AHC: Francophone Lousiana

Your challenge: make the state of Louisiana at least 70% Francophone in 2011. Furthermore, Louisiana has to have some kind of Autonomist/Separtist movement, comparable to Quebec's.

POD can be any time after 1718 (the founding of New Orleans) but the United States must form in a way recognizable to OTL, and it must eventually aquire Louisiana.
 

Arrix85

Donor
Your challenge: make the state of Louisiana at least 70% Francophone in 2011. Furthermore, Louisiana has to have some kind of Autonomist/Separtist movement, comparable to Quebec's.

POD can be any time after 1718 (the founding of New Orleans) but the United States must form in a way recognizable to OTL, and it must eventually aquire Louisiana.

The only things that comes to my mind is that Napoleon doesn't sell off all of Louisiana, but just the northern part (upper Mississipi Valley, so the USA can expand west) and a French government in debt in 20th century (when nationalism is well established) sell off the rest (the frontier in the US is closing, the possibility of "anglo" settlers into the new territory should be diminished). Don't know if it's ASB or anything.
 
The only things that comes to my mind is that Napoleon doesn't sell off all of Louisiana, but just the northern part (upper Mississipi Valley, so the USA can expand west) and a French government in debt in 20th century (when nationalism is well established) sell off the rest (the frontier in the US is closing, the possibility of "anglo" settlers into the new territory should be diminished). Don't know if it's ASB or anything.

Countries didn't sell populated territories around in the 20th century-as soon as the idea was seriously brought up, I expect the Louisiannais would strongly protest and demand independence.

What I'm really looking for (though it doesn't have to be this) is either something that creates more Francophone immigration (by four or five times or so) or-less likely-something that delays the American takeover by a few decades, giving the Francophone population more time to establish itself.
 
Here's an interesting idea, after looking at the other thread.

I read in one (whent he search engine was working well) that John Adams might have pushed for slavery to be outlawed in the Louisiana Purchase if he'd made it - which I posit he does in "Created Equal," a "Jefferson in 1796" TL that might never see the light of day the rate things are going.

However, suppose Adams does this, perhaps as a bone thrown to some New England Federalists for their support. Now, it's true that quite a few Frenchmen practiced slavery, but there would be some who didn't, and there would also be free blacks and such, too. So, some move to West Florida (causing a Spanish-American War that is TTL's equivalent of the War of 1812) but others decide to sell of their slaves and stay.

The idea here is that the banning of slavery *prevents* immigration from other slaveholding settlers who are not Francophones. So then, it's more likely that a large number of French liberals coming after 1815 or so (as mentioned in the other thread) can provide sufficient numbers that they can outnumber the English speaking ones. It's much easier to get to 70% if you've got the population of Montana than it does if you have the population of OTL Louisiana. (OP didn't say it had to have the same population.)

Then, of course, it would require someone willing to push for such equiality, but perhaps Aaron Burr is successful down there, not as the rumors of OTL, but instead as Governor of Louisiana for, oh, about 20 years. (He believed in equality for blacks IIRC.)

I don't know if that would get us to 70% French but it's entirely possible, I think, to take it from there.
 
I still think this from the Tripartite Alliance timeline is worth considering:

1814: The Congress of Vienna ends the Napoleonic Wars. Like France, which has been allowed to keep its pre-Revolutionary frontiers, the United States is forced only to cede most of northern Maine to the British colony of New Brunswick and to pay an indemnity of 20 million pounds to Britain. It is allowed to keep formerly French Louisiana though, and the terms of the Treaty of Brest are honoured. This suits the almost 20 thousand French liberals and their families who flee reactionary Restoration France for liberal Francophone Louisiana.

1815-1850: The Louisiana French community grows as more French liberals continue to immigrate to republican Francophone Louisiana. By 1850, there are almost one hundred thousand Louisiana French. The intermarriage of the élite of the Louisiana French community with the prosperous upper-class Créoles of New Orleans and the Mississippi delta, and of the poor among the Louisiana French with the Cadiens of west Louisiana, creates a united Francophone enclave within the United States, amounting to more than 70% of the Louisiana population. This population is quite radical -- in 1853, Louisiana is the first state in the Union to abolish slavery, by enacting a graduated emancipation law. This anti-slavery radicalism sets Louisiana apart from the rest of the South: Although Francophone Louisiana sees itself as an integral part of the United States, neither it nor the South sees itself as Southern in the sense of being a conservative slaveowning society.
 
My idea:

Sometime in the 1720's, some French governor realizes how well-suited the lower Mississippi is for cash-crop agriculture (sugar, indigo, and rice in the south, cotton on the Mississippi Delta) and convinces the French government back in Paris to seriously invest in the place. From the 1720's to the 1750's, France brings in, say, 30,000 settlers (I understand the OTL number was around 7,000, so I don't think this is a huge stretch. And not all of them would be French), plus twice as many slaves (some from Haiti and their other Caribbean islands, some straight from Africa). They settle the lower Mississippi river-OTL Louisiana and Mississippi, plus small parts of Tennessee and Arkansas.

After the Seven Years War, Lower Louisiana, all the way to the Appalachains, is ceded to Spain, with Britain taking Illinois and the Ohio valley. Spain, however, doesn't attempt to assimilate the French planter aristocracy, instead being content simply to tax them. Louisiana gets a modest amount of immigration during the Spanish period, but they tend to assimilate into the already-resident French population.

The American Revolution and Napoleon happen as OTL, but meanwhile, Spain tries to ban American settlers from *Tennessee and *Alabama. As French settlement is mostly concentrated along the Mississippi, these territories are largely unpopulated and thus the ban is virtually impossible to enforce. Spanish attempts at it, however, manage (after being highly sensationalized in American news reports) to infuriate the public of the nascent US, and in a series of escalating diplomatic incidents, Spain closes New Orleans and its part of the Mississippi to American shipping. Meanwhile, the Napoleonic Wars are going on right now with France and Spain allied against Britain. America jumps in on the British side, and in the ensuing war expels the Spanish from Louisiana with British help.

Under American rule, Louisiana recieves a goodly amount of Anglophone settlers, and cities like New Orleans and Baton Rouge become bilingual. The Francophones, for their part, are uneasy at coming under American rule, but the once they're admitted as a state, their state constitution establishes French and English as co-official languages and guarantees protection for the Catholic church.

Nevertheless, the French planter aristocracy remains quietly resentful at rule from the "foreigners" in Washington, and, along with South Carolina, become one of the most anti-federalist, pro-states rights places in the US. This gradually gets mixed up into the South's general antagonism towards the free states of the North (much of the Francophone elite own slaves, and don't like Anglo, Protestant Abolitionists lecturing them about what grave sinners they are, and the animosity is mutual). Manifest destiny still exists ITTL, and the *Mexican War and *ACW still happen, with Louisiana supporting the *Confederacy. The *Civil War and the cotton bust of the late 19th century contribute to Louisiana's becoming a rather economically backward place, with the same civil rights problems as the rest of the south, and the addition of a highly influential Catholic church. In the 1960's century, this leads to a large civil rights movement, which takes on nationalistic overtones (a large majority of the black people are Francophone), eventually leading to an active secessionist movement.

Thoughts?
 
Bump!

Since I don't think I fully explained my ideas for Louisiana's development after the *Civil War, basically, I think the sudden end of slavery, combined with price fluctuations in things like sugar and cotton (the bane of any economy based mainly on exporting agricultural commodities) would make the state rather impovershed. Most of the economy outside agriculture, furthermore, would likely be dominated by the Anglophone minority or people from other parts of the US (due to their connections with the rest of the country), though the majority of the population would still be Francophone, much of them rural and poor.

This basically describes the state of affairs in most of the post-ACW south, minus the language issues, and the result tended to be the formation of entrenched political machines, which used the poor white population as a base of support. I think Louisiana as described in my above post will be somewhat similar-it gets dominated, after TTL's ACW, by one local political party. Said political party is authoritarian, dominated by a few personalities and with one long-term leader. Its base, as I said, is poor white Francophones, whose economic interests it supports, albeit in a rather paternalistic way. Much of the white Francophone population resents the fact that, essentially, they are an ethnic minority in an economically backward part of the country, and Louisiana's political machine points this resentment at both the Anglophones who run most of the state's economy, the US federal government, and the black population. Its closely allied with the church and socially conservative-think the Union Nationale of Quebec, except with lots of racism thrown in.

Sometime in the 20th century-probably the 1960's I guess-the domination of Louisiana's Union Nationale is shaken, and ultimately toppled, by a more left-wing, socialist political movement, one that's explicitly anti-racist but also sovereigntist, and likely to blame all Louisiana's problems on it being a part of the US. This movement-call it the Parti Louisiannais-succeeds in controlling state politics throughout the 1970's, 80's, and part of the 90's, when, unable to achieve mass popular support for its aim of seceeding from the US, it begins faltering, and alternating power with the Democrats and Republicans (or whatever TTL's two American parties are called).

American culture would probably be affected as well-with a resident linguistic minority, I'd imagine the US being more open to different cultures-we have been historically IOTL, but always in a somewhat assimilationist way-think the "American Melting Pot"-Italians, Germans, Englishmen, Irish all go in, and "Americans" come out. In this TL, America might instead be more multiculturalist-in particular I think you might see less (not no, but less) cultural pressure on, say, Hispanics, and the idea of, say, making Spanish an official language on the state or local level in areas with large Hispanic populations, particularly in the Southwest, might be more popular (after all, we would already have one state where French is an official language).

Again, thoughts? Does any of what I've posted on this idea sound plausible?
 
Could they see an influx of Catholics, such as Irish or perhaps Mexican exiles?

I think we'll see some, especially during the pre-*Civil War period. After TTL's ACW, though, Louisiana would (as OTL) be a rather backward place economically, and thus a source of out-migration to other parts of the US rather than a destination for immigrants.
 
This thread hits close to home. I'm from Louisiana and I so wished they would have kept the French language in the state. I speak French from France, but it was from college classes and study abroad. Would be SO nice if we were like Quebec and everyone either just spoke French or were bilingual too.
 
The idea here is that the banning of slavery *prevents* immigration from other slaveholding settlers who are not Francophones.

I thought slavery discouraged immigration, due to slaves undercutting wages for poor freemen likely to move in. Thus banning slavery in the area would probably cause more Anglo immigration.
 
I don't think the presence of having one state with a multicultural nature will change the American melting pot stance- I would gather that Quebec is proportionally more significant to Canada than Louisiana would be to the U.S. Though, a side question- would there be French settlers further north the Louisiana Territory? Might there be multiple states with Francophones?

However, the existence of such a state at least establishes precedent for a different paradigm. While we wouldn't get the U.S. turning Indian reservations or territories into states- this happens in U.S. annexes Quebec during the ARW timelines, and I think it's too optimistic- I think maybe it could lead to interesting effects in former Mexican territories. Though neither California nor any of the southwestern states had many Mexicans who stayed after annexation, I assume. But maybe as you say, by the post-1960s when there's more Latino immigration to the southwest, it would be easier to grant language rights compared to OTL's more nativist atmosphere.

Also, maybe explicitly Catholic Louisiana's presence could make the U.S. less xenophobic towards Irish and German immigrants in the 19th century, and southern Europeans in the early 20th.
 
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