Santo Domingo Annexed by the United States ... under LINCOLN

Super_Cool2

There have been some discussions on this site about the potential annexation of Santo Domingo (now Dominican Republic) under the presidency of Ulysses Grant in the 1870s. However, Santo Domingo had previously given up its sovereignty to Spain in 1861 in OTL, which is a nice POD.

What if, instead of Spain, Santo Domingo petitioned for statehood in the United States in 1861? Lincoln could go for it for several reasons:
-Place to send former slaves after the war instead of his OTL proposal to buy Cozumel.
-Majority black state will help him get elected in 1864. Nevada was made a state for electoral reasons in OTL. Santo Domingo won’t be voting Democrat.
-Demonstrates at home and abroad that the USA is powerful, still growing, and inspiring.
-Source of troops to fight Civil War so Lincoln may not need to use conscription. And it won’t be foreign troops because troops from Santo Domingo would now be Americans.

Seward is happy because he was a major expansionist.

So, Santo Domingo becomes American instead of Spanish in the 1860s. Is this plausible and what are the effects?
 

stubear1012

In the long term you would see Puerto Rico and the American Virgin Islands merged into Santo Domingo to form a larger American State.

The wild cards in the future are Haiti and Cuba. Would Haiti eventually merge into the existing American state of Santo Domingo? Also would the presence of an existing AMerican state in the Caribbean make it easier for Cuba to be merged with that American State.
 

FillyofDelphi

Banned
Arcavius said:
Would the Congress even confirm a Hispanophone state in this time period?
Click to expand...

I doubt it. They're a tad busy at the moment to manage that particular public debate and the complexities of integrating an overseas territory, given there is a large civil war going on.
 
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