The American Civil War...

I'm not putting this in the politics section because it's not meant to be a debate or any one view point....I just took a class to renew my teacher's license and it was Civil War and Reconstruction. It was an awesome study! Now I'm a full blown novice on the topic. I was just wondering what everyone's take on it is. In my study, I was pretty glued to the military manuevers, etc. We also studied the political climate, etc...the issues of the time and it was very interesting to me that the Republicans were considered the liberals back then and the Democrats were the conservatives. Yet I studied battle strategy and military plans mostly. It was considered the first "modern" war....largely due to the implementation of rifled weaponry.

Any discussion might be fun if there are any civil war buffs here. I found a civil war message board, but I can't remember my password...lol....