If the Confederacy Won

[Republic of Coldwater]

Then explain why West Virginia counter seceded, and why Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland and Delaware all didn't secede despite having slaves and slavery.

If this is meant as a counter argument, it's pretty pathetic. Consider this: I'm arguing the South rebelled over slavery. West Virginians, Missourans, Kentuckyans, Marylanders, Delawarishmen (what is the demonym for Delaware?), Northern Louisianans, and East Tennesseeans preferring to stay with the Union has no meaningful impact on slavery being the decisive reason for the South to secede.

The south mainly fought for their independence and to oppose northern tariffs.

A lie. Tariffs are virtually unmentioned as a reason for secession when secession happened, primarily because the issue had been resolved in the South's favor years earlier.

The problem was that they begun to industrialize, but the north instilled high tariffs, which resulted in a slower pace of industrialization as the south had to buy machinery from both the north and Europe. This resulted in a weaker economy, and the main reason behind the war.

A lie. There were no high tariffs at the time.

Jefferson Davis actually adopted a black child (look up Jim Limber) and treated him equal to his other white children, and people like Lysander Spooner supported the CSA despite being an abolitionist.

So what? Davis engaging in a single act of decency is about as meaningful as when Hermann Göring helped a Jewish couple flee Nazi Germany. And Lysander Spooner's opinion on the legality of secession is largely irrelevant.

Slavery was also dying by the time the war had begun. Supply has been at an all-time low, and only the wealthiest of the wealthiest can afford slaves. Most of the people in the south didn't own slaves and couldn't ever own slaves, yet 900,000 largely working or middle class citizens, those who cannot afford slaves in their lifetime still join the Confederate Army regardless.

And it was the wealthiest of the wealthy that called the shots on secession.

I don't want to divert this thread into "What the Confederacy fought for" so TG me on that issue if you want to further debate this issue.

Oh, fuck no. I've got no patience for having my inbox filled with bullshit about how someone can't be bothered to read the declarations of reasons for secession or that pretends they're somehow less relevant than post-war excuses written by the losers.

So by your logic, companies wouldn't have installed the conveyor belt on their factories, or upgraded to computers, or do anything new.

And seeing as "companies haven't", I'm pretty spot on with my contention. And that's not even considering that a comparable scenario would be where installing conveyor belts is at least implicitely unconstitutional and not using conveyor belts was a major way of life. Also, people that suggested using conveyer belts would occasionally end up getting murdered for suggesting it.

Most places abolished slavery when it has become simply inefficient and unprofitable, and it would be the same for the CSA. There would be other nations who would pressure and urge the CSA to do so, and many leaders and generals in the CSA aren't very fond of slavery, and when the time came for abolition, the leaders, who would have quite some influence could help the abolition.

Delusion and speculation.

So you have a federal government that doesn't want to end slavery and only signed a symbolic law to get moral high ground, a US President who expressed no intention of ending slavery in the southern states (and urged southern states to rejoin the Union in 1865 by stating that the 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery wouldn't be passed and slavery would be preserved), and promised on numerous occasions that he would allow slavery to exist. He has also never talked about ending slavery in his campaign, yet the southern states still seceded because of the election of Abraham Lincoln. What he did support (and capitalized his campaign on) were higher tariffs, which helped the industrialized northern economy, but not the agrarian, but progressively industrializing southern economy, and border states, who also relied on slavery deciding to not secede. Tell me more about how the south didn't secede for slavery.

And I'm well aware that slavery were one of the reasons, alongside the tariffs for why the south seceded in their Declaration of Independences, but in the US Declaration of Independence, they stated that all men were created equal, and blacks didn't get full equality until 1964, 188 years following the signing of the declaration. The Declarations were simply to get the support from slaveholders by ensuring that slavery will not be abolished as a result of the secession. Slavery would've ended eventually regardless of what the declaration says.

[The Cobalt Sky]

Slavery would certainly have ended, but the timeframe is questionable: it is possible that the practice would have continued for several decades longer. Nonetheless, I have confidence that:

(a) Economic and social pressures would have ensured the eventual end (downward prices of cotton production, inefficiency of slavery, slave revolts, poor white farmer rebellions, etc.)

(b) Liberal social ideals would continue their monotonous, unending march forward

Such that the southern gentry elite would eventually need or decide to abolish the 'peculiar institution'.

Now, larger questions:
1) How would civil rights have faired in Southern America without Union intervention?
2) What would geopolitics look like?

As per 1, we see a decidedly grimmer South: without Northern intervention, oppression of blacks occurs not only more heavily, but also more directly, as the state is less impeded by constitutional restrictions in its ability to enforce legislated racial oppression. Social progress would continue as it has historically, but at a far slower pace.

Yet, as per 2, I think we see an unarguably better word: one that perhaps even warrants the sacrifice of increased racial bigotry. Without the Confederate States, the Union finds itself in a weaker position than it has historically been: deprived of its agricultural base and challenged with three powerful competitors (Britain to the north, Mexico to the southwest, and CSA to the south). The Union is no longer able to assert its regional hegemony as aggressively as it has historically done, so it cannot intervene globally to the same extent that the American empire is used to. This means no Spanish-American war... more importantly, no (decisive) American intervention in World War I, meaning no German surrender/desperate strategy, meaning no collapse of the Russian Empire/Bolshevik Revolution, meaning no Treaty of Versailles, meaning no Nazi Germany, no Soviet Union, no Maoist China. The British and French colonial Empires do not collapse, Germany comes to dominate Central Europe in an economic union, and Eurasia is united in free trade. North America is tenser than was historically the case, but millions of lives have been spared holocausts, world wars, and communist revolutions. The atom bomb was not invented, and a Congress of Vienna reasserts the conducts and norms of a more civilized era. The Atlantic powers lead the way in forwarding a bold, united vision of a liberal future, and science, progress, and cosmopolitanism rule the day.

In other words, all the calamitous, unintended failures of US foreign policy do not come to be, and balance and order are maintained in Europe, as they had been for a century before.

Isn't it possible that a more gradual abolition of slavery would result in less oppression of blacks? If the south won, the people would be happier, and wouldn't need to find a scapegoat for the suffering, which in the case of the south, were blacks, resulting in the lynch mobs and other forms of discrimination. Slower and more gradualistic abolition throughout the later decades of the 19th Century and perhaps some level of compensation for the manumission of slaves would've made the people happier with black people being freed, and they wouldn't go around oppressing blacks and lynching them.

No. You base all aggression towards black people in whites of the south losing the civil war. Black people weren't seen as human, thus the enslavement and horrible medical experiments conducted on us during that era and after. You can't seriously think those sentiments would just go away? Those sentiments were entrenched in white society. As its economy was founded almost entirely around slavery, the idea that whites were inherently superior was also rampant. And besides, without a government telling you not to do it, people would still be holding on to slaves. Today there are still all sorts of people who break the law (ex: polygamists) and in the nightmare situation you describe there would probably be people who would still try to keep slaves as well. I believe that you do not understand the horrors of bondage.
http://www.blackpast.org/files/classroo ... n_1863.jpg
Article IV, Section 3, Clause 3
"The Confederate States may acquire new territory; and Congress shall have power to legislate and provide governments for the inhabitants of all territory belonging to the Confederate States, lying without the limits of the several Sates; and may permit them, at such times, and in such manner as it may by law provide, to form States to be admitted into the Confederacy. In all such territory the institution of negro slavery, as it now exists in the Confederate States, shall be recognized and protected be Congress and by the Territorial government; and the inhabitants of the several Confederate States and Territories shall have the right to take to such Territory any slaves lawfully held by them in any of the States or Territories of the Confederate States."
Article IV, Section 2, Clause 1
"The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States; and shall have the right of transit and sojourn in any State of this Confederacy, with their slaves and other property; and the right of property in said slaves shall not be thereby impaired."
Article I, Section 9, Clause 4
"No bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves shall be passed."
Article IV, Section 2, Clause 3
"No slave or other person held to service or labor in any State or Territory of the Confederate States, under the laws thereof, escaping or lawfully carried into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor; but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such slave belongs,. or to whom such service or labor may be due."

[Alcase]

Within a decade the Southern economy would've imploded due to plummeting cotton prices as Egypt floods the market in the wake of the Union blockade.

Without reliable exports, the South becomes an economic ramshackle - the plantation elite collapses, the South (having been utterly exhausted by the war with the north) is suddenly overrun in slave revolts (especially in areas where blacks outnumber whites, like Virginia).

The confederacy collapses with only the largest and most economically self sufficient states (like Texas) able to keep themselves afloat. The border states either beg the Union for readmission in order to restore order, the blacks take over the state entirely, or the Union moves in on its own to reannex the breakaways.

After the Union consolidates its reclaimed territory, it's only a matter of time until they come for any confederate survivors like Texas. And that's not counting if Mexico launches a war to take Texas first.

What a slippy slope you slide on

[Trotskylvania]

Yet England, the first nation to industrialize was the heart of abolitionist thought, and that anything north of the Mason-Dixon Line had ended slavery, and also were far more industrialized than the south.

The North was Abolitionist long before industrialization. You're completely bungling the causality, if there even was one to begin with.

Abolition would taken over the Confederacy regardless if industrialization played a part, as even more agrarian nations like Brazil ended it by the late 1800s.

Why? The South was founded on the principle of racist slavery and even before that abolitionists were routinely killed or driven out of business. Support for slavery was a thing regardless of how much economic or moral sense it made. It even had a church that split from its predecessor solely because some people refused to accept their interpretation that slavery was ordained by God (see Southern Baptism).

The South was utterly different from all the examples where slavery ended, so stop abusing Brazil as an example of what would have happened.

To say nothing of the fact that manumission of any sort would mean the economic ruin of everyone involved in the slave economy, because slaveowners were mortgaged to the hilt on their slaves. Any large scale manumission would result in the paralysis of the credit economy.

[Laerod]

So you have a federal government that doesn't want to end slavery and only signed a symbolic law to get moral high ground, a US President who expressed no intention of ending slavery in the southern states (and urged southern states to rejoin the Union in 1865 by stating that the 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery wouldn't be passed and slavery would be preserved), and promised on numerous occasions that he would allow slavery to exist. He has also never talked about ending slavery in his campaign, yet the southern states still seceded because of the election of Abraham Lincoln.

No one's accusing the Southerners of having a firm grasp on reality. Their fears of losing slavery being unfounded doesn't mean they weren't deathly afraid. Take anti-vaxxers, for instance. They're hysterical, but their hysteria being unfounded doesn't disprove that they're deathly afraid.

What he did support (and capitalized his campaign on) were higher tariffs, which helped the industrialized northern economy, but not the agrarian, but progressively industrializing southern economy, and border states, who also relied on slavery deciding to not secede. Tell me more about how the south didn't secede for slavery.

I'm not arguing that the South didn't secede because of slavery. I'm arguing it did. And I'll let the traitors do the talking for me. Go read the declarations of reasons for secession. NiS even linked the Texas one so you don't have to go far.

And I'm well aware that slavery were one of the reasons, alongside the tariffs for why the south seceded in their Declaration of Independences, but in the US Declaration of Independence, they stated that all men were created equal, and blacks didn't get full equality until 1964, 188 years following the signing of the declaration. The Declarations were simply to get the support from slaveholders by ensuring that slavery will not be abolished as a result of the secession. Slavery would've ended eventually regardless of what the declaration says.

Tired bullshit doesn't cease being tired or bullshit simply because you repeat it.

[Nazi Flower Power]

The Civil War would never have happened in the first place if the racial divisions weren't already there.

Factually wrong. The Civil War was fought for a litany of reasons, many of which had nothing to do with race/slavery.

People had some disagreements about non-racial issues same as they do in any country, but they weren't enough to cause a war if you took slavery and race out of the equation.

[Nazi Flower Power]

Tahar Joblis has, incidentally, raised a good point.

Eugenics were quite popular throughout the latter half of the 19th, and first half of the 20th century. If the South decides to destroy a healthy chunk of its economic capital by way of freeing the slaves (Unlikely, IMO, seeing as - as Trotzkylvania has noted -, breeding slaves was a profitable endeavour) before the 1950s at the earliest, large-scale sterilisation (Or flat-out industrialised murder) to deal with a population of undesirables is likely inevitable.

There is historical precedent. The entire reason the Middle East doesn't have a sizable black minority, if not an outright majority, is that the Arabs started to castrate their slaves after a particularly nasty revolt that almost toppled them. And I don't think I need to point out the historical precedent for industrialised murder.

After the 1950s, this may become increasingly difficult due to international pressure, though. This being said, Peru still pulled it off with 400000 indigenous women in the 1990s, so hey.

So, yeah.

Abolition of slavery in a victorious south? During the heyday of the Eugenics movement? In a staggeringly racist society?

We're talking genocide here. Inevitable genocide.

It's certainly plausible.

I don't really see the CSA keeping slavery to the present day, but I also don't see them just throwing it out the window and modernizing as soon as they had their independence. It would be a nasty issue that they'd have to work through sometime after the war.

[Nazi Flower Power]

Within a decade the Southern economy would've imploded due to plummeting cotton prices as Egypt floods the market in the wake of the Union blockade.

Without reliable exports, the South becomes an economic ramshackle - the plantation elite collapses, the South (having been utterly exhausted by the war with the north) is suddenly overrun in slave revolts (especially in areas where blacks outnumber whites, like Virginia).

The confederacy collapses with only the largest and most economically self sufficient states (like Texas) able to keep themselves afloat. The border states either beg the Union for readmission in order to restore order, the blacks take over the state entirely, or the Union moves in on its own to reannex the breakaways.

After the Union consolidates its reclaimed territory, it's only a matter of time until they come for any confederate survivors like Texas. And that's not counting if Mexico launches a war to take Texas first.

I think after a few years the Union would lose interest in getting the South back. It would take back any states that asked to come back, but I don't think it'd go to war to conquer the CSA unless the CSA picked a fight. The North is less militaristic than the South, and for the CSA to become independent in the first place, we'd have to be looking at a history where the Union was dominated by the un-militaristic elements of Northern society. The North can fight when it has a good enough reason to, but sometimes people would just rather stay home, and I don't think "because we could win" is a good enough reason to get it to invade the CSA.

[Distruzio]

Within a decade the Southern economy would've imploded due to plummeting cotton prices as Egypt floods the market in the wake of the Union blockade.

Without reliable exports, the South becomes an economic ramshackle - the plantation elite collapses, the South (having been utterly exhausted by the war with the north) is suddenly overrun in slave revolts (especially in areas where blacks outnumber whites, like Virginia).

The confederacy collapses with only the largest and most economically self sufficient states (like Texas) able to keep themselves afloat. The border states either beg the Union for readmission in order to restore order, the blacks take over the state entirely, or the Union moves in on its own to reannex the breakaways.

After the Union consolidates its reclaimed territory, it's only a matter of time until they come for any confederate survivors like Texas. And that's not counting if Mexico launches a war to take Texas first.

I think after a few years the Union would lose interest in getting the South back. It would take back any states that asked to come back, but I don't think it'd go to war to conquer the CSA unless the CSA picked a fight. The North is less militaristic than the South, and for the CSA to become independent in the first place, we'd have to be looking at a history where the Union was dominated by the un-militaristic elements of Northern society. The North can fight when it has a good enough reason to, but sometimes people would just rather stay home, and I don't think "because we could win" is a good enough reason to get it to invade the CSA.

A renewed war was inevitable given the militancy of Southern leadership. To say nothing of their righteous cause.

*sigh*

I grow more and more disconnected and irreverent towards the Confederacy with each thread on the subject. The frustratingly obvious attempts to aabitrarily elevate one conception of the Union over the other without consideration for the legitimacy for the other is.... astounding.

Of course, slavery, for me, is not an issue im willing to consider as a valid reason to hate the Confederacy seeing, as i do, the hypocrisy involved in such a position (assuming the Union is lauded for the same basis).

For me, the fundamental ideological contest between the two American nations - compact or contact - is the more interesting and important issue. More and more.... contract grows favorable in my eyes.

Fuck it. Heres the decision. Distruzio will no longer lean towards southern nationalism. ASB, Cat Tribe, Trotsky, NiS and others have arguments too compelling to dismiss any longer. Im sad the war happened (its STILL not a civil war) but ive never been sad the Confederacy lost.... now i have another reason to say that. She was wrong.

[Republic of Coldwater]

So you have a federal government that doesn't want to end slavery and only signed a symbolic law to get moral high ground, a US President who expressed no intention of ending slavery in the southern states (and urged southern states to rejoin the Union in 1865 by stating that the 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery wouldn't be passed and slavery would be preserved), and promised on numerous occasions that he would allow slavery to exist. He has also never talked about ending slavery in his campaign, yet the southern states still seceded because of the election of Abraham Lincoln.

No one's accusing the Southerners of having a firm grasp on reality. Their fears of losing slavery being unfounded doesn't mean they weren't deathly afraid. Take anti-vaxxers, for instance. They're hysterical, but their hysteria being unfounded doesn't disprove that they're deathly afraid.

What he did support (and capitalized his campaign on) were higher tariffs, which helped the industrialized northern economy, but not the agrarian, but progressively industrializing southern economy, and border states, who also relied on slavery deciding to not secede. Tell me more about how the south didn't secede for slavery.

I'm not arguing that the South didn't secede because of slavery. I'm arguing it did. And I'll let the traitors do the talking for me. Go read the declarations of reasons for secession. NiS even linked the Texas one so you don't have to go far.

And I'm well aware that slavery were one of the reasons, alongside the tariffs for why the south seceded in their Declaration of Independences, but in the US Declaration of Independence, they stated that all men were created equal, and blacks didn't get full equality until 1964, 188 years following the signing of the declaration. The Declarations were simply to get the support from slaveholders by ensuring that slavery will not be abolished as a result of the secession. Slavery would've ended eventually regardless of what the declaration says.

Tired bullshit doesn't cease being tired or bullshit simply because you repeat it.

Why would they be afraid of losing an institution thanks to the election of someone who has never advocated for the abolition of slavery and has been known in his debates with Stephen Douglas to believe that blacks were inferior people who should not be given equality? Nobody is that illogical and stupid, and unless you believe that those who seceded are complete retards (which they evidently aren't), there is no reason for them to secede for the sake of maintaining slavery.

Furthermore, in 1864, the largest slaveholder in the Confederacy, and a Representative from Louisana, Duncan F. Kenner approached Jefferson Davis with a plan to abolish slavery to get British and French support. In Late 1864, it happened, and the CSA sent envoys to get the French and British to support them, stating that they plan to end slavery, which effectively destroys the Union's Moral High Ground, but the British initially rejected, and then General Lee's surrender in Appomattox Court House resulted in no chance of any foreign help. If the Confederacy is willing to give up the institution that they were supposedly fighting for, and were supposedly (according to mainstream history) founded on, just for the sake of getting support and winning the war really disproves the idea that the south was founded upon, and fought for the maintenance of slavery.

Furthermore, the Confederacy in its final days planned to arm slaves and give them freedom afterwards, which once again shows that they are cool ending slavery for the sake of secession and creating a new nation

Source (I know it is from the Mises Institute, but I believe I found the source from another website) http://mises.org/library/lincolns-inver ... union#ref4

EDIT: Found an article from Jstor (MIT's Database) http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/4 ... 5235420413

[Kelinfort]

No one's accusing the Southerners of having a firm grasp on reality. Their fears of losing slavery being unfounded doesn't mean they weren't deathly afraid. Take anti-vaxxers, for instance. They're hysterical, but their hysteria being unfounded doesn't disprove that they're deathly afraid.

I'm not arguing that the South didn't secede because of slavery. I'm arguing it did. And I'll let the traitors do the talking for me. Go read the declarations of reasons for secession. NiS even linked the Texas one so you don't have to go far.

Tired bullshit doesn't cease being tired or bullshit simply because you repeat it.

Why would they be afraid of losing an institution thanks to the election of someone who has never advocated for the abolition of slavery and has been known in his debates with Stephen Douglas to believe that blacks were inferior people who should not be given equality? Nobody is that illogical and stupid, and unless you believe that those who seceded are complete retards (which they evidently aren't), there is no reason for them to secede for the sake of maintaining slavery.

Furthermore, in 1864, the largest slaveholder in the Confederacy, and a Representative from Louisana, Duncan F. Kenner approached Jefferson Davis with a plan to abolish slavery to get British and French support. In Late 1864, it happened, and the CSA sent envoys to get the French and British to support them, stating that they plan to end slavery, which effectively destroys the Union's Moral High Ground, but the British initially rejected, and then General Lee's surrender in Appomattox Court House resulted in no chance of any foreign help. If the Confederacy is willing to give up the institution that they were supposedly fighting for, and were supposedly (according to mainstream history) founded on, just for the sake of getting support and winning the war really disproves the idea that the south was founded upon, and fought for the maintenance of slavery.

Furthermore, the Confederacy in its final days planned to arm slaves and give them freedom afterwards, which once again shows that they are cool ending slavery for the sake of secession and creating a new nation

Source (I know it is from the Mises Institute, but I believe I found the source from another website) http://mises.org/library/lincolns-inver ... union#ref4

EDIT: Found an article from Jstor (MIT's Database) http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/4 ... 5235420413

In reference to the 1864 proposal, that was more of a Hail Mary than anything else. Such an act would be impossible for the planter elite, and by that time, Britain and France would know the Confederacy was extremely desperate.

All of these were last bid efforts to win the war. Do you honestly think a society based around the social order of the inferiority of blacks would be so willing to consider them equals?

[Republic of Coldwater]

Why would they be afraid of losing an institution thanks to the election of someone who has never advocated for the abolition of slavery and has been known in his debates with Stephen Douglas to believe that blacks were inferior people who should not be given equality? Nobody is that illogical and stupid, and unless you believe that those who seceded are complete retards (which they evidently aren't), there is no reason for them to secede for the sake of maintaining slavery.

Furthermore, in 1864, the largest slaveholder in the Confederacy, and a Representative from Louisana, Duncan F. Kenner approached Jefferson Davis with a plan to abolish slavery to get British and French support. In Late 1864, it happened, and the CSA sent envoys to get the French and British to support them, stating that they plan to end slavery, which effectively destroys the Union's Moral High Ground, but the British initially rejected, and then General Lee's surrender in Appomattox Court House resulted in no chance of any foreign help. If the Confederacy is willing to give up the institution that they were supposedly fighting for, and were supposedly (according to mainstream history) founded on, just for the sake of getting support and winning the war really disproves the idea that the south was founded upon, and fought for the maintenance of slavery.

Furthermore, the Confederacy in its final days planned to arm slaves and give them freedom afterwards, which once again shows that they are cool ending slavery for the sake of secession and creating a new nation

Source (I know it is from the Mises Institute, but I believe I found the source from another website) http://mises.org/library/lincolns-inver ... union#ref4

EDIT: Found an article from Jstor (MIT's Database) http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/4 ... 5235420413

In reference to the 1864 proposal, that was more of a Hail Mary than anything else. Such an act would be impossible for the planter elite, and by that time, Britain and France would know the Confederacy was extremely desperate.

All of these were last bid efforts to win the war. Do you honestly think a society based around the social order of the inferiority of blacks would be so willing to consider them equals?

Yet it was one of the biggest slaveholders and a prominent member of the Planter Elite who proposed the plan to end slavery.

It doesn't matter that it was a last ditch attempt, but if a nation was founded on such a principle, it would be pointless to give it all up, or else their existence is essentially pointless.

[Kelinfort]

In reference to the 1864 proposal, that was more of a Hail Mary than anything else. Such an act would be impossible for the planter elite, and by that time, Britain and France would know the Confederacy was extremely desperate.

All of these were last bid efforts to win the war. Do you honestly think a society based around the social order of the inferiority of blacks would be so willing to consider them equals?

Yet it was one of the biggest slaveholders and a prominent member of the Planter Elite who proposed the plan to end slavery.

It doesn't matter that it was a last ditch attempt, but if a nation was founded on such a principle, it would be pointless to give it all up, or else their existence is essentially pointless.

It's not like they felt slavery made up their social and economic backbone.

“”Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race 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.

Among the various Articles of Secession promulgated by the would be members of the Confederacy were:

Georgia,
“”The people of Georgia having dissolved their political connection with the Government of the United States of America, present to their confederates and the world the causes which have led to the separation. For the last ten years we have had numerous and serious causes of complaint against our non-slave-holding confederate States with reference to the subject of African slavery.

Mississippi,
“”Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun.

South Carolina,
“”We affirm that these ends for which this Government was instituted have been defeated, and the Government itself has been made destructive of them by the action of the non-slaveholding States. Those States have assume the right of deciding upon the propriety of our domestic institutions; and have denied the rights of property established in fifteen of the States and recognized by the Constitution; they have denounced as sinful the institution of slavery; they have permitted open establishment among them of societies, whose avowed object is to disturb the peace and to eloign the property of the citizens of other States. They have encouraged and assisted thousands of our slaves to leave their homes; and those who remain, have been incited by emissaries, books and pictures to servile insurrection.

Texas,
“”Texas abandoned her separate national existence and consented to become one of the Confederated Union...She was received into the confederacy...as a commonwealth holding, maintaining and protecting the institution known as negro slavery-- the servitude of the African to the white race within her limits-- a relation that had existed from the first settlement of her wilderness by the white race, and which her people intended should exist in all future time.
In all the non-slave-holding States...the people have formed themselves into a great sectional party...based upon an unnatural feeling of hostility to these Southern States and their beneficent and patriarchal system of African slavery, proclaiming the debasing doctrine of equality of all men, irrespective of race or color-- a doctrine at war with nature, in opposition to the experience of mankind, and in violation of the plainest revelations of Divine Law. They demand the abolition of negro slavery throughout the confederacy, the recognition of political equality between the white and negro races, and avow their determination to press on their crusade against us, so long as a negro slave remains in these States

...all white men are and of right ought to be entitled to equal civil and political rights; that the servitude of the African race, as existing in these States, is mutually beneficial to both bond and free, and is abundantly authorized and justified by the experience of mankind, and the revealed will of the Almighty Creator, as recognized by all Christian nations...

Wait, shit, they did.

[Myrensis]

It doesn't matter that it was a last ditch attempt, but if a nation was founded on such a principle, it would be pointless to give it all up, or else their existence is essentially pointless.

When the alternative was totally defeat and dominance by the Union?

This is just pathetic rationalization, "Well at the very end when they were on the verge of total defeat and destruction of the Confederacy they considered giving up slavery! That proves that they totally never cared about it in the first place!"

[Rebellious Fishermen]

Honestly I think the North would have come back some years later and retook the South. I'm a Southerner, but I don't believe in secession and am happy with the way things turned out.

[Republic of Coldwater]

It doesn't matter that it was a last ditch attempt, but if a nation was founded on such a principle, it would be pointless to give it all up, or else their existence is essentially pointless.

When the alternative was totally defeat and dominance by the Union?

This is just pathetic rationalization, "Well at the very end when they were on the verge of total defeat and destruction of the Confederacy they considered giving up slavery! That proves that they totally never cared about it in the first place!"

There were Generals and politicians in the beginning who supported enlisting slaves in exchange for their freedom, and it was in 1864, when the Confederacy wasn't 100% screwed when the proposal for emancipation in return for foreign help was brought up. No nation would ever dare to give up its founding principle, especially 3 years following its formation, and they were willing to give up an institution that ran their economies for the sake of their independence, which shows that they would value independence over slavery. Furthermore, if they valued slavery over independence, they could've rejoined the Union and overturned the 13th Amendment and perpetuated the institution of slavery (Lincoln was willing to comply too in the Hampton Roads Peace Conference).

[Nazi Flower Power]

I think after a few years the Union would lose interest in getting the South back. It would take back any states that asked to come back, but I don't think it'd go to war to conquer the CSA unless the CSA picked a fight. The North is less militaristic than the South, and for the CSA to become independent in the first place, we'd have to be looking at a history where the Union was dominated by the un-militaristic elements of Northern society. The North can fight when it has a good enough reason to, but sometimes people would just rather stay home, and I don't think "because we could win" is a good enough reason to get it to invade the CSA.

A renewed war was inevitable given the militancy of Southern leadership. To say nothing of their righteous cause.

*sigh*

Yeah, that's why "unless the CSA picked a fight." It wouldn't be that surprising if the CSA picked a fight.

It's one of the biggest reasons why I don't get cognitive dissonance from being a secessionist and supporting the Union side of the Civil War. I'd have a little sympathy for the Confederates if they hadn't been so militant.

[California Prime]

Well one way or another the South never had a chance. In the end I think Lincoln could have waged purely a naval war with the blockade and merely kept the union borders heavily fortified (and not trading with southern states) and the Confederacy would have imploded within 20 years anyways. Their entire economy depended on overseas trade and trade to the north of just a handful of agricultural products, their infrastructure was pathetic even by 1860's standards, and they didn't have the means, credit, or connections to industrialize.

[Anglo-California]

I feel like that pan-nationalist movements in the late 19th and early 20th centuries would also take root in the form of a pan-Anglo-American nationalism, which seeks to reunite the United States and Confederate States, in which nationalists seek to merge the two countries into a Greater America which may or may not include Canada. Anyways, this movement could either result in a second War Between the States or the annexation of the Confederate States by the United States.

And assuming this doesn't happen, we the two American nations would've gone to war over who had control of the New World, and the United States would be grappling the issue of whether or not the Monroe Doctrine applied to the Confederate States. There would certainly be a lot of fighting in the Caribbean.

Also, the settlement of the West would be extremely different, with both sides competing to settle their frontier faster, and this could escalate into a full-scale war. Also, the discovery of natural resources like gold and oil in the West would lead to some conflict.

And another scenario is that irredentist nationalism takes hold in the United States and the Americans seek to reclaim their former territory, launching an invasion of the Confederate States.

So that's just the many possible scenarios of foreign policy. My take: the Confederates States will be part of the United States once more before the year 1950.

So now let's talk about the Confederacy.

Many white nationalists like to posit that the Confederates were a bunch of pro-white crusades fighting against a supposed "nigger-loving yankee" regime led by Abraham Lincoln. I'm just going to ignore the absurdity that is the "Southern nation", so let's move on to deconstructing this, shall we? From a white nationalist perspective, the Union was far more pro-white in the long run than the Confederacy. The Confederacy was led by a rich, planter aristocracy that routinely gave the working-class, poor white farmers the fingers and limited their prospects by employing cheap, black slave labor over white labor. The Confederacy was an aristocratic, neo-feudal republic (this is Distruzio's favorite part lol), not a white nationalist state. The Southern elite only wanted poor whites on their side so that they'd have soldiers to fight the Union, not because they cared about their advancement at all. Now let's compare this to the Union, where the government's actions were significantly more pro-white. The Union took an active role in conquering the West for white farmers, while the Confederacy armed Amerindian tribes to fire on American soldiers. Abraham Lincoln, and hell, even John Brown, both seriously considered the idea of giving blacks their own state, whether through carving one out of the South, or deporting them to Liberia or Central America. Abraham Lincoln seriously considered the latter and most likely would've done it had the Union not been strapped for cash. So there you have, the Confederacy fought fought to preserve human bondage and aristocracy, while the Union actually sought to help the white common man.

Now, let's look at daily life if the Confederacy won. Structurally, the Confederate government was pretty much identical to that of the Union, and just as bureaucratic and federalized, so the argument of state's rights falls flat. Why is Richmond more representative of the people than Washington? Furthermore, slavery would have been outlawed by 1890, and given the racial nature of American slavery, it is very likely that blacks would be nearly 40%, if not more, of the Confederate population. This again brings me back to discrediting the argument of the Confederacy as a pro-white nation. How could the nation be pro-white if it is nearly half black and actually majority black in some states? Well, the nation would have to resort to a brutal system of segregation that's on the level of South Africa, and such a system would've been unsustainable, and the entire Confederate government would've collapsed in fury of black nationalist revolts, and the scenario would be a lot like what happened in Africa during Decolonization.

Best case scenario for an independent Confederacy? Slavery and racial issues are handled horribly, but at least there is no major violent uprising, and the nation is somewhat similar to what South Africa is now. Yeah, that's best case scenario. Not a pretty picture.

Worst case scenario: a black nationalist revolt destroys the Confederate States and the white parts of the Confederacy break off, most likely to be annexed into the United States, while the black parts of the Confederacy consolidate and become a black nationalist republic, most likely in Mississippi or Louisiana.

[The Cobalt Sky]

Any way you slice it, I think it wouldn't end very pretty. Slavery would end up lasting longer, and nothing's good about that.

[Balenderg]

I have two main theories.

The first, and most unlikely, is that the United Kingdom recognizes the CSA as independent, and that drastically boosts their cotton export, as the UK could not sustain it's large economy without Confederate Cotton, which was a major import. Then, because of economic reliance on the CSA, the UK might ally or befriend the CSA in some way, making so that the USA would not be able to take it back any time soon. Slowly the CSA would industrialize, and then eventually, when most countries abolished slavery, Confederate Cotton would be the cheapest for the USA to buy, so they would have to repair relations.

The second, and more likely, is that when the CSA gains independence, they would try to rebuild the nation, but the states would not like the Confederative (Confederal? Confederate?) government to use power and invest in their states, and then it would continue to decentralize until their economy was a failure because the states were too weak to rebuild themselves, and then either it would become a state with a ruined economy that is plunged in turmoil, or it would be annexed by the USA.

[Tahar Joblis]

I feel like that pan-nationalist movements in the late 19th and early 20th centuries would also take root in the form of a pan-Anglo-American nationalism, which seeks to reunite the United States and Confederate States, in which nationalists seek to merge the two countries into a Greater America which may or may not include Canada. Anyways, this movement could either result in a second War Between the States or the annexation of the Confederate States by the United States.

And assuming this doesn't happen, we the two American nations would've gone to war over who had control of the New World, and the United States would be grappling the issue of whether or not the Monroe Doctrine applied to the Confederate States. There would certainly be a lot of fighting in the Caribbean.

Also, the settlement of the West would be extremely different, with both sides competing to settle their frontier faster, and this could escalate into a full-scale war. Also, the discovery of natural resources like gold and oil in the West would lead to some conflict.

And another scenario is that irredentist nationalism takes hold in the United States and the Americans seek to reclaim their former territory, launching an invasion of the Confederate States.

So that's just the many possible scenarios of foreign policy. My take: the Confederates States will be part of the United States once more before the year 1950.

So now let's talk about the Confederacy.

Many white nationalists like to posit that the Confederates were a bunch of pro-white crusades fighting against a supposed "nigger-loving yankee" regime led by Abraham Lincoln. I'm just going to ignore the absurdity that is the "Southern nation", so let's move on to deconstructing this, shall we? From a white nationalist perspective, the Union was far more pro-white in the long run than the Confederacy. The Confederacy was led by a rich, planter aristocracy that routinely gave the working-class, poor white farmers the fingers and limited their prospects by employing cheap, black slave labor over white labor. The Confederacy was an aristocratic, neo-feudal republic (this is Distruzio's favorite part lol), not a white nationalist state. The Southern elite only wanted poor whites on their side so that they'd have soldiers to fight the Union, not because they cared about their advancement at all. Now let's compare this to the Union, where the government's actions were significantly more pro-white. The Union took an active role in conquering the West for white farmers, while the Confederacy armed Amerindian tribes to fire on American soldiers. Abraham Lincoln, and hell, even John Brown, both seriously considered the idea of giving blacks their own state, whether through carving one out of the South, or deporting them to Liberia or Central America. Abraham Lincoln seriously considered the latter and most likely would've done it had the Union not been strapped for cash. So there you have, the Confederacy fought fought to preserve human bondage and aristocracy, while the Union actually sought to help the white common man.

Now, let's look at daily life if the Confederacy won. Structurally, the Confederate government was pretty much identical to that of the Union, and just as bureaucratic and federalized, so the argument of state's rights falls flat. Why is Richmond more representative of the people than Washington? Furthermore, slavery would have been outlawed by 1890, and given the racial nature of American slavery, it is very likely that blacks would be nearly 40%, if not more, of the Confederate population. This again brings me back to discrediting the argument of the Confederacy as a pro-white nation. How could the nation be pro-white if it is nearly half black and actually majority black in some states? Well, the nation would have to resort to a brutal system of segregation that's on the level of South Africa, and such a system would've been unsustainable, and the entire Confederate government would've collapsed in fury of black nationalist revolts, and the scenario would be a lot like what happened in Africa during Decolonization.

Best case scenario for an independent Confederacy? Slavery and racial issues are handled horribly, but at least there is no major violent uprising, and the nation is somewhat similar to what South Africa is now. Yeah, that's best case scenario. Not a pretty picture.

Worst case scenario: a black nationalist revolt destroys the Confederate States and the white parts of the Confederacy break off, most likely to be annexed into the United States, while the black parts of the Confederacy consolidate and become a black nationalist republic, most likely in Mississippi or Louisiana.

I will repeat what I pointed out earlier. With the particular structure of policy in the South, and especially the popularity of the eugenics movement within the South, it is highly unlikely that the black population of the South would have increased as slavery became less useful.

(The percentage of the South that was black as opposed to white actually declined from 1840 to 1860, from 38 / 62 to 36 / 64.)

What we would see, between:

• Miscegnation laws (relatively selectively enforced)
• Emigration of freed blacks upon individual emancipation.
• Slave liberation / escape out of the country.
• Greater support for sending former slaves to, for example, Liberia - Southern political leaders were often quite prominent in the "recolonization" movement.
• Voluntary emigration from apartheid-style oppression.
• Sterilization of free blacks (some sterilization did happen IRL, and we're talking about a hypothetical state with much stronger incentives and much weaker political checks on the eugenics movement).
• Slow, rather than sudden, reduction in the number of slaves - meaning an economic response by plantation owners regulating the breeding of slaves causes lower "production" of slaves, i.e., enslaved blacks having fewer children.

(Et cetera - that list isn't quite comprehensive, but includes most of the likely main factors.)

... is that a victorious CSA means, in the longer run, a [i]whiter South. A very significant difference between this and South African apartheid is that in a victorious CSA, the oppressed class is a minority, and likely a shrinking one - whereas in South Africa, it was a shrinking minority that was on top.

[Anglo-California]

I feel like that pan-nationalist movements in the late 19th and early 20th centuries would also take root in the form of a pan-Anglo-American nationalism, which seeks to reunite the United States and Confederate States, in which nationalists seek to merge the two countries into a Greater America which may or may not include Canada. Anyways, this movement could either result in a second War Between the States or the annexation of the Confederate States by the United States.

And assuming this doesn't happen, we the two American nations would've gone to war over who had control of the New World, and the United States would be grappling the issue of whether or not the Monroe Doctrine applied to the Confederate States. There would certainly be a lot of fighting in the Caribbean.

Also, the settlement of the West would be extremely different, with both sides competing to settle their frontier faster, and this could escalate into a full-scale war. Also, the discovery of natural resources like gold and oil in the West would lead to some conflict.

And another scenario is that irredentist nationalism takes hold in the United States and the Americans seek to reclaim their former territory, launching an invasion of the Confederate States.

So that's just the many possible scenarios of foreign policy. My take: the Confederates States will be part of the United States once more before the year 1950.

So now let's talk about the Confederacy.

Many white nationalists like to posit that the Confederates were a bunch of pro-white crusades fighting against a supposed "nigger-loving yankee" regime led by Abraham Lincoln. I'm just going to ignore the absurdity that is the "Southern nation", so let's move on to deconstructing this, shall we? From a white nationalist perspective, the Union was far more pro-white in the long run than the Confederacy. The Confederacy was led by a rich, planter aristocracy that routinely gave the working-class, poor white farmers the fingers and limited their prospects by employing cheap, black slave labor over white labor. The Confederacy was an aristocratic, neo-feudal republic (this is Distruzio's favorite part lol), not a white nationalist state. The Southern elite only wanted poor whites on their side so that they'd have soldiers to fight the Union, not because they cared about their advancement at all. Now let's compare this to the Union, where the government's actions were significantly more pro-white. The Union took an active role in conquering the West for white farmers, while the Confederacy armed Amerindian tribes to fire on American soldiers. Abraham Lincoln, and hell, even John Brown, both seriously considered the idea of giving blacks their own state, whether through carving one out of the South, or deporting them to Liberia or Central America. Abraham Lincoln seriously considered the latter and most likely would've done it had the Union not been strapped for cash. So there you have, the Confederacy fought fought to preserve human bondage and aristocracy, while the Union actually sought to help the white common man.

Now, let's look at daily life if the Confederacy won. Structurally, the Confederate government was pretty much identical to that of the Union, and just as bureaucratic and federalized, so the argument of state's rights falls flat. Why is Richmond more representative of the people than Washington? Furthermore, slavery would have been outlawed by 1890, and given the racial nature of American slavery, it is very likely that blacks would be nearly 40%, if not more, of the Confederate population. This again brings me back to discrediting the argument of the Confederacy as a pro-white nation. How could the nation be pro-white if it is nearly half black and actually majority black in some states? Well, the nation would have to resort to a brutal system of segregation that's on the level of South Africa, and such a system would've been unsustainable, and the entire Confederate government would've collapsed in fury of black nationalist revolts, and the scenario would be a lot like what happened in Africa during Decolonization.

Best case scenario for an independent Confederacy? Slavery and racial issues are handled horribly, but at least there is no major violent uprising, and the nation is somewhat similar to what South Africa is now. Yeah, that's best case scenario. Not a pretty picture.

Worst case scenario: a black nationalist revolt destroys the Confederate States and the white parts of the Confederacy break off, most likely to be annexed into the United States, while the black parts of the Confederacy consolidate and become a black nationalist republic, most likely in Mississippi or Louisiana.

I will repeat what I pointed out earlier. With the particular structure of policy in the South, and especially the popularity of the eugenics movement within the South, it is highly unlikely that the black population of the South would have increased as slavery became less useful.

(The percentage of the South that was black as opposed to white actually declined from 1840 to 1860, from 38 / 62 to 36 / 64.)

What we would see, between:

• Miscegnation laws (relatively selectively enforced)
• Emigration of freed blacks upon individual emancipation.
• Slave liberation / escape out of the country.
• Greater support for sending former slaves to, for example, Liberia - Southern political leaders were often quite prominent in the "recolonization" movement.
• Voluntary emigration from apartheid-style oppression.
• Sterilization of free blacks (some sterilization did happen IRL, and we're talking about a hypothetical state with much stronger incentives and much weaker political checks on the eugenics movement).
• Slow, rather than sudden, reduction in the number of slaves - meaning an economic response by plantation owners regulating the breeding of slaves causes lower "production" of slaves, i.e., enslaved blacks having fewer children.

(Et cetera - that list isn't quite comprehensive, but includes most of the likely main factors.)

... is that a victorious CSA means, in the longer run, a [i]whiter South. A very significant difference between this and South African apartheid is that in a victorious CSA, the oppressed class is a minority, and likely a shrinking one - whereas in South Africa, it was a shrinking minority that was on top.

Many Northerners agreed with this stuff though. Hell, California had the most comprehensive eugenics program in the nation, and Abraham Lincoln was a supporter of recolonization, and we didn't see the black population decrease. In fact, it remained pretty constant.

And the CSA was even more cash-strapped than the Union was, so where would they get the funds for this?

[Tahar Joblis]

Many Northerners agreed with this stuff though. Hell, California had the most comprehensive eugenics program in the nation, and Abraham Lincoln was a supporter of recolonization, and we didn't see the black population decrease. In fact, it remained pretty constant.

And the CSA was even more cash-strapped than the Union was, so where would they get the funds for this?

Spoiler alert: California has a very small black population, most of which arrived after eugenics became unpopular. The increase of California's black population had much to do with migration. California had the largest number of sterilizations; but then, California had a larger population than any Southern state during most of this period. North Carolina's sterilization program was far more aggressive, in proportion to its population; and was far more decisively racial in nature.

A CSA would not be limited by the 14th amendment; nor feel challenged by the 14th amendment. The post-Civil War amendments, and the introduction of [some] blacks into the voting pool, presented political obstacles that slowed the pace of eugenics programs. In particular, eugenics programs didn't get rolling much until Buck v. Bell resolved that it was OK by the 14th amendment; and Skinner v. Oklahoma put some limits on the use of sterilization on criminals on the basis of 14th amendment Equal Protection.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buck_v._Bell
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinner_v._Oklahoma

Eugenics was reasonably popular throughout the US; in the South, it was a smash hit.

Abraham Lincoln more or less supported recolonization; but support was strongest among white Southerners.

There's a long list of factors to consider, and they work together. A CSA would have continued slavery up until it was forced to end the institution - e.g., by the transition from mule to tractor, which in the US South IRL happened sometime around the 1940s - and you would expect to see much the same dynamic as you saw 1840-1860. You have three periods to consider, and only the last of those three is the traditional consideration of the eugenics movement in a post-slavery society.

The first is an extended period where slavery remains the South's "peculiar institution," likely extending at least to near the end of the 19th century, and possibly right up to WWII.

With new "imports" of slaves virtually non-existent (thanks to British efforts) and "breeding" of slaves (i.e., slaves having children) being something largely controlled by slave owners:


(A) Because of a desire to control slave breeding, a sense that white men fathering slaves was "improving the stock," and a fear of blacks having sex with white women, castration of male slaves was a thing. It was legal in many southern states, and it's entirely possible it would have enjoyed a period of relatively high popularity shortly before emancipation. Especially if emancipation happened after the eugenics movement started.
(B) Selectively enforced miscegnation laws (and A, above) mean the slave population would become more genetically "white" (call it the Sally Hemings effect of miscegnation laws and norms) and thus with a greater proportion of the "black" population more easily able to pass for white (and basically then become white, in an era of limited paperwork) after the end of slavery / freedom / escape.
(C) The slave population would grow at a limited rate - in particular, not grow past demand for slaves. This, in an era with slowly modernizing agriculture, was slowly declining relative to population (even if it may have continued to increase in total magnitude until agriculture became significantly more mechanized).

Second, there is the actual act of emancipation itself. There were many ways to carry out emancipation. Carried out under a racist regime, it would have been an opportunity for large-scale deportation, sterilization, residential segregation, isolation, et cetera. Carried out during the US Civil War, it was effectively impossible to even try to regulate anything outside of the fact of its happening. A peaceful emancipation in a USA that remained united and didn't have a Civil War may well have involved sending most of the former slaves to Africa; one happening in a victorious post-war CSA would be even more likely to involve large-scale emigration (voluntary or not).

Then, and only then, do we come to the question of how the eugenics programs in the RL USA might have been carried out by a victorious CSA not worried about the 13th-15th amendments. That's on top of the first two reductions in the black population.

[United Marxist Nations]

Well, I guess I would probably be racist and have a much more pronounced Southern accent.