Trump: Why did America's Civil War happen?

Andrew Jackson could have been peacemaker, president says

NEW YORK — The U.S. president had a historical question: Why did America’s Civil War happen? “Why could that one not have been worked out?”

Remarks by Donald Trump, aired Monday, showed presidential uncertainty about the origin and necessity of the Civil War, a defining event in U.S. history with slavery at its core. Trump also declared that President Andrew Jackson was angry about “what was happening with regard to the war," which started 16 years after his death.

Trump questioned why issues couldn’t have been settled to prevent the war that followed the secession of 11 Southern states from the Union.

“People don’t realize, you know, the Civil War, if you think about it, why?” Trump said in an interview with The Washington Examiner that also aired on Sirius XM radio. “People don’t ask that question, but why was there the Civil War? Why could that one not have been worked out?”

In fact, the causes of the Civil War are frequently discussed, from middle school classrooms to university lecture halls and in countless books. Fierce disagreement over the future of slavery was a driving force behind the war, but economic issues and disputes over state rights were also factors.

“Slavery was the root cause of the Civil War. It was not the only cause, but it was the underlying cause,” said Eric Foner, a Columbia University history professor and a leading expert on the war. “As a historian, I would prefer the president had a better handle on American history.”

Trump’s comments about the war came after he lauded Jackson, the populist president whom he and his staff have cited as a role model. He suggested that if Jackson had been president “a little later, you wouldn’t have had the Civil War.”

“He was really angry that he saw what was happening with regard to the Civil War. He said, ‘There’s no reason for this,’” Trump continued.

Jackson died in 1845. The Civil War began in 1861.