““It was no longer a question of the Union as it was , that was to be reestablished; it was the Union as it should be , that is to say, washed clean from its original sin, regenerated on the baptismal font of liberty for all. … Now, we could march with a prouder step, and fight with more confidence. We were no longer merely the soldiers of a political controversy, to be decided by the fate of arms. We were now the missionaries of a great work of redemption, the armed liberators of millions of men bent beneath the brutalizing yoke of slavery. The war was ennobled; the object was higher.””
![“You have not been mistaken in supposing my views and feeling to be in favor of the abolition of war. Of my dispos[i]tion to maintain peace until its condition shall be made less tolerable than that of war itself, the world has had proofs, and more, perhaps, than it has approved. I hope it is…” quote by Thomas Jefferson](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/77f/thomas-jefferson-43_abolition_you-have-not-been-mistaken-in-supposing_184816.jpg)
