Abraham Lincoln the Politician
Abraham Lincoln: Moral, Just, and Practical
Today in the United States one of the most controversial issues is race relations. Mainstream America would like to exist in an environment of integration and race independent societal construct. However, one cannot negate the existence of racially motivated problems. Slavery, which is a primary component of the development of what we call modern American culture and its abolition could be considered the moment where race relations started to become an issue in the US.
Slavery was abolished after the civil war by President Abraham Lincoln. The question becomes, was the blood shed in the civil war motivated by a moral imperative to end slavery, or was there some other primary causal factor? Was President Lincoln a man driven by a moral agenda or was he an adept statesman who knew that he needed a moral high horse to justify the war which was being fought for other reasons? These questions lie at the center of events which in reality can be considered the start to the shaping of modern day race relations in the United States. By answering them we can understand the intentions and identify the core of the cultural problem we have today.
To understand the motivation of the man, initially we have to understand the man. This paper will begin by describing president Lincoln and the emancipation proclamation and then come to some conclusion with regard to the questions aforementioned.
Abraham Lincoln was the sixteenth president of the United States from 1861 until 1865. He was born in 1809 and died, assassinated by a madman while still in office. His father was a pioneer, who lived on what he caught by hunting or grew himself, and ...
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...oclimation. However, I do not think that Lincoln's morality coincided with his political agenda. Freeing the slaves was a coincidence, because it was in his fvor to do so. Had Lincoln not been a Politicia,, he would not have been concerned with the agenda of the black people in America.
This man fought a practical battle while feeling morally justified, because his cause was for the better good of the country, not the slaves. He used the moral stance to gain international support, and this combined moral/practical approach is what lead to the victory of the industrial North. Although the union which was created was now indestructible bitterness was bound to remain high for many years, and it is the remnants of this bitterness which set the stage for affirmative action requirements in the 60's and the strained race relations today.
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The American Civil War not only proved to be the country’s deadliest war but also precipitated one of the greatest constitutional crises in the history of the United States. President Lincoln is revered by many Americans today as a man of great moral principle who was responsible for both preventing the Union’s dissolution as well as helping to trigger the movement to abolish slavery. In retrospect, modern historians find it difficult to question the legitimacy of Lincoln’s actions as President. A more precise review of President Lincoln’s actions during the Civil War, however, reveals that many, if not the majority, of his actions were far from legitimate on constitutional and legal grounds. Moreover, his true political motives reveal his
Clay had a unique perspective on the abolishment of slavery. Henry Clay wanted to slavery to be abolished within the early United States, but his motives leaned more towards have these slaves returned to their original countries, thus making them unable to become citizens of the United States. A large number of citizens in the north supported this ideal because they felt it was an effective way to eliminate slavery and remove the possibility of these enslaved men becoming apart of their society. Abraham Lincoln had a strong moral compass that he used to determine decisions on most of the major issues he encountered. He believed slavery to be morally wrong and had difficulty comprehending how people were able to justify its morality. Lincoln was disgusted by the treatment that took place in slavery. He believed that if one to remove the moral obligation within slavery and the mere realization of its cruelty, there are no there reasons to inhibit the expansion of it. At this particular time, slavery was an exceptionally prominent source of income, giving those who owned the most slaves, the most wealth. Because slavery produced such a resource of income, Lincoln knew that if given the opportunity, slavery would only increase.
. .’, concludes James Oakes’ book with the aftermath of the Civil War and Lincoln’s assassination. Oakes discussed the respect Douglass gathered for Lincoln over the years and the affect his assassination had on both himself and America as a whole. Oakes even brushed over Douglass’ relationship with Andrew Johnson, the president succeeding Lincoln. Analyzing his experience with the new president, it was safe to say that Andrew Johnson had no consideration as to what Douglass and Lincoln previously fought for. Johnson did not have the same political skills as Lincoln did, and he did not retain the same view for America that Lincoln did. It was obvious that Douglass held Lincoln at a higher standard than Andrew Johnson, stating that he was a “progressive man, a humane man, an honorable man, and at heart an anti-slavery man” (p. 269). Oakes even gave his own stance on Andrew Jackson, “It was a legacy that Andrew Johnson could ever match. When all of Lincoln’s attributes were taken into consideration - his ascent from the obscurity to greatness, his congenial temperament, his moral courage - it was easy for Douglass to imagine how much better things would be ‘had Mr. Lincoln been living today’.” (p. 262). It is hard to imagine the pre-war Douglass to have said something like that as opposed to an older, much more reserved Douglass. With the abolishment of slavery, so came much discrimination. Without
When President Lincoln first called for troops to put down the confederate rebellion, he made no connection between this action and an attempt to end slavery. In fact, he explicitly stated "the utmost care will be observed to avoid any devastation, any destruction of, or interference with, property..." At this point, slavery was not yet integral to the struggle, it was much more important for the Union to air on the side of political prudence and avoid angering loyal boarder states. However, despite this lack of political dialogue, many abolitionists, slaves, and free blacks felt the war to preserve the union could also be a war to end slavery. In the end, they were right, as military need overwhelmed potential political dangers, slaves and the institution of slavery became a central issue in the civil war.
Up until the late 1800s, slavery was widely considered acceptable in America. This ethical issue was important because African Americans were forcibly held against their will in order to fulfill the hard labor duties that were demanded by their owner. Slaves had no say in whether their lives belong to themselves. There was no sense of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. African Americans were not even considered a full person. Although the slaves had families they had no control on whether or not they would stay together. Slaves were sold to different parts of the country in which sometimes they would never see their family members again. Although slavery was accepted, the northern part of America allowed African Americans to be free. This ultimately led to a bloody division between the North and the South. The south led a revolt to go to war against the north, specifically in order to keep their rights to allow slavery. Based on the principles of jus ad bellum, the south was not qualified to go to war in the first place. In order to go to war the state has to be minimally just and the south was not minimally just in doing so. Throughout this paper I will explain the six principles of the jus ad bellum and whether or not the south met any of those principles. I will also explain the south perspective within each of these principles, on why they believed it was right for them to go to war.
...ator.’ Rather than to view Lincoln as a man who sought emancipation as a primary goal, which is misleading, we should remember him as a man who rose above the prevailing prejudices of his time to cast away a morally corrupt institution
As a child in elementary and high school, I was taught that President Abraham Lincoln was the reason that African slaves were freed from slavery. My teachers did not provide much more information than that. For an African American student, I should have received further historical information than that about my ancestors. Unfortunately, I did not have the opportunity or desire to research slavery on my own until college. And with my eagerness and thirst for more answers concerning my African American history, I set out to console my spirit, knowledge, and self-awareness of my ancestors’ history. I received the answers that my brain, mind, and soul need. Although Abraham Lincoln signed the 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution, courageous African American slaves were the real heroes and motivation of the movement.
The controversies surrounding slavery have been established in many societies worldwide for centuries. In past generations, although slavery did exists and was tolerated, it was certainly very questionable,” ethically“. Today, the morality of such an act would not only be unimaginable, but would also be morally wrong. As things change over the course of history we seek to not only explain why things happen, but as well to understand why they do. For this reason, we will look further into how slavery has evolved throughout History in American society, as well as the impacts that it has had.
...h the Confederacy. Even if the goal of the Emancipation Proclamation was to win the war, it was also a moral value because at the end of the war, Lincoln supported the 13th amendment, which ended slavery in the USA. Looking at different sources such as Eric Foner’s “emancipation proclamation” and McPherson James’s “how president Lincoln issued the emancipation proclamation” , it is clear that opinions differed regarding the purpose of the emancipation proclamation, but both of them argued that it was both a military tactic but had also a moral value behind it.
Abraham Lincoln’s original views on slavery were formed through the way he was raised and the American customs of the period. Throughout Lincoln’s influential years, slavery was a recognized and a legal institution in the United States of America. Even though Lincoln began his career by declaring that he was “anti-slavery,” he was not likely to agree to instant emancipation. However, although Lincoln did not begin as a radical anti-slavery Republican, he eventually issued his Emancipation Proclamation, which freed all slaves and in his last speech, even recommended extending voting to blacks. Although Lincoln’s feeling about blacks and slavery was quite constant over time, the evidence found between his debate with Stephen A. Douglas and his Gettysburg Address, proves that his political position and actions towards slavery have changed profoundly.
Contrary to what today’s society believes about Lincoln, he was not a popular man with the South at this time. The South wanted to expand towards the West, but Lincoln created a geographical containment rule keeping slavery in the states it currently resided in. Despite his trying to rationalize with the South, Lincoln actually believed something different ”Lincoln claimed that he, like the Founding Fathers, saw slavery in the Old South as a regrettable reality whose expansion could and should be arrested, thereby putting it on the long and gradual road ”ultimate extinction” (216). He believed it to be “evil” thus “implying that free southerners were evil for defending it”(275). Lincoln wanted to wipe out slavery for good, and the South could sense his secret motives.
His personal beliefs had always been opposed to slavery. He believed that the Founding Fathers had put slavery on the road to extinction, and he wanted to continue it down that path. Lincoln acted very professional; he always put the nation before his personal perspective. It transformed the fight to preserve the nation into a battle for human freedom. According to the history book “A People and a Nation”, the Emancipation Proclamation was legally an ambiguous document, but as a moral and political document it had great meaning.
The drive to end slavery in the United States was a long one, from being debated in the writing of the Declaration of Independence, to exposure of its ills in literature, from rebellions of slaves, to the efforts of people like Harriet Tubman to transport escaping slaves along the Underground Railroad. Abolitionists had urged President Abraham Lincoln to free the slaves in the Confederate states from the very outset of the Civil War. By mid-1862, Lincoln had become increasingly convinced of the moral imperative to end slavery, but he hesitated (History.com). As commander-in-chief of the Union Army, he had military objectives to consider (History.com). On one hand, emancipation might
There are certain historical facts, which have been lost in the public memory, as certain legends have taken the place of reality. In order to fully understand what happened, it is necessary to comprehend that the Northern states were far from being uniformly the champions of equal rights that is generally indicated by popular belief. By this understanding, that is that the abandonment of African-Americans did not constitute a drastic change of moral position for many people in the North, it is easier to understand their subsequent actions in ignoring the plight of African-Americans in the South after the Reconstruction era. An example of one of these overlooked historical facts would be that there were still slaves in the nation’s capital in 1860; and, at that time, the President-elect, Abraham Lincoln, offered, “to support a constitutional amendment to insulate the institution of slavery in the slave states from federal interference. ”6....
Slavery was the core of the North and South’s conflict. Slavery has existed in the New World since the seventeenth century prior to it being exclusive to race. During those times there were few social and political concerns about slavery. Initially, slaves were considered indentured servants who will eventually be set free after paying their debt(s) to the owner. In some cases, the owners were African with white servants. However, over time the slavery became exclusive to Africans and was no limited to a specific timeframe, but life. In addition, the treatment of slaves worsens from the Atlantic Slave trade to th...