DBWI: What is the US had settled Western America?

[Wolfhound]

*Inspired by a misreading I had of a thread title*

What if the West was settled by the United States, not carved up between Mexico and Canada? Would it be possible that California and Oregon would be in the US now?

And how would a Coast-to-Coast US work? Would the US and not Canada connect pacific and atlantic via railword? further, would an American line earlier eliminate the need for a Mexican line from coast-to-coast later?

 

[USGrant]

This is an interesting one. Maybe if the United States annexes Texas...you'd have to butterfly away British support, maybe have more slaveholders emigrate that way (if Texas was more attached to slavery, they wouldn't have agreed to the gradual abolition for recognition deal being accepted).

That's a lot of land for the United States to annex, though. The Caribbean states caused enough controversy in the 1860's, and we almost didn't annex Cuba (President Seward pushed that one through, thankfully).


I think they would have broken off eventually, though. California and Cascadia are just so...Pacific, you know what I mean?

 

[Nicole]

Well I always wondered why the US didn't push harder for Cascadia- you know, Lewis and Clark went out that way, so I think we could have made a claim on it. In the end it basically just went to Britain and later Canada by default.

 

[Berra]

The Us couldn't expand since they decided to let the Indians be, Their ideals came in the way. And that is one of historys ironies. The Canadians where less concerned with their rights killing them at every oppertunity.

 

[Bavarian Raven]

maybe if the us was bigger, there wouldn't have been the canadian vs US war, where maine was annexed by canada...

 

[Nicole]

maybe if the us was bigger, there wouldn't have been the canadian vs US war, where maine was annexed by canada...

The Aroostock War was an inevitability, I think, thanks to the aggressive actions of the governors of Massachusetts in the period.

It's quite interesting, in older works "Maine" referred to the entirety of Northern Massachusetts, but after the British made their annexations the term has gradually changed to just mean the northern sections Britain annexed. Probably because it's easier and more dramatic for irredentalists to yell "Free Maine!" than, "Free The Northern Half Of Maine!"... If the whole area was still part of the US, it might have become its own state eventually.