Was Lincoln The Great Emancipator?

Taken into effect on January 1, 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation, signed by our 16th president, Abraham Lincoln, allowed millions of enslaved people to be free in the southern areas of the United States. Even though Lincoln signed the proclamation, does this really make him the “Great Emancipator”? The question is up for debate. The Great Emancipator should have had supported the negroes’ 100 percent, without doubt, on all levels of equality, constitutionally, politically and socially, and took immediate action to end slavery. Lincoln, in reality, was still a white supremacist and tried to look for other solutions, other than emancipation, that would end the Civil War. Although Lincoln may have ended slavery, he does not deserve the title

as the Great Emancipator because he lacked support for negroes as equals, cared more about the Union than slavery, nor took immediate action to put an end to slavery.
First of all, Lincoln is not the great emancipator because he did not support the idea that negroes were equal on every level.

As stated in the Declaration of Independence, he first believed that all negroes had the right to have natural rights. He declared this in the first Lincoln-Douglas Debate that “he is much entitled to these as the white men.”1 Here, Lincoln emphasized his stance that even a negro is entitled to their natural rights. However, prior to this, Lincoln stated that he has no lawful right or inclination to end slavery and “introduce political and social inequality between the white and the black races.”2 Abraham Lincoln did not even have any intention of ending slavery. He just wanted the public to know that the negroes deserved natural rights and nothing more. He was never in favor of making them voters or jurors in court, or letting them hold office, or marry white people.3 How can one say that he is the “Great Emancipator” when he did not want to give the negroes any more rights? Looking at them as minorities, he still did not want to try and to give them any freedom. He does not view them as equals in society, nor did he have strong feelings to support the negroes at all. Attacking their race, he still calls the white race superior to the negroes. If Lincoln never supported the equal rights of negroes, he cannot be the great emancipator. Showing indifference to the negroes, he was also reluctant to interfere with the state’s rights and wanted to

respect slavery’s existence beyond his control. Since Lincoln let the states deal with slavery, he became a bystander by not taking action. He did not try to step in earlier, but just gave up on the fact that it was out of his control. There was no intention of him giving the least amount of attention to it because he claimed to have no power to abolish it. If Lincoln were to deserve the title of the Great Emancipator, he would not have earned it because he did not support the negroes enough to fight for their political and social equality and did nothing by claiming that bringing an end to slavery was out of his control.
In addition to not giving equality the negroes on every level, Lincoln should not hold the title as the great emancipator because he favored saving the Union instead of outlawing slavery. During the Civil War, Lincoln became more concerned with saving the union than trying to abolish slavery. He wanted to restore national authority by having all of the states be a part of the union again. In the letter to Horace Greeley, Lincoln tells him that “his paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery.”5 He stated that the war is not about slavery at all, it is more about saving the Union and bringing it back to power. Lincoln shows that he has no care whatsoever about ending slavery. He again does not support the negroes because he had no intention of freeing the slaves at this point and only cares about the Union. Focusing all his attention on winning the war for his side, he cared about nothing else. Throughout the letter, he even reiterated the fact that what he did about slavery and the colored race, he did because he believed it helped to save the union.6 Lincoln had absolutely no intention to end slavery. He had no commitment to slavery but instead commitment to saving the Union.
Finally, another policy that Lincoln tried to establish was the colonization of slaves.

Instead of calling for immediate emancipation of slaves, he decided to set up meetings with the head of the Chiriqui Improvement Company to obtain land to send slaves to. He also urged Congress to provide funds to put colonized slaves, freed and those that decided to be free, in a newly acquired territory.7 Here, Lincoln is more interested in colonizing the slaves than trying to emancipate them. Shifting his efforts into trying to acquire land in Central and South America, Lincoln now seemed to be avoiding the idea of emancipation. He used colonization as an excuse to circumvent the idea of emancipation as a solution to end the Civil War. Lincoln also claimed that colonization would “be better for us both, therefore, to be separated.”8 In addition, he then said that the political affairs are not as satisfactory as he would had liked them to be in the territory he aquired, but he would send them there anyway because of all the other benefits it possessed for the negroes.9 Lincoln even tried to convince the blacks that colonization would be better for them instead of emancipation besides the fact that they would have to deal with political issues at their new home. If political matters are not up to his satisfaction, it does not make sense as to why he would even consider colonization at this point as a solution. It would make more sense to call for emancipation. Again, Lincoln shows he is

not the “Great Emancipator” because how can one try to find another solution like colonizing the slaves with mediocre conditions instead of taking immediate action and calling for emancipation as one of the first solutions.
Had Lincoln called for emancipation in the first place, put freeing the slaves at the top of his priorities, and supported the blacks through all levels of equality, he would have definitely earned the title as the “Great Emancipator”. But because he did not do any of this, there is not a chance to consider him for that title. Lincoln ultimately took too long, tried too many solutions and lacked the support needed to become the great emancipator. If Lincoln really wants people to remember him for something, it will only be for signing the document, not for being the “Great Emancipator”.