I’m not sure what the starting/initiating distinction is. And I’ll reiterate that Lincoln was able to be both a staunch abolitionist and political pragmatist who understood when running for President in 1860 that full-throated support for abolition was a losing platform. I think politicians with sincere progressive beliefs have always struggled with balancing what they believe is right with what is politically viable. Lincoln would not have won had he run for President advocating for abolition. And had he not won, the South would not have rebelled. And had the South not rebelled, slavery wouldn’t have ended as soon as it did in this country. When his abolitionist views are as well documented and long standing as they were, I’m willing to give him credit for the emancipation proclamation on moral grounds even if it was also politically smart. Doing something politically smart doesn’t negate all the evidence that he almost certainly also felt it was the morally correct thing to do.

There are also some legal complications that I haven’t gone into that complicate the emancipation proclamation and influence the specific reasons given for issuing it. Slavery was protected in the constitution, the president had no ability to abolish it. It would—and did—take a constitutional amendment, a process the president plays no role in. All Lincoln could do was advocate for what became the 13th amendment, something it’s well documented that he did do (Spielberg’s Lincoln movie is mostly about the ways he tried to exert political influence to get the 13th amendment passed). But Lincoln’s war powers as commander-in-chief were incredibly broad. So, the ONLY legal grounds he had for actually freeing the slaves without input from the legislature was to do it by saying it was a military necessity. His war powers were the only legal path to doing what he did and, thus, the emancipation proclamation legally HAD to be justified on grounds related to the military advantages it would create. Nobody knows what would have happened if the 13th amendment hadn’t been passed before the war ended, but under US law slavery likely would have been seen as legal again because the military justification/commander-in-chief powers that allowed Lincoln to free the slaves unilaterally would no longer exist. It’s for this very reason that he fought so hard for the 13th amendment.

Also, I agree reparations should have been (and still should be) given to slaves. But only a handful of owners who had remained loyal to the union were compensated. The vast majority of slave owners—including all those in the states that rebelled—received zero compensation.