Post by eurofed on Nov 25, 2020 23:40:59 GMT
The topic at hand is the slavery issue in a version of the USA that was larger, more inclusive (by 19th century standards, and not necessarily for freedmen), and less friendly to slave interests. The PoD occurred after the French and Indian War, and caused the British colonial administration to take a more repressive and intolerant attitude towards the Canadian colonies. This drove Quebec (with pre-1774 borders) and Nova Scotia to join the American Revolution and later the USA. The Canadian section integrated w/o much trouble in American society and political system, creating a strong precedent for tolerance of Catholics and Romance-speakers. Acadia (OTL New Brunswick) followed the same path to statehood as its Maine neighbor. Ontario ultimately split in two separate northern and southern states. Western Canadian states more or less organized in a similar pattern as OTL provinces, even if not necessarily with the same exact borders (and British-derived names are right out).
Another major effect of the divergence caused the Appalachian and Trans-Appalachian territories, and Vermont, to split from the 13 colonies and be recognized as separate states during and after the ARW. They got organized in the new states of Vandalia (southwestern Pennsylvania, western Virginia, and eastern Kentucky), Frankland (eastern Tennessee, western North Carolina, and northwestern Georgia), and Vermont. The Appalachian states became free ones more or less at the same pace as the Canadian and Northern ones. Because of their presence acting as a barrier to slaveholding settlers, and the political balance in the US government being tilted in favor of the free section since the beginning, Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri, and Arkansas joined the Union as free states. For the same reason, the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights turned out broadly similar to the OTL versions, except for a few harmless guarantees to the Canadiens about their language and religion, but their text was less favorable to slavery. The Three-Fifths Clausle was replaced with a One-Half one, there was no Fugitive Slave Clausle, and the Constitution allowed an immediate ban of transatlantic slave trade.
A third major effect of the divergence caused the Iroquois Confederation to side with the Patriots during the ARW. This created a powerful precedent in American society for assimilationist acceptance and tolerance of Natives that embraced the American lifestyle and Christianity and accept US expansion. The tribes that resisted US expansion and clung to their traditional lifestyle, however, got dealt with as brutally as OTL if not worse. This allowed the Iroquois to set up the state of Haudenosaunee in upland New York and northwestern Pennsylvania. Following their example, the Four Civilized Tribes (Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, and Muscogee) later created the state of Cherokee in North Alabama and northern Mississippi. The Trial of Tears did not occur and 'civilized' Indians assimilated with American settlers w/o excessive trouble. Haudenosaunee became a free state, Cherokee a slave one. South Carolina and Georgia bargained cession of their claims on the territories of Alabama and Mississippi to allow them becoming slave ones.
ITTL the Federalists remained politically dominant or at least influential in the US party system for much longer. Their influence caused a substantially greater degree of investment being made in infrastructure projects, accelerating the colonization of the West and industrialization, and rearmament, putting the US military into good fighting shape. France's failure to cede Louisiana to the Americans pushed the USA to make an alliance of convenience with Britain in 1804-05 and intervene in the Napoleonic Wars against France and Spain. This allowed America to seize Louisiana and pleased the British, making them willing to sell Rupert's Land and cede their claims on the Pacific Northwest to the USA. Good relations with Britain and lack of conflicts about the Canadian territories and the natives averted the War of 1812. On the other hand, rising tensions with Spain about Florida, Louisiana, and the Caribbean caused a US intervention in the Latin American Wars of Independence and the Spanish-American War in 1819-20. Spain, being weakened by the aftermath of the Peninsular War, political tensions at home, and the colonial wars, was in no shape to resist the well-armed Americans. Victory allowed the USA to annex the Spanish Greater Antilles. The free section in the Congress accepted Louisiana, Cuba, Santo Domingo, and Puerto Rico to join the Union as slave states, in exchange for prohibition of slavery in the rest of the Louisiana Cession.
As westward expansion of the USA progressed, a flood of American settlers went into the Mexican territories of Texas, Rio Grande (Coahuila, Neuvo Leon, and Tamaulipas), and California. Slaveholders were prevalent in Texas and Rio Grande, and freesoilers in California. Domestic instability and conflicts between centralizers and federalists in Mexico, and the pro-US sympathies of the settlers, drove these areas to become breakaway republics. US support to the separatists and conflcting territorial claims caused the Mexican-American War. The USA won a decisive victory and forced Mexico to cede its Northern territories (the Californias, Neuvo Mexico, Texas, Rio Grande, Sonora, Chihuahua, Sinaloa, Durango, Zacatecas, and San Louis Potosi). Soon afterwards, Texas and Rio Grande joined the Union as slave states, California as a free one. As the rest of the Mexican Cession got organized into US Territories, it showed a marked reluctance to undo Mexican prohibition of slavery, and the free-soiler majority in the Congress was just as unwilling to overrule them.
The slave section desired new territories to expand slavery into, but it was running out of suitable options. Filibustering in Central America turned out to be its swan song. A group of Southern filibusters exploited political instability in Nicaragua to take over the Republic, re-establish slavery, enact various Americanization policies, and prepare for annexation to the USA. The other Central American states formed a coalition to oppose the filibusters, but got defeated thanks to the generous aid the filibusters got from slave states. Even the US government, despite its antislavery leanings, supported Nicaragua out of its strong interest to build and control a inter-oceanic canal in the region. Victorious Nicaragua annexed Costa Rica and petitioned to join the USA as a slave state. The Congress agreed in exchange for a ban of slavery throughout the Mexican Cession.
By the middle 19th century, the steady territorial expansion, population growth, and economic development of the USA was making the free section, already stronger to some degree since the birth of the nation, overwhelmingly dominant in political, economic, and military terms. The slave section had exhausted any realistic avenue of territorial expansion: further filibustering attempts in Yucatan and Central America failed, the Western territories were closed to slavery, and its was very unlikely densely-populated and antislavery Central Mexico could be forced to change its mind. The dominant free section increasingly drove the federal government to legislate according to its interests and against slave ones, such as with the aforementioned ban of slavery in the territories and by imposing a protectionist tariff system. Even the courts increasingly ruled against slave interests, such as when the Supreme Court declared that slaves that went into a free state became free and the local authorities were under no obligation to return them to their masters.
The slave section increasingly despaired about the future perspectives of its society in America. Its political influence had grown marginal enough to allow the free section to rule against its interests with impunity, and the political imbalance was growing serious enough to make antislavery Constitutional amendments feasible. To be fair, besides a vocal radical abolitionist fringe, the vast majority of the free section was showing no great wish to impose abolition to an unwilling South, out of respect for state autonomy and a wish to avoid domestic strife. However, they were increasingly turning to regard slavery as wicked, outdated, and harmful, a moral blight and a social, political, and economic burden for the Union. Their intent was to gradually limit its importance and influence by various measures, foster its decline, and support gradual emancipation. In their plans, such gradual phasing out was to be combined with large-scale transfer of the freedmen (and many free Blacks) to Africa, since even most Northern abolitionists were deeply reluctant to accept integration of vast numbers of Blacks into American society.
The reaction of the slave section to the impending crisis varied: as a rule, prevalent opinion in the Mid-Atlantic and Upper South states (Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina) favored going along with gradual emancipation and mass resettlement of the freedmen and free Blacks to Africa. There even were growing calls within these states to enact these policies by state action and get support for them from the federal government. In the Deep South and Caribbean states (South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Cuba, Santo Domingo, and Puerto Rico) there was greater support for secession from the USA and creation of a new Confederation of slave states explicitly dedicated to the preservation of slavery. Public opinion in Cherokee, Texas, Rio Grande, and Nicaragua was split and wavered between the two options.
To be fair, supporters of secession greatly overestimated its chances of success and optimistically assumed the free section would peacefully consent to separation or be defeated by Southron fighting spirit against all apparent odds. To impartial observers, it seemed plain that if the Union chose to resist, and fought with any decent competence, the rebellion would be crushed in a few months, a year or two at most. Foreign intervention gave somewhat better chances, but far from any real guarantee of success, and reliance on it brought as many drawbacks as benefits. There was no guarantee it would occur, foreign invasion would surely multiply the Union's fighting spirit, and it would potentially cast the chances of the secession to the vagaries of the European alliance system and potentially a larger conflict.
How do you think it would end? The South eventually bowing to the writing on the wall and accepting gradual emancipation and transfer of the freedmen to Africa, their place in the workforce likely filled by immigrants? A shorter, less destructive, and more limited version of the ACW? Foreign powers intervening trying to cut down the American giant one size? Such an expanded conflict blossoming into a larger, proto-WWI conflict?
For reference, please assume this is a TL where the 1848-49 Revolutions were mostly successful. Germany, Italy, and Scandinavia unified, Hungary became independent, and the Habsburg Empire collapsed. As usual, Britain is potentially sympathetic to the Confederacy, but might face serious domestic backlash if it goes too far supporting slavery. France is up to its usual imperialist meddling in Mexico and Central America which is going to bring it in a collision course with the Union. It might easily support the CSA, it suffers no real home front issue as long as the Napoleonic regime stays strong, but is scheduled to get into an all-out fight with Germany and Italy sooner rather than later. Spain is another Confederate sympathizer, but it has its usual domestic issues and limited punching power. Austria is long gone. The liberal CP bloc (Germany, Italy, Hungary) has overwhelming sympathies for the Union, but might be potentially distracted by France and Russia. Scandinavia is another Union cheerleader, but has limited force projection. Russia tends to lean in favor of the Union, but might change its stance depending on the the other powers' action, or be distracted by Turkey. Japan is just starting its modernization process and is unable to play a role.
Another major effect of the divergence caused the Appalachian and Trans-Appalachian territories, and Vermont, to split from the 13 colonies and be recognized as separate states during and after the ARW. They got organized in the new states of Vandalia (southwestern Pennsylvania, western Virginia, and eastern Kentucky), Frankland (eastern Tennessee, western North Carolina, and northwestern Georgia), and Vermont. The Appalachian states became free ones more or less at the same pace as the Canadian and Northern ones. Because of their presence acting as a barrier to slaveholding settlers, and the political balance in the US government being tilted in favor of the free section since the beginning, Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri, and Arkansas joined the Union as free states. For the same reason, the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights turned out broadly similar to the OTL versions, except for a few harmless guarantees to the Canadiens about their language and religion, but their text was less favorable to slavery. The Three-Fifths Clausle was replaced with a One-Half one, there was no Fugitive Slave Clausle, and the Constitution allowed an immediate ban of transatlantic slave trade.
A third major effect of the divergence caused the Iroquois Confederation to side with the Patriots during the ARW. This created a powerful precedent in American society for assimilationist acceptance and tolerance of Natives that embraced the American lifestyle and Christianity and accept US expansion. The tribes that resisted US expansion and clung to their traditional lifestyle, however, got dealt with as brutally as OTL if not worse. This allowed the Iroquois to set up the state of Haudenosaunee in upland New York and northwestern Pennsylvania. Following their example, the Four Civilized Tribes (Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, and Muscogee) later created the state of Cherokee in North Alabama and northern Mississippi. The Trial of Tears did not occur and 'civilized' Indians assimilated with American settlers w/o excessive trouble. Haudenosaunee became a free state, Cherokee a slave one. South Carolina and Georgia bargained cession of their claims on the territories of Alabama and Mississippi to allow them becoming slave ones.
ITTL the Federalists remained politically dominant or at least influential in the US party system for much longer. Their influence caused a substantially greater degree of investment being made in infrastructure projects, accelerating the colonization of the West and industrialization, and rearmament, putting the US military into good fighting shape. France's failure to cede Louisiana to the Americans pushed the USA to make an alliance of convenience with Britain in 1804-05 and intervene in the Napoleonic Wars against France and Spain. This allowed America to seize Louisiana and pleased the British, making them willing to sell Rupert's Land and cede their claims on the Pacific Northwest to the USA. Good relations with Britain and lack of conflicts about the Canadian territories and the natives averted the War of 1812. On the other hand, rising tensions with Spain about Florida, Louisiana, and the Caribbean caused a US intervention in the Latin American Wars of Independence and the Spanish-American War in 1819-20. Spain, being weakened by the aftermath of the Peninsular War, political tensions at home, and the colonial wars, was in no shape to resist the well-armed Americans. Victory allowed the USA to annex the Spanish Greater Antilles. The free section in the Congress accepted Louisiana, Cuba, Santo Domingo, and Puerto Rico to join the Union as slave states, in exchange for prohibition of slavery in the rest of the Louisiana Cession.
As westward expansion of the USA progressed, a flood of American settlers went into the Mexican territories of Texas, Rio Grande (Coahuila, Neuvo Leon, and Tamaulipas), and California. Slaveholders were prevalent in Texas and Rio Grande, and freesoilers in California. Domestic instability and conflicts between centralizers and federalists in Mexico, and the pro-US sympathies of the settlers, drove these areas to become breakaway republics. US support to the separatists and conflcting territorial claims caused the Mexican-American War. The USA won a decisive victory and forced Mexico to cede its Northern territories (the Californias, Neuvo Mexico, Texas, Rio Grande, Sonora, Chihuahua, Sinaloa, Durango, Zacatecas, and San Louis Potosi). Soon afterwards, Texas and Rio Grande joined the Union as slave states, California as a free one. As the rest of the Mexican Cession got organized into US Territories, it showed a marked reluctance to undo Mexican prohibition of slavery, and the free-soiler majority in the Congress was just as unwilling to overrule them.
The slave section desired new territories to expand slavery into, but it was running out of suitable options. Filibustering in Central America turned out to be its swan song. A group of Southern filibusters exploited political instability in Nicaragua to take over the Republic, re-establish slavery, enact various Americanization policies, and prepare for annexation to the USA. The other Central American states formed a coalition to oppose the filibusters, but got defeated thanks to the generous aid the filibusters got from slave states. Even the US government, despite its antislavery leanings, supported Nicaragua out of its strong interest to build and control a inter-oceanic canal in the region. Victorious Nicaragua annexed Costa Rica and petitioned to join the USA as a slave state. The Congress agreed in exchange for a ban of slavery throughout the Mexican Cession.
By the middle 19th century, the steady territorial expansion, population growth, and economic development of the USA was making the free section, already stronger to some degree since the birth of the nation, overwhelmingly dominant in political, economic, and military terms. The slave section had exhausted any realistic avenue of territorial expansion: further filibustering attempts in Yucatan and Central America failed, the Western territories were closed to slavery, and its was very unlikely densely-populated and antislavery Central Mexico could be forced to change its mind. The dominant free section increasingly drove the federal government to legislate according to its interests and against slave ones, such as with the aforementioned ban of slavery in the territories and by imposing a protectionist tariff system. Even the courts increasingly ruled against slave interests, such as when the Supreme Court declared that slaves that went into a free state became free and the local authorities were under no obligation to return them to their masters.
The slave section increasingly despaired about the future perspectives of its society in America. Its political influence had grown marginal enough to allow the free section to rule against its interests with impunity, and the political imbalance was growing serious enough to make antislavery Constitutional amendments feasible. To be fair, besides a vocal radical abolitionist fringe, the vast majority of the free section was showing no great wish to impose abolition to an unwilling South, out of respect for state autonomy and a wish to avoid domestic strife. However, they were increasingly turning to regard slavery as wicked, outdated, and harmful, a moral blight and a social, political, and economic burden for the Union. Their intent was to gradually limit its importance and influence by various measures, foster its decline, and support gradual emancipation. In their plans, such gradual phasing out was to be combined with large-scale transfer of the freedmen (and many free Blacks) to Africa, since even most Northern abolitionists were deeply reluctant to accept integration of vast numbers of Blacks into American society.
The reaction of the slave section to the impending crisis varied: as a rule, prevalent opinion in the Mid-Atlantic and Upper South states (Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina) favored going along with gradual emancipation and mass resettlement of the freedmen and free Blacks to Africa. There even were growing calls within these states to enact these policies by state action and get support for them from the federal government. In the Deep South and Caribbean states (South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Cuba, Santo Domingo, and Puerto Rico) there was greater support for secession from the USA and creation of a new Confederation of slave states explicitly dedicated to the preservation of slavery. Public opinion in Cherokee, Texas, Rio Grande, and Nicaragua was split and wavered between the two options.
To be fair, supporters of secession greatly overestimated its chances of success and optimistically assumed the free section would peacefully consent to separation or be defeated by Southron fighting spirit against all apparent odds. To impartial observers, it seemed plain that if the Union chose to resist, and fought with any decent competence, the rebellion would be crushed in a few months, a year or two at most. Foreign intervention gave somewhat better chances, but far from any real guarantee of success, and reliance on it brought as many drawbacks as benefits. There was no guarantee it would occur, foreign invasion would surely multiply the Union's fighting spirit, and it would potentially cast the chances of the secession to the vagaries of the European alliance system and potentially a larger conflict.
How do you think it would end? The South eventually bowing to the writing on the wall and accepting gradual emancipation and transfer of the freedmen to Africa, their place in the workforce likely filled by immigrants? A shorter, less destructive, and more limited version of the ACW? Foreign powers intervening trying to cut down the American giant one size? Such an expanded conflict blossoming into a larger, proto-WWI conflict?
For reference, please assume this is a TL where the 1848-49 Revolutions were mostly successful. Germany, Italy, and Scandinavia unified, Hungary became independent, and the Habsburg Empire collapsed. As usual, Britain is potentially sympathetic to the Confederacy, but might face serious domestic backlash if it goes too far supporting slavery. France is up to its usual imperialist meddling in Mexico and Central America which is going to bring it in a collision course with the Union. It might easily support the CSA, it suffers no real home front issue as long as the Napoleonic regime stays strong, but is scheduled to get into an all-out fight with Germany and Italy sooner rather than later. Spain is another Confederate sympathizer, but it has its usual domestic issues and limited punching power. Austria is long gone. The liberal CP bloc (Germany, Italy, Hungary) has overwhelming sympathies for the Union, but might be potentially distracted by France and Russia. Scandinavia is another Union cheerleader, but has limited force projection. Russia tends to lean in favor of the Union, but might change its stance depending on the the other powers' action, or be distracted by Turkey. Japan is just starting its modernization process and is unable to play a role.