Confederate Political Parties in a CSA-Victory

The CSA has won its independence, comprised the OTL CSA minus Tennessee.

In Confederate Elections, Jefferson Davis was a nonpartisan in the 1861 election and the two parties in the 1863 legislative election were the pro-administration and anti-administration parties. On the other hand, in the Virginia and Louisiana gubernatorial elections of 1863 the candidates were all Democrats.


Given the Planterocracy's opposition to industrialization, I think that'd be one split between two potential parties.

With freedom being so close, there'd likely be more pressure to conscript people into the slave patrols. Considering how Alexander Stephens considered enslaving poor whites, planters in general thought pretty lowly of the yeomen, and how sharecropping had already started in Mississippi for poor whites before the civil war, I think there'd be a lot of focus by Planters on promoting the sharecropping system (with certain financial interests coming along for the ride).

The Confederate Constitution banned the federal government from spending money on internal improvements for the purpose of promoting economic growth. However, the war created a need for industrialization and I think there'd be a work-around for infrastructure of it was military in nature. In essence, industrialists could cooperate with military-types to get their infrastructure goals through. Ergo, "this road we're building between two economic hubs has nothing to do with investing in the economy, it's about being able to move the troops around and supplies from point A to point B!"

Cajun interests might also come up as an issue.

So one party as a coalition of Defense, Industrialists, and Poor Whites vs another party of Planters and financiers?
 
I would figure it would in many ways resemble the Bourbon vs. Populist split seen in late 1800s South Carolina politics. You would have a more urban, economically well off and pro-industrialization faction arguing for Gold Standard and perhaps protectionism, as well as a more agrarian and poor faction that would be quite militant on racial issues (lynchings and the like) and in favor of silver and reduction of tariff walls, as well as the progressive income tax.

There would be likely a third faction representing the interests of planters and mid sized farmers who would benefit from a Confederate victory in this time line who would be pro-Gold standard and pro-Free trade, but against industrial competition and industrialization in general.

I think that you'd probably see in the aftermath of the war, you would see successful Generals dominating the political arena, and as a result, there would be a fair amount of political ambiguity towards the top. Various generals would likely use their personal fame to push various causes (a surviving Stonewall Jackson might push for more puritanical social legislation; Robert E. Lee for establishing more institutions of higher education; etc). I would imagine that debates over the size of the Confederate Army would be vigorous, with the generals favoring a larger and more well equipped (and expensive) one, versus the interests of the planters.

I think the politics however might start to break down on regional lines as time goes on and different regions have different rates of industrialization.

In addition, immigration would probably start to pop up as a political issue. The South took in a very large amount of migrants in the years after the American Revolution, particularly from Scotland and Northern Ireland, and this group largely dominated the culture of the "inland" south, but they were largely the ones who settled that land to start with. Immigration from Eastern and Southern Europe would be a much larger culture shock associated with the industrializing cities such as Atlanta, New Orleans, and probably Charleston, and would likely put another cleave into the politics.

I think its likely that women start to get more involved in politics through the temperance movement as time goes on, and that might throw a wrench into a bit of this.

The big elephant in the room of course is how relations with the US would be going. There are basically innumerable ways that they could go very poorly.
 
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Schnozzberry

Gone Fishin'
Donor
The CSA would probably evolve into a one party dominant state with a political party consisting of the plantation elite and their supporters winning functionally every election. Other parties would be legal, but I doubt they could overcome the dominance of the southern oligarchs. It would be akin to how much of the south IOTL was after Reconstruction.
 
The CSA would probably evolve into a one party dominant state with a political party consisting of the plantation elite and their supporters winning functionally every election. Other parties would be legal, but I doubt they could overcome the dominance of the southern oligarchs. It would be akin to how much of the south IOTL was after Reconstruction.
That is sort of a misreading of how the one party system worked, though. The competition in the political system was contained inside of the various state Democratic parties, and often it was vicious enough to warrant actual political violence. For example, there were pro and anti Klan factions that were always at each other's throats in the 1870s Tennessee Democratic Party, and the 1890s South Carolina Democratic Party essentially waged war on itself over the policies pursued by Ben Tillman.

The oligarchs you speak of were also not really a fixed group. You had the landholders from the antebellum period who lost power pretty quickly during the Reconstruction Era due to financial ruin for the most part, and then you had the industrialists, some of whom were former carpetbaggers, who coalesced around the Grover Cleveland faction in the Democratic Party, dominant in much of the 1880s-1890s. And after the initial wave of industrialization, there was a sort of return to power for some of the older surviving landholders who formed alliances with rural populists in some cases (particularly in Mississippi after 1876, where they were largely able to halt industrialization), while in other cases, it was the legal establishment (Lawyers, Law School Professors, Judges and Prosecutors, etc.) who really held power, and relatively pointless offices like Justice of the Peace or Administrator of Wills became massive battlegrounds because they dictated who would rise in the ranks of the state Democratic Party. This was very much true for Alabama, and really, it has never changed since. Everyone who runs for office in Alabama, no matter the party or party faction, gender, race, or anything, has a legal background of some kind.

It was only later on that machine politics really started to develop in much of the South. But the "planter elite" you speak of quickly stopped being planters and over time, stopped being elite, except in a few isolated cases. Large landholding was not profitable after the war, and the sharecropping system did nobody any favors, not even those who collected the rents.

As for how the CSA would evolve, that is more complicated. Its politics were rudimentary in many ways, resembling 1830s America with pro and anti Davis administration factions at the national level. There was also, unsurprisingly for a movement that made "states rights" its calling card, a lot of insubordination among state governors who were opposed to Richmond's war powers, particularly the governors of Georgia and North Carolina. I would think that the prereogatives of the states would be a big issue going forward. But as for how the factions would break down in national politics, that is much tougher to say. I think it might even be possible that the CSA would have to deal with its own issues over secession as time went on.
 
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In addition, immigration would probably start to pop up as a political issue. The South took in a very large amount of migrants in the years after the American Revolution, particularly from Scotland and Northern Ireland, and this group largely dominated the culture of the "inland" south, but they were largely the ones who settled that land to start with. Immigration from Eastern and Southern Europe would be a much larger culture shock associated with the industrializing cities such as Atlanta, New Orleans, and probably Charleston, and would likely put another cleave into the politics.

Immigrants largely avoided the slaveholding states because the use of slaves brought down the wages of free workers and because the slaveholding states were anti-immigrant. In the 1856 Presidential election, the anti-immigrant American Party (the Know Nothings) got a maximum of 32.8% of the vote in free states and between 32.9% and 54.6% of the vote in slave states. Rather than be despised as 'mudsills' and 'mongrels', most immigrants went to the free states - in 1850 New York had more immigrants than the whole of the Confederacy would have a decade later. The 1860 Census showed that about 1 in 6 people in Union states were immigrants, while about 1 in 40 people in Confederate states were immigrants.
 

Marc

Donor
I would think the obvious historical model would be South Africa and the National Party; but less attractive.
Oh, and no, I very much doubt Texas would ever secede - they were a hard core deep South state to all intents and purposes.
 
William Davis' Look Away points that all Confederate politicians being Democrats they tended to form coalitions on an issue by issue basis. Short term, they have factions, not political parties. Existing factions within the party were the Fire Eaters (small and largely shunted aside); what Davis calls the new Nationalists (mainly Breckinridge Democrats like Toombs, Harris, and Davis); the reluctant secessionists or Moderates (mainly former Douglas Democrats, Bell supporters, and former Whigs); and the Unionists (who lacked leadership but formed a significant group). There was also the divide between pro-Davis and anti-Davis men. All of the previous groups (save the Unionists) were divided on whether they thought Jefferson Davis was doing a good job. And these factions are riven with personal conflicts even among men who share the same views.

Planters had influence beyond their numbers in southern legislatures, but planters were only a small percentage of slaveholders, and the smallholders' interests did not always mesh with those of the planters. Like the yeomen, the smallholders were not exempt from the draft, plus the smallholders faced the significant risk that a major portion of their wealth would run away. Rather than yeomen (those who owned no slaves) versus planters, it’s better to look at yeomen, smallholders, and planters. These three groups had different interests and different views of what the Confederacy should become,

Yeomen were a majority in the Arkansas Legislature and had pluralities in Texas and Florida, the least developed regions. These states had the smallest populations, the largest percent of immigrants, the most per capita livestock, and virtually no free blacks. Planters were a majority in the South Carolina Legislature and had pluralities in Mississippi and Alabama; states focused on monocrop cotton plantations. Over 50% of the population was enslaved, and there few free blacks or immigrants. Smallholders were a majority in the Tennessee Legislature and had pluralities in North Carolina, Virginia, Georgia, and Louisiana; states with more diverse agriculture, more external trade, and more manufacturing. They also had the most Unionists and suffered the most from the war. These states had the highest populations, produced about twice as much manufactured goods per capita as the rest of the south and had virtually all of the free blacks. Those last two points are related – southern industry used a lot of slaves because they could not go on strike. Factory owners found that paying slaves a small amount, enough that they could buy their freedom in several years, increased production and decreased the amount of tools, machinery, and product broken by the slave workers.

The one issue that united the Confederates - slavery - would be resolved, leaving them divided on most other issues. Several issues have come out of the war. There are a large number of pro-Union southerners, black and white, in Union Army and they can’t exactly go back. A lot of black Union soldiers that have been enslaved by the Confederacy. Large sections of former Confederate territory are occupied by the Union – many but not all of these people are Unionists. Other Unionists still live in Confederate territory, some are in armed rebellion against the Confederacy. And considering the economy of the Confederacy, there will be economic refugees. All of these issues will be brought up as well as expansion, inflation, tariff rates, revanchism, the public debt, appointing a Supreme Court, and the size of the military.

Since the Confederates haven't divided into political parties yet; 1867 candidates will-probably be self-nominated and all nominally Democrats. That could easily include at least one candidate from each of the factions, since, as noted, even Confederate politicians with similar political positions often had strong personal animosities towards each other. Some possibilities are David Atchison (Fire Eater), Robert Rhett (Fire Eater), Edmund Ruffin (Fire Eater), Louis Wigfall (Fire Eater), Joseph Brown (Moderate), Robert Hunter (Moderate), Alexander Stephens (Moderate), Zebulon Vance (Moderate/Reconstructionist), JC Breckinridge (Nationalist), Thomas Bragg (Nationalist), Howell Cobb (Nationalist), Wiley Harris (Nationalist), John Reagan (Nationalist), and Robert Toombs (Nationalist).

And the Confederacy was founded with the idea that losing an election was good reason to leave and form your own country. There’s a good chance the Confederacy would lose some states over the 1867 election. At which point the lucky winner faces the problem that any significant decision that he makes also risks the Confederacy losing states. If the CSA survives the 1867 election, these factions would start coalescing into political parties.

Alternatively, the CSA, all nominally Democrats might become a single-party autocratic state. A lot of decentralization got pitched out the window by the Confederacy during the ACW. For most Confederate politicians, States Rights were anything but sacrosanct. The Border Ruffians, the LeCompton Constitution, the Fugitive Slave Law, the Dred Scott decision - all blatant violations of States Rights and all enthusiastically supported by much of the South. The Davis administration dictated rates to railroads and required blockade runners to carry government cargoes free of charge. Workers were drafted to keep them from striking and to get better rates out of industries. Civilian firearms were confiscated. Half-a-million dollars in goods was impressed by the Confederate government. Internal passports were required in certain areas. The CS government declared that any debts owed to Union citizens were now owed to the Confederate government. Emory Thomas points out that by 1863, more government workers were employed by Richmond than by Washington DC. Men who actually believed in States Rights like Brown of Georgia and Vance of North Carolina were generally seen as obstructionists, not hailed for their dedication.
 
IMO the political parties would form after the 1867 election once the various post-war groups had coalesced around various leaders. Once it became clear Lee wouldn't run in 1867, the groups who formed regional political blocs would begin punting candidates and eventually forming around one another. 1867 would most likely end up being a 'gray election' as most likely former army officers would emerge as the front runners since they have the advantage of being well known and popular public figures. You'd probably end up with some weird coalition of Fire Eaters and Nationalists facing off against a coalition of Moderates, Nationalists, and former Unionists who are looking for a different future for the Confederacy. Once the election of '67 crystalizes things the years between then and '73 would see major party organizations forming.
 
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