CSA: The Confederate States of America

[Loren]

I started to post this over on the Film board, but then I realized that I was talking more about the politics and theory behind the film, rather than the movie itself.

I rented CSA and watched it last week. For those who haven't heard of it, it's a fake documentary of an alternate-history US, where the South won the Civil War and then took over the whole country.

I came away from it with mixed feelings. I like the conceit of alternate histories, so that appealed to me. The modern-day ads were well-done.

But as much as the film wanted to sell itself as a researched and plausible alternate history, I couldn't take it seriously. The longer the movie went on, the more the historian and political scientist in me got annoyed.

Several reviews compared the movie to books like "Fatherland" (which featured Nazis winning WWII) and "The Plot Against America" (which had fascists beating FDR for office). But the former was set in 1964, and the latter in the 1940s. Neither assumes that its alternate events would actually be sustainable long-term in their existing forms.

But this movie does. It assumes that slavery would take a *firmer* hold in the US, and only gain in popularity and use over the next 140 years. The rest of the world advances as before, but the US stays so stuck in an antebellum mindset that no civil rights advances happen at all for a century and a half. Even science seems to have gotten trapped in a pre-Civil War mindset. For instance, the film portrays the widespread acceptance of "dreptomania," a supposed slave disorder proposed before the Civil War. We're supposed to believe that that bad science actually gained a foothold, while other old bad theories (like phrenology) were presumably disposed of.

Thus, while the film's suggestion of a slaveholding US is plausible up until the turn of the 20th century, the more contemporary it gets, the more absurd it becomes.

In a way, it almost displays what I've heard called geographic bias. It posits that because the South was once home to a bunch of slaveholders and racists, the South will *always* be dominated by slaveholders and racists. And that barring outside force, the South would never change, and would continue in its slaveholding ways forever. That's just not something I can fathom. As society and technology would advance, a slaveholding US would eventually advance and change too. It couldn't continue indefinitely to exist in a bubble of overwhelming support for the enslavement of other people. In other word, the film's core concept is that if the South had won the Civil War, Americans would have gotten really backward and stupid, and stayed that way for 140 years.

[SUPERECWFAN1]

I started to post this over on the Film board, but then I realized that I was talking more about the politics and theory behind the film, rather than the movie itself.

I rented CSA and watched it last week. For those who haven't heard of it, it's a fake documentary of an alternate-history US, where the South won the Civil War and then took over the whole country.

I came away from it with mixed feelings. I like the conceit of alternate histories, so that appealed to me. The modern-day ads were well-done.

But as much as the film wanted to sell itself as a researched and plausible alternate history, I couldn't take it seriously. The longer the movie went on, the more the historian and political scientist in me got annoyed.

Several reviews compared the movie to books like "Fatherland" (which featured Nazis winning WWII) and "The Plot Against America" (which had fascists beating FDR for office). But the former was set in 1964, and the latter in the 1940s. Neither assumes that its alternate events would actually be sustainable long-term in their existing forms.

But this movie does. It assumes that slavery would take a *firmer* hold in the US, and only gain in popularity and use over the next 140 years. The rest of the world advances as before, but the US stays so stuck in an antebellum mindset that no civil rights advances happen at all for a century and a half. Even science seems to have gotten trapped in a pre-Civil War mindset. For instance, the film portrays the widespread acceptance of "dreptomania," a supposed slave disorder proposed before the Civil War. We're supposed to believe that that bad science actually gained a foothold, while other old bad theories (like phrenology) were presumably disposed of.

Thus, while the film's suggestion of a slaveholding US is plausible up until the turn of the 20th century, the more contemporary it gets, the more absurd it becomes.

In a way, it almost displays what I've heard called geographic bias. It posits that because the South was once home to a bunch of slaveholders and racists, the South will *always* be dominated by slaveholders and racists. And that barring outside force, the South would never change, and would continue in its slaveholding ways forever. That's just not something I can fathom. As society and technology would advance, a slaveholding US would eventually advance and change too. It couldn't continue indefinitely to exist in a bubble of overwhelming support for the enslavement of other people. In other word, the film's core concept is that if the South had won the Civil War, Americans would have gotten really backward and stupid, and stayed that way for 140 years.


I haven't seen it but it does sound interesting. These " What If ? " futures are always cool to muse about. But really theres a lot of variables to take into account. The South wanted their Indepenance so I can't see them taking over the entire country anyhow. I could see them controlling the southern states and all for a limited time because really , besides tobacco farming and all farming , could the Confederacy hold an economy togethor that would last ?

[Grazzt]

Just out of curiousity, how did slavery impact America's standing in the world? How did WWII turn out, for instance?

[Stellar]

that's the question. if they did, we'd be looking at a situation the likes of the dominican republic and haiti.
but with that kind of bad blood and the two countries neighboring so close, i see a situation the likes of pakistn/india.
the question now, of course, is who would be superior in terms of weaponry

[cactusmaac]

The North would be have been much better off in that regard. In terms of an industrial, financial and educational base, it smoked the South. The South's governing elite were firm believers in agrarian values and disdained industrialism.

[Slam_Bradley]

Without a crystal ball, it's always hard to say, but slavery was becoming a drain on the southern economy at the time of the Civil War and in certain areas, particularly Virginia, much earlier. I don't think slavery, as an institution, would have lasted long past the 1860s in any event. It simply wasn't economically feasible.

[Loren]

Just out of curiousity, how did slavery impact America's standing in the world? How did WWII turn out, for instance?

The movie suggested that the US never entered WWII, choosing instead to back Hitler, although persuading him to enslave the Jews instead of killing them.

Somehow, though, WWII ends pretty much the same way. That's one of the movie's oddities; despite a radically different US, the rest of the world seems to have evolved almost exactly the same way (except for Canada, which becomes a cultural mecca full of American expatriots, and South Africa, which retains apartheid).

[Grazzt]

Without a crystal ball, it's always hard to say, but slavery was becoming a drain on the southern economy at the time of the Civil War and in certain areas, particularly Virginia, much earlier. I don't think slavery, as an institution, would have lasted long past the 1860s in any event. It simply wasn't economically feasible.

That doesn't mean that it couldn't last, only that it would create a severely weakened economy. If the government believed in slavery as a way of life, I'm sure they'd be willing to make economic sacrifices. There was an interesting SF story by H. Beam Piper about something like that, called "A Slave Is A Slave".

[jade_nova]

The worst thing about this movie is that it works on the basis that if the South won the Civil War they would then take over the North. When all the South ever wanted to do was leave the rest of the country. There are books out there that cover the South winning the Civil War better.

[Loren]

Without a crystal ball, it's always hard to say, but slavery was becoming a drain on the southern economy at the time of the Civil War and in certain areas, particularly Virginia, much earlier. I don't think slavery, as an institution, would have lasted long past the 1860s in any event. It simply wasn't economically feasible.

And slavery was also the purvue of folks with the money to afford the upkeep of slaves. I recall that when the Governor of Georgia issued an open letter to the state's residents, a good chunk of it was devoted to convincing the majority of poor and middle-class folks (who didn't own slaves) that slavery was something they should even care about.

Yet the movie depicts virtually every 21st century middle-class household as having one or more slaves in the home. Who knows where they get the money to afford the expense. As if every real middle-class family can afford a full-time maid/cook/caregiver.

[Loren]

The worst thing about this movie is that it works on the basis that if the South won the Civil War they would then take over the North. When all the South ever wanted to do was leave the rest of the country. There are books out there that cover the South winning the Civil War better.

Yeah, that's a conceit that the movie hinges on, but I didn't find it convincing. Especially when it's coupled with the notion that all of America's civil rights-minded citizens choose to run off to Canada rather than to advocate for freedom here. Why would abolitionists all suddenly become spineless?

[cactusmaac]

Without a crystal ball, it's always hard to say, but slavery was becoming a drain on the southern economy at the time of the Civil War and in certain areas, particularly Virginia, much earlier. I don't think slavery, as an institution, would have lasted long past the 1860s in any event. It simply wasn't economically feasible.

There was a lot of emotional heft tied up with owning slaves in the South. It wasn't simply a matter of cost-benefit analyses.

[Alex]

Even given the alternate past the movie laid out, i thought it was really, really farfetched to beleive slaverly would have stayed so accepted.
BUT, i give this movie credit for being very well done, it really looked like a history channel show.

[EZMOHR]

This movie was alright. It would've been better if it wasn't too hokey. I know that the commercials in it were to prove a point, but, damn they could've presented it better than they did.

It raised nice subjects, but it just got a little too eye rolling at times. With a better filmaker, it could've been special. Instead, it was just a nice way to waist an hour and a half.

[Justin D.]

I saw this movie a while back at one of the local art house theaters. I remember walking away really surprised at how much I liked it. Like Alex said, it really does come off looking as if it's a real documentary, and that mos likely swayed my thought on the movie. Once I distance myself from the technical quality of the film, I have many of the same problems Loren and others have.

The farther forward in the timeline the move goes, the less I can suspend my disbelief over the subject. I found it hard to believe that other countries wouldn't find it necessary to intervene. Maybe that's another statement on the United States about how we're seen as always stepping into other countries' affairs when most of them do not. The fact that so much of the rest of the world evolved as before while the CSA became a country built around the institution of slavery, including applauded racism in the media, is where the plausability of the movie falters.

I did like the whole bit with Lincoln running to Canada though. That was just funny stuff.

How much extra stuff is on the DVD? I checked out the website before I saw the movie in the theater and noticed some stuff onthe site not in the movie. Information about 9/11, Homeland Security, war in Iraq, and other stuff like that.

By the way, I think it would be awesome if this thread was on the FILM/TV board, and we could have more conversations like it there.

[Loren]

Even given the alternate past the movie laid out, i thought it was really, really farfetched to beleive slaverly would have stayed so accepted.
BUT, i give this movie credit for being very well done, it really looked like a history channel show.

It definitely had the look down, except for one thing: it relied so heavily on the same two talking heads. You'd think they could have afforded a couple more actors to play historians, but no. By the end of the film, the lack of any other experts became noticable.

[Alex]

It definitely had the look down, except for one thing: it relied so heavily on the same two talking heads. You'd think they could have afforded a couple more actors to play historians, but no. By the end of the film, the lack of any other experts became noticable.
I never noticed it :-(

[Noah Johnson]

I enjoyed the film quite a bit; part of the fun was seeing how they'd make this admittedly very farfetched premise at all plausible. Overall, though, I saw it as a commentary not so much on the South, but on the America we know.

It posits an America whose worst impulses, which have always been part of our national character, have run completely amok. The racism, yes, but also the zealotry, the militarism, the unfortunate taste for empire, the xenophobia, the anti-intellectualism, the self-congratulatory sentimentality, and so on. The mechanism for discussing this is the notion of a Confederate victory, but the real point, it seems to me, is that these impulses are always with us, we could turn into this society without too much difficulty. Hence the multiple things (dreptomania, Darky toothpaste, etc.) that have you going "They HAVE to be making that shit up" but were in fact all too real.

[Alex]

Hence the multiple things (dreptomania, Darky toothpaste, etc.) that have you going "They HAVE to be making that shit up" but were in fact all too real.
I wasn't surprised myself, but this was mainly because i remeber my grandmothers gollywog from my youth, and that wasn't even america, and any comics fan should know about Coon's chicken.

[Loren]

Hence the multiple things (dreptomania, Darky toothpaste, etc.) that have you going "They HAVE to be making that shit up" but were in fact all too real.

It never occurred to me during the film that I was supposed to think dreptomania was made up. It sounded exactly like a 19th-century pseudoscience, like phrenology. Yet the end of the film acted like I was supposed to be surprised that somebody once proposed a stupid idea, which didn't catch on.

But why a pseudoscience that apparently never caught on beyond the guy who created it, and is so obscure that there's not even a Wikipedia entry on it, would somehow succeed and survive into the modern day just struck me as silly. The film was too wedded to the idea that every social science in America would've frozen as it was circa 1850.

[Iangould]

It definitely had the look down, except for one thing: it relied so heavily on the same two talking heads. You'd think they could have afforded a couple more actors to play historians, but no. By the end of the film, the lack of any other experts became noticable.

You mean it was cheesier and cheaper than the average History Channel offering?

*shudder*

The other countries that still retained slavery after the end of the American Civil War (like Brazil) all abandoned it before the end of the 19th century.

So it seems unlikely that chattel slavery would have remained in the US - although there's a scary bit in one of Harry Turtledove's books (I think it's Guns of the South) about southerners working to keep slavery relevant in the immediate antebellum period - using them as factory labor, paying them token cash wages; allowign them to live off premises.)

Given the way coal miners and factory worekrs were treated in the late 19th century, it's conceivable that if slavery had remained legal it might have clung on in some areas and indsutries.

The suggestion in Turteldove's books that an independent CSA woudl ahve abolished slavery, at least nomianlly and evolved soemwhat similarly ot apartheid-era South Africa is a more crdidble suggestion.

I also find it unbelievable that the south could, or would, have conquered and occupied the north.

[Gilda Dent]

The most immediate consequence of a Southern victory would have been a hostile split between the two new countries along the border. There is ample precedent for this result. Conquering the North wasn't even a goal.

I'd suspect that long term, we'd see increased militarization of one or both countries, with one finding world favor and the other suffering economically. Think East/West Germany or North/South Korea. The resulting concentration on defending this domestic border would likely prevent American involvement in the wars of the 20th century, and would simultaneously result what is now the US being a collective of smaller countries, much like Western Europe. I can see Texas and California as independant countries, never joining the Union, possibly with a dozen countries, many allied with the USA or CSA in a continental cold war, a 19th century version of latter 20th century Europe.

I can even see WW2 involvement spilling over into this now further divided continent instead of the US becoming involved in the European theater, with the USA and CSA picking different sides due to hostility towards each other as much as loyalty to one of the warring factions, and a plausible case being made for either side siding with Germany.

Assuming Europe develops parallel to our own reality, I can see the Germans still losing WW2, even with a weakened American involvement or American support, so long as they still attempt a land grab in Russia. They do that, they're eventually going to go down, but it might take longer.

In the Pacific it would be a different story. The Japanese, left unopposed, would dominate the Pacific rather quickly, and a good deal of Eastern mainland Asia.

Modern USA would be too far removed to guess with any reasonable accuracy. We'd almost certainly be a militarily and economically weaker country, but I think a case could be made for an economically strong continent.

I remember a short story that proposed a South victory. 21st century ideological descendants of the Nazis get access to a time machine that allows them to send information back in time in the form of intangible advisors. The advisor gives the South scouting information they lacked for key battles, giving them key intelligence advantages, in some cases revising results until the South either wins or does extensively more damage to the North, doing so to such an extent that the North finally pulls out out of war weariness, allowing the South to secede. This leads to further fracturing and a divided continent much like current South America, with the intent being that the US would be unable to make a significant impact on WW2.

This subsequently enables the Germany and Austria-Hungary to stalemate the Allies in WW1, preventing WW2 altogether, promting the future neo nazis to use their time machine to aide the allies so as to set up WW2, which then turns out much worse for the Germans because they lose the war, and Russia, unopposed by the US, comes to dominate Western Europe to the English Channel, with Eurasia being split between the Russian and Japanese empires, and the Americas fractured into third world countries.

The story ends with the time travellers having destroyed the remnants of the Nazis that produced them (they exist somehow out of the time stream so long as they don't rejoin the real world), and desperately trying to reinfluence events to bring themselves back to where they started, the implication being that there's no way to do that, only to keep make changes that will have unpredictible consequences.

I've just put the CSA at the top of my Netflix.

Gilda

[Tages]

Without a crystal ball, it's always hard to say, but slavery was becoming a drain on the southern economy at the time of the Civil War and in certain areas, particularly Virginia, much earlier. I don't think slavery, as an institution, would have lasted long past the 1860s in any event. It simply wasn't economically feasible.
Bingo.

Jeffrey Rogers Hummel in "Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men" goes over, in exquisite detail, the reasons why slavery was an economic drain on the South and in the long-run was unsustainable. That it lasted as long as it did was due only to massive political effort.

Chattel slavery surviving into 21st Century America would have been like serfdom surviving into 20th Century France.

On another topic, yeah, the CSA winning the ACW lends doubt as to whether WWII ever happens. No American intervention into WWI, no Treaty of Versailles, the Hohenzollerns stay on the throne, no Hitler. For that matter, it's possible that the Germans would have been able to, after an armistice, march into Russia and toss the Bolsheviks out (I know they shipped Lenin back there, but Kaiser Bill probably wouldn't be too keen on his cousin getting shot once Russia was out of the war).

[thehod]

The suggestion in Turteldove's books that an independent CSA woudl ahve abolished slavery, at least nomianlly and evolved soemwhat similarly ot apartheid-era South Africa is a more crdidble suggestion.

I'm working the those Turtledove books at the moment and enjoying them immensley.

As Ian says, the fact that slavery was abolished, but blacks treated as little more than third class citizens does seem more historically viable.

As does where this histories Adolf Hitler comes from too.

[Iangould]

Chattel slavery surviving into 21st Century America would have been like serfdom surviving into 20th Century France.



Well it did survive into 19th century Russia which is several hundred years later than in western Europe so I suppose its possible it could have survived in some form in the CSA.

Not as mass agricultural stoop labor obviously but I can see the upper class possibly owning a few slaves or slavery surviving in a handful of really dangerous and unpleasant industries.

[Markavian]

Is a master of Fantasy and Sci Fi.He has wrote many books on Alternate Histories. The Great War Series Covers WW I and II . The US Weakened becomes an internationa; Paraih and whipping boy by both France and the British. So the USA Joins The Central Powers in WW I.Its a Tough fight but the USA annexes Canada maybe 25% of the CSA and Hawai and Alaska (Two territories it didnt absorb in this Timeline in the 19th century) And Becomes a Superpower A generation Earlier..In a twist America and the Former Central Powers become MORE Democratic and Humane while the Allied Powers and the nearly crushed CSA become the Nations that Facism takes root in the Years after WW I ..Its a Grand Read:)

[TheTen-EyedMan]

http://www.rob-clarkson.com/duff-brewery/apu/02.jpg

"The South will..Come Again!"

[heretic]

Without a crystal ball, it's always hard to say, but slavery was becoming a drain on the southern economy at the time of the Civil War and in certain areas, particularly Virginia, much earlier. I don't think slavery, as an institution, would have lasted long past the 1860s in any event. It simply wasn't economically feasible.
Perhaps not, however it was _socially_ very desireable. So long as the Planters maintained thier relative socio-economic standing and the negros were kept in thier place, I suspect Southern society would have kept things as they were until come externality seriously disrupted the political equation.

Remember that the Slaveholding Classes were not making the decisions in Brazil or the Sugar Islands when Emancipation was decreed there.

HTG

[heretic]

Yet the movie depicts virtually every 21st century middle-class household as having one or more slaves in the home. Who knows where they get the money to afford the expense. As if every real middle-class family can afford a full-time maid/cook/caregiver.
Or for that matter the assumption than an intact Dixie would even have that much of a Middle Class....

HTG

[Dreadstar]

Perhaps not, however it was _socially_ very desireable. So long as the Planters maintained thier relative socio-economic standing and the negros were kept in thier place, I suspect Southern society would have kept things as they were until come externality seriously disrupted the political equation.

Even if that were true, and I don't think it would be, the industrial revolution would have turned the economic factor on its head. A tractor can do a shitload more work than a slave. Even if a slave is driving the tractor. So what happens when you have to support a workforce of 900% of what you need?

Slavery would have beeen dead in the 20th century. But I admit it sounds like an interesting premise, so I'll be looking this video up myself.

[BoosterBronze]

One thing that bothered me about this otherwise very interesting film was it's claim that art, music, and culture in the CSA could never advance without black influence. Without understating black influece on American culture, it still seems unfair to make such a claim.

[Grazzt]

One thing that bothered me about this otherwise very interesting film was it's claim that art, music, and culture in the CSA could never advance without black influence. Without understating black influece on American culture, it still seems unfair to make such a claim.

But that would have required them to think up what other influences to art, music, and culture could/should/would replace the black ones. And I'm sure they didn't want to bother with that.

[Adam Crocker]

One thing that bothered me about this otherwise very interesting film was it's claim that art, music, and culture in the CSA could never advance without black influence. Without understating black influece on American culture, it still seems unfair to make such a claim.

Well speaking as a music fan (or specifically a fan of twentieth century popular music) it's not an completely unreasonable claim to make regarding music given the enormous influence that black music has had in that area, even when such music is primarily consumed by white audiences. Of course that would also assume that no racial mixing was occuring under the table and away from proper society...which is how these things happened anyways. And according to Loren this film already stretches plausibility in several areas. I do see it definitely affecting Jazz though which took in many influences from white classical music as swing developed, so it could stunt its growth into be-bop.

That said I can't speak to what the black influence is on American art and culture in general in the twentieth century, save for the influence of jazz on the beat writers (who were already looking outside mainstream culture for their influences).



Well it did survive into 19th century Russia which is several hundred years later than in western Europe so I suppose its possible it could have survived in some form in the CSA.

Probably, but we also have to consider that 19th century Russia had a very different set of economic and social circumstances than either western Europe or America. For example, the processes that the eroded the power of the nobility in western Europe came very late to Russia. Though I do find your scenario of it surviving in a very limited fashion to a few household slaves for the upper class or in the really dangerous industries to be very plausible.

[Charles RB]

For those who haven't heard of it, it's a fake documentary of an alternate-history US, where the South won the Civil War and then took over the whole country.

Since the war as I understand it was because the South wanted to seperate and go independent, I already dislike this movie for arsing up history.

[JeffreyWKramer]

For me at least, good alternate history stuff has to start by being plausible. Sounds like this particular project violates that principle in many areas.

[Kid Omega]

It sounds like it's essentially a smear campiagn against white southerners. That may be reactionary on my part, especially without having seen it, and I'm not saying that's what it is. But that's the impression I'm getting.

Someting like THE PLOT AGAINST AMERICA is brilliant because it takes a drastic turn, and extrapolates in a very real way what plausibly could have happened. It has no overt political points (although the subtle ones are well-played), and is not out to paint things as black and white.

In Roth's book, there are no clear villains, just a gradual cultural shift for the worse, that could very well have happened. He certainly didn't have to imagine from whole cloth a reality that just wouldn't have been feasible, ever, ever, in this country.

Slavery simply would not have existed in this country past 1900. There were too many people fighting it, even in pre-Revolutionary times. It goes against everything we believe in, and although it took tremendous effort and a long time, the abolition of slavery was inevitable. The idea that the Southern states would proliferate it is insulting to the many southerners that fought it, freed slaves, helped slaves escape, etc.

[Dreadstar]

OK, if I suspend belief and accept that the Southern states not only won, but in fact further incorporated the North (as has been said already, not bloody likely considering the motivation of separation to begin with), how did the movie handle slavery in the Northern States?

I'd HAVE to believe that there WAS no slavery in the Northern states, because the PRIME motivation (or at the very least, the prime talking point) of secession was STATES RIGHTS. Am I correct? So how does Jeff Davis and his successors rationalize Federalization of the institution of slavery if a northern state declares that slavery is verbotten? Following this particular tangent, how then do you prevent a re-emergence of the underground railroad?

Yeah, now that I think of it, KO is right: It smells suspiciously like a subtle smear.

I'd still like to see it, though.

[Loren]

OK, if I suspend belief and accept that the Southern states not only won, but in fact further incorporated the North (as has been said already, not bloody likely considering the motivation of separation to begin with), how did the movie handle slavery in the Northern States?

As I recall, the movie has Grant surrender to Lee at Appomattox. The Confederate leaders take over control of the government, and the entire country becomes the Confederate States of America.

Faced with the issue of slavery in the North, President Jefferson Davis and the Confederate Congress concoct a solution. First, they legalize slavery in all the states. (They also bring back the slave trade at some poit.) Then they institute a national income tax, and provide for deductions for the number of slaves owned, encouraging Northerners to buy slaves or effectively pay a penalty for not doing so.

Faced with the new realities of slavery, nearly all of America's abolitionists and civil rights-minded folks flee to Canada.


I'd HAVE to believe that there WAS no slavery in the Northern states, because the PRIME motivation (or at the very least, the prime talking point) of secession was STATES RIGHTS. Am I correct? So how does Jeff Davis and his successors rationalize Federalization of the institution of slavery if a northern state declares that slavery is verbotten?

The states' rights issue wasn't rationalized at all. Then again, it's been my contention that the Confederacy just used "state's rights" as an innocuous cover for "slavery rights."


Following this particular tangent, how then do you prevent a re-emergence of the underground railroad?

Strangely, that never comes up, although you'd think a modern-day Underground Railroad would be a natural idea in this context. The closest they get is a rather well-done ad for a Cops-esque TV show called "Runaways."


I'd still like to see it, though.

And I'd still recommend it.

[Dreadstar]

... First, they legalize slavery in all the states. (They also bring back the slave trade at some poit.) Then they institute a national income tax, and provide for deductions for the number of slaves owned, encouraging Northerners to buy slaves or effectively pay a penalty for not doing so.

The states' rights issue wasn't rationalized at all. Then again, it's been my contention that the Confederacy just used "state's rights" as an innocuous cover for "slavery rights."

I won't get into whether or not states rights was an actual goal or merely a rationalization: as we've seen here before, that way lies madness. So let's just go ahead and accept that that idea gets chucked at the end of the war.

With that premise, I can see the CSA legalizing slavery (would they be legalizing or merely repealing anti-slavery laws, vis-a-vis a Constitutional standpoint?) on a Federal level. But I can't see them making it a *preferred* situation. That just doesn't make sense to me, even WITH the other suspensions of disbelief.

[Loren]

It sounds like it's essentially a smear campiagn against white southerners. That may be reactionary on my part, especially without having seen it, and I'm not saying that's what it is. But that's the impression I'm getting.

Yep, that was generally my feeling, and it's the same sort of idea I was trying to express with my 'geographic bias' comment. The entire movie is more or less built around the notion that if the South had been victorious, this country would have never evolved socially and the population would have only grown *more* overwhelmingly racist with time. The film even posits that women's suffrage would never have happened, so that 21st century America would still exclude women from voting.

[Noah Johnson]

For me at least, good alternate history stuff has to start by being plausible. Sounds like this particular project violates that principle in many areas.
Well, as I said (which everyone seems to have ignored) plausibility is really not the point of this film; it uses its basic conceit as a jumping-off point for what is essentially a meditation on culture.

[Justin D.]

One thing that bothered me about this otherwise very interesting film was it's claim that art, music, and culture in the CSA could never advance without black influence. Without understating black influece on American culture, it still seems unfair to make such a claim.

Yeah, this is another one of those points where I don’t know if I can suspend my disbelief that much. Television and music was pretty much equated to nothing more than a wasteland of Laurence Welk shows. With all the talk over the last 10 or so years about how white the landscape of television is (it’s started expanding its cultural horizons over the last few years), I’m surprised that CSA portrayed television as being much different than how it already is or, at least, how it was 5-10 years ago. Maybe it would’ve been funnier to see them represent television as nothing more than television filled with programs mimicking Friends (minus the Jewish ancestry of the Gellars or any appearance of anyone not white-skinned or Christian) and episodes of 7th Heaven. There could even have been a Law & Order: Slave Unit show portrayed. However, the portrayal of television and other forms of media in CSA simply came off as too simplistic.

In fact, that’s how most of the film comes off. The people behind it had an interesting concept and ran with it, but not a lot of thought went into realistically thinking out cause and effect relationships. Some definite thought went into cause and effect, but it didn’t feel like it dug below the most surface level on many issues. More like someone made a joke, a snide comment, or a sarcastic remark, and then they filmed a scene based around that without developing it much further.

I also agree with Loren about how odd it is that abolitionists and others (like people who helped with the underground railroad) became spineless and stopped believing in their causes to let the country turn out the way it did. I could honestly have seen a more realistic occurrence of a second civil war happening sometime in the 1900s, maybe the 1950s or 60s to make it relevant to the civil rights movement.

With all of that said, I still really liked this movie. That’s an impressive accomplishment considering what appears as easily spotted logical fallacies. While the substance wasn’t as well-thought out as I wished or it could have been given possible time restraints of the film, the style won me over.

[Tages]

Perhaps not, however it was _socially_ very desireable. So long as the Planters maintained thier relative socio-economic standing and the negros were kept in thier place, I suspect Southern society would have kept things as they were until come externality seriously disrupted the political equation.
Or until they were faced with the option to either continue being a backwater nation or join the US and European nations as equals. Sheer economic logic makes it extremely unlikely that the single-digit percentage of the population that owned large slave plantations would have been able to hold complete sociopolitical advantage for long.

[Justin D.]

It sounds like it's essentially a smear campiagn against white southerners. That may be reactionary on my part, especially without having seen it, and I'm not saying that's what it is. But that's the impression I'm getting.

That’s exactly what I thought before I saw it, especially because I knew Spike Lee is an executive producer of the movie. All the way up until the point the movie started, I was prepared to hate it and get pissed. Still, the concept intrigued me enough to see it, and I’m glad it did. Like I said, it’s a well-made movie even if many ideas are not posited fully or with much more than what seems a cursory thought before shooting the scene. Plus, I’ve noticed no one else has mentioned something else about the movie that surprised me: I laughed out loud more than once. In fact, everyone else in the theater did too. Of course, that’s interesting in itself because it was a very small theater with only about 15 people in it, none of them black from what I could see. Anyway, some ideas are so absurd, that I couldn’t help laughing at them even if they’re spawned from some factual event.

I have seen many people comment about how the South wanted to secede so they find it hard to reconcile the idea of the CSA encompassing the whole nation, but the movie gave information at the end about some plans of the South to reach out to other lands if they were victorious in the Civil War. I haven’t seen the movie in months so I can’t remember the plans exactly, but I plan on renting the movie to see it again soon. The same problem with that plan is the same one pointed out by dreptomania. It’s such an obscure reference with what seems to be no backing even during the time of its origination that it’s doubtful it could have taken a strong foothold, if any at all, on the country.

[The Batman]

I didn't realize that this was out. I'm going to have to try and rent it this week. It's something that I'm really interested in seeing since it sort of deals with my M.A. thesis topic.

What I got from the trailer and the few articles I've read about this film it's less a serious alternate history and more of a commentary on racism in the present day real Earth 1 United States of America forwarding the argument that while institutional slavery was ended and eventually civil rights laws have been passes a sort of defacto economic and social slavery exists that maintain African Americans as an underclass or marginal group.

But, like I said I've yet to see the film.

[Tages]

Someting like THE PLOT AGAINST AMERICA is brilliant because it takes a drastic turn, and extrapolates in a very real way what plausibly could have happened. It has no overt political points (although the subtle ones are well-played), and is not out to paint things as black and white.

In Roth's book, there are no clear villains, just a gradual cultural shift for the worse, that could very well have happened. He certainly didn't have to imagine from whole cloth a reality that just wouldn't have been feasible, ever, ever, in this country.
I hate that book. (http://www.amconmag.com/2004_09_27/review.html)

(And yes, I've read it, but Bill Kauffman does a more succinct job summing up my problems with it, particularly the bizarre treatment given to Burton K. Wheeler and Gerald P. Nye, about whom Roth apparently did no research at all)

[Tages]

The film even posits that women's suffrage would never have happened, so that 21st century America would still exclude women from voting.
Ironic, given that one of the biggest supporters for universal suffrage in our timeline was the KKK (the logic goes that it would double the "white vote").

[Grazzt]

Ironic, given that one of the biggest supporters for universal suffrage in our timeline was the KKK (the logic goes that it would double the "white vote").

:confused:

The KKK do realise that there are black women, too, right?

[Ray R.]

Or until they were faced with the option to either continue being a backwater nation or join the US and European nations as equals. Sheer economic logic makes it extremely unlikely that the single-digit percentage of the population that owned large slave plantations would have been able to hold complete sociopolitical advantage for long.

Yup. Slavery was more or less dead at the time of the Civil War, but the body was still warm.

My recollection of biographies of people like Jefferson Davis, were that they were more iconoclastic traditionalists than hardcore racial supremacists, which is hardly much of a distinction when you look at the results, but I say that for the point that I agree with Dread and others that both the willingness to federalize slavery and apply it to solidly abolitionist or abolitionist-in-spirit states like Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, etc., would just have created another Civil War, or a longstanding guerrilla action with no chance of ceasefire. In other words, no chance of success, hence no suspension of disbelief.

I have seen the movie, and agree it is better looked at as a mirror on popular culture, albeit a funhouse mirror view, than a legitimate alternative history. The filmmakers have the conceit of the true way of things, in order to exploit that to point out absurdities. Personally, I think they took the easy way out and could have settled less for the whack-a-mole attempt at slick and spotty bites across many popular if superficial cultural icons and put some meat on the bones of what would have been a locked-in caste system, and the inner struggle against it.

[cactusmaac]

Or until they were faced with the option to either continue being a backwater nation or join the US and European nations as equals. Sheer economic logic makes it extremely unlikely that the single-digit percentage of the population that owned large slave plantations would have been able to hold complete sociopolitical advantage for long.

How significant were homegrown anti-slavery movements in the South prior to the Civil War?

And exactly where would Southern abolitionists have sprung from? The bulk of the wealth there was tied up in agriculture. Any industrial middle classes would have been a long time coming.



The idea that the Southern states would proliferate it is insulting to the many southerners that fought it, freed slaves, helped slaves escape, etc.

If they had been victorious in the Civil War, the CSA leadership planned to take over swathes of Mexico, Nicaragua, Cuba and the Dominican Republic and establish and reinforce chattel slavery there.

It's tempting to think the South would have voluntarily abandoned slavery, but as far as I can tell there would have been little internal impetus to do so, particularly as victory would have been seen as confirmation of the superiority of agrarian, slave-holding society over an industrial, free labour one.

[Ray R.]

If they had been victorious in the Civil War, the CSA leadership planned to take over swathes of Mexico, Nicaragua, Cuba and the Dominican Republic and establish and reinforce chattel slavery there.

It's tempting to think the South would have voluntarily abandoned slavery, but as far as I can tell there would have been little internal impetus to do so, particularly as victory would have been seen as confirmation of the superiority of agrarian, slave-holding society over an industrial, free labour one.

Well, in many of those countries, slavery had already been ended and the slaves emancipated for decades. I think Haiti was a cautionary tale for any CSA takeover.

One of the most interesting characters to come out of that time was William Walker. With a mercenary army he took over Nicaragua and tried to make a slavery empire in Latin America. He ended up being executed in Honduras. Fascinating story -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Walker_(soldier)

[Grazzt]

I hate that book. (http://www.amconmag.com/2004_09_27/review.html)

(And yes, I've read it, but Bill Kauffman does a more succinct job summing up my problems with it, particularly the bizarre treatment given to Burton K. Wheeler and Gerald P. Nye, about whom Roth apparently did no research at all)

One criticism of that review:


(Lindbergh) was no more a Nazi than FDR was.

Didn't Charles Lindbergh say that if the US had to choose a side to enter the war in, that the Americans should have sided with the Nazis?

[Tages]

One criticism of that review:



Didn't Charles Lindbergh say that if the US had to choose a side to enter the war in, that the Americans should have sided with the Nazis?
Not to my knowledge. He was against entering the war at all.

He declined to refuse a medal from the Nazi leadership and in a speech said that certain Jewish Americans (and he made it very clear he wasn't talking about all American Jews) were for entering the war for reasons not in the best interests of the US. To Roth, that makes him a Nazi.

[Tages]

How significant were homegrown anti-slavery movements in the South prior to the Civil War?
What abolitionists lived in the South tended to be driven North, since many of them were encouraging slaves to rise up and kill their masters. You can imagine that this spooked them a little.


And exactly where would Southern abolitionists have sprung from? The bulk of the wealth there was tied up in agriculture. Any industrial middle classes would have been a long time coming.
The majority of the population that didn't own slaves and was therefore harmed by slavery, since they still had to pay for its upkeep?

[LtMarvel]

Hmmm....I've already long considered an alternate history when I was repulsed by HW Jr's "If the South Would've Won.." The US was so instrumental in WW II that I can't imagine how Axis would've lost WWII. Certainly, the Manhatten Project wouldn't have happened. How would the W. Europe allies survived the Nazis? Would the Nazis still run out of fuel or could they have broken the blockade??

And...shudder...would the CSA join the Axis and battle the rest of the USA?

[Tages]

Hmmm....I've already long considered an alternate history when I was repulsed by HW Jr's "If the South Would've Won.." The US was so instrumental in WW II that I can't imagine how Axis would've lost WWII. Certainly, the Manhatten Project wouldn't have happened. How would the W. Europe allies survived the Nazis? Would the Nazis still run out of fuel or could they have broken the blockade??
Depends, is there still American aid short of war? If not, it's possible the Germans could have won a narrow victory, though after Hitler's death their empire likely would have collapsed once his cronies started squabbling over the remains. Nazism was an extremely unstable philosophy held together only through perpetual conflict and the sheer force of Hitler's personality.

With American aid, the Nazis still bite it. After Stalingrad they can't stop the Soviets. Fascism dies a horriffic death, though it's possible Europe goes Red as a result, which is about as bad actually.


And...shudder...would the CSA join the Axis and battle the rest of the USA?
What possible reasons could they have had for doing so?

[cactusmaac]

The majority of the population that didn't own slaves and was therefore harmed by slavery, since they still had to pay for its upkeep?

I suppose that's why they submitted to fighting an extremely bloody and destructive war where the issue of slavery was the paramount one.

[Grazzt]

Not to my knowledge. He was against entering the war at all.

He declined to refuse a medal from the Nazi leadership and in a speech said that certain Jewish Americans (and he made it very clear he wasn't talking about all American Jews) were for entering the war for reasons not in the best interests of the US. To Roth, that makes him a Nazi.

Well, there is the Desmoines speech he made. (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/lindbergh/filmmore/reference/primary/desmoinesspeech.html) And that makes it pretty clear that he's talking about all Jews, although he characterizes it there as simple self-interest.

He was also an apologist at times for the actions of Nazi Germany: "Germany has pursued the only consistent policy in Europe in recent years. The question of right and wrong is one thing by law and another thing by history.", "if England and France had offered a hand to the struggling republic of Germany, there would be no war today.", and "Our accusations of aggression and barbarism on the part of Germany, simply bring back echoes of hypocrisy and Versailles," for instance.

I'll try and look harder for a reference to his wanting to side with the Nazis. If I remember the context correctly, it was what he considered to be the better alternative if America couldn't (for whatever reason) stay out of the war. Its probably because he was a racist and thought that the Soviet Union needed to be held back at an cost: for instance he said "If the white race is ever seriously threatened, it may then be time for us to take our part in its protection, to fight side by side with the English, French and Germans, but not with one against the other for our mutual destruction". However, assuming I can't find it, I'll assume that it was some other quote taken out of context, and apologize for making that accusation.

[Charles RB]

The US was so instrumental in WW II that I can't imagine how Axis would've lost WWII.

American involvement didn't make the Nazis attack the USSR at the coldest time of year whilst still being repulsed by the RAF. It's not inconcievable that the Allies could've won against Germany & Italy without America (Japan I'm less sure on), albeit in a much worse state.

[cactusmaac]

Nope. If it wasn't for American production, neither Russia nor Britain could have stayed in the war.

[LtMarvel]

What gov't forms in CSA? What bitterness/hatred of USA still exists? How did CSA deal with all the alliances in WW 1?

[Dreadstar]

It was mentioned earlier. WWII is unimportant. The question is: Would the CSA as a whole of the U.S. (or either the CSA or the U.S. if separate) gotten into WWI?

Because if they don't, perhaps Germany wins that war and WWII (as we know it) becomes a moot point.

[Grazzt]

Nope. If it wasn't for American production, neither Russia nor Britain could have stayed in the war.

Really? A quick check on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_production_during_World_War_II#Military_a ircraft_of_all_types) shows that Russia managed to outproduce the Germans on a number of fronts. Including more than twice as many artillery pieces and more than twice as many tanks. The Germans had a fighter aircraft advantage against the Soviets, but it wasn't so large as one might imagine, and the UK more than made up for that.

[Ray R.]

Nope. If it wasn't for American production, neither Russia nor Britain could have stayed in the war.

I think you're right. Lend-lease was a major factor in allowing Britain and Russia to stay viable, and continued even after the U.S. started sending in troops to North Africa, Italy and then France (in addition to the Pacific theatre).

According to Wiki:


A total of $50.1 billion worth of supplies were shipped. $31.4 billion went to Britain, $11.3 billion to the Soviet Union, $3.2 billion to France (that is, Free France), and $1.6 billion to China...No lend lease money went to Canada, which operated a similar program that sent $4.7 billion in supplies to Britain and Soviet Union.
...

In 1943-44, about a fourth of all British munitions came through Lend-Lease. Aircraft comprised about one fourth of the shipments to Britain, followed by food, land vehicles, and ships.

Even after the United States forces in Europe and the Pacific began to reach full-strength in 1943–1944, Lend-Lease continued. Most remaining belligerents were largely self-sufficient in front-line equipment (such as tanks and fighter aircraft) by this stage, but Lend-Lease provided a useful supplement in this category even so, and Lend-Lease logistical supplies (including trucks, jeeps, landing craft, and above all the Douglas DC-3 transport aircraft) were of enormous assistance.

...

For example, the USSR was highly dependent on trains, yet the desperate need to produce weapons meant that fewer than 20 new locomotives were produced in the USSR during the entire war. In this context, the supply of 1,981 US locomotives can be better understood. Likewise, the Soviet air force was almost completely dependent on US supplies of very high octane aviation fuel. Although most Red Army tank units were equipped with Soviet-built tanks, their logistical support was provided by hundreds of thousands of high-quality US-made trucks. Indeed by 1945 nearly two-thirds of the truck strength of the Red Army was US-built. Trucks such as the Dodge ¾ ton and Studebaker 2.5 ton, were easily the best trucks available in their class on either side on the Eastern Front. US supplies of waterproof telephone cable, aluminium, and canned rations were also critical.

If this information is reliable, it's clear that the Allies probably would have lost Russia, and there may have been enough left over German warpower for an invasion of the British Isles.

So even if the soldiers didn't go to Europe, the aid was just as important.

[cactusmaac]

Really? A quick check on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_production_during_World_War_II#Military_a ircraft_of_all_types) shows that Russia managed to outproduce the Germans on a number of fronts. Including more than twice as many artillery pieces and more than twice as many tanks. The Germans had a fighter aircraft advantage against the Soviets, but it wasn't so large as one might imagine, and the UK more than made up for that.

Russia was only able to produce so many military goods because they got everything else - including industrial expertise - from Allied convoys.

[Grazzt]

Russia was only able to produce so many military goods because they got everything else - including industrial expertise - from Allied convoys.

Forget about that.

However, I think Ray Rivard beat you to this point. Doesn't that mean you owe him a Coke? :p

[cactusmaac]

Forget about that.

However, I think Ray Rivard beat you to this point. Doesn't that mean you owe him a Coke? :p

Bah! I had it all in my head. Cactusmaac does not need Wiki.

[Charles RB]

Nope. If it wasn't for American production, neither Russia nor Britain could have stayed in the war.

Production, yeah, but I thought he was talking about sending troops in.

[Loren]

How significant were homegrown anti-slavery movements in the South prior to the Civil War?

Significant enough to run the Underground Railroad. And the South had its share of free African-Americans.


And exactly where would Southern abolitionists have sprung from? The bulk of the wealth there was tied up in agriculture. Any industrial middle classes would have been a long time coming.

The Industrial Revolution would've still happened, and farming advances would have still made chattel slavery less profitable. A Confederate victory would've slowed the South's advancement, but wouldn't have frozen it. Sooner or later, it would have moved beyond agriculture.

And as the quality of life for the lower classes rises, the less tolerable the idea of chattel slavery would be. People would inevitably come to realize that they couldn't support a system that treated some black people as people, and other black people as property. (Of course, the movie's solution to that problem was to suggest that the CSA would force the enslavement of *all* black people.)

[Ray R.]

It was mentioned earlier. WWII is unimportant. The question is: Would the CSA as a whole of the U.S. (or either the CSA or the U.S. if separate) gotten into WWI?

Because if they don't, perhaps Germany wins that war and WWII (as we know it) becomes a moot point.

Perhaps. I may be wrong, but I thought that American involvement in World War I was more of an afterthought than a decisive factor. By the time the American Expeditionary Force went over, the Germans had taken massive losses and due to the lack of motorized infantry and artillery couldn't keep the gains that they got. By the time the U.S. came, German production was at 53% of capacity, and fighting on several fronts a war of attrition took its toll.

Granted, the U.S. forces were extremely helpful in the Hundred Days counter-offensive against the Germans, but the Brits, French, Australians and Canadians did a lot of the heavy lifting, and the Italians entered the war on the Allied side as well, and did a number on the Austro-Hungarians getting as far as Trieste, while other parts of the Empire declared independence....

I think eventually British naval supremacy and continued aid from the Commonwealth and perhaps the U.S./CSA would have defeated Germany, with or without U.S. troops. But that's more speculation than informed fact, I'll admit.

[Ray R.]

Bah! I had it all in my head. Cactusmaac does not need Wiki.

Neither do I. But details tend to make a stronger case. ;)

[cactusmaac]

Large-scale farming mechanisation only came to the South in the 1930s. A reliable mechanised cotton picker was only developed in 1948.

http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/holley.cottonpicker

[cactusmaac]

Perhaps. I may be wrong, but I thought that American involvement in World War I was more of an afterthought than a decisive factor. By the time the American Expeditionary Force went over, the Germans had taken massive losses and due to the lack of motorized infantry and artillery couldn't keep the gains that they got. By the time the U.S. came, German production was at 53% of capacity, and fighting on several fronts a war of attrition took its toll.

Granted, the U.S. forces were extremely helpful in the Hundred Days counter-offensive against the Germans, but the Brits, French, Australians and Canadians did a lot of the heavy lifting, and the Italians entered the war on the Allied side as well, and did a number on the Austro-Hungarians getting as far as Trieste, while other parts of the Empire declared independence....

I think eventually British naval supremacy and continued aid from the Commonwealth and perhaps the U.S./CSA would have defeated Germany, with or without U.S. troops. But that's more speculation than informed fact, I'll admit.


If it wasn't for all the fresh American troops coming over, Germany would probably not have agreed to an armistice. Both sides were equally worn out at that point, and during the summer of 1918, Germany actually came close to winning the war in the West. This was after Russia got knocked out in 1917 by the Revolution.

[Perry Holley]

If it wasn't for all the fresh American troops coming over, Germany would probably not have agreed to an armistice. Both sides were equally worn out at that point, and during the summer of 1918, Germany actually came close to winning the war in the West. This was after Russia got knocked out in 1917 by the Revolution.I don't know if Germany would have 'won' WWI (in the sense of conquering othering countries), but at the very least without the US showing up, theoretical-Germany would have fared a lot better... enough so that they would not have suffered the reparations of the Treaty of Versailles that Germany did in our world (which pretty much crippled Germany's economy at the time). German dissatisfaction with the Treaty during the 20's and 30's helped forment the rise of National Socialism: if theoretical-Germany comes out of the Great War on a more even footing, not being humbled on both a social and economic front, then Hitler and the Nazi party most likely never rise to power... and if WWII occurs at all, it's verrrrrry different in how it turns out.

[spoon_jenkins]

How significant were homegrown anti-slavery movements in the South prior to the Civil War?

And exactly where would Southern abolitionists have sprung from? The bulk of the wealth there was tied up in agriculture. Any industrial middle classes would have been a long time coming.

If they had been victorious in the Civil War, the CSA leadership planned to take over swathes of Mexico, Nicaragua, Cuba and the Dominican Republic and establish and reinforce chattel slavery there.

It's tempting to think the South would have voluntarily abandoned slavery, but as far as I can tell there would have been little internal impetus to do so, particularly as victory would have been seen as confirmation of the superiority of agrarian, slave-holding society over an industrial, free labour one.

I agree with cactusmaac on a number of points including the above. Southerner interest in acquiring new territory to expand slavery elsewhere was a recurring theme before the Civil War. I think without the North holding back Southern expansionist ambition and emboldened by military success, the CSA would probably try to seize portions of Mexico, the Carribbean, etc. In the short term, I think the extent of slavery would expand dramatically.

Brazil has slavery until 1888, so I wouldn't be surprised if slavery in the U.S. lasted at least that long. I think when emancipation finally came, the CSA would probably opt for gradual emancipation rather than emancipating everyone at the same time, because they seemed to conceive of blacks with freedoms as a menace.

I don't think there would be any great rising among non-slaveowners for emancipation (or other freedoms later). That severely downplays the role that racial animosity played in Southern society throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. Racist institutions in the South like slavery weren't based merely on economic calculation, but also on emotion. For example, it seems lynchings wasn't some solemn judicial duty, but a celebration of the violence involved.

I'm skeptical that a significant opposition faction would arise against racist institution. Folks may not realize that Southern Republicans in Congress (few as they were) voted against the Civil Rights Act of 1964 in even greater proportions than Southern Democrats. So it's not like, within the South, there was strong action for civil rights at that time by either party.

[The Batman]

^^^

That's what Jim Crow was all about. Recreating the social and economic conditions of slavery without actually recreating the institution of slavery. It allowed the Southern white elite to maintain a culture of white supremacy and keep a tight control on a population of free African Americans that centuries of propaganda, ignorance, and racism had constructed to be at best a drain on the fruits of white civilization and at worst a deadly threat to the honour, virtue and even life of white people everywhere.

An argument has been made, by Edmund S. Morgan I believe, that most whites went along with this even if they didn't have an economic or emotional investment in slavery because it allowed even the poorest of white farmers to be elevated in status because at least he wasn't black or a slave.

[ragnarok_2012]

An argument has been made, by Edmund S. Morgan I believe, that most whites went along with this even if they didn't have an economic or emotional investment in slavery because it allowed even the poorest of white farmers to be elevated in status because at least he wasn't black or a slave.

Caste systems can be very durable.

I'd like to think that there was a better way than a war between the states to do away with the institution of slavery.

There are only two places in the history of mankind where slavery was done away with through violence: Haiti and the United States of America.

[Iangould]

Perhaps. I may be wrong, but I thought that American involvement in World War I was more of an afterthought than a decisive factor. By the time the American Expeditionary Force went over, the Germans had taken massive losses and due to the lack of motorized infantry and artillery couldn't keep the gains that they got. By the time the U.S. came, German production was at 53% of capacity, and fighting on several fronts a war of attrition took its toll.

Granted, the U.S. forces were extremely helpful in the Hundred Days counter-offensive against the Germans, but the Brits, French, Australians and Canadians did a lot of the heavy lifting, and the Italians entered the war on the Allied side as well, and did a number on the Austro-Hungarians getting as far as Trieste, while other parts of the Empire declared independence....

I think eventually British naval supremacy and continued aid from the Commonwealth and perhaps the U.S./CSA would have defeated Germany, with or without U.S. troops. But that's more speculation than informed fact, I'll admit.


The final German Offensive of 1917/18 had been defeated before the arrival of significant numbers of American troops.

The knowledge of America's entry certain hurt German morale and contributed to ther German surrender but I suspect that had America not entered World War I the general course of the war would have been similar but the Germans might have held out until 1919 or 1920.

Which also raises the question of whether the Allies would have been so desperate to end the war that they would have offered more generous terms that the Treaty of Versaillies.

[cactusmaac]

I don't know if Germany would have 'won' WWI (in the sense of conquering othering countries), but at the very least without the US showing up, theoretical-Germany would have fared a lot better... enough so that they would not have suffered the reparations of the Treaty of Versailles that Germany did in our world (which pretty much crippled Germany's economy at the time). German dissatisfaction with the Treaty during the 20's and 30's helped forment the rise of National Socialism: if theoretical-Germany comes out of the Great War on a more even footing, not being humbled on both a social and economic front, then Hitler and the Nazi party most likely never rise to power... and if WWII occurs at all, it's verrrrrry different in how it turns out.

Versailles wasn't that damaging especially since it got revised in subsequent years. Germany's economy was actually booming in the Weimar period up until the global depression. What upset Germans immensely was the belief that they'd sacrificed so much in WW1 and still came out with nothing. Thus the myth of them being stabbed in the back circulated and the finger was pointed at the Jews.

What's most surprising about German culture in that period is how much of the groundwork for Nazism had already been laid. The contempt for materialism, liberal democracy and Judaism and the celebration of the military, Germany's exalted spiritual and racial nature and their destiny to rule the world all had long pasts and had been the subject of considerable academic buttressing long before Hitler arrived on the scene.

[Tages]

Well, there is the Desmoines speech he made. (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/lindbergh/filmmore/reference/primary/desmoinesspeech.html) And that makes it pretty clear that he's talking about all Jews, although he characterizes it there as simple self-interest.
From that speech:


Tolerance is a virtue that depends upon peace and strength. History shows that it cannot survive war and devastations. A few far-sighted Jewish people realize this and stand opposed to intervention. But the majority still do not.

[Tages]

I suppose that's why they submitted to fighting an extremely bloody and destructive war where the issue of slavery was the paramount one.
And as I keep pointing out to you, an analysis of the letters and diaries of Southern soldiers fighting in the war shows that the great majority of them didn't give a damn about slavery.

[Tages]

Large-scale farming mechanisation only came to the South in the 1930s. A reliable mechanised cotton picker was only developed in 1948.

http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/holley.cottonpicker
Perhaps because of a ruinous war that killed or maimed half of their free men ages 18-45, ruined the economy, and left several cities in ruins followed by decades of political corruption.

[cactusmaac]

70 years wasn't a long enough recovery time?

Heck, most of Europe was back on its' feet a decade after WW2.

[Iangould]

Perhaps because of a ruinous war that killed or maimed half of their free men ages 18-45, ruined the economy, and left several cities in ruins followed by decades of political corruption.

You've argued repeatedly that the civil war was caused in large part by the north's import tariffs.

I'd suggest that a relatively resource-rich (and labor-poor) country like the CSA without tariffs would probably have remained a largely agrarian (and mining) economy - think South Africa, once again.

[cactusmaac]

And as I keep pointing out to you, an analysis of the letters and diaries of Southern soldiers fighting in the war shows that the great majority of them didn't give a damn about slavery.

Bearing in mind the caveat that the bulk of soldiers engaged in wars are mostly concerned with food, sleep, not getting shot and not disappointing their friends, I still don't see how that would have translated into support for the abolition of Southern slavery, as elegantly pointed out by spoon's post.

[Grazzt]

70 years wasn't a long enough recovery time?

Heck, most of Europe was back on its' feet a decade after WW2.

Wasn't that because there was a ton of foreign aid coming into Europe after World War II, though? Hardly the same circumstances.

And Tages, you claimed that he only blamed a specific few Jews. In the quote you picked, he blames the majority, and says only a specific few are not driving the country to war.

[Gilda Dent]

Ok, so I'm watching it right now.

Noah pegged it. It isn't an alternate history study, it's a satire of modern American culture, taking shots at a dozen different subjects using the CSA as a backdrop. Some of the jokes are falling completely flat, but the film clips are frequently very funny, and some of the throwaway gags are giving me a big grin.

"I Married an Abolitionist" had me laughing out loud at how it parodies cautionary movies of the 50's and manages to use abolitiionism as a metaphor for homosexuality.

The war movie about 20 minutes back was a wonderully loopy take on the rah rah sanitized 50's anti communist propaganda. Some fall flat, but an equal number leave me smiling or laughing at how ridiculous they are.

Hee hee. The Cotton Curtain, the North America divided like Korea, the Canadian border the fortified one. :)

:D Slaves overnighting themselves to Canada in shipping boxes.

:D The parody of prescription medicines, with the listing of side effects (anal bleeding).

:) I just paused the newspaper. One of the headlines is "Evolution debunked by Scientists". Hee hee.

Corporate training films. They're hitting a new target every minute or so.

Home shopping channels.

The House Committee on Racial Identity as a parallel for communism.

A racial smear campaign against a popular politician, another nice parody of sex scandals and implications of homosexuality.

~

I just finished watching the whole thing. Watching it as an alternate history is missing the point. It's satire of American history and culture. The over the top portrayal of everything is intentional, not intended to be accepted at face value. That the products with slave imagery were all real shouldn't have been surprising, but it was.

The one thing that irked me a bit was the implication that Sambo's was somehow related to these othe products. There was never any slave imagery associated with the Sambo's restaurant chain. The name came from combining the names of the owners, and the symbol used was an Indian boy as in the book Little Black Sambo. The name and corporate symbols were not related to negative portrayals of blacks in any way.

Otherwise, once I got it, I was able to enjoy this thoroughly, especially some of the neat little reversals, such as the surprise attack on Japan on Dec. 7, 1941 and the inclusion of a black division in that war, similar to the Japanese American division in the European theater in WW2. I may keep this another day and watch it with the commentary on.

[Loren]

"I Married an Abolitionist" had me laughing out loud at how it parodies cautionary movies of the 50's and manages to use abolitiionism as a metaphor for homosexuality.

It does? You noted the communist parallels in other places, so what made you think this was supposed to be a metaphor for homosexuality? It's made to look like a propaganda thriller, and even its title is a take on an anti-Communist film (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0041495/) from 1949.

[Gilda Dent]

It does? You noted the communist parallels in other places, so what made you think this was supposed to be a metaphor for homosexuality? It's made to look like a propaganda thriller, and even its title is a take on an anti-Communist film (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0041495/) from 1949.

The husband has been spending a lot of time in his basement, alone. His wife asks him why he's been so cold and distant, if it's something about her. She has literature she's found hidden in his room, and asks him what he's doing with it. He says he reads it, and thin confesses, "I'm abolitionist." Note the absense on an article there, the word following "I'm" is an adjective, not a noun.

Sure, it does communism at the same time, at takes the form of a zombie movie as well, which were in turn a metphor for communist infiltration, but it also has echoes of movies that were part of the celluloid closet, with homosexuality as a theme riding just below the surface, never stated, but there for anyone who cares to look closely. All That Heaven Allows uses age and class as a metaphor for homosexuality in much the same way.

The books could easily be magazines, and you otherwise only have to change one word of the dialog for the scene to work as a woman discovering her husband is gay.

I don't know that this is the intent on any level, but it sure works well that way.

[DavidLeVack]

What you have to consider is, that The CSA would have been as much an Imperial power as other countries.

The only reason we no longer have Imperial powers is because of how WWII turned out in reality.

Germany and the CSA are now imperial world powers because of their shared ties.

The other thing is, there are people who still today believe creationism over evolution, how can you say something like the bad science of "dreptomania" would not be pervasive. People can refute the Holocaust, and serious problems like Alcoholism.

The nazi's were not against manufacturing answers to reinforce their beliefs.

I think you give too much credit to what is currently deemed "right and undeniable truth."

Truth is as real as we perceive it to be.

[Omega Alpha]

I haven't seen the movie, but slavery existing (legally and widespread, I mean) in any industrialized country until these days is a really far-fetched idea, to say the least. The reason why anti-slavery movements begun to rise in any country that had them was not because of slavery's immorality (though certainly fueled by it), but due to the fact that it's against capitalism; if the workers are not paid, they can not be consumers, and if there are no consumers, then what's the point of producing anything?

Any country could only begin a massive industrial program after it; England had already banned slavery in their colonies by the time they became the world's greatest superpower due to the industry being much more developed there than anywhere, Brazil only begun to be heavily industrialized in the 1930's, over 40 years after it banned slavery, and so on.

[cactusmaac]

Britain was making a lot of money out of the slave trade. It was only abolished because William Wilberforce led a moralistic campaign against it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Wilberforce

[rick]

I haven't seen the movie, but slavery existing (legally and widespread, I mean) in any industrialized country until these days is a really far-fetched idea, to say the least. The reason why anti-slavery movements begun to rise in any country that had them was not because of slavery's immorality (though certainly fueled by it), but due to the fact that it's against capitalism; if the workers are not paid, they can not be consumers, and if there are no consumers, then what's the point of producing anything?

Any country could only begin a massive industrial program after it; England had already banned slavery in their colonies by the time they became the world's greatest superpower due to the industry being much more developed there than anywhere, Brazil only begun to be heavily industrialized in the 1930's, over 40 years after it banned slavery, and so on.


The film isn't shooting for realism, it's satire.

Some rough, just plain harsh satire, but very much worth watching.

[Omega Alpha]

Britain was making a lot of money out of the slave trade. It was only abolished because William Wilberforce led a moralistic campaign against it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Wilberforce

I'm not saying moral and ethical reasons and campaign didn't helped, which they did, but, like I said, the main reason for the ending of slavery was economical. While Britain made lot of money with slavery, it would be more lucrative for them to have slaves everyhwere becoming consumers of British products.

[cactusmaac]

I don't believe that was ever advanced as a reason to abolish slavery. Do you have any evidence that it was? The value of slaves as a cheap labour resource in the days before widespread agricultural mechanisation far outweighed their potential value as consumers. That is why plantation owners fielded large amounts of Indian labour to the Carribean as indentured servants after slavery was made illegal.

Also economical means sparing and efficient. The term you mean is economic.