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Love the actual history getting downvotes here... this also doesn't conflict with it being about slavery. The thing we shouldn't do is equate "about slavery" in the way the Confederate states meant it when they seceded, with "about slavery" in the sense of abolition. Lincoln did not enter the war to emancipate slaves and fight for abolition, his first inaugural address on the eve of war leaves no question, a direct quote:
Lincoln's primary motivation was keeping the Union together at first, and obviously that changed, because we have the Emancipation Proclamation. The moral issue of slavery was hugely important for the North's motivation and for people to fight though, many being emancipated slaves who understood the true point of fighting more than their northern white commanders, and who also faced racism from other northern soldiers yet still fought with them. The point is it wasn't some goodness of the government that defined this war to be about slavery, it was actually the slaves that did that and those that were sympathetic to this cause.
Barbara Fields is an expert on civil war history and makes the case for this view in this excellent interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ncnTNkeoOM The question of Lincoln's motivations at the beginning of the war as Union before slavery and whether he can be excused is addressed at 55 minutes.
Spotswood Rice, a former slave, writes to Kittey Diggs, 1864:
(It's not known if Spotswood had a showdown with Kittey but there are property records indicating he lived with Mary and his wife after the war.)
Edit: It's people downvoting historical letters from freed slaves and historians reading testimonies of black Union soldiers that makes me think my time on this website is just about over...