Could the Confederacy have survived as a nation?

It is spring, 1861. Jefferson Davis is the first President of the new Confederate States Of America. How does he fund the new government and prepare defenses against an almost certain confrontation with the Federals? Where should he permanently locate the capital of the CSA? What should his first priorities (both military and economic) be? How can he entice the border states (Kentucky, Maryland and Missouri) to join the Confederacy and what steps should he take to gain recognition of his government by England and France? What plan can he come up with to gradually phase out the institution of slavery to help gain this recognition?

The Confederacy could have survived to the present day if Mr. Davis and his advisors had made better decisions on all of these issues.

I'll open up things with a couple of suggestions. #1: The capital should have remained in Montgomery and not been relocated to Richmond. Montgomery is a long way from the Union states and much more defensible than Richmond which was too close to Washington. #2: Instead of embargoing cotton sales to force recognition by European powers, every bale of cotton in the South should have been immediately shipped overseas and sold or stored there before any naval blockade against Southern ports been enforced. The proceeds could then have been used to purchase arms or build blockade runners and commerce raiders in English shipyards or as tangible backing for Confederate bond sales.

Let's hear some more ideas!
 

Anaxagoras

Banned
The movement of the capital to Richmond is overrated as a potential POD, in my opinion. Even if the capital remained elsewhere, Richmond and the rest of Virginia would need to be defended to the last drop of blood. It was the most industrialized Confederate state, contained the most vital salt works, and there was a whole host of other reasons.

Not embargoing cotton would be a major change for the better, as far as the Confederates are concerned. The decision to embargo cotton made what would have already been an extremely difficult fiscal situation much worse than it had to be. Shipping out as much cotton as possible and using them as collateral for loans would have greatly eased the inflation which, IOTL, killed the Confederacy more than any other thing.

Don't fire on Fort Sumter would be another one. Being painted as the aggressor by the Lincoln administration badly hurt the cause of the Confederacy in the border states. Considering the close-run situation in Missouri and Kentucky IOTL (Maryland was a lost cause, for it would be quickly occupied by Union troops no matter what), a reverse situation in which the Union fired the first shots against the Confederacy might be enough to push fence-sitters into the Southern camp.

Better cabinet choices would have been good. Breckinridge at the head of the War Department would have done wonders. Have Toombs at Treasury rather than State would also have been a good choice, given his expertise in fiscal matters when he was in the Senate (and a drunk Treasury Secretary is not nearly as bad as a drunk president).

Other appointments: put anyone other than Lucius Northrop at the head of the Commissary Department. He did more damage to the Confederate supply situation through sheer incompetence than every Union cavalry raid put together.
 
Davis should have had a more realistic defense plan. Priority #1 would be to defend the Ohio and Mississippi river systems plus the port of New Orleans in depth to prevent the Confederacy from being cut in half. IMO, that's why having Kentucky in the CSA would have been so crucial because of the Ohio river frontage. Strong defense should also have been put up around Charleston, Wilmington, Savannah and Mobile to keep supply lines open. Since Davis knew his army would always be outnumbered, he should have avoided large set-piece battles and concentrated more mobile forces that could have attacked Union weak points and raided behind enemy lines, destroying transportation and burning or capturing essential military supplies and armament. Just look at the success Nathan Forrest and John Morgan enjoyed in their Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana raids.

Basically, I'm suggesting that Davis should have fought the same kind of battle that General Giap waged against both the French and Americans in Vietnam.
 

Brunaburh

Gone Fishin'
I think he should have founded a new capital, Daviston.
He could have looked for Brazil or the northern states for models about gradual abolition of slavery.

I suspect that finding plans for the effective abolition of slavery was somewhat low on the list of priorities for the newly formed Confederate administration.
 

Anaxagoras

Banned
Getting someone other than Jefferson Davis as President probably would have done wonders.

Who would have done a better job, though?

Breckinridge wasn't available, as Kentucky did not secede and, in any realistic TL, would have not seceded by the time of the Montgomery Convention.
 
IMHO when things were going well (relatively) the deficiencies in the CSA governmental system were bad but not critical. As there were reverses, they became critical. basically the states rights attitudes where the governors would hoard supplies or only supply troops from their locality was a typical example.
 
I think he should have founded a new capital, Daviston.
He could have looked for Brazil or the northern states for models about gradual abolition of slavery.
Didn't the constitution of the CSA explicitly forbid the abolition of slavery?

Article I Section 9(4)
No bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves shall be passed

Article IV Section 2(1)
The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States; and shall have the right of transit and sojourn in any State of this Confederacy, with their slaves and other property; and the right of property in said slaves shall not be thereby impaired.

Also, having the precedent of successful secession in cases where states disagree with the larger nation, what's to stop some of the Confederate states from seceding off themselves with Union support (in exchange for favorable trade deals and what not)? When the point is to have state's rights, supposedly, centralization becomes rather difficult, which is unfortunate since the central government starts to starve if the states get too autonomous (Articles of Confederation) and interstate disputes become more problematic. It doesn't exactly scream stability or longevity, honestly.

If they do get British support, they can win the war but after that? Industrialization? When the CSA is an agrian plantation society? King Cotton's teats are rich but they'd have to wean themselves off of it or they'll just stagnate (I mean, most of what I've read on here suggests that's what the majority would expect). But I doubt that's on the table, not while the plantation owners are still sitting pretty.
 

Brunaburh

Gone Fishin'
Didn't the constitution of the CSA explicitly forbid the abolition of slavery?



Also, having the precedent of successful secession in cases where states disagree with the larger nation, what's to stop some of the Confederate states from seceding off themselves with Union support (in exchange for favorable trade deals and what not)? When the point is to have state's rights, supposedly, centralization becomes rather difficult, which is unfortunate since the central government starts to starve if the states get too autonomous (Articles of Confederation) and interstate disputes become more problematic. It doesn't exactly scream stability or longevity, honestly.

If they do get British support, they can win the war but after that? Industrialization? When the CSA is an agrian plantation society? King Cotton's teats are rich but they'd have to wean themselves off of it or they'll just stagnate (I mean, most of what I've read on here suggests that's what the majority would expect). But I doubt that's on the table, not while the plantation owners are still sitting pretty.

We can look at Argentina as a model. The power of the cattle barons stopped Argentina from taking the economic measures required for developing the economy and modernising the state, the cotton oligarchy would fulfil a similar role. Lot's of money coming from a single agricultural resource is rarely a bad thing.
 
The South has two basic ways to win the war. The first is to win quickly by concentrating forces in the east, winning decisive victories over the Union army and/or taking DC or another major Northern city to convince foreign powers to intervene on the side of the Confederacy and to convince the Northern public the war is unwinnable. Arguably the chance for this passes after First Manassas, and it's certainly done for good after Antietam at the absolute limit. Any prospect of foreign intervention is long gone by then, and the North's overall morale has become inured to major shifts in opinion even from major defeats like Chancellorsville. That's probably the most reasonable criticism of Lee; he continued to pursue a strategy of annihilation for some time after it has ceased to hold any real promise for the Confederacy.

The second way is the attrition path. Hold on, inflict crippling casualties on the North, and hope to outlast the Northern will for the war. But the problem of course is that the presidential election is not until 1864, and the resources disadvantage and the vast spaces the CSA has to defend means there's going to be, at a minimum, some losses along the way. The South can't fortify and defend all of the sheer amount of ground, especially in the Western Theater. The Confederates need an intelligent policy of trading unimportant space for time, then concentrating on interior lines to meet the Union rapidly when they try to seize a location like Chattanooga which grants them major advantages, especially in the Western Theater. However, politically, Davis had no choice but to protect everything. He did not have the luxury of trading space for time, as George Washington had in the Revolutionary War.

A good POD to help the Confederacy is to have a consistent strategy in the Western Theater. In the western theater, there is no coherent Confederate policy. It oscillates around virtually at random and this is the pattern for the disjointed Confederate defense of the west. The Confederate Army in the West spinned back and forth without any effective coordination. Offensive blows without being properly supported by the rest of the Confederates forces in the west render them ineffective even when temporarily successful. A consistent defensive strategy focused on denying Union forces rivers to use as supply lines might have worked, though Federal advantages at naval and siege work, and the sheer expanse of terrain to defend would work against it. A policy of trading space for time and concentration to strike blows at Federal forces or to strike into the North to keep the Union off balance might work if consistently followed. However, like with Lee's army, this might ultimately burn itself out in the end. There's also politics at play; when you get right down to it, the Trans-Mississippi doesn't matter that much to the Confederacy in most senses, but Davis can't exactly abandon entire states and expect them to continue providing troops and supplies to the Confederacy.

In short, ANY consistent policy in regards to how to wage the war, almost no matter what it was, would have been better than the shamble that was actual Confederate war policy in practice, particularly in the West.
 
Yes.

The "easy" route to achieving independence and being a successful nation didn't close until Gettysburg. Up until that point, getting foreign recognition was well within reach and the economy (primarily in the form of debt) could very easily rectified upon peace. After that point, until about July of 1864, the main route to achieving victory became a lot harder as it primarily relied on the Northern morale breaking (Had Atlanta not fell, this would've been achieved) and increasing amounts of debt would seriously limit Confederate options upon independence. After that point (Battle of Peachtree Creek), the only hope for the Confederacy was the St. Albans Raid blowing up into war between the North and the UK, and the debt issue would be a serious liability.
 
I think he should have founded a new capital, Daviston.
He could have looked for Brazil or the northern states for models about gradual abolition of slavery.

Where? Best site for a planned capital might've been where Birmingham, Alabama now stands, thanks to Birmingham's future as a major Southern industrial city. But when you have prominent Southern voices in that era complaining about the pointlessness and evil of industrialisation and how the South didn't need a single factory (since they can just sell cotton to buy industrial goods, after all), trying to industrialise Birmingham while in the midst of a war for survival might be rather difficult to convince people of. And without industry, the area is just another rural part of the South not too different than surrounding counties.

A planned capital can definitely wait, although if the CSA survives, then moving the capital deeper into the South might be a good idea in preparation for the inevitable round two.
 

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
Donor
Monthly Donor
yes. getting created and staying alive the first several years would be the hard part. Once they exist in peace, survival is not hard. By the standards of its day, the American South was not a very "third world" country, it was productive, relatively educated and stable.
 
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