Edited by author 12-11-2007 06:18 PM
Backfill post- Lincoln's Second Inaugural, Gettysburg Address, Chickamauga monument.

It was surprising to see from these documents how willingly Lincoln, and the rest of the Union along with him, adopted slavery as the reason for fighting the Civil War. You always hear people who say "the war wasn't about slavery, it was about states' rights" or "the war wasn't about slavery, it was about saving the Union." Even Lincoln is often quoted as saying something to the effect of "if I could save the Union by saving no slaves, I would do it." However, these documents (or in the case of the Chickamauga monument, the plaque) are removed from the earlier part of the war and openly embrace freeing the slaves as a major reason to justify the fighting.

Lincoln's Second Inaugural clearly states: "All knew that this interest [slavery] was somehow the cause of the war."

The Gettysburg Address opens with the notion that "all men are created equal" and closes by talking about "a new birth of freedom."

The Chickamauga monument calls the Civil War "the conflict which made all men free."

I had always read that freeing the slaves was not a popular war goal in the early days of the war, and that some Union soldiers even deserted when Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation because freeing the slaves was not what they were fighting for. However, it seems as if by the end of the war, fighting to free the slaves had become an even more powerful justification for fighting than "saving the Union." While it is obvious that Lincoln himself agreed with this, I wonder how much of the rest of the public went along with Lincoln, and how long it took them to do so. Clearly, by the time the Chickamauga monument was constructed, public opinion rested with Lincoln's interpretation.