Any Freeper should be proud to be proud of Lincoln. As Dr. Guelzo puts it so eloquently:
“Lincoln is, both culturally and in terms of his economic thinking, firmly and immovably located in the center of what we can call liberal democratic thought in the 19th century. He is very much market oriented, with tremendous confidence in the power of a capitalist society to transform for the better, and he believes in opening the possibilities of that society to as many as possible. To him, that’s what’s coterminous with liberty. If you have to put him in company, he would belong with John Stuart Mill, whom he seriously admired. Shortly before he was assassinated, Lincoln was asked by a journalist what books had been most influential for him. One of the two books he indicated is Stuart Mill’s On Liberty. Put him in that context of the upwardly aspiring bourgeoisie—that’s Lincoln.”
You can’t have free men rise who have to compete with agrarian, aristocratic slaveholders. (Not to mention firstly the incredible injustice to the slaves).
You can be proud of the Father of Federalism is you want, I’ll pass.