Myths About Lincoln and the Civil War

Abraham Lincoln is honored as “The Great Emancipator,” as a champion of equal rights for all, regardless of race, and as the president who waged war to “free the slaves.” In fact, he sought to make the US an all-white republic that would be “an outlet for free white people everywhere, the world over.” He supported ambitious efforts to resettle or “colonize” blacks in Africa or central America. In today’s America, the heritage of slavery is so shameful that many who honor the legacy of the South and the Confederacy deny that the motive of white southerners in breaking away from the federal union in 1860-61 was above all to preserve the institution of race-based slavery. A common mistake in trying to learn from the past is to evaluate the behavior and motives of people in history on the basis of attitudes and values that prevail in the present.