Poll: Not all agree about slavery’s role in Civil War
By Samantha Ehlinger, Tribune News Service
WASHINGTON — A century and a half after the war ended, Americans still fundamentally disagree about slavery’s role in the Civil War and what to teach schoolchildren about it, according to a new McClatchy-Marist Poll.
Fifty-four percent of respondents think slavery was the main reason for the Civil War. A sizable minority, 41 percent, do not think slavery was the main reason, the national survey found.
Echoing that divide, they also are split over what to teach children. A majority, 54 percent, believe schools should teach that slavery was the main reason for the war; 38 percent think they should not teach that.