Ken Burns discusses Civil War and Confederate flag on CBS' 'Face The Nation'

Ken Burns sat down with CBS’ “Face The Nation” to discuss his documentary The Civil War, which he was working on in order to bring it to ultra high definition.

CBS reported that when he saw the film in these new details, he admitted that it caused tears to form in his eyes. In his interview on Sunday, he said “It also reminded me of the centrality of this event.” The film was first seen in 1990 on PBS and around 39 million people viewed the film.

It will air on Sept. 7 in HD on PBS once again this year. He said that the film’s central theme focused on freedom and it also dealt with the tensions that were seen between individual freedom as well as freedom overall. In addition, it also spoke about the rights of the state versus the federal government.

Along with talking about the film, he also indicated what the Civil War was about in light to recent debate about whether the war was over slavery or states’ rights. He pointed out that while people argued over it being states’ rights, Burns said “It is much more complicated than that- but essentially, the reason why we murdered each other…was over essentially the issue of slavery.”

According to Deadline, Burns also talked about the Confederate flag and said that it was actually “one of many battle flags adopted by the Army of Northern Virginia, it got adopted after 1954, worked into state flags in the old south.”