Was Abraham Lincoln a Liberal or Conservative?

FriedChicken1

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Sep 18, 2010
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I just got back from the movie "Lincoln" and it was an excellent movie. But I had a hard time understanding if he was a right or left winger. Many say that he was a Liberal, but he had the support of the Conservative Republicans to establish the 13th Amendment (to free the slaves).

What I don't understand is that people say he was Liberal. But he obtained the support of the Conservatives with this quote:

"The chief and real purpose of the Republican party is eminently conservative. It proposes nothing save and except to restore this government to its original tone in regard to this element of slavery, and there to maintain it, looking for no further change in reference to it than that which the original framers of the Government themselves expected and looked forward to."

Judging by this quote, he sounds Conservative. What do you all think?
 
During that time period, he was considered a liberal, but the Republican Party at the time was considered more progressive than the opposing Democratic Party ironically enough.
The 2 major political parties didn't switch positions until the early 1900's.
The liberal ideology at the time was social equality that didn't officially make way until a hundred years after the Civil War.
Most historians can agree that Lincoln was definitely a social liberal for his time.
 
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