Could a much harsher Reconstruction sow the seeds for a Second American Civil War?

How much realistically harsher could the penalties imposed for losing the war get on the South, and how specifically might this cause a civil war decades down the line?
 
It's hard to say how tough Reconstruction could become realistically, but many Radical Republicans supported trying southern leaders, confiscating the land of planters and redistributing them to former slaves and poor whites, maintaining the disenfranchisement of anyone who had anything to do with the confederate government or military, and generally doubling down on the rights of freedmen and their organizations. In OTL you had the Battle of Canal Street in New Orleans in 1874. Any of the Radical policies being put into effect would lead to more events like that. In the worst case scenario, you could see Redeemer militias seize control of a state government and declare its independence from the US. It would be a civil war within a state or states, pitting Republicans and freedmen backed up by federal troops against Democrats and Confederate veteran freikorps.

To get another conflict you need a level of resentment among ex-Confederates that didn't exist IOTL, especially after 1877. To get that, Reconstruction needs to last indefinitely, be more radical, and be backed up fully by the US government. None of those are likely. In all likelihood, if southern nationalists march on a state capital and seize control, moderates in the federal government will see the "error" of policy in the south and pressure the leadership to back down, if they don't do something stupid like declare independence.
 
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The harshest reconstruction would be the mass removal of former slaves from the south. I read some calculations made on the economics of removing the lowest labor tier, lowest in education and political clout. That leaves the large scale farming forced to rely on a much smaller labor pool, which include a hefty portion of small freeholders or 'family farms'. This remaining agricultural labor force includes men who can vote, includes a high portion of veterans who are more prone to resist efforts to exploit them.

With a far smaller pool of disenfranchised laborers to exploit the large farm or plantation model goes thru a lot of changes, or just collapses. The wealthy have fewer groups in the labor pool to play off against each other. Its going to be more difficult and less effective to play off redneck freeholders against 'white trash' day laborers. OTL efforts to bring immigrant labor to Southern agriculture did not go far until the Hispanic migration took off mid 20th Century. So, labor costs in the Souths agriculture will be larger.

All this will be horrible for the wealthy and powerful in the South. The economic and social change would be far more radical than OTL more difficult to adapt to, and result in a much larger replacement of the former leaders. Of course there are other factors that make such a removal of the African Americans ASB or near so. Still its one option for making things worse in the PoV of the southerners, or at least the wealthy and powerful as it further undercuts their economic mechanism.
 
Frankly, the South eventually accepts it with some grumbling and maybe occasional rioting, short of the US going full Nazi which wouldn't happen. Joseph E Johnston was right "In my view, sir, the people are tired of war, feel themselves whipped and will not fight." The South was fully aware how badly it was beaten. The South was in no shape to go round 2 and they were well aware of it. They were clearly weaker in 1876 than in 1860 and knew that full well.
 

Grimbald

Monthly Donor
No matter how bad it is there is no "Round Two" until a European Superpower is willing and able to help. Wholesale treason trials and execution of Confederate vets plus revoking of voting and property rights of their descendants might see a second round when the US joined the Allies in 1917.
 
Frankly, the South eventually accepts it with some grumbling and maybe occasional rioting, short of the US going full Nazi which wouldn't happen. Joseph E Johnston was right "In my view, sir, the people are tired of war, feel themselves whipped and will not fight." The South was fully aware how badly it was beaten. The South was in no shape to go round 2 and they were well aware of it. They were clearly weaker in 1876 than in 1860 and knew that full well.

And the smart heads among them will realise that, if they lie reasonably quiet, within a few years the last Union soldiers will be back on their farms, and the South will be able to much as it pleases where race relations are concerned.
 
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