Abraham Lincoln used the slavery issue as a pawn to be traded for support. Case in point being Maryland's (a slave state at the time) support for the North. As a Union border state, Maryland was not included in President Lincoln's 1863 Emancipation Proclamation, which declared all slaves in Southern Confederate states to be free. He needed Maryland's troops or more importanlyt, didn't want to fight them, so he allowed them to keep slavery in place. So those who wish to whitewash history, put that in your pipe and smoke it. Gonna tear down the Lincoln Memorial now?