Greg,

I, in no way, have any love for the pre-war Southern Democrat'd behavior... The entire period was a slobber-knocker... The election of 1860 was a slobber knocker... I find it interesting that the Constitutional Union Party carried the three states that would see more battles combined (not deaths) than any other three state combination...

As for continuing to study the Civil War??? No, I don't do books that much anymore... I do independent research on the inter net... There is a lot of stuff there where you get more perspectives without havonmg to wade thru books... I will, however, read articles by writers which tend to put forth their hypothesis without all the wading... The wading in tiresome...

I was very fortunate to take both semesters of "History of the South" under Dr. Rogers as an under-grad who at the time was the dean of the history department at VCU...

BTW, the position that I hold on the war isn't at all popular in most Southern academic communities... It seems to be more the birthers and tin-foilers and die-hard rednecks who wouldn't like my alternate view of hos things could could have worked out better for everyone...

Might of fact, there are very few of us that hold this position based on knowledge of history and the Southern culture... But there are others... Just not that many that I know... But the ones I know I respect for arriving to the same conclusions based on their knowledge as opposed to their emotions...

B~