already held the legality of slavery to be "implied constitutinal law," and "I have no objection to its being made express and irrovocable" by enshrining slavery explicitly in the Constitution.
"My paramount objective in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union." -Lincoln
Lincoln was ambitious and took advantage of the abolitionist platform, especially in 1864. A lot of politicians do this. Just look at Hilary on the war or Mitt Romney on abortion. A good book to read would be The Real Lincoln by Thomas DiLorenzo as I quoted earlier. I mean you can still debate a lot of things, but a lot of how we view him is based largely on myth than fact. He got his nickname Honest Abe not for being honest, but sarcastically as you might call a tall person shorty.
He did destroy the voluntary union of the states though.
