Abe was definitely a crafty guy and had a tremendous gift for rhetoric, so it is certainly possible that he was playing a double-game. That leaves two possible readings of the quote, but IMO the "double-game" reading is only 'better', from a moral standpoint, for Lincoln himself. It doesn't provide any more moral cover for the Union as a whole.
If we take Abe at face value, he is admitting that emancipation is, as declared in the Emancipation Proclamation, merely a war measure, i.e. a lever which aids his goal of sectional domination. This is neither a good look for Union nor for Lincoln, as it undermines any moral impetus for the war.
The alternative is that we're reading Abe the moral operator, who is merely telling the people what they want to hear, so as to gain their support for his moral mission. While this is a better look for Abe, it is no better for the Union as a whole, as it still implies that the Union was broadly against emancipation (for most of the war, anyway), which forced him to defend it as a necessary war measure.
So either A) the North invaded to subjugate the South, and only freed the slaves as a war aim, or B) the North invaded to subjugate the south, and thought that they had to free the slaves as a war aim, when in actuality they were duped into doing so by the super-canny Abe Lincoln. In either case, the nation as a whole is driven forward by imperialist motives, and the moral outcome of emancipation was, at best, incidental for all concerned, except perhaps for Abe Lincoln.
This is a bit of a narrow point, but I think it's worth making, as it underpins my original point--The idea that the South was "unnuanced evil" is utter, a-historical nonsense, spread by goobers who don't read history. The Southerners were a people who suffered the most common moral failing of their time. When they were invaded (for the sin of believing that governments powers are derived from the consent of the governed, rather than military might) they were not immoral, let alone evil, for fighting back. Their posterity is not immoral for celebrating their ancestors' valiant defense of their country.
Regarding ”Fighting for your country as a virtue” - yup.
Regarding motivations of the north-”more imperialistic rather than abolitionist” - yup.
The point remains though - the southern system even post-civil war was so vile and dehumanizing with jim-crowe and all that nazis used it as a template for the ostracism of the jews.
So in my books it’s a system that does not deserve to survive.
I acknowledge the sacrifice of sourhern soldiers was honorable as individuals but they defended a system built on a deep evil.
Similarly as nazi germany was a political entity that needed to lose the south was a political entity that needed to lose. Regardless of the ’true political motivations’ of the time.
But military victories are hardly tools of building better societies.
What alternatives are there to strategies of borderline genocide then? Is there any version of history where the slaver-components of the southern cultural heritage can be isolated from the non-slaver parts?
The post-apartheid South Africa handled the heritage of the afrikaaners pretty well IMO. No purges, no melting of statues. Just huge effort to make everyone understand - including the truth commission - what the new rules are, and what is now acceptable.
Germany post-ww2 was rebuilt and the nazi elements eradicated.
Both of these examples had a country with a long history before the super oppressive systems took place.
South otoh was built by slavers with slaver institutions from the early beginning. I honestly don’t know how much there is of non-slaver stuff to fall back to.
That does not make genocide right, nor does it explain away the trauma of cultural eradication. I hope there would be some method of healing but I guess close to two centuries no one has come up with one. I’m not convinced melting statues helps at all.
If we take Abe at face value, he is admitting that emancipation is, as declared in the Emancipation Proclamation, merely a war measure, i.e. a lever which aids his goal of sectional domination. This is neither a good look for Union nor for Lincoln, as it undermines any moral impetus for the war.
The alternative is that we're reading Abe the moral operator, who is merely telling the people what they want to hear, so as to gain their support for his moral mission. While this is a better look for Abe, it is no better for the Union as a whole, as it still implies that the Union was broadly against emancipation (for most of the war, anyway), which forced him to defend it as a necessary war measure.
So either A) the North invaded to subjugate the South, and only freed the slaves as a war aim, or B) the North invaded to subjugate the south, and thought that they had to free the slaves as a war aim, when in actuality they were duped into doing so by the super-canny Abe Lincoln. In either case, the nation as a whole is driven forward by imperialist motives, and the moral outcome of emancipation was, at best, incidental for all concerned, except perhaps for Abe Lincoln.
This is a bit of a narrow point, but I think it's worth making, as it underpins my original point--The idea that the South was "unnuanced evil" is utter, a-historical nonsense, spread by goobers who don't read history. The Southerners were a people who suffered the most common moral failing of their time. When they were invaded (for the sin of believing that governments powers are derived from the consent of the governed, rather than military might) they were not immoral, let alone evil, for fighting back. Their posterity is not immoral for celebrating their ancestors' valiant defense of their country.