U.S. Politics if Henry Clay is elected?

Zioneer

Banned
So when working on my independent Deseret TL, I've run into a snag. I have a large amount of usable info for Deseret itself, and to a lesser extent Texas and California (both of which will also be independent), but very little on possibilities for the U.S. itself.

So I'm wondering, if Henry Clay is elected instead of Polk, how are the politics of the U.S changed?

What is the focus of the U.S without a Mexican-American War?

Would the Southerns aim for Cuba and the other Caribbean islands instead if they couldn't get the West? Or would they still focus on the West?

What regional sorts of things will pop up?

How about if splinter groups of Mormons stick around in the U.S.? Will there still be violent opposition to these smaller Mormon communities?
 
seems to me the USA would focus more on Oregon Territory, as well as attempt to annex the other independent nations like TX and CA. Eventually, they might focus also on Alaska as well as the Caribbean.

this would probably lead to tension with the British
 

Zioneer

Banned
seems to me the USA would focus more on Oregon Territory, as well as attempt to annex the other independent nations like TX and CA. Eventually, they might focus also on Alaska as well as the Caribbean.

this would probably lead to tension with the British

So they'd probably try to take or buy parts of Canada? As well as having a more northern focus for the Manifest Destiny?

Oh, and apparently Texas was annexed (or at least the bill to annex Texas) three days before Polk became president in OTL, by John Tyler. That would still happen, but would Texas still accept the terms?
 

Zioneer

Banned
Oh, and a second thought; with a diminished (or at least not uber-expanded) US, what would various nation's attitudes towards the Americans be?
 

Zioneer

Banned
Just bumping this to make sure that I've gotten as much info as possible, and if anyone has any thoughts on this, feel free to share them.
 
I'm not sure if the Southerners would direct their attention strongly toward the Caribbean. Wasn't one of the main objectives of annexing western territory to carve out new slave states to counter the free ones? Cuba certainly has slavery, but it's a very well-populated island of non-English speakers, as opposed to the scarcely populated northern Mexican territories which could be flooded with American settlers. Was it really very likely that Cuba could be added as a state? If not, it won't be nearly as valuable to the South.

This area of history isn't my forte though, so correct me if I'm wrong.
 

Zioneer

Banned
I'm not sure if the Southerners would direct their attention strongly toward the Caribbean. Wasn't one of the main objectives of annexing western territory to carve out new slave states to counter the free ones? Cuba certainly has slavery, but it's a very well-populated island of non-English speakers, as opposed to the scarcely populated northern Mexican territories which could be flooded with American settlers. Was it really very likely that Cuba could be added as a state? If not, it won't be nearly as valuable to the South.

This area of history isn't my forte though, so correct me if I'm wrong.

Well, I'm looking towards the idea of more than just Cuba getting invaded. What about the Bahamas (yes, I know, the British have the world's greatest navy and such, but it could technically be feasible), or Hispanola? Or even a collection of the smaller islands?

Also, there is the possibility of keeping Caribbean islands as territories, making them stopovers on the way to Central America, which could be an area of interest for the South.
 
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