“Here is the bottom line:”
No~ This is the bottom line
In Springfield, Ill., on July 17, 1858, Lincoln said, “What I would most desire would be the separation of the white and black races.” On Sept. 18, 1858, in Charleston, Ill., he said: “I will to the very last stand by the law of this state, which forbids the marrying of white people with Negroes.”
Lincoln supported the Illinois Constitution, which prohibited the emigration of black people into the state, and he also supported the Illinois Black Codes, which deprived the small number of free blacks in the state any semblance of citizenship. He strongly supported the Fugitive Slave Act, which compelled Northern states to capture runaway slaves and return them to their owners. In his First Inaugural he pledged his support of a proposed constitutional amendment that had just passed the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives that would have prohibited the federal government from ever having the power “to abolish or interfere, within any State, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State.” In his First Inaugural Lincoln advocated making this amendment “express and irrevocable.”
Lincoln was also a lifelong advocate of “colonization” or shipping all black people to Africa, Central America, Haiti—anywhere but here. “I cannot make it better known than it already is,” he stated in a Dec. 1, 1862, Message to Congress, “that I strongly favor colonization.” To Lincoln, blacks could be “equal,” but not in the United States
You want to judge Lincoln by the standards of our times then fine. I know you Southron types too well to expect you to judge your own Southern leaders like Davis and Lee by the same standards. For if you did then you would be forced to admit that they were bigger racists than Lincoln was. But let me point out that in those debates that you quoted from, Lincoln was on record as opposing slavery and saying that the black man was entitled to the same fundamental set of rights as the white man, and that when it came to the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness then the black man was his equal. Can you point to a single quote by Lee or Davis or any other Southern leader of the same period which indicated that they thought the black man to be their equal in any way? That he was entitled to any rights whatsoever? Can you do that?
Lincoln supported the Illinois Constitution, which prohibited the emigration of black people into the state, and he also supported the Illinois Black Codes, which deprived the small number of free blacks in the state any semblance of citizenship.
I don't suppose you have any quotes from Lincoln supporting your claim do you?
Lincoln was also a lifelong advocate of “colonization” or shipping all black people to Africa, Central America, Haiti—anywhere but here.
Lincoln was along time supporter of voluntary emigration or colonization to Africa. But so was Robert Lee, who put his money where his mouth was and actually paid passage for some of his former slaves to Liberia. Of course the slaves in question had little choice. Under Virginia laws of the period they had 12 months in which to leave the commonwealth or they could be sold back into slavery.
great post,