What would it take for post-ACW Dixie to decisively reject its antebellum heritage?

[Shadowwolf]

Coming from someone in Alabama I think that if the planter class was forced to move to another state, and perhaps resettling the freed slaves into another area either out west of maybe in Florida, then maybe you could avoid such things.

It needs be said that the biggest reason the "Lost Cause" ideology became so strong in the South was due to former slave holders using propaganda to increase the hatred of the former slaves and the Northerners in order to stay in power.

 

[Mikestone8]

This challenge is to come up with the most plausible way to have the people of the former Confederacy reject the heritage of slaveocracy, planter aristocracy and institutional racism that defined their society prior to their defeat in the ACW. They may retain other cultural idiosyncrasies that make them distinct from the Yankees, but nostalgia for the antebellum social order has to go.

Could the Southern states go as far as redefining themselves as heralds of racial harmony? Something along the lines of "We had our sins burnt away with fire, let us be pure from now on."

How about the same way as in Germany?

Suppose the South had committed a successful genocide on its Black population, either killing them all or at least deporting them all back to Africa or elsewhere. Then they could "have it both ways" as the Germans were able to do about the Holocaust.

The defeated Germans could repudiate the Nazis as totally as they liked, even acquiesce in the hanging of the chief figures among them, and make generations of their schoolkids take "pilgrimages" to Auschwitz, to the accompaniment of a big song and dance about how terrible it was, and pious invocations of "Never again". Even the most antisemitic ones could quite happily do this, because no matter how much of it they did - they could go on repudiating Nazism till the cows came home - there was not the slightest "danger" of the Jews coming back to life. By VE-Day the Final Solution was a fait accompli. At most a few exiled Jews might return, but probably few would want to given recent history. They could passionately disavow Hitler without losing the "Judenrein" Germany which he had bequeathed to them; a bit like those respectable Wehrmacht officers who damned the SS in the mess, while in office hours dutifully working with it to put Communists and other undesirables behind barbed wire.

So the North wins in 1865, but finds no slaves to free - the Rebels have killed them all. No doubt they can't ignore an atrocity on such a scale, and some leading Rebs are duly hanged (though probably not West Point classmates of Union Officers, who will get a Rommel-type rehabilitation, and portrayed as having been "really" Unionist at heart) and Confederate symbolism will be outlawed, like Nazi symbolism in the New Germany. And the poorer Whites, with no Blacks to "keep in their place" can now have it out with the Planter class without needing to worry about opening a door to Black political power by splitting the White vote. TTL, they can happily wave the Stars and Stripes while doing it, and damning the big Slaveowners who conscripted them to fight for the CSA.

Thoughts?

 

[funnyhat]

How about the same way as in Germany?

Suppose the South had committed a successful genocide on its Black population, either killing them all or at least deporting them all back to Africa or elsewhere. Then they could "have it both ways" as the Germans were able to do about the Holocaust.

I don't know why it would do that given that it fought a war to protect the free labor that black slaves provided. The Confederates' notion of an ideal society was white-supremacist but not all-white; they wanted to have black people around to do their dirty work for them.

There were Americans who called for an all-white country, but they were usually on the abolitionist side. The state of Oregon, for instance, passed laws excluding black people from settling there. Abolitionism was a very big-tent movement covering everything from those (like John Brown) who genuinely advocated for racial equality and those who wanted to ship the freed slaves to Liberia.

 

[Mikestone8]

I don't know why it would do that given that it fought a war to protect the free labor that black slaves provided. The Confederates' notion of an ideal society was white-supremacist but not all-white; they wanted to have black people around to do their dirty work for them.

There were Americans who called for an all-white country, but they were generally on the abolitionist side. The state of Oregon, for instance, passed laws excluding black people from settling there. Abolitionism was a very broad movement that caused people of all views of the racial spectrum (from those who advocated equality to those who wanted to ship black people to Liberia) to temporarily come together.

I didn't say it was likely.

My point is that this thread seems to be looking for a repudiation of the old Southern society (and the Confederacy in particular) comparable to how Nazism was repudiated in postwar Germany. I merely observed that to create this outcome you need to create the conditions which gave rise to it, ie make the 1865 South more closely resemble 1945 Germany - and not necessarily in nice ways.

 

[MerryPrankster]

Sounds a lot like what we did in Ireland, dispossessing al those rebellious Catholic landowners and giving the land to loyal people.

Sure was a really brilliant success <g>.

Did it work in Ulster?

 

[jpj1421]

Picking them back up and moving on like we did with the Germans after World War 2 might do the trick, especially if we drove in the moral wrongness of the situation as well as a no hard feelings approach.

Alternatively, a federal boot stamping on a Southern face...forever.

 

[Troyer IV]

Getting Southerners to admit that they're wrong about anything is pretty much ASB.

Well that's just rude. That's like saying all Texans are inbred cowboys. Untrue and unjustified.

By the way LOTS of white people in the South would in fact be able to find ancestors who fought for the Union, far more than Germans who resisted the Nazis

I have family who fought on both sides. Now ask me if anyone anywhere in my family tree had slaves. The answer to that, and for most southerners, is a resounding 'no.' In those days it was STATE first, country second. I think for most of the rank and file, there wasn't inherent racism. There were simply black slaves and white free men. There's a common misrepresentation that all of the South was the way you see in relation to plantations and White Boss and Hordes of mutilated slaves. This was the smallest, wealthiest fraction of the populace.

NOT to say there wasn't endemic and multi-faceted racism. But I don't believe for an instant all southerners were visceral slavocratic automatons.

But things changed. I'd say after the defeat of the ACW, and generally the undeniable fact we are all Americans, is all that is needed to heal from the "antebellum heritage." Of course, in wording it the way it was written in the title, it makes it sound as if the entirety of Dixie is/was horrible and wrong in every facet. I don't care for that position.

There's a book "Send the Alabamians" about a troops in WW1. Their commander, stunned at their service, said, "In time of war, send me all the Alabamians you can get!" Douglas MacArthur once noted that the battlefield exploits of the Fourth Alabama had "not been surpassed in military history."

Now, call me crazy, but if Southerners as an singular entity harbored ills over the ACW, Reconstruction, and the forceful nature of eviscerating the "antebellum heritage," I don't particularly see the sort of patriotism and ardent service we can see out of Southerners throughout the 20th century.

To suggest otherwise is disrespectful and conveys a degree of contempt I don't believe I've ever taken umbrage with on this board... but then, my heritage is close to my heart, as a Southerner and an American. The two are inherently linked in my mind, and I believe in most others.

 

[NHBL]

A possibility...

One option for a better solution in some areas, anyway: Charge all confederate officers and government officials with treason (open and shut case...) and offer a deal where they plead guilty--and includes surrendering all real property and other major wealth. At the same time, send the "Colored Troops" as they were called to be part of the occupation army--and have them train all the former slaves as militia, and arm them. Give the militia appropriate weapons, such as Gatling guns and cannons, as well as their personal weapons.

You won't be able to disarm the traitors--guns are too common--but you will be able to keep them away from heavy weapons.

It could get very messy--but now reconstruction isn't based on if the army stays...

(And convicted traitors can't vote, run for office, etc...) Let the convicts know that any further treason will result in a trial and a short drop...

Not, perhaps, a good solution--but a decisive one, and one that I could see the radicals trying...especially since that will tend to keep the former slaves in the south.

 

[MerryPrankster]

About the white bosses and abused slaves, most slaves were owned by the richest slave-owners even though most slave owners owned few slaves. And those were the ones worked hardest and with the least food because the cotton economy was so debt-driven.

Read RIVER OF DARK DREAMS about the Mississippi Valley. It got real bad.

 

[Mikestone8]

Picking them back up and moving on like we did with the Germans after World War 2 might do the trick, especially if we drove in the moral wrongness of the situation as well as a no hard feelings approach.

Alternatively, a federal boot stamping on a Southern face...forever.

How does the latter help to turn the South Unionist? If anything it makes them more anti-Union.

 

[Fordicus]

Along those lines

I have been working on a TL that ends with something like what the OP suggests, America reunited in a way that will subdue prejudice and division.

First, hatred is based largely on fear. The fear of a repeat of Santo Domingo fueled racial hatred in the South. After the CW ended, the fear of being dominated by outsiders and former slaves continued to fuel hatred, especially in those areas where former slaves outnumbered the white population. Add to that the sting of defeat and you have the bitter social cocktail that kept segregation in place for almost 100 years.

In order to remove some of the fear and tension, some degree of geographical separation and segregation might have been helpful, more to protect the freedmen than to indulge latent racism. As Shadowwolf pointed out and as I have discussed in other threads, Lincoln and many others supported colonization outside the US and suggested schemes for relocation within. There was actually funded federal legislation in place for this purpose when the ACW ended. Florida, with a relatively small white population and large tracts of land already owned by the federal government seems to be an ideal place for resettlement of former slaves. In states like South Carolina that had majority or close to majority black populations, the whites would have probably been forcing the freedmen onto trains rather than facing the prospect of sharing political power with them. Think of the economic benefits also. There were how many freedmen? About 4 million? Perhaps half move to Florida where 18 million people live today. Florida is a state dominated by freedmen where they can develop a society free from abuse. There is a labor shortage in other states due to this migration. If land is not confiscated for taxes or redistributed on a large scale, as in OTL, the old planters and landowners will have no choice but to share some of the amazing wealth that slave labor had produced.

The second key is the eloquence of Lincoln and his conciliatory policies. I am sure we can all recall some quotes about caring for widows and lettin' up easy. Perhaps I am a bit soft on the subject and I recognize that the same word craft was not enough to prevent the ACW but I do believe that Lincoln represented the potential for national healing.

The third key is what Seward suggested prior to the ACW: the War Panacea. The freedmen had shown their ability as soldiers. So had the whipped Southerners. Fighting together, side by side, a mutual respect could have been established with Southerners regaining their honor and earning their pardon.

Certainly, the old prejudices would not die easily as they have not today but these things would have put us well ahead on our way and perhaps would have allowed us to avoid so much of the animosity and hatred that are the curse of slavery.

 

[jpj1421]

How does the latter help to turn the South Unionist? If anything it makes them more anti-Union.

I suppose I was being a bit facetious, but they would in practice if not in heart unionist. So more in line with the first sentence of the challenge and not the second. From an outside perspective they're certainly the model of unionist values, but that's only because they are being forced to under the might of a military power. This would probably not mean anything good for the Union itself, but...those are the breaks.

 

[Mikestone8]

One option for a better solution in some areas, anyway: Charge all confederate officers and government officials with treason (open and shut case...) and offer a deal where they plead guilty--and includes surrendering all real property and other major wealth.

Thus creating a huge mass of dispossessed men who've had plenty of practice at shooting. Brilliant!

At the same time, send the "Colored Troops" as they were called to be part of the occupation army--and have them train all the former slaves as militia, and arm them. Give the militia appropriate weapons, such as Gatling guns and cannons, as well as their personal weapons.

Why are you dragging the Blacks into it?

I thought the OP was to wean the South (ie the White South) away from its Rebel traditions - to which I presume the Freedmen never subscribed anyway. Giving Blacks the vote (never mind about confiscated land and the like) practically guarantees that this can't happen.

If there's one consistent feature of the South in this era, it is that the racial divide trumps issues of class or economic status. If you want Planters and Yeoman whites to divide against each other, you need to leave them alone together. As soon as you bring Blacks into the equation, the White population (bar some in mountain country where there are too few Blacks to matter) will solidify against you. If only Whites can vote, then there's at least a chance of them splitting, though nothing is guaranteed.

Best chance would be if Lee and Jackson vanish from the scene early on, and the CSA collapses in 1862. Then it has lasted less than half as long as OTL, its white population has suffered far less, and many thousands of white men have never served in its army, so maybe don't feel the same emotional commitment to it. They don't get a lump in their throats at the sight of a Rebel flag. So a non-Confederate Southern tradition could exist.

 

[Sonichu]

Now ask me if anyone anywhere in my family tree had slaves. The answer to that, and for most southerners, is a resounding 'no.'

Family history goes back a long way; are you entirely sure about this? I know people who thought the same until they researched their ancestry, and they live in the north.

 

[Sonichu]

If only Whites can vote, then there's at least a chance of them splitting, though nothing is guaranteed.

This is really missing the point, though. If you have a Germany that idolizes Hitler, calls for the genocide of non-Germanic peoples within their borders and militaristic expansion eastward by any means necessary, but you got them to stop calling themselves Nazis, you haven't really completed the challenge of de-Nazifying the Germans.

 

[Mikestone8]

I suppose I was being a bit facetious, but they would in practice if not in heart unionist.

Isn't that about what they were anyway?

They sentimentalised the Confederacy, but in practice accepted the Union victory as irreversible, concentrating on getting a free hand about their internal race relations.

 

[Mikestone8]

This is really missing the point, though. If you have a Germany that idolizes Hitler, calls for the genocide of non-Germanic peoples within their borders and militaristic expansion eastward by any means necessary, but you got them to stop calling themselves Nazis, you haven't really completed the challenge of de-Nazifying the Germans.

But you would have done if the attitudes you list were also the norm in all or nearly all of the victorious powers.

A postwar US in which the slaves were emancipated but not enfranchised would have put the South on a par with the vast majority of Northern states in 1865. If, in addition to that, they didn't wax sentimental about the CSA, that would seem to meet the OP. The Southerners would be (racially) conservative Unionists, but still Unionists.

 

[voss749]

Sounds a lot like what we did in Ireland, dispossessing al those rebellious Catholic landowners and giving the land to loyal people.

Sure was a really brilliant success <g>.

The last time I checked Irish had never been wealthy slaveholders who engaged in insurrection against the lawfully elected government.

 

[Mikestone8]

The last time I checked Irish had never been wealthy slaveholders who engaged in insurrection against the lawfully elected government.

How is that relevant? It does not demonstrate that such tactics are any more likely to be effective in achieving what the OP looked for?

 

[voss749]

The difference being in Ireland the land was transferred from catholic to protestant lord creating religious division. In this case you would be breaking up the plantations and parceling the land out to homesteaders. In a generation or two much of that land will have been sold and resold. Its no longer a political issue it becomes economic issue, and the amount of sympathy for exslaveholders is probably not that high.