It has been hip for quite some time to trash the intentions, not to mention the legacy, of certain great Americans, not the least of these being Jefferson and Lincoln. Their ambiguous record on slavery is the major source of such attacks. In Jefferson's case, of course, it was his ownership of slaves and his relationship with Sally Hemming. With Lincoln, the negative views have to do with whether or not he gave a damn about slavery or whether it was a political issue he got stuck with.

In July 1858, Lincoln wrote this note:

I have not allowed myself to forget that the abolition of the Slave-trade by Great Brittain, was agitated a hundred years before it was a final success.... Speeches & Writings, 1832-58

Why write such words if abolition was not something he considered a goal to be pursued? I have no doubt Lincoln was opposed to slavery not merely on political but also on moral grounds. In 1837, as a member of the Illinois Legislature, Lincoln joined with a colleague to protest a resolution on slavery that had been passed. In this protest, Lincoln stated unequivocally: "...the institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy...." The protest, however, did not deal with slavery as such but with states rights: "[We] believe that the Congress of the United States has no power, under the constitution, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the different States."

This protest summarizes neatly the challenge that later faced President Lincoln: At one time, the necessity of abolishing the unjust institution of slavery, yet preserving the rights of each state to make laws pertinent to its own governance. Ultimately, with the acts of the southern states in seeking dissolution of the Union, Lincoln could end slavery without touching on the question of states rights: He freed slaves in states which were in rebellion and, as such, had relinquished the rights he had once defended against federal usurpation.

We long for moral and political purity in our leaders; the greater that leader, the more saintly we demand they be. Lincoln was no saint. Had the southern states not chosen the path of civil war, the institution of slavery may likely have lasted beyond Lincoln's lifetime. He would have continued to seek a path to abolition that preserved states rights, but that possibility was removed from him. Instead, he led the Union to victory in war, freed the slaves, violated the Constitution at times, and upheld it eventually, victorious. Lincoln's legacy is sullied, so to speak, by both his humanness and politics. But he does remain our greatest president because when he was able to do so, he did what no other American president was willing or able to do: Abraham Lincoln ended slavery in America.

And it took him less than a hundred years. A great cost of blood, yes, but barely "four score and seventy years" after the nation was founded, its great original sin was eliminated. It cost Lincoln his life, but he gave freedom where no other President had been willing to do.