The Confederate Economy

Faeelin

Banned
Since these threads are good at generating discussion and thought, even if they don't have a timeline, as such.

Some thoughts: Prior to the civil war, Southern infrastructure lagged behind northern infrastructure. The Confederate constitution forbade protective tariffs, and federal improvements to infrastructure.

So, what's the Confederacy to do? Clearly at some point there will be a desire for protective tariffs; but how do you get the Carolinas and so forth to agree to tariffs? As agricultural states, they're going to favor free trade.

Hmm. It seems that the Confederate constitution doesn't forbid, say, Virginia from establishing protective tariffs; a confederation within the Confederation?

How will the Confederacy cope with the declining cotton prices in the latter half of the 1860s?
 

Straha

Banned
The negative effects of having no tariffs and no infrastucture will cause the CSA to revamp its constition in the 1890's or so allow for a more centralized governmnet...
 
Straha said:
The negative effects of having no tariffs and no infrastucture will cause the CSA to revamp its constition in the 1890's or so allow for a more centralized governmnet...
Think your right on this one. These clauses in the CS constitution were reaction to US tariffs pre succession which were use to fund projects that benifited the north while coming mostly from the south.
 
Straha said:
It wouldn't be a stretch to see the confederacy pioneering fascist style economics.

On this we agree. we'd probably see an "Iron revolution" shortly affter secession, as White confederates are forced to come up with an up to date military in the absence of a stable economy. Of course the side effect is that blacks take over menial jobs such as food production ;)
 

Straha

Banned
pisces74 said:
On this we agree. we'd probably see an "Iron revolution" shortly affter secession, as White confederates are forced to come up with an up to date military in the absence of a stable economy. Of course the side effect is that blacks take over menial jobs such as food production ;)
I think the blow up would take until the 1890's
 
I'd say 1870s, IMO England would want a loyal vass....errrr ally in the CSA, and play up the importance of an up to date military, they'd help out ...... for a fee. Cotton would be king for a while until the confederate national ports are brought up to speed , and then Gunship gunship gunship all the way. Based on English design, and the English textile industry gets all that cheap cotton to cloth Europe.
 

Straha

Banned
pisces74 said:
I'd say 1870s, IMO England would want a loyal vass....errrr ally in the CSA, and play up the importance of an up to date military, they'd help out ...... for a fee. Cotton would be king for a while until the confederate national ports are brought up to speed , and then Gunship gunship gunship all the way.
Well either way the blowup would be ugly...
 
Define Blow up please? I'm talking about whites taking nesscessary government/military positions ineligble to blacks, only to find that the blacks have a controlling interest in nesscessary economies. When that happens you'll see a redefiniton of "slavery"

in 1860s the CSA needs a

Up to date all white military

Stable economy, very likely backed by a european power

something that having a 40% black population isn't going to be conducive to. The CSA is going to needs the blacks on board, Lee, Jackson, Longstreet, Stephens, and Cleburne(?) all realized this. and this is in OTL where the issue wasn't forced.
 

Straha

Banned
pisces74 said:
Define Blow up please? I'm talking about whites taking nesscessary government/military positions ineligble to blacks, only to find that the blacks have a controlling interest in nesscessary economies. When that happens you'll see a redefiniton of "slavery"

in 1860s the CSA needs a

Up to date all white military

Stable economy, very likely backed by a european power

something that having a 40% black population isn't going to be conducive to. The CSA is going to needs the blacks on board, Lee, Jackson, Longstreet, Stephens, and Cleburne(?) all realized this. and this is in OTL where the issue wasn't forced.
Well in my CSA TL which I'm working on that issue is finessed by both the effect of the latin conquests and by dividing the free blacks(even before the ACW there was a good sized number of freed blacks and in my TL I have some owners using abolition as a possible goal to work to) from the rest of the blacks. Instead of having to deal with a close to a majority black population its more like 15-25% black population.
 
You've got a cold war with the union to worry about before dealing with central America, they're better armed, they're importing more daily, there is more of them to begin with, and they eat babies.The spanish speakers have their own problems to deal with. The CSA needs to "look to its own front" first. Anyone who says different is a scalawag carpetbagger.
 

Straha

Banned
pisces74 said:
You've got a cold war with the union to worry about before dealing with central America, they're better armed, they're importing more daily, there is more of them to begin with, and they eat babies.The spanish speakers have their own problems to deal with. The CSA needs to "look to its own front" first. Anyone who says different is a scalawag carpetbagger.
Well the POD of my CSA wins TL is 1850 and it involves wiliam walker taking over central america and filibusters seizing northern mexico/yucatan/chiapas/cuba. After the CSA wins the war the filibusters join up with the confederacy and thus begins the process of encircling mexico. Mexico falls under the Confederate heel in the 1890's...
 

Faeelin

Banned
pisces74 said:
something that having a 40% black population isn't going to be conducive to. The CSA is going to needs the blacks on board, Lee, Jackson, Longstreet, Stephens, and Cleburne(?) all realized this. and this is in OTL where the issue wasn't forced.

A war for national independence, when thousands of miles of the nation's territory are occupied by the enemy, isn't a time when the issue would be forced?
 
Faeelin said:
A war for national independence, when thousands of miles of the nation's territory are occupied by the enemy, isn't a time when the issue would be forced?

No. because in OTL when cleburne ( I think) start black confedeate units the war was for the most part over with. The CSA economy didn't become an issue because the CSA was stillborn. in a CSA wins scenario, economy becomes a high priority because the confederacy has to pay off the soldiers its employed, develop an economy, outfit a military, and grow an infrastructure. The whole time ignoring 40% of your population.
 

Faeelin

Banned
pisces74 said:
No. because in OTL when cleburne ( I think) start black confedeate units the war was for the most part over with.

Yes, because Cleburne proposed it (and was shot down), despite the state of the Confederacy in 1865.

"In January, 1864, General Patrick Cleburne and several other Confederate officers in the Army of the Tennessee proposed using slaves as soldiers since the Union was using black troops. Cleburne recommended offering slaves their freedom if they fought and survived. Confederate President Jefferson Davis refused to consider Cleburne's proposal and forbade further discussion of the idea. The concept, however, did not die.

By the fall of 1864, the South was losing more and more ground, and some believed that only by arming the slaves could defeat be averted. On March 13, the Confederate Congress passed General Order 14, and President Davis signed the order into law. The order was issued March 23, 1865, but only a few African-American companies were raised, and the war ended before they could be used in battle."

http://americancivilwar.com/colored/histofcoloredtroops.html

The CSA economy didn't become an issue because the CSA was stillborn. in a CSA wins scenario, economy becomes a high priority because the confederacy has to pay off the soldiers its employed, develop an economy, outfit a military, and grow an infrastructure. The whole time ignoring 40% of your population.

I don't get your point here.
 
In OTL the CSA didn't need to worry abot its economy, because they ceased to be the CSA.

If in this ATL the CSA wins, it needs to shore up the confederate dollar or go into immediate depression post war.

In my CSA experiment the CSA gets loaned money from England, and bent over the stump in the 1900s due to interest.
 
Faeelin said:
" On March 13, the Confederate Congress passed General Order 14, and President Davis signed the order into law. The order was issued March 23, 1865, but only a few African-American companies were raised, and the war ended before they could be used in battle."

http://americancivilwar.com/colored/histofcoloredtroops.html

The above contains a few factual errors, for what it is worth. Actually, on March 13, Congress passed the "Act to Increase the Military Force of the Confederate States," which authorized the recruitment of up to 200,000 slaves into the Confederate forces. On March 23, the Confederate War Department, at the order of President Davis, issued General Order #14, which specified the conditions under which slaves were to be admitted into the Confederate armies, including the following...1) They had to be freed first; 2) No regiments, brigades, or higher organizations would be formed using black troops; 3) pay, clothing, rations, and treatment would be equal to that provided for white troops.

And there is an eye-witness account indicating the black troops did fight during the retreat from Richmond to Appomattox. A witness saw a company of blacks defending a wagon train, "firing like veterans" before they were overwhelmed by attacking Union cavalry.
 
pisces74 said:
I'd say 1870s, IMO England would want a loyal vass....errrr ally in the CSA, and play up the importance of an up to date military, they'd help out ...... for a fee. Cotton would be king for a while until the confederate national ports are brought up to speed , and then Gunship gunship gunship all the way. Based on English design, and the English textile industry gets all that cheap cotton to cloth Europe.

Britain doesn't need the Confederacy. The Confederates overplayed their hand leading up to and during the ACW. Britain, wisely, recognized that dependence on the US for cotton was a bad thing, and began looking elsewhere. Lo and behold, they found Egypt, still in the throes of reform, jumped in, and enslaved Egypt to Cotton. Not only, cotton, but long-staple cotton, which is of considerably higher quality than American short-staple and the other major US kind, whose name escapes me now.

Britain got better prices and just as much from Egypt, reducing their need for Confederate cotton. Indeed, the CSA is going to be in deep shit very soon after the war. Britain's major interest is going to be to keep the CSA afloat so they can repay their debts. The CSA is going to have to commit major reforms very early as they find British bankers and diplomats becoming increasingly distant in light of the CSA's inability to pay off their war time debts, and if there is one thing the incipient CSA needs, it is public British backing.....
 
Since the Confederacy split from the US to prevent things like tariffs (that would've helped the Northern industry, but hurt the South - even though it might've helped the latter one in the long run), I can imagine that after they won the war they wouldn't introduce tariffs even if it becomes clear for thinking persons that they should - because of tradition, and because "we didn't fight a war to introduce tariffs!"
 
Why do most of the C.S.A. win scenerios involve them getting involved in Latin America? Why does it seem necessary for them to do so? Wasn't one of the ideas of the Confederacy to "be left alone; live and let live?" The C.S.A. should concentrate on defending the territory that they have and build a strong military not for offensive measures in Latin America but for defensive purposes. They would have bigger fish to fry after the war before needing to worry about Latin America. The only immediate foreign involvement I can see is Mexico - obtaining some land to allow the Confederacy a Pacific port and an ocean-to-ocean railroad. And this can be done thorough negotiation, and not military conquest.
 
Top