US annexation of British Columbia for the Alabama Claims

Pando

Mid-1867: The confederation of Canada is formed. However British Columbia is not included, as the US is fiercely claiming it as compensation for helping the CSA.
1869: After 2 years of heated negotiations, the US annexes British Columbia, giving Britain an extra million dollars and promising to pay back all the debt that British Columbia owed.

What would happen now? Would British Columbia be renamed to Columbia? Would Washington, Idaho, Montana, and/or Alaska territories have any land exchanges with BC? Would BC be admitted directly as a state, like Vermont, Texas, and California were? Would we be looking to buy southwest Yukon to add a rail connection to Alaska, like we did to northern Sonora in the Gadsden purchase? How would BC's economy improve, now that it's completely integrated with the Pacific Northwest states?
 
Umbric Man

Umbric Man

The reason Washington state got the name was because Washington DC was called 'Columbia' more often at the time, so they went with the lesser-used name. At the time. If only they knew what'd happen in the future...

In that case, I vote the name 'Fraser.'

And it would be a territory, possibly divided up (Stikine, Vancouver Island, rump BC?). The population wasn't enough for a state at the time.
 
Tallest Skil

Tallest Skil

Banned
Umbric Man said:
In that case, I vote the name 'Fraser.'

And it would be a territory, possibly divided up (Stikine, Vancouver Island, rump BC?). The population wasn't enough for a state at the time.
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"But I don't know what to do with that fifty-four forty or fight… It's callin' again…" ;)

Oh, absolutely it's getting divided. If anyone has any or wants to take a crack at it, I'd love to see some maps of that region, assuming a fully US-owned Pacific Northwest. I've always wondered how states would be formed from that, had we offered up the money.

I'll try, too.

Oh, for the purpose of making maps, Pando, are we considering "British Columbia" to be everything south of 54º40', or, given the lack of actual settlement at the time, potentially everything west of the Rockies?
 
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Pando

Tallest Skil said:
"But I don't know what to do with that fifty-four forty or fight… It's callin' again…" ;)

Oh, absolutely it's getting divided. If anyone has any or wants to take a crack at it, I'd love to see some maps of that region, assuming a fully US-owned Pacific Northwest. I've always wondered how states would be formed from that, had we offered up the money.

I'll try, too.

Oh, for the purpose of making maps, Pando, are we considering "British Columbia" to be everything south of 54º40', or, given the lack of actual settlement at the time, potentially everything west of the Rockies?
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The entirety of British Columbia. As far as I know the north, east, and southern borders haven't been changed since before 1867, so it would be British Columbia as today.

An interesting state idea would be western Washington and the Vancouver area be the state of Washington, while eastern Washington, the Idaho panhandle, the western rocky's of Montana (Helena might or might not stay in Montana), the rest of BC, and the Alaskan panhandle can be Columbia, Cascadia, Kootenai, or Lincoln.
 
Tallest Skil

Tallest Skil

Banned
Pando said:
The entirety of British Columbia. As far as I know the north, east, and southern borders haven't been changed since before 1867, so it would be British Columbia as today.
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But there was no real northern border in 1867, and the US claim only went up to 54º40'.

Now, an interesting point is that the US bought Alaska in 1867, as well. It terminates at 54º40'… But the British will want Pacific access.

Look at it on a map. With modern tech, a bridge across that gap would be possible, but back then they'd want contiguous land. Would the British allow that?

And what of modern-day Yukon? Since there's no way for the British to really enforce a northern border, with the US buying Alaska and Columbia, that land also is basically ours.
 

Pando

Would the the rockies and everything west of it be a good border compromise for BC, and then everything to the SE of the Yukon river the border for Northwest Territories?

Then eastern Washington and Vancouver can be the state of Cascadia, while the rest of BC & Washington, the Alaskan & Idaho panhandle, and mountainous west Montana can be the state of Rocky, Washington, or Lincoln.
 
Tallest Skil

Tallest Skil

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Pando said:
Would the the rockies and everything west of it be a good border compromise for BC, and then everything to the SE of the Yukon river the border for Northwest Territories?
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Everything up there is pretty much contingent on how fast the US or Britain shoves their settlers in. I wouldn't consider ownership of this:

9rPbR.png


locked down for a few decades afterward.

Then eastern Washington and Vancouver can be the state of Cascadia, while the rest of BC & Washington, the Alaskan & Idaho panhandle, and mountainous west Montana can be the state of Rocky, Washington, or Lincoln.
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Wish I had a vector continental divide to work with… Can't reasonably show some borders without it. Anyway. Light blue is what I figure will be territory for a good long while. Note Alaska's in that, too. I can explain any other borders anyone wishes.

62lsB.png
 
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Elfwine

And these "heated negiotations" are seeing BC given the US because . . .

.. . why?

No, really. Why does the US want it so badly and why does Britain accept giving it?
 

Elfwine

Tallest Skil said:
Land connection with Alaska.
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Which is not useful (given how rugged the terrain we're talking about).

Seriously, there's absolutely no reason to spend money gaining a land connection that's worse in every way than the by-sea connection. This isn't EU where not being land connected is a penalty to province income.

Because wasn't BC voting on even being part of Canada at all at that time, anyway? Could have sworn I remember something about either joining Canada or joining the US.
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Wiki (in an article with this: This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (October 2010) - which makes me deeply suspicious to say the least) - mentions that, but I can't think of anything else.
 

The Uchronian

Pando said:
Mid-1867: The confederation of Canada is formed. However British Columbia is not included, as the US is fiercely claiming it as compensation for helping the CSA.
1869: After 2 years of heated negotiations, the US annexes British Columbia, giving Britain an extra million dollars and promising to pay back all the debt that British Columbia owed.

What would happen now? Would British Columbia be renamed to Columbia? Would Washington, Idaho, Montana, and/or Alaska territories have any land exchanges with BC? Would BC be admitted directly as a state, like Vermont, Texas, and California were? Would we be looking to buy southwest Yukon to add a rail connection to Alaska, like we did to northern Sonora in the Gadsden purchase? How would BC's economy improve, now that it's completely integrated with the Pacific Northwest states?
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One potential solution I can see is that the U.S. gains everything south of 54'40* as a state, and when Alaska does get purchased, perhaps the U.S. can cede the southeastern coast and most of the islands with it, and it gets grafted onto Canada's Northwest Territories, and eventually, the leftovers would become the Yukon Territory.
I feel that this would satisfy both the Commonwealth and the U.S., as we'd have even more land to our name in this scenario, while Canada would still have the desired coastline. :D
 

Elfwine

CaliBoy1990 said:
One potential solution I can see is that the U.S. gains everything south of 54'40* as a state, and when Alaska does get purchased, perhaps the U.S. can cede the southeastern coast and most of the islands with it, and it gets grafted onto Canada's Northwest Territories, and eventually, the leftovers would become the Yukon Territory.
I feel that this would satisfy both the Commonwealth and the U.S., as we'd have even more land to our name in this scenario, while Canada would still have the desired coastline. :D
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The idea of 54-40 as a border is a few decades out of date, and bringing it up here would be arbitrary and inconvenient.

Admittedly, I personally have a pet peeve against US annexations outside the territory of the OTL US. They always come off as overestimating the enthusiasm of the people who are suddenly American subjects (and I use the word "subjects" as opposed to citizens intentionally).
 

Pando

Elfwine said:
The idea of 54-40 as a border is a few decades out of date, and bringing it up here would be arbitrary and inconvenient.

Admittedly, I personally have a pet peeve against US annexations outside the territory of the OTL US. They always come off as overestimating the enthusiasm of the people who are suddenly American subjects (and I use the word "subjects" as opposed to citizens intentionally).
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The most the US could of reasonably I think is British Columbia, the now-northern Mexican states (that was the original plan of annexation), Greenland (we did offer to buy it after WWII), and the Dominican Republic, since they offered to be annexed.
Less possible ones are the Philippines (if they wanted to stay with us), Canada (if they rebelled with us), and Yucatan (if we decided to annex them according to their offer).
Even less likely but still within the realms of possibility is Japan after WWII, Cuba, some Central American nations, the rest of Mexico, Haiti, and Sicily (if the movement there was greater).

But besides northern Mexico, the US would want British Columbia for more Pacific ports, a connection to Alaska, and the fact that Columbians were closer to the Pacific Northwest than Canada (economically as well), since there's a big hunk of nothing in between them and Ontario. And they were in debt, so they wanted to be annexed by someone.
 
Tallest Skil

Tallest Skil

Banned
Pando said:
Even less likely but still within the realms of possibility is Japan after WWII, Cuba, some Central American nations, the rest of Mexico, Haiti, and Sicily (if the movement there was greater).
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Now you're just reading insane theories from wherever. If by "less likely" you mean "punch in the face the person who told you this and never listen to them again," then yeah. I buy it.

I'll give you Cuba and Haiti. Everything else requires ASBs to mess with a timeline created by ASBs.

If we hadn't botched up the Philippines, I don't see why they wouldn't have, though. "Canada" is too broad. "If Arnold had whatever in wherever" might net you a single additional colony. I don't see the Yucatan.
 

JJohnson

Banned
Yucatan, at the time it had declared independence, probably not going to incorporate into the US in any sense. Maybe some fillibusters would've gone in there, and maybe it would achieve some kind of independence.

Cuba, as a territory if the PoD is late enough, or commonwealth if earlier, or state if really early. Haiti I don't think there would be any interest in the US for acquiring it, similarly, none for the Dominican Republic either.

I would agree with the prior poster on more of northern Mexico, along with the possibility of Columbia. Those seem the most likely expansions of the US without Canada having joined the revolution or being successfully invaded either in the revolution or War of 1812.
 

Elfwine

Pando said:
(snip.)
But besides northern Mexico, the US would want British Columbia for more Pacific ports, a connection to Alaska, and the fact that Columbians were closer to the Pacific Northwest than Canada (economically as well), since there's a big hunk of nothing in between them and Ontario. And they were in debt, so they wanted to be annexed by someone.
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1) More Pacific ports . . . um . . . what? It makes sense for Canada or GB to care about the Pacific ports of BC, but the US doesn't need them (or have any reason to want them).

2) A connection to Alaska, as stated, adds nothing. Alaska is still going to be for all intents and purposes linked to the rest of the US by sea simply because that's a considerably more practical route.

3) And they sure as heck don't seem to have been that interested in it being the US. Why that changes TTL badly needs an answer.
 
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