I would caution against making the story too much about Jedi/Sith, as people in the OT (Han) believe that the Jedi are simply a "hokey religion". This argues against the Jedi being the saviors of the Republic in the Clone Wars, or at least they are not seen as such by the public. I consider that the Jedi were just an entrenched power structure in the Old Republic, one of the many vestiges of a time long past which the Empire was quick to eliminate in its march to a standardized and racially pure military.