Lincoln's Dilemma is a 4-episode, 4-hour Apple TV+ documentary series about Abraham Lincoln focusing on before and during the American Civil War. The new Republican Party was built to be anti-slavery yet Lincoln was publicly more of a moderate, concerned with keeping the Southern states in the Union. As the war began and progressed Lincoln was fairly conciliatory but more and more came to publicly support abolition (keeping in mind that several border states still in the Union had slavery).

The documentary goes a bit more behind the scenes. Lincoln was much more abolitionist in private yet had rather practical political aims. But he wasn't perfect in that he wanted to free the slaves and send them to Africa which would moot the issue of integrating African-Americans into predominantly white society. The documentary also examines Frederick Douglass, his writings and speeches about Lincoln, and his brief personal interactions with Lincoln.

We get several historians talking about the issues and half of them are African-American. We have voice-actor readings of Lincoln, Douglass, and other's speeches and writings. I really like that they included the whole Gettysburg Address (which is less than three minutes long).

It's not a gripping documentary but it's ok and presents a different view on Lincoln and abolition than the usual ACW histories.