American Civil War history[edit]
Napolitano has made numerous claims about the American Civil War, which are rejected by historians. These claims include those that the Civil War was President Abraham Lincoln’s war by choice, that slavery was dying anyway, that Lincoln could have freed the slaves by paying the slaveholders, and that Lincoln armed the slaves.
[31][32] More specifically, in a
Daily Show segment, Napolitano said that Lincoln started the war "because he wanted to preserve the union, because he needed the tariffs from the southern states," a claim rejected by a panel of three distinguished historians of the Civil War:
James Oakes,
Eric Foner, and
Manisha Sinha.
[32] Napolitano argued that Lincoln could have solved the slavery question by paying slaveholders to release their slaves, thereby avoiding war.
[31] However, Lincoln did offer to pay to free the slaves in Delaware, but the Delaware legislature rejected him.
[31] Napolitano also asserted that Lincoln attempted to arm slaves, but two prominent historians of the Civil War said they had never heard of such an effort and
PolitiFact rated the claim "pants-on-fire".
[31][33]Napolitano has asserted that slavery was dying a natural death at the time of the Civil War, a claim that one of the historians on the
Daily Show panel rejected. The historian said, "Slavery was not only viable, it was growing ... This idea that it was dying out or was going to die out is ridiculous."
[32]
Napolitano has also said that Lincoln enforced the
Fugitive Slave Act by sending escaped slaves back to their owners during the war; PolitiFact notes that "while there were cases when Lincoln enforced the law during the Civil War, he did so selectively when he thought it would help keep border states in the Union fold. When it came to slaves from Confederate states, the weight of the government actions fell heavily on the side of refusing to return escaped slaves."
[31]