Why I Don't Like the Civil War...A Continuing Series

Some Introductory Thoughts...
I am very aware of the fact that there are probably a lot of people who disagree with me. And, if you are one of them, I am open to your comments on this topic, but sadly, have nearly made up my mind.
I was troubled recently by an article that I read in American Heritage magazine where a high school history teacher noticed in his travels that at memorials and battlefields and museums associated with the Civil War, there was no mention of anyone doing anything wrong. It was sort of like the deaths of 600,000 men was due to a terrible (and romantic) train accident or natural disaster. So, he went around to various monuments, etc searching for some clue to a moral lesson from such an epic event, but found none. Nothing in the remarks of park rangers or guides; nothing on all that signage at museums; nothing in the pamphlets at the gift shop. Nothing. He reported that there is plenty of condemnation of slavery and the miseries and hardships of life in military camps; gruesome displays of "Civil War medicine", and of course, the terrible treatment of Union soldiers at Andersonville, Georgia (whose commandant was the only Confederate executed for the war). But, no clue as to whether it was ok to try to destroy this country (treason) and certainly no talk of ,"If the South would have won, this continent would have been torn apart by savage warfare by various confederations of states preying on one another, while being manipulated by various foreign powers...something like happened in Europe in the 20th century. Would we really be as prosperous and free today if Johnny Reb or the great Southern men of character such as "Stonewall" (indeed!) Jackson or Robt. E. Lee would have been as successful as U.S. Grant, Wm Sherman, or George Meade?
The second thing that has troubled me about all this is a document that I was given at a history teacher conference entitled the "Cornerstone Speech" by Confederate vice-president, Alexander Stephens. The entire speech can be read online, but here are a few excerpts:
"The prevailing ideas entertained by him (Jefferson) and most of the leading statesmen at the time (The Founders)...were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong...Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the government built upon it fell when the 'storm came and the wind blew.' (That is the attempted destruction of the Union by the secession of several Southern states in 1860). Our new government (that is the Confederacy) is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests (hence, the title) upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery...is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth..." Lincoln and Stephens did agree on one thing: that the Civil War was a test: "Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure." (Gettysburg Address) But, when the wind and the storm blew (the conflict), the outcomes were different. Stephens states that the 1860 destruction of the Union was proof of the "new government's" soundness. But, what he could not have known yet was that there was a greater storm brewing. Lee's surrender at Appomattox and the virtual destruction of the South along with the restoration of the Union, demonstrated what the true cornerstone is: what Lincoln called the equality principle - that all men are created equal. And, I bet you won't find that on a National Park Service plaque, especially south of the Mason-Dixon Line.