Alright just as a thought...
There has been lost of discussion in the CSA's economy had it become independent. I believe it would have been a small agricultural based economy never to be come a power such as in TL191 although it will gain an economic boost with the boom of the oil industry. Later some tourism. Anyway...
In OTL lots of the fear around the use of marijuana derives from mass propaganda spread throughout the 30s by William Randolph Hearst who was afraid the hemp industry threatened the forest industry in which he had large investments in for his newsprint.
So if the CSA becomes independent Hearst is never born and it is very unlikely anyone would be able to build such a large scale publishing empire as he did.
Also as the years go by and the CSA frees its slaves and it enters the 1900s it would begin to have some economic troubles particularly due to the fact that cotton exports have gone down. As said above the oil industry gives it a economic push early in the 1900s. But what if some Confederate entrepreneur invested in the industrial cultivation of hemp?
Hemp can produce paper and textiles it would be an alternative to cotton and lumber. The CSA would lack a forest industry since that was primarily a northern resource. Although someone could have invested in it.
And there are all the wonderful multi-uses for hemp that they could also tap into.
Moving on...
with a growing hemp industry beginning in the 1930s, there also comes the side market of cannabis. The CSA government puts a blind eye to this because hemp growers are powerful and well ... pot growers also become powerful... plus it is a large export both in its legal forms and illegal ones. So basically after a few generations of the hemp industry growing. The large hemp corporates lobby for a bill that legalizes marijuana. This would be around the 1990. After after a few years of lobbying the bill passes.
And so every spring break thousands of US college students flood the beaches of Florida and Cuba to enjoy the warm Confederate sun during the day and get baked at night.
As I said just a thought....
There has been lost of discussion in the CSA's economy had it become independent. I believe it would have been a small agricultural based economy never to be come a power such as in TL191 although it will gain an economic boost with the boom of the oil industry. Later some tourism. Anyway...
In OTL lots of the fear around the use of marijuana derives from mass propaganda spread throughout the 30s by William Randolph Hearst who was afraid the hemp industry threatened the forest industry in which he had large investments in for his newsprint.
So if the CSA becomes independent Hearst is never born and it is very unlikely anyone would be able to build such a large scale publishing empire as he did.
Also as the years go by and the CSA frees its slaves and it enters the 1900s it would begin to have some economic troubles particularly due to the fact that cotton exports have gone down. As said above the oil industry gives it a economic push early in the 1900s. But what if some Confederate entrepreneur invested in the industrial cultivation of hemp?
Hemp can produce paper and textiles it would be an alternative to cotton and lumber. The CSA would lack a forest industry since that was primarily a northern resource. Although someone could have invested in it.
And there are all the wonderful multi-uses for hemp that they could also tap into.
Moving on...
with a growing hemp industry beginning in the 1930s, there also comes the side market of cannabis. The CSA government puts a blind eye to this because hemp growers are powerful and well ... pot growers also become powerful... plus it is a large export both in its legal forms and illegal ones. So basically after a few generations of the hemp industry growing. The large hemp corporates lobby for a bill that legalizes marijuana. This would be around the 1990. After after a few years of lobbying the bill passes.
And so every spring break thousands of US college students flood the beaches of Florida and Cuba to enjoy the warm Confederate sun during the day and get baked at night.
As I said just a thought....