I'm not an expert on US history, so any suggestions especially for replacing the currently fictitious players with real personas is appreciated. Generally, what do you think? At all plausible?
In spite of the efforts made and blood shed to gain their liberty, the black population of the United States after the Civil War remained an embarrassment to its liberators as well as its former owners. In fact, many northern states had passed laws forbidding blacks to reside there even before the war, and even in the most liberal corners the best they could hope for was being tolerated. A large majority of whites on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line believed that it would be best if they left the country entirely, and, in light of their appalling living conditions, quite a few blacks agreed. Thus the proposal by Congressman Aaron Blackwell (Rep, Michigan) to subsidise their voluntary resettlement in Africa was met with widespread approval. The motion passed both houses and became law in October of 1876.
The main question for 'Back to Africa' proponents had long been where to find room for the returnees and how to integrate them into whatever state they would be placed in. By 1876, a solution of beguiling simplicity offered itself: the blacks were to colonise and civilise their benighted brethren in the Congo basin, forming the elite of a new 'Congo Free State' to be built in the region. Needless to say, the inhabitants of the Congo valley were not asked. In 1877, the first ship of colonists and missionaries from Boston dropped anchor off Port Banana and put a bewildered group of well-dressed blacks ashore. Early settlements were quickly swelled by an increasing stream of African settlers hoping to find salvation, purpose, freedom from persecution, or quick wealth in the beckoning continent. The Congo State Militia, trained and officered by veterans of Union Colored Regiments, carved paths into the interior where timber, ivory, and increasingly rubber could be traded or extorted from the locals. In 1885, the Congo Free State's borders were finally agreed upon at a conference in London. It was here that the Belgian King Leopold resigned from his position as protector of the nascent nation and, after much quibbling, was replaced by the United States.
The Congo Free State as constituted under President the Reverend Charles Butler Babbington in 1889 became an anomaly in Africa - a colony of blacks ruling blacks. The state's considerable expenses - building a railroad to Stanley Pool, maintaining steamer lines and road links, and establishing military control over the hinterland - were paid for through rubber and ivory purchased through a system of licensed traders for a fraction of their value. The English-speaking American colonisers quickly came to look down on their African subjects and established a two-tier society in which they ruled enserfed natives at the points of their bayonets. Mission stations and settlements carved out of the less insalubrious corners of the high plateau formed nuclei of cultural assimilation through which much of the Congo would eventually come to speak English and worship in Baptist and Methodist chapels. As the state succeeded economically and politically, it drew ever larger numbers of American blacks to replenish the ranks of its officials, soldiers, and traders (contrary to common opinion, American black proved as susceptible to tropical disease as whites).
It is 1917 and after years of painful neutrality the Congo Free State is entering the war against Germany. Congo rubber, timber, and copper are upholding Allied war efforts while the well-drilled troops of the Free State Militia (still armed along US lines) are now facing German-led Askaris shoulder to shoulder with the King's African Rifles. Internal politics are still dominated by a vast gulf separating 'American' from 'Native'. The state is constituted as a republic, with suffrage for all adult literate males (literate, that is, in English, not Arabic). The American upper classes (and increasingly upwardly mobile Natives) place great store by education and the colleges at Port Banana, Port Liberty, Lincolnville and Stanley City are burgeoning (though the wealthy still send their sons to be educated in Boston and Philadelphia). There is increasing unease with the inequalities inherent in the system, and a large faction of second-generation Congolese are campaigning for more rights for Natives, including education, the vote, and access to state offices. As yet, immigrants from the United States (who are automatically extended citizenship of the Free State if they so choose) have better chances for advancement that locals, but even the 'open-door principle' is now coming under attack.
Less immediately visible, but in the long run probably far more pernicuious, is the effect on the United States. The black population lost a large number of its most active and ambitious members as the 'drive for Africa' became more widespread. In this Alternate, Booker T. Washington heads the Lincolnville College and Martin Luther King Sen. will soon accept a nomination to the Our Savior's Chapel in Port Stanley. As a result, the white population is increasingly coming to look at US blacks as 'staying behind'. In many northern states white political organisations are pressuring blacks to leave and even in the majority-black areas of the old South, blacks are often told to 'shut up or get out'. To many, emigration to a state where they are extended the hope of a modest career and a modicum of respect, even as a gang foreman or private soldier, is looking tempting and every year young men and women leave for Port Banana and the riches of Africa. In the meantime, fabuluosly wealthy black 'rubber barons' are squandering millions in the hotels and restaurants of New York and Boston and the black ministry is hemorrhaging capable candidates to fill positions on the upper Congo. A civil rights movement does not seem to be in the cards anytime soon.
In spite of the efforts made and blood shed to gain their liberty, the black population of the United States after the Civil War remained an embarrassment to its liberators as well as its former owners. In fact, many northern states had passed laws forbidding blacks to reside there even before the war, and even in the most liberal corners the best they could hope for was being tolerated. A large majority of whites on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line believed that it would be best if they left the country entirely, and, in light of their appalling living conditions, quite a few blacks agreed. Thus the proposal by Congressman Aaron Blackwell (Rep, Michigan) to subsidise their voluntary resettlement in Africa was met with widespread approval. The motion passed both houses and became law in October of 1876.
The main question for 'Back to Africa' proponents had long been where to find room for the returnees and how to integrate them into whatever state they would be placed in. By 1876, a solution of beguiling simplicity offered itself: the blacks were to colonise and civilise their benighted brethren in the Congo basin, forming the elite of a new 'Congo Free State' to be built in the region. Needless to say, the inhabitants of the Congo valley were not asked. In 1877, the first ship of colonists and missionaries from Boston dropped anchor off Port Banana and put a bewildered group of well-dressed blacks ashore. Early settlements were quickly swelled by an increasing stream of African settlers hoping to find salvation, purpose, freedom from persecution, or quick wealth in the beckoning continent. The Congo State Militia, trained and officered by veterans of Union Colored Regiments, carved paths into the interior where timber, ivory, and increasingly rubber could be traded or extorted from the locals. In 1885, the Congo Free State's borders were finally agreed upon at a conference in London. It was here that the Belgian King Leopold resigned from his position as protector of the nascent nation and, after much quibbling, was replaced by the United States.
The Congo Free State as constituted under President the Reverend Charles Butler Babbington in 1889 became an anomaly in Africa - a colony of blacks ruling blacks. The state's considerable expenses - building a railroad to Stanley Pool, maintaining steamer lines and road links, and establishing military control over the hinterland - were paid for through rubber and ivory purchased through a system of licensed traders for a fraction of their value. The English-speaking American colonisers quickly came to look down on their African subjects and established a two-tier society in which they ruled enserfed natives at the points of their bayonets. Mission stations and settlements carved out of the less insalubrious corners of the high plateau formed nuclei of cultural assimilation through which much of the Congo would eventually come to speak English and worship in Baptist and Methodist chapels. As the state succeeded economically and politically, it drew ever larger numbers of American blacks to replenish the ranks of its officials, soldiers, and traders (contrary to common opinion, American black proved as susceptible to tropical disease as whites).
It is 1917 and after years of painful neutrality the Congo Free State is entering the war against Germany. Congo rubber, timber, and copper are upholding Allied war efforts while the well-drilled troops of the Free State Militia (still armed along US lines) are now facing German-led Askaris shoulder to shoulder with the King's African Rifles. Internal politics are still dominated by a vast gulf separating 'American' from 'Native'. The state is constituted as a republic, with suffrage for all adult literate males (literate, that is, in English, not Arabic). The American upper classes (and increasingly upwardly mobile Natives) place great store by education and the colleges at Port Banana, Port Liberty, Lincolnville and Stanley City are burgeoning (though the wealthy still send their sons to be educated in Boston and Philadelphia). There is increasing unease with the inequalities inherent in the system, and a large faction of second-generation Congolese are campaigning for more rights for Natives, including education, the vote, and access to state offices. As yet, immigrants from the United States (who are automatically extended citizenship of the Free State if they so choose) have better chances for advancement that locals, but even the 'open-door principle' is now coming under attack.
Less immediately visible, but in the long run probably far more pernicuious, is the effect on the United States. The black population lost a large number of its most active and ambitious members as the 'drive for Africa' became more widespread. In this Alternate, Booker T. Washington heads the Lincolnville College and Martin Luther King Sen. will soon accept a nomination to the Our Savior's Chapel in Port Stanley. As a result, the white population is increasingly coming to look at US blacks as 'staying behind'. In many northern states white political organisations are pressuring blacks to leave and even in the majority-black areas of the old South, blacks are often told to 'shut up or get out'. To many, emigration to a state where they are extended the hope of a modest career and a modicum of respect, even as a gang foreman or private soldier, is looking tempting and every year young men and women leave for Port Banana and the riches of Africa. In the meantime, fabuluosly wealthy black 'rubber barons' are squandering millions in the hotels and restaurants of New York and Boston and the black ministry is hemorrhaging capable candidates to fill positions on the upper Congo. A civil rights movement does not seem to be in the cards anytime soon.
