No Lousiana Purchase

Let's say for whatever reason, the French Revolution doesn't happen, or maybe Napoleon never rises to power in order to sell Lousiana. How would America with no Lousiana Purchase be different? Would they eventually get the land? Or would someone else? Mexico? Britain? Thanks.
 
I'd have to say that we'd find a way to invade it. Imagine a scenario similar to the Texan Revolution or the Mexican-American War; Americans colonize a part of the territory (let's say New Orleans or Kansas), throw a Revolution, either get crushed, which leads to an invasion by the US to "protect its sovereign people under attack by a foreign and hostile government", or win, join the United States, which in turn will try to bait the owner of the Louisiana Territory into war, most likely succeed in its baiting, invade, and take the entirety of the Louisiana Territory for itself.
 
I'd have to say that we'd find a way to invade it. Imagine a scenario similar to the Texan Revolution or the Mexican-American War; Americans colonize a part of the territory (let's say New Orleans or Kansas), throw a Revolution, either get crushed, which leads to an invasion by the US to "protect its sovereign people under attack by a foreign and hostile government", or win, join the United States, which in turn will try to bait the owner of the Louisiana Territory into war, most likely succeed in its baiting, invade, and take the entirety of the Louisiana Territory for itself.

I entirely disagree. The Louisiana purchase really started manifest destiny, so saying that manifest destiny would inevitably see the US have the territory is crazy. In the spirit of the OP let's actually look at the realistic results of No louisiana purchase;

I propose the area would have been taken by the UK; they took Cape from the Dutch, who were conquered by the french, so why not take an extremely valuable colony from the Spanish? They might also retake Florida, which they lost in the Revolution, though this is unlikely. This colony of Louisiana would remain British because, let's face it, the US with access to the Great Plains and Pacific Coast will never match the British Empire. To those who would argue that the area would be filled with American Settlers, I point out that Canada was not and it bordered the US. I still find a War of 1812 likely here, which will further encourage the British to take Louisiana. They might also take disputed areas from the US and maybe Michigan.

The US would be a rump state here, sure it would be a regional power, but never a global power, it might even collapse sometime in the mid 1800's; the CSA would be much more likely to win if the civil war as we know it occurs.
 
I'd have to say that we'd find a way to invade it. Imagine a scenario similar to the Texan Revolution or the Mexican-American War; Americans colonize a part of the territory (let's say New Orleans or Kansas), throw a Revolution, either get crushed, which leads to an invasion by the US to "protect its sovereign people under attack by a foreign and hostile government", or win, join the United States, which in turn will try to bait the owner of the Louisiana Territory into war, most likely succeed in its baiting, invade, and take the entirety of the Louisiana Territory for itself.

A France that isn't wracked with revolution and fighting half of Europe is going to be one that is exerting a great deal more pressure on the colony than OTL. Americans might not get the chance to settle there en mass because the French will tell them to politely leave, and not so politely if they don't. The important thing about the Texas is that they were invited, these Americans won't be.
 
A France that isn't wracked with revolution and fighting half of Europe is going to be one that is exerting a great deal more pressure on the colony than OTL. Americans might not get the chance to settle there en mass because the French will tell them to politely leave, and not so politely if they don't. The important thing about the Texas is that they were invited, these Americans won't be.


Of course No French Revolution almost certainly means no Napoleon. so LA is likely to be still Spanish, not French. But they too might discourage American settlement.
 
sooner or later, the US is going to try to take the area around New Orleans, so that they have full access down the entire length of the Mississippi. At this time, there is no sense of Manifest Destiny, but there is a strong desire to have all the land from the East Coast to the Mississippi (Florida is likely to get some attention too). The Americans had some bad memories of when Spain owned the city, and periodically closed it to American shipping; the main reason they constantly were trying to buy it from France. If someone else (UK?) ends up with ownership of the place, the Americans are going to make offers to buy it to them. If everyone keeps refusing them, the US will likely look for the first chance they have to just invade and annex the place (succeeding might be a problem though)…
 
sooner or later, the US is going to try to take the area around New Orleans, so that they have full access down the entire length of the Mississippi. At this time, there is no sense of Manifest Destiny, but there is a strong desire to have all the land from the East Coast to the Mississippi (Florida is likely to get some attention too). The Americans had some bad memories of when Spain owned the city, and periodically closed it to American shipping; the main reason they constantly were trying to buy it from France. If someone else (UK?) ends up with ownership of the place, the Americans are going to make offers to buy it to them. If everyone keeps refusing them, the US will likely look for the first chance they have to just invade and annex the place (succeeding might be a problem though)…

It won't be a problem; problem implies a challenge that can be solved. To be frank, the US would get it's shit kicked in if they tried to take such a valuable port by force.
 
It won't be a problem; problem implies a challenge that can be solved. To be frank, the US would get it's shit kicked in if they tried to take such a valuable port by force.
if they try to take on a UK that isn't distracted by anything else... yep. If it's Spain, they could win that one. Of course, this rather big POD is likely to have a huge number of butterflies, so it's hard to say just what will be going on in the future...
 
Basically as pointed out above, the US had a poor history with access to the mouth of the Mississippi, and the Spanish did repeatedly close the mouth of the river off, which is going to prompt the US to go out of the way to get access to New Orleans - and the longer and larger the Midwestern States grow, the larger the calls will become.

Absent a French Revolution, i doubt there'd be much in the way of British annexation of Louisiana - They can settle the remainder of BNA through the provinces in Canada, as they have control of the St. Lawrence and access to the Lakes; they don't need access to the Mississippi to shore up that support. And as the French Regime will stil lbe in such dire straits, I feel that the British will be distracted propping it up and helping the French stamp out revolutionaries... for a price.

I'd expect an earlier Adam-Onis treaty of sorts come to pass between the US and Spain. They need access to the Gulf, and specifically New Orleans. Louisiana is a peripheral territory for the Spanish as well, and its population is still tiny, with only two towns of any notable size, along with a few small settlements, that were not receiving any major settlement and not producing any major revenue for the Spanish - well, outside of New Orleans.

So, I believe a deal would be reached, with borders more favoring the Spanish (look at the red -o- line on this map to see an approximate indicator of a potential border). the US would get most of Louisiana, with definable borders. They may or may not purchase access to the Oregon Country; it depends on the time of purchase. Heck, they may not, but come back a decade later to negotiate access to the Pacific as well.

That sounds to me like the most reasonable expectation - the US needs New Orleans to allow its hinterland unfettered access, sans New Orleans the Louisiana Interior is hard to access, and all that needs to be done is to have a price agreed upon.

The only thing is that the US would have to pay for Florida as well - the US received Florida in exchange for dropping claims to the Rio Grande Boundary that it received as part of the Louisiana purchase.
 
Louisiana was a money sink for Spain, they barely did anything with it in OTL, and I doubt they do anything with in ATL. There was just not any draws for Spanish to come to Louisiana, or even migration in general. Cuba and the Caribbean was worth far more then Louisiana and in that time, invested far more into Cuba and the rest of the Empire then they ever did with Louisiana.

Next you have the US, who will have the same high population growth and affinity toward movement vs building up cities. (Even back before the American Revolution, you have setters going across the Appalachian Mountains, and throwing the Royal Proclamation of 1763 out a window.)

New Orleans is basically impossible to defend. It is a low laying region between two bodies of water. And it is not like Spanish ever kept a large amount of soldiers in the region, because they never did in OTL.
 
New Orleans is basically impossible to defend. It is a low laying region between two bodies of water. And it is not like Spanish ever kept a large amount of soldiers in the region, because they never did in OTL.

We know that isn't true because Britain got its hand slapped when they tried to seize it in 1815.

New Orleans is the most important part of Louisiana, Spain might not fight for the rest of it but the port is definitely worth fighting over.
 
We know that isn't true because Britain got its hand slapped when they tried to seize it in 1815.

New Orleans is the most important part of Louisiana, Spain might not fight for the rest of it but the port is definitely worth fighting over.

New Orleans is the most important part of Louisiana (Only thing worth of value at this point of time.) and America knows it, and Spain knows it. And I am sure the Creole would prefer American rule over Spanish, or British rule any time of day.
 
I propose the area would have been taken by the UK; they took Cape from the Dutch, who were conquered by the french, so why not take an extremely valuable colony from the Spanish?

French colony, surely? Which of course would make Britain even more likely to take it.

The US would be a rump state here, sure it would be a regional power, but never a global power, it might even collapse sometime in the mid 1800's; the CSA would be much more likely to win if the civil war as we know it occurs.

I think "rump state" is an exaggeration: sure a US east of the Mississippi would be smaller than OTL's US, but it would still be one of the largest countries in the world. Plus, even IOTL the great majority of the US population lives east of the Mississippi, so ITTL the US' population might not even be that much smaller than IOTL.
 
I think "rump state" is an exaggeration: sure a US east of the Mississippi would be smaller than OTL's US, but it would still be one of the largest countries in the world. Plus, even IOTL the great majority of the US population lives east of the Mississippi, so ITTL the US' population might not even be that much smaller than IOTL.

True, however most of the US food production comes from west of the Mississippi which allows the east to have that population.
 
A France that isn't wracked with revolution and fighting half of Europe is going to be one that is exerting a great deal more pressure on the colony than OTL. Americans might not get the chance to settle there en mass because the French will tell them to politely leave, and not so politely if they don't. The important thing about the Texas is that they were invited, these Americans won't be.
Yeah, but that doesn't mean that Americans would listen. We didn't listen much when GB told us to stop going past the Appalachians, and that was our government, so what's the likelihood that we'd listen to France? Plus, by the time of the Louisiana Purchase IOTL, even Napoleon realized how much of a craphole the Louisiana Territory was; it's why he sold it to the US at such a small price. So, it's likely that France wouldn't even care about the American illegals.

True, however most of the US food production comes from west of the Mississippi which allows the east to have that population.
Yeah, but the US would still have the Northwest Territory and general territory east of the Appalachians to help feed that large population. They'd still have room to farm, it just won't be as much room as OTL.
 
Yeah, but that doesn't mean that Americans would listen. We didn't listen much when GB told us to stop going past the Appalachians, and that was our government, so what's the likelihood that we'd listen to France? Plus, by the time of the Louisiana Purchase IOTL, even Napoleon realized how much of a craphole the Louisiana Territory was; it's why he sold it to the US at such a small price. So, it's likely that France wouldn't even care about the American illegals.
This is a Europe that isn't tearing it apart in a gargantuan war. America is going to find that an unoccupied Spain/France isn't that easy to tango with. You also have to wonder what Britain might do without Napoleon, Britain might decide it wants the old Northwest and come down on America like a bag of hammers.
 
Louisiana was not a money pit in 1800. It wasn't an extremely valuable/profitable territory, but it paid it's own way. New Orleans was a bustling city and the northern 'wilderness' was slowly being settled.

Spain welcomed US immigrants. Daniel Boone (on the run from debtors law in the US) was hired on as a land agent to bring in settlers from the states moving west.

Much of the animosity between Spain and US was over territory east of the Mississippi. Spain's agreement with France in gaining LA gave ALL the territory west of the Apalachians to Spain. France's agreement with Britain, gave Britain everything East of the Miss. Spain never relinquished its claim. Plus they claimed everything west and south of the Tennessee River by right of conquest in the revolution. Additionally, there was dispute over the northern border of Florida. They had good claims that were being trammeled. US shippers on the river regularly sought to skirt customs. Spain wasn't willy nilly closing the river out of petulance. Spain was a match for the US prior to being ripped apart in the French/Nap wars. The problem is that Spain had a lot of the world to cover. US gained a lot of valuable lessons in the War of 1812. butterfly that, and you have a dog with a lot of bark and little bite. But, Britain did have their back, which is why Spain backed off after 1795, only closing the river after returning LA to France, and presumably at French bidding. How much Britain would back US without the French Revolution/aftermath is a matter of debate. Britain had a nasty habit of not being too reliable an ally.

US correctly saw that the river was valuable and if they didn't take it soon, they wouldn't be able to get it later. So, while the continent was busy ripping itself apart, US turned up the rhetoric and lucked into an easy purchase. In their favor, though, if you butterfly the easy purchase, is that Spain wasn't exactly a beacon of capable government in that era.
 
Top