And while Lincoln did oppose enslavement on moral grounds, he also opposed it practically, as toxic to the success of the U.S. experiment. He believed the system of enslavement that propped up the southern US economy was damaging and would ultimately lead to stagnation, loss of American competitiveness on the world stage, and maybe even collapse.

And while he may have been right about that, it’s another reason to understand that he did not oppose slavery because he stood for the equality of Black people. His stand was a practical one and it was about the success of white people.

I believe there is some evidence, however, that he evolved in the last two or three years of his life and that his back-to-Africa and anti-civil rights views had changed quite a bit, at least in part because of his evolving friendship with Frederick Douglass.