Not evil, but indifferent to slavery as an institution, and on human rights in general. The North was no more moral than the South.
I think you are obviously incorrect about Lincoln. It is obvious from many of his speeches that he had given a great deal of thought to the whole "Negro Issue."
By today's standards, he was a racist, as indeed was (almost) everybody at the time.
However, he was unalterably opposed to slavery and especially to its spread into new areas. He believed that the federal governmenthad no power to end slavery in the slave states, but that it had every right to prevent its spread into the territories.
He did not believe that blacks were fully equal to whites, but he was adamant that they had every right to live their lives without being mistreated and to enjoy the fruits of their own labor. For the time, that was pretty advanced.
I guess this is where we part company. It's the same old tune. If a person or institution isn't perfect, then it cannot be spoken of as any better than another that is completely corrupt or evil.
In Turkey, until recently, women had some minor disabilities under the law. Therefore, I guess they were no better than the taliban, since women were not absolutely equal to men.
I think this line of "reasoning" is just silly. It is highly relevant to compare societies and individuals. Even though none of them are perfect, some are much more imperfect than others. And that comparative imperfection is important.
This is all based on the theory that since all humans contain both good and evil, there is no relevant difference between them. So Hitler and Mother Theresa were morally equivalent, to use a little hyperbole, since both were composed of both good and bad.