Political Parties in the Confederate States of America

Anaxagoras

Banned
Yep, and they may well make a comeback. There were signs of that OTL. They may start back up again call themselves "Cotton or Southern Whigs".

I'm skeptical about the old divisions between Democrats and Whigs playing much of a role in the politics of a victorious Confederacy.
 
Protectionist? Protectionist how? The Southern economy was based on a free flow of exports and imports and Southern politicians had been opposed to tariffs for generations.

The last is exaggerated, SOME politicians were opposed to tariffs. As Alexander Stephans himself pointed out a number of Southerners voted for the previous tariff. If they want to develop any sort of industry they would have to use tariffs or some other trade restricting to do so or they will be run over by US and British manufacturers.
 
I'm skeptical about the old divisions between Democrats and Whigs playing much of a role in the politics of a victorious Confederacy.

Maybe, maybe not. Someone is eventually going to compete against the Democrats (unless it turns into a full fledged one party police state which is quite possible if not probable) and the most likely candidate are the Whigs or Whigs in all but name. There were a lot of ex-Whigs running around.
 

Anaxagoras

Banned
The last is exaggerated, SOME politicians were opposed to tariffs. As Alexander Stephans himself pointed out a number of Southerners voted for the previous tariff. If they want to develop any sort of industry they would have to use tariffs or some other trade restricting to do so or they will be run over by US and British manufacturers.

True enough. Sugar producers in the South fought hard for protection against imports. But that's a specific case. Generally speaking, pre-war Southern politicians favored free trade. But putting into place a tariff designed to support industrialization would have violated the Confederate Constitution.
 
True enough. Sugar producers in the South fought hard for protection against imports. But that's a specific case. Generally speaking, pre-war Southern politicians favored free trade. But putting into place a tariff designed to support industrialization would have violated the Confederate Constitution.

So they come out in favor of an amendment. They main thing the South cared about was slavery the rest was negotiable.
 

bguy

Donor
True enough. Sugar producers in the South fought hard for protection against imports. But that's a specific case. Generally speaking, pre-war Southern politicians favored free trade. But putting into place a tariff designed to support industrialization would have violated the Confederate Constitution.

That doesn't mean you couldn't have a pro-industry party develop though. They would just campaign on seeking to amend the constitution so as to allow protective tariffs (and subsidies for industry.) And anyway the Confederate Constitution did allow for revenue tariffs, so a pro-industry party could still get a lot of protection against imports simply by maintaining a high revenue tariff.
 
I'm loving the idea of Emocrats. They'd walk around all in black, take up a daring fashion inspired by Ancient Egypt and their eyes with kohl, affect a sorrowful, lugubrious tone and watch disdainfully as the foppish, active politicians try to each make themselves important. ;)
 
In the immediate aftermath of the civil war, this is pretty much in my opinion only democrats organized along factions, state affiliations and personal interests. I would see eventually see the political landscape bipolarized between a party of whig obedience (former southern whigs as said previously) and what would IOTL become Bourbon Democrats.
The white supremacy isn't much the issue of the day since independence and continued existence of slavery limit eventual grudge that former Confederate people would hold against former slaves.
Eventually, I think Whigs could rely on pro small farmers who would feel wronged big planters and their large unpaid workforce; that consideration has come to me regarding the agrarian component of Ben Tillman's platform. Ultimately, racial hatred would still develop, but rather on social ground, lower class people accusing slaves of taking their jobs.
 
In the immediate aftermath of the civil war, this is pretty much in my opinion only democrats organized along factions, state affiliations and personal interests. I would see eventually see the political landscape bipolarized between a party of whig obedience (former southern whigs as said previously) and what would IOTL become Bourbon Democrats.
The white supremacy isn't much the issue of the day since independence and continued existence of slavery limit eventual grudge that former Confederate people would hold against former slaves.
Eventually, I think Whigs could rely on pro small farmers who would feel wronged big planters and their large unpaid workforce; that consideration has come to me regarding the agrarian component of Ben Tillman's platform. Ultimately, racial hatred would still develop, but rather on social ground, lower class people accusing slaves of taking their jobs.

The Confederate States of America were mainly conservative, perhaps there are liberal or democratic holdouts.
 

jahenders

Banned
Well, during the actual war, they seem to have avoided political party labels as ungentlemanly.

Largely, but that was largely because they united in the face of an existential threat. If they somehow secured their independence, they'd soon fall to bickering, parties, and so forth. Over time, I suspect there would even be some with differing views on maintaining slavery as time progressed (assuming it had negative international consequences and was a continuing source of contention with the US).
 
Largely, but that was largely because they united in the face of an existential threat. If they somehow secured their independence, they'd soon fall to bickering, parties, and so forth. Over time, I suspect there would even be some with differing views on maintaining slavery as time progressed (assuming it had negative international consequences and was a continuing source of contention with the US).
They had plenty of bickering as it was, the 1863 midterms saw a lot of very bitter contests, but It Just Wasn't Done to give your faction a label or organise slates. I think internal Democratic politics postbellum may be the best model.
 
They had plenty of bickering as it was, the 1863 midterms saw a lot of very bitter contests, but It Just Wasn't Done to give your faction a label or organise slates. I think internal Democratic politics postbellum may be the best model.

I think eventually there would be labels, if you don't label yourself your opponents eventually will label you.
 
Top