No Erie Canal - Western Republics?

Highlander

Banned
Lately I've been reading At Home: A Short History of Private Life by Bill Bryson (a truly incredible book, I highly recommend it to everyone), and he raised an interesting point.

Before the completion of the Erie Canal, farmers in the Old West and beyond the Appalachians were pretty cut off; it was cheaper to send their produce west to the Mississippi and down to New Orleans. Because of this separation, and without the Canal, many people of the day thought that eventually they would form their own Republics. He also proposed that Canada would have become the powerhouse of North America, as the St. Lawrance acted as the waterway to the Great Lakes.

What are your thoughts on this?
 
Perhaps...
A fledgling state would be easy prey for New Spain and/or Canada, and I feel The USA would offer more protection.
 

archaeogeek

Banned
Perhaps...
A fledgling state would be easy prey for New Spain and/or Canada, and I feel The USA would offer more protection.

Easy prey for Canada?
I know it would probably affect immigration but Canada has land of its own to settle; Upper Canada is also tiny and insignificant until the 1850s. Plus you'd need the will to take over these republics.
 
I don't know any specifics, but firmly believe that communications and transport defines the size of a nation. The canal tied the two areas together into one.
 
interesting idea! My Fourm "What if Southern States kept thier Land Claims?" talks of something simmilar. In my idea there is no u.s just 13 republics. In this case it would be very likely western states could form. Possibly in conjunction? Kentucky, Tennesse and Mississippi/alabama could make new nations
 
Perhaps...
A fledgling state would be easy prey for New Spain and/or Canada, and I feel The USA would offer more protection.

Easy prey for Canada?
I know it would probably affect immigration but Canada has land of its own to settle; Upper Canada is also tiny and insignificant until the 1850s. Plus you'd need the will to take over these republics.

Similarly, by the time of the Erie Canal, Spain wasn't in a very good position to make anything in North America easy prey. Spain had settled its boundaries so that it no longer had any legal claim to the Louisiana or Florida. Mexico was in the midst of revolution and was slowly winning. Their northern reaches were underpopulated anyway. Even if you could get over all of this, would they even have any desire to conquer anything more than New Orleans?

I like this idea a lot. I'd like it even better if you can make the split amicable, or at least make the two nations on good diplomatic and trade terms within a couple of decades after a non-amicable split.
 
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Highlander

Banned
I like this idea a lot. I'd like it even better if you can make the split amicable, or at least make the two nations on good diplomatic and trade terms within a couple of decades after a non-amicable split.

I don't see why not - people at the time were pretty amicable about it, almost as if it was inevitable. I guess, for a time, it seemed like it was.

More curiosities: obviously the US government would be different with only thirteen (fourteen, maybe, if they can nab Florida, and of course Vermont) states, more in line with what it was intended to be. Also curious if these speculated Western Republic(s) would be modeled after it.

Also, butterflies for the rest of the world.
 
The Northwest Territories would remain in the US, but they would be more oriented to the Southern states as that's where all they're trading activities would take place. We may end up with a US dominated by slave states.
 
The Northwest Territories would remain in the US, but they would be more oriented to the Southern states as that's where all they're trading activities would take place. We may end up with a US dominated by slave states.

Agreed. Folks would just come here from Virginia, Tennessee & Kentucky rather then from New York & Massachusetts. I can easily (sadly :() see Illinois & Indiana becoming slave states, or at least sympathetic to slavery in these circumstances.
 
Hmmmm... I don't know about that. Ohio was already a state in 1803, Indiana in 1816, Illinois in 1818. (And free states at that, as decreed by the Northwest Ordinance.) Obviously the lack of a canal didn't really stop them from being settled from the east. I could see the lack of bridges over the Ohio as being as large a deterrent as the lack of canal over the mountains.

Was there really anyone in the south who needed some place to go, anyway? And, if the Northeasterers don't move west, where would they go?
 
Hmmmm... I don't know about that. Ohio was already a state in 1803, Indiana in 1816, Illinois in 1818. (And free states at that, as decreed by the Northwest Ordinance.) Obviously the lack of a canal didn't really stop them from being settled from the east. I could see the lack of bridges over the Ohio as being as large a deterrent as the lack of canal over the mountains.

Was there really anyone in the south who needed some place to go, anyway? And, if the Northeasterers don't move west, where would they go?

Southern Illinois and Indiana were settled more by people from the (upper) south then by New Englanders. Also, the introduction of slavery was seriously considered in Indiana, Illinois and Wisconson (I believe).
 
Southern Illinois and Indiana were settled more by people from the (upper) south then by New Englanders. Also, the introduction of slavery was seriously considered in Indiana, Illinois and Wisconson (I believe).

Okay, I guess I can see that (Well, all except Wisconsin[1]). But as I said, the Northwest Ordinance guarantees that the territories do not allow slaves. Of course, if it's a separate country, then they can decide for themselves. If they end up allowing slavery as a separate nation, though... I guess I can't foresee completely amicable relations with the east to continue indefinitely. At the very least, there will be heated discussions about escaped slaves not being returned.

Speculation Alert:

I think a spread of slavery into southern areas of the Midwest could be justified in this timeline, but I think that will just move the line further north a little. You are still going to see New Englanders and New Yorkers settle in the northern parts of that country. *Michigan, *Wisconsin, *Minnesota or whatever states form from these areas, will not have slavery, especially if the Germans still come.

Of course, it's possible that the southerners become powerful enough in the state legislatures that slavery becomes legal in all states in this Western Republic. The New Englanders and Europeans might then get diverted to Canada instead... or go further west beyond the Mississippi and start their own new republic.

Or, the discussion over slavery leads to a split in the republics comparable to the slave/free split between states in OTL. Perhaps the line ends up getting drawn north of the Ohio river, although this leads to some rather unnatural borders for autonomous nations. However, with no U.S. Legislature to mediate these disputes, you might end up with some armed standoffs, if not outright conflict. Something like Bloody Kansas, but spread throughout much more of the West.

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[1] The state didn't begin to form until 1846, long after the question could be practically asked by a northern state. Even if the citizens were amenable (which was doubtful), congress needed a free state to balance out Texas, so they would not have accepted their constitution if they allowed slavery.
 
But as I said, the Northwest Ordinance guarantees that the territories do not allow slaves.

There were some attempted constitutional conventions to try to repeal this (and to divide the Old Northwest vertically instead of horizontally) but they all came to nothing as they didn't have that much influence.
 

archaeogeek

Banned
The problem with the Upper South is that, well, the Chesapeake colonies were a finger away from early abolition and it often came down to a handful votes compared to the deeper south; the weather in the northwest wouldn't be terribly plantocracy friendly. Settlers from the Appalachians, especially, would likely have been fairly common and those were very much not friendly to slavery.
 
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