He once remarked in 1837, while speaking of his 'Free Soil' stance opposing both slavery and radical abolitionism: 'The institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy, but the promulgation (legal enactment) of abolition doctrines tends rather to increase than abate its evils.' Early in his Presidency he said that he would back any solution to the slavery question that preserved the Union, whether it was freeing all the slaves, freeing none of them, or freeing some and leaving others enslaved, but by then he had already chosen option one, though border states had exemption initially. At one point in time, he supported the American Colonization Society program, which would have enabled the freed slaves to emigrate to Liberia and start new lives. Though he was an abolitionist, he was willing at least in principle to allow slavery to continue, if only because it was constitutionally protected in established states, believing that it would end on its own if it could be kept from spreading. He considered blacks to be less intelligent than whites. It is also relevant, if somewhat uncomfortable to admit, that Lincoln was by today's standards a racist.
