Yes Mr. President, Slavery and Jim Crow Laws Were Horrible.but...

At the recent National Prayer Breakfast, President Obama decried the fact that many horrible things were done in the name of Christ.  In this country, he specifically referenced slavery and Jim Crow [laws] as an example. 

While it is true that southern white ministers preached that blacks were less than human, there were numerous ministers -- mostly in the north -- who preached to abolish slavery.  People like John Wesley and Henry Ward Beecher are famed for their opposition to slavery.  We fought the Civil War over slavery.  But, Obama and a lot of Democrats always seem to ignore the fact that the Civil War wasn't just a war between the North and the South, it was a war between anti-slavery northerners and pro-slavery southern white Democrats who were mostly Christian.  Also, the President who drove that war was both a Christian and a Republican.  And, that President, in his second inaugural address, said this about slavery; the bible (Christianity); and the war between the North and the South:

Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's  faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered.

So, he questioned how those in the North and in the South could read the same bible and, yet, those in the South could believe in slavery ("wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces"). Thus, Abraham Lincoln, by his words, is explaining that there was a deep religious divide in this country over the issue.  A fact that Obama didn't state or want you to know.  Instead, we are left with the impression that all Christians in this country, condoned slavery. 

Also, after the war, and during the period known as the Reconstruction, it was the southern white Democrats who, in state after southern state, passed segregationist laws known as Jim Crow.  A fact that a Democrat like Obama never wants to admit but, instead, through that omission, wants to make his audiences think that he, as a Democrat, is talking about Republicans and Jim Crow. Again, southern white ministers took no stance against Jim Crow laws.

References:

At Prayer Breakfast, Obama Decries 'Distortions':  http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/prayer-breakfast-obama-decries-distortions-faith-justify-violence-n300786

PBS: Jim Crow Stories: The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow: Democratic Party: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/jimcrow/stories_org_democratic.html

Jim Crow Laws: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Crow_laws

The Abolitionist Movement - The Tumult Of Reform:  http://www.libraryindex.com/history/pages/cmxyrbgl6u/abolitionist-movement-tumult-reform.html

Abraham Lincoln: Second Inaugural Address Saturday, March 4, 1865: http://www.bartleby.com/124/pres32.html