AHC no states in what is now the USA

How could you get rid of the states in what became the United States (it would obviously have a different name ITTL) and just have a national government? I think its impossible with a POD after 1900 due to path dependence but is it possible before 1900?
 

Skallagrim

Banned
The tricky part is that no matter what you do about mentality, a country that big can't be governed centrally before modern means of communication. Initially, it's just going to be rather decentral by default-- even if you call the relevant polities "provinces" instead of "states". The best bet is to discredit the whole Anti-Federalist Movement early on, though. Have the whole clash between centralists and decentralists escalate beyond OTL's proportions. Still, you run the risk that the states will balk if a plan to reduce them to mere provinces is proposed.

Here's a sugestion: have the war of independence drag on longer, or have the economic turmoil caused by it somehow worsened significantly. Mutinies, tax rebellions, etc. break out all over the place. The army is never demobilised, and used to subdue the various insurrectionist mobs. Federalists call for a much stronger government. Anti-Federalists break out into open rebellion against the army. Washington is murdered by an angry mob-- possibly accidentally, in the frenzy. Hamilton - because he's the guy you want for this - becomes the leader of the Nationalist faction. His side wins the internal struggle, which is essentially a civil war. Afterwards, the Nationalists put a Constitution in place the explicitly vests authority in the national government, and reduces the states to mere administrative units (called provinces) that have no actual autonomy or sovereignty.
 
Telegraphy modernizes communications such that it enables one block occupational government of the South after the ACW. With the development of the telephone this strengthens the Zone's cohesion, and beginning with the consolidation of Connecticut and Rhode Island in 1888 for cost-saving purposes a trend ensues such that by 1950 the only remaining governments are federal and (much larger) county blocs.
 
It's extremely difficult since English and later British settlement was primarily via province like entities.
One way however would be to have smaller entities that would naturally become part of a bigger more unitary polity.
 
Maybe extremely early on, like if the Dominion of New England somehow sticks. The problem was that the centers of population were separated by wilderness and the colonies were very concerned about freedom for their own particular religious branches.

Like Skallagrim said though, a centralized state in North America would not have been as effective at settling or governing the continent. It probably wouldn't have even reached the Pacific.
 
Actually, it's probably easier after 1900 to get this, since IOTL, the federal government has been much more powerful the past few decades than they were in the late 19th century. The obvious POD to me would have some sort of Second American Civil War happening. Either it's over communism, and communists take over the US and install a much more centralised government. Or perhaps it's over "states rights" again (this time the "right" being segregation), where the South loses again, and a few constitutional amendments later the states are deprived of much of their remaining powers.

Each would take a POD before 1900 to happen.
 
There is a fascinating timeline, which I haven't gotten through yet (google "People's Socialist Atlas" about a communist takeover of the USA and that is one way to do it.

Another way is a very different British colonial policy, which would basically mean no Whig victory in British domestic politics or a Whig politician is able to get the opposite colonial policy of OTL through. The Dominion of New England becomes permanent and this is followed through by organizing the Atlantic seaboard into four provinces (New England, Mid Atlantic, Virginia, and Carolina), court favorites keep their land grants but they don't get their own colonies. A third, less likely, possibility is a post-Civil War constitutional convention and thorough reorganization of the system.
 
Top