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His words if spoken today would label him a white supremacist, and probably would be placed on a government watch list.
Our generations textbooks led us to believe slavery was a major moral issue in his decision to free them. The reality is, outside of the Harper's Ferry incident it was a non-issue until 2 years into the war. Lincoln only freed the slaves to punish the south for waging war.
Thank you for the grammatical correction, I failed English having deemed it another worthless subject.
Don't blame your "generations textbooks" [sic] for your own failure to learn what you were taught about American history. American history textbooks since the 1960s have stressed Lincoln's personal opposition to slavery as well as his typical 19th century racist beliefs and the fact that the Emancipation Proclamation was a war measure and not some great moral action. I learned all that when I was in school in the 1960s; I taught the same when I was a school teacher back in the 1980s; and it's the same thing kids are taught today.
...the fact that the Emancipation Proclamation was a war measure and not some great moral action.
I regard it as both a war measure and a great moral action. As soon as the North won the war, the slaves were in fact freed as the EP promised. And in the 1860s, a fella could be killed for less...oops...
I have found that all of those subjects I had to take to be well rounded taught me to think about the subjects I mastered in different ways. I didn't think so at the time but I have come to appreciate that EVERY class I took had value towards my life and my career.
I tell my students that every subject they study teaches their brain to think in a different way and they will use the brain they grow learning those subjects every day of the rest of their lives. Education isn't about just learning to do a job. It's about growth and you get the most growth by stepping outside of your comfort zone.
Education at high school and below, yes. It isn't about a job. If someone asked me 15 years ago if College was about learning for a job, I would have said no. My outlook has entirely changed because corporations are making it a requirement for degrees more-so now than ever. That means that the expectation from corporations is that a degree makes someone ready for a job, specifically in one's field or expertise. And in some cases, corporations have realized that four year degrees aren't enough because Colleges don't teach enough in the specific area of expertise. This is the fundamental disconnect between Academia and Employment.
What do you think? I taught high school for 32 years and taught way fewer concepts in a lot shallower depth at the end than I did at the beginning.
When I cleaned out my files last summer when I retired I pulled out some of the old tests that were in the back.
They were (for general Psych), in some cases, as difficult as the ones I was giving to AP Psych the last year I taught.
The same was true for the US History and World History tests. The older ones were much more difficult than the ones I was using at the end.
Having said that, the later tests came from Curriculum and Instruction, not from my generating them or using tests supplied with the text.
There's a lot of unanswered questions in your anecdote, like changes over that time in the demographics of the student body, or widening scope of topics to go with shallower depth. High school enrollment didn't even cross 50% of the population until around the 40s and 50s. So at best you could assert that we had a single generation of universally brilliant and hard-working children around the 70s-90s, the likes of which have never been seen before or since. That seems like a very unlikely explanation to me. More likely-seeming is that the ignorance of Today's Kids has been embellished.
There's a lot of unanswered questions in your anecdote, like changes over that time in the demographics of the student body, or widening scope of topics to go with shallower depth. High school enrollment didn't even cross 50% of the population until around the 40s and 50s. So at best you could assert that we had a single generation of universally brilliant and hard-working children around the 70s-90s, the likes of which have never been seen before or since. That seems like a very unlikely explanation to me. More likely-seeming is that the ignorance of Today's Kids has been embellished.
You missed "fewer topics"?
For the 26 years I was at my last school the financial demographics got better, the education level of the parents increased. The school was solidly middle/upper middle class with a fair number of kids whose parents were high GS level civil servants, command staff military officers, senior NCOs, mid to upper level business employees, lawyers, doctors, other professionals, entrepreneurs. The only demographic that changed significantly was the school went from majority White to majority Black.
Don't blame your "generations textbooks" [sic] for your own failure to learn what you were taught about American history. American history textbooks since the 1960s have stressed Lincoln's personal opposition to slavery as well as his typical 19th century racist beliefs and the fact that the Emancipation Proclamation was a war measure and not some great moral action. I learned all that when I was in school in the 1960s; I taught the same when I was a school teacher back in the 1980s; and it's the same thing kids are taught today.
My generations textbooks were from the 70's and 80's, and they are/were inaccurate.
"And when it comes to the Civil War, children are supposed to learn that the conflict was caused by “sectionalism, states’ rights and slavery” — written deliberately in that order to telegraph slavery’s secondary role in driving the conflict, according to some members of the state board of education."
"Students in Texas are required to read the speech Jefferson Davis gave when he was inaugurated president of the Confederate States of America, an address that does not mention slavery. But students are not required to read a famous speech by Alexander Stephens, Davis’s vice president, in which he explained that the South’s desire to preserve slavery was the cornerstone of its new government and “the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution.”
Which is a shame, b/c I really do love US History.
Maybe I should go back into teaching it.
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I have found that all of those subjects I had to take to be well rounded taught me to think about the subjects I mastered in different ways. I didn't think so at the time but I have come to appreciate that EVERY class I took had value towards my life and my career. 
