I was scrolling through Naruto Forum and found a thread about which Edo Hokage did people favor most.
In a vote for favorite Edo Hokage, Tobirama beats Hashi, Hiruzen and Minato by large margins. While all of them had great feats during the war, what made Tobirama stand out to people?
Probably because he's cool-looking, a great strategist, comical, an inventor, the creator of democracy and several other things.
When you think of what Tobirama did to the Uchiha, and how his students (Hiruzen and Danzo) would be the arbiters of the Uchiha Clan's destruction and the then present state of the ninja world (the rise of the Akatsuki, Oro and his schemes, the 4th Ninja War etc). You would think Tobirama would be as despised.
Oh yes, Tobirama is responsible for ALL CONFLICT IN NARUTO! Cliche much?
First of all, conflict existed with the human race long before even Kaguya herself arrived. After that, it still waged, due to Indra being a spoiled brat and easily swayed by a stranger who promised him power.
Tobirama came across those who followed Madara's ideals for a coup and domination over the villages. In response, he kept them out of the village to protect everyone and eventually, it turned out he was right and they did arrange a coup. You cannot blame Tobirama for Madara's ideals. Madara grew up in war, losing all his siblings, following his arrogant ass father's examples just as Tobirama and Hashirama grew up losing their family as well. If Madara wished no harm to come to his brother, he should have taken him out of the wars or at the very least kept him away from Tobirama, who was a a ninjutsu genius anyway and had already lost his own brother, in a far worse manner than Izuna no less.
Tobirama gave them their own village and the police force. I will agree it seemed a bit subjugationalist to not let them live with and breed with Konoha directly, but Tobirama had dealt with the Uchiha his whole life and knew more about the sharingan than even they did and even went on to explain that countless Uchiha became either corrupted or even insane by their sharingans. Clearly he felt it would be too dangerous to completely let his guard down with such power, intellect and skills as theirs. Furthermore, they had access to knowledge no one else in the world had on the tablet, which as we saw, corrupted several of them further. One of Tobirama's students was an Uchiha whom he respected, so clearly he wasn't racist or hateful towards them, he just wanted to protect his people who were near defenseless against them at a time of peace.
Hiruzen did not arrange the Uchiha massacre. Danzou underminded him and did it the night before his final decision, just as Danzo had underminded him countless times throughout the series.
