[central_va]

The problem is that conservatives want a strong federal government also, they have forgotten what a Republic is themselves. I look at the Civil War as the end of the Republic. Because it “was about slavery”, the fact the the Federal Monster was created as a result of the war, is lost on all it seems. States are a joke. Everyone knows where the power is. It wasn’t always so, we truly were a Republic at one time.

[jla]

The Civil War did not create the "fed monster" - that beast made its appearance many decades earlier. The critical juncture was when the opposing factions solidified their respective sides - Jefferson and the republicans who favored states rights vehemently vs. the Hamiltonian federalists who urged more centralization in managing the country.
What we are experiencing today is a direct result of ignoring the prescient warnings from Jefferson.

[Colonel Kangaroo]

The problem is that conservatives want a strong federal government also, they have forgotten what a Republic is themselves. I look at the Civil War as the end of the Republic. Because it “was about slavery”, the fact the the Federal Monster was created as a result of the war, is lost on all it seems. States are a joke. Everyone knows where the power is. It wasn’t always so, we truly were a Republic at one time.

But Davis was a centralizer also. And beacause we're rightfully frustrated today with the evil that is, it's easy to dismiss the evil that could have been had the Confederacy of slavery won. And while centralized government is the greater threat today, freedoms can also be stolen by local governments and the Confederacy contained many gun-grabbing, extorting and oppressing petty tyrants. Under Lincoln, the nation would have remained as it had been since Washington had the secessionists not tried to split the one nation into two camps. It was the Confederates who let the genie out of the bottle.