Lincoln gave priority to preserving the Union, but personally despised slavery and wished to contain it if he couldn’t end it. The Barn Burner party headed by Lloyd Garrison wanted to destroy the Union because its constitution tolerated slavery, and therefore he considered it a pact with the Devil. Lincoln was right, and when he realized the flaw in his mentor Garrison’s argument, Fredrick Douglas, a former slave himself, founded the Republican Party together with Lincoln. Simple minds, simplistic narratives.
Correct. Playing politics to avoid further divisions of the Union was a necessity to be successful.
Unfortunately the same small minds exist on the other side of the debate as well and they make similar arguments with nearly identical revisionist history about Lincoln.
He wished to contain it's ability to gain more seats in Congress where they could do something about the system rigged to funnel money from the Southern states into the pockets of the corrupt greedy Northern power brokers.
Southerners were paying 72% of all the taxes. *THAT* is something they don't teach you in history.