Lincoln's Views on Slavery

On January 1, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, abolishing slavery throughout the United States. While this was a politically controversial act, for its time, it was a necessary and appropriate culmination of an evolving policy concerning the problem of slavery.

In present-day America, the idea that slavery was an inherently unjust and immoral institution is almost universally understood and accepted. In the mid 1800s, however, slavery was an established tradition that played an integral role in the agriculturally-based economy of the southern United States. As a growing number of people recognized its immoral nature and actively sought its abolition, the problem of slavery emerged as a bitter point of contention which would eventually escalate into a civil war.

Lincoln's views concerning slavery were formed and expressed when he was still quite young. He often stated that he was "naturally anti-slavery". In 1837, as a newly elected member of the Illinois State Legislature, Lincoln and fellow legislator Dan Stone recorded a formal protest against the strong anti-abolitionist resolutions presented by their colleagues. The protest stated that "The institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy" (Donald 134). Years later, he would argue against slavery from a logical point of view. His argument stated that "If A can prove that he may enslave B, then B can use that same argument to prove that he may enslave A. If

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vided into Kansas and Nebraska with Nebraska admitted to the Union as a slave state. Lincoln had been a practicing lawyer since his departure from the U.S. Senate in 1850. The Kansas-Nebraska act prompted him to run again for office. Although his bid for a seat in the U.S. Congress was unsuccessful, his campaign gave him valuable exposure, allowed him to publicly rebuke Douglas, and it paved the way for Lincoln to run against Douglas in the Senate race of 1858. Although the anti-slavery activists had lost a political battle with the Kansas-Nebraska act, Lincoln still did not consider himself an abolitionist. He did, however, leave the Whig party, of which he had been an active member for more than 20 years, in order to join the newly created Republican party. The Republican Party was formed by the moderate, anti-slavery faction of the Whigs in opposition to both the pro-slavery platform of the Democrats and the radical, anti-foreigner stance of the Know-nothing Party. He would align himself politically with the Republican Party for the rest of his life and career. Lincoln's successful election to the U.S. Senate in 1858, his obvious talents as an observant and convincing public speaker and his growing political influence

Category: History - L