AHC: America is a white supremacist nation

Butterfly out the rise of the Nazi party and WWII and you probably have attitudes worldwide remain much closer to the median person of the 1930s, which is a level of pro-European chauvinism that many people would basically call white supremacism today. No camps and no international warfare, I'd guess no anti-racist counter culture, no shift in Western world culture, and attitudes probably generally remain at a level of chauvinism and superiority complex that's typical of OTL's contemporary non-West / OECD (Russia, China, India, etc.).

Seems like that could get you what you're looking for in OP except the slavery thing, but that's really a post 1900 POD.

Remove that big obvious lever and try to have the USA stand alone as the white supremacist nation among a West that isn't seems tougher.

Even before WW2, India was moving towards independence on the basis of ultimately deserving democratic rights. So I think it would still happen, just take a lot longer.
 
IMO America is already a white-supremacist nation, but I suppose there's a certain level of subjectivity to that. Anyway, as per the OP.

Create a scenario where America is pretty much a white supremacist's wetdream. America is a majority white country, slavery is still legal, there is zero immigration from non-European countries and positive views on racial eugenics are still popular in the US.

(I want to say for the record that I don't endorse these views in any way. I am merely curious what people come up with)

1) America is already white majority, at around ~70%, so we don't have to change anything to meet that criterion.

2) Slavery is already still legal, as per the 13th Amendment. Look up prison slavery, it's a very popular industry. Now it doesn't officially target ethnic minorities, but given racially disproportionate rates of incarceration, I think it fits the bill. Granted, I suppose prison slavery could be used in a broader scope of industries than it is today.

3) This is probably the most difficult one IMO. I think you could severely crack down on non-white immigration by having a Trump-like nativist come into power earlier than OTL. But a complete ban isn't really good for business, as even racists like to hire skilled labor. So I think the most sustainable situation is one in which only highly skilled non-whites are allowed to immigrate, presumably in small numbers.

4) My understanding is that a majority of the populace supported sterilization of "criminals" and "the mentally unfit" according to a poll done around 1937. Even after the Nazis, forced sterilization of ethnic minorities occurred well into the 1970s. To keep eugenics popular, an ATL could popularize the views of the few African Americans that supported racial sterilization (usually citing some "Talented Tenth" type philosophy). That would go a long way to undermining criticisms of racial eugenics.
 
IMO America is already a white-supremacist nation, but I suppose there's a certain level of subjectivity to that. Anyway, as per the OP.



1) America is already white majority, at around ~70%, so we don't have to change anything to meet that criterion.

2) Slavery is already still legal, as per the 13th Amendment. Look up prison slavery, it's a very popular industry. Now it doesn't officially target ethnic minorities, but given racially disproportionate rates of incarceration, I think it fits the bill. Granted, I suppose prison slavery could be used in a broader scope of industries than it is today.

3) This is probably the most difficult one IMO. I think you could severely crack down on non-white immigration by having a Trump-like nativist come into power earlier than OTL. But a complete ban isn't really good for business, as even racists like to hire skilled labor. So I think the most sustainable situation is one in which only highly skilled non-whites are allowed to immigrate, presumably in small numbers.

4) My understanding is that a majority of the populace supported sterilization of "criminals" and "the mentally unfit" according to a poll done around 1937. Even after the Nazis, forced sterilization of ethnic minorities occurred well into the 1970s. To keep eugenics popular, an ATL could popularize the views of the few African Americans that supported racial sterilization (usually citing some "Talented Tenth" type philosophy). That would go a long way to undermining criticisms of racial eugenics.
Given OTL immigration quotas and Chinese Exclusion Act, I don't think it's completely unreasonable for 3) to happen, though it would probably mean the U.S. can't get involved in (direct) imperialism, and would have to broaden its definition of "white" to include people of Hispanic descent.
 
Given OTL immigration quotas and Chinese Exclusion Act, I don't think it's completely unreasonable for 3) to happen, though it would probably mean the U.S. can't get involved in (direct) imperialism, and would have to broaden its definition of "white" to include people of Hispanic descent.

I suppose it's fair to cite historical American immigration quotas to make a case for 3). However, I'd say that even after the Chinese Exclusion Act, there was still immigration from other non-white countries. And even if you keep and expand the Chinese Exclusion Act somehow to restrict virtually all non-white immigrants by country of origin, you'd still get a steady trickle of illegal immigration through various means, unless you make ATL United States underdeveloped/authoritarian enough that it's not a desirable immigration target. I suppose what I'm saying is you could get non-white immigration down to very near zero, perhaps even less than one hundred a year, but I don't know if it's possible to completely exclude them.
 
I think there are two approaches to take to this. The first is to back to the 18th or even 17th century and change things about pre-Independence American society. The second is a 20th century mad dictator who holds white supremacists beliefs.

With the 18th century POD, the key is to find a way to prevent abolition of slavery in the northeast. Find a way to have African slaves imported to do what indentured servants do. I suspect you have to keep both the Congregationalists/ Puritans and the Quakers out The first states to abolish slavery were Pennsylvania and the New England states, it took longer in New York and New Jersey. Then as other countries abolish slavery, have the fact that the United States is one of the few countries in the world to still have slavery to become a perverse point of national pride, in fact the powerful USA of teh 20th century uses its influence to re-introduce slavery into countries that don't have it.

If you can keep slavery on a nationwide basis, you keep the slave codes and all that entails. You may have to find a way to kill or marginalize Jefferson to keep any Enlightenment ideas from gaining much currency. Paine and Franklin can just settle permanently in Europe.

The other POD is the time honored AH POD of FDR getting assassinated, a fascist regime comes to power, and a dictator comes out on top with white supremacist beliefs (though this is counter-intuitive, its not a given with fascists), and you are off to the races. However this could get reversed easier by just having the regime fall from power.

Immigrants are a problem. I don't think keeping out non-white immigrants, or importing non-white laborers and then treating them only a step above the actual slaves, is that difficult with the 18th century POD. Our 20th century dictator could introduce a South African style racial gradient system to deal with those of Asian and Latin American ancestry.

However, 18th century British immigration policy was pretty liberal at least for white people, so if you really want to keep immigrants from Catholic and Orthodox countries out that is difficult. And of course with the 20th century POD they are already here. Making them second class citizens doesn't work because they presumably won't come (or stay) under these conditions, and once they are here they are too numerous.
 
As a side note, you can actually do a lot with the USA in terms of ramping up or ramping down the craziness, or getting different types of craziness, if you put the POD in the 17th or early 18th centuries. The other opportunity is the Great Depression, where there was a real though small chance of things going off the rails and FDR was successful in preventing this.
 
If it can make it easier to, maybe don't have America expand as much as OTL. If it's easier to pull it off with an America that never expands beyond the Mississippi and/or doesn't have areas like New England so they become South-dominated early enough to (re)impose slavery country wide... well, might as well. It also takes off the preassure of needing as much immigration so it can be better controlled or something. At the same time, maybe if other places (mainly Canada and Latin America) have it better than OTL, then numbers going to the US go down futher as well.

Unless the AHC also wants America to retain more or less its OTL course intact outside the requested areas.
 
With the 18th century POD, the key is to find a way to prevent abolition of slavery in the northeast. Find a way to have African slaves imported to do what indentured servants do. I suspect you have to keep both the Congregationalists/ Puritans and the Quakers out The first states to abolish slavery were Pennsylvania and the New England states, it took longer in New York and New Jersey. Then as other countries abolish slavery, have the fact that the United States is one of the few countries in the world to still have slavery to become a perverse point of national pride, in fact the powerful USA of teh 20th century uses its influence to re-introduce slavery into countries that don't have it.

Is there any way that the Quakers don't adopt their anti-slavery stance? At the very least, that could reduce abolitionist sentiment in Pennsylvania.
 

Brunaburh

Gone Fishin'
Slavery can indeed by adapted to industry and in fact was in the American South, but eventually industry gets advanced to the point you just can't do it anymore because it requires a degree of education, and allowing said degree will in the long term undermine the system as it allows ideas to propagate among the "chattel" as well as forms leadership cadres for revolts.

I'm intrigued as to what degree of education a 1920 factory worker needed that wasn't open to a slave in 1850. Genuine question.

I am not at all convinced by the idea that slavery would disappear for economic reasons, capitalists take cheap labour wherever they can get it. It seems wishful thinking to me.
 

Mobiyuz

Banned
I'm intrigued as to what degree of education a 1920 factory worker needed that wasn't open to a slave in 1850. Genuine question.

I am not at all convinced by the idea that slavery would disappear for economic reasons, capitalists take cheap labour wherever they can get it. It seems wishful thinking to me.
Well, if anything it was more mechanization. If you owned a slave, you also had to pay to house and feed them, whereas if you had a machine you could just pay a worker to keep it running, resulting in lower overhead. It's not that slavery is inherently unprofitable, it's more than in the long run, it's less profitable in a modern mechanized economy. Capitalists take cheap labor, yes, but they also like making money.
 

King Thomas

Banned
Have the Civil Rights campaign in the USA go as badly as the one in Northern Ireland with paramilitary groups springing up.
 
I'm intrigued as to what degree of education a 1920 factory worker needed that wasn't open to a slave in 1850. Genuine question.

I am not at all convinced by the idea that slavery would disappear for economic reasons, capitalists take cheap labour wherever they can get it. It seems wishful thinking to me.

Yet it was the capitalists that were a large part of the abolitionist movement.
 

Brunaburh

Gone Fishin'
Well, if anything it was more mechanization. If you owned a slave, you also had to pay to house and feed them, whereas if you had a machine you could just pay a worker to keep it running, resulting in lower overhead. It's not that slavery is inherently unprofitable, it's more than in the long run, it's less profitable in a modern mechanized economy. Capitalists take cheap labor, yes, but they also like making money.

Slaves are cheaper than free labourers, that's kind of the point of them. Mechanisation still included a vast number of semi-skilled or totally unskilled jobs that were far less complicated than the skills needed for, for example, cutting sugar cane. The idea that slaves can not do these seems to be a strange argument, given slaves performed vastly more difficult jobs, eg. blacksmiths, OTL.
 

Mobiyuz

Banned
Slaves are cheaper than free labourers, that's kind of the point of them. Mechanisation still included a vast number of semi-skilled or totally unskilled jobs that were far less complicated than the skills needed for, for example, cutting sugar cane. The idea that slaves can not do these seems to be a strange argument, given slaves performed vastly more difficult jobs, eg. blacksmiths, OTL.
Once again, it's that with slaves, you have more overhead because you also have to feed and house them. If they're your property, then you have to worry about keeping maintaining them, whereas if they're workers, then it's their own job to feed and house and take care of themselves. I'm not arguing the skill set, I'm arguing the overall costs.
 

Brunaburh

Gone Fishin'
Yet it was the capitalists that were a large part of the abolitionist movement.

Not so much ones with access to significant sources of slave labour. But I accept your point, there is nothing incompatible with capitalist ideology and an opposition to slavery.
 

Brunaburh

Gone Fishin'
Once again, it's that with slaves, you have more overhead because you also have to feed and house them. If they're your property, then you have to worry about keeping maintaining them, whereas if they're workers, then it's their own job to feed and house and take care of themselves. I'm not arguing the skill set, I'm arguing the overall costs.

A factory owner must pay workers sufficient to feed, house and clothe themselves or else they will not work for him. The economies of scale of keeping slaves make feeding and keeping them much cheaper, also the fact that slaves are unable to seek better conditions means that there are much weaker pressures to increase "wages". Free labourers will move to accept the best offer they can get, meaning the capitalist is forced to match that or shut down.

If feeding and keeping slaves were more expensive than paying free labourers nobody would ever have done it. People didn't just decide "I'm a bad racist. I want some slaves." The ideology of white-supremacy was a justification of an economic (cheap labour) and political (conquest) necessity.
 
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