Lincoln's path through Racism & Abolitionism to Slave Emancipation
Channel: lilmikesf
Date: 2015-07-07

Columbia University History Professor Eric Foner explains President Lincoln's evolving views on the abolition of slavery leading up to the historic Emancipation Proclamation. Lincoln, while never a fan of slavery, did not always believe freed slaves would be suitable to live in American society or have the right to vote. Prior to the final year or two of his life, he didn't really conceptualize the United States as a biracial society of free people. His thinking about the fate of people of African descent was like many of his contemporaries, who largely favored colonization of blacks back to Africa. Midway through the civil war the President's thinking evolved, and he began to realize forcing the slaves back to Africa was not a viable solution, and the only way to truly solve the problem of slavery was to give freed slaves equal rights to live and prosper in America. Lincoln was under great political pressures, and widespread prejudice, racism, appeals to ethnocentrism and anti-immigrant sentiment are all still very visible in our American society today and certainly are not new.