May 1, 2017 - Historians David Blight (Yale Univ.), Judith Giesberg (Villanova Univ.), and AHA Executive Director Jim Grossman gave the BBC a line-by-line assessment of President Trump's recent statements concerning the cause of the Civil War. "They seceded because they thought the election of Lincoln threatened the institution of slavery," Grossman stated, responding to the president's remark that people don't ask the question, "Why was there a Civil War?" Grossman further explained why Trump's remarks have faced such strong criticism in an interview on BBC Radio (listen at 2:38:00) and in a subsequent article in the Washington Post.