What If: Lincoln Gunned Down in Baltimore!

As the title suggests, what if the infamous Baltimore Plot hadn't been discovered by Pinkerton and thus Lincoln was assassinated in Baltimore as he traveled through? Even today the United States hasn't seen a President-elect killed before taking office. Likely Hamlin would be inaugurated as the 16th President. What consequences would this have?
 
Personally I've never understood why some people think this would cause LESS states to secede. The South hated Lincoln and many openly called for his assassination before he could take office. I can imagine Hamlin, being a radical Republican, would potentially announce a premature Emancipation Proclamation and drive many, if not all, of the border states into the Confederacy.
 
Three things with this scenario:

1. Although it was assumed that the VP took over if the President died, it wasn’t codified into the Constitution, and it hadn’t happened before a President took office. After the Civil War, this will be the first rule patch in the Constitution whether the nation stays together or not.

2. The only way the South wins the war is with outside assistance. Lincoln made sure the British stayed out of the war - if Hamlin is less smooth and the CSA calls upon the British, they have a fighting chance.

3. In addition to Kentucky and Missouri as slave states that didn’t join the CSA, the state of Maryland was on the verge of voting to secede. This means Washington, DC is surrounded by Confederate territory and will almost certainly have to be abandoned. After the war, the USA will need a new permanent capital. Philadelphia is possible but it’s built up and too close to CSA territory. One possibility is Chicago, especially after the Great Chicago Fire.
 
If Maryland were to vote to secede, which is a very long shot but let's say partly spurred by fear of reprisal for having a President Elect assassinated on their own soil, it's still not as if secession was winner take all. Maryland would still be crawling with Union Loyalists and Federal Troops. Even if by some miracle the Union Army gets completely ejected from DC and Maryland, the Mason-Dixon line isn't particularly a strong defensive border. You might see action in the east shift somewhat northward but it'd be highly dependent on keeping that rail line to Alexandria going. Supplying an army in Maryland is going to be a challenge for the Confederacy regardless even if this all goes very well.

Maybe Maryland would raise more regiments for Confederate service if this all went off perfect, but I suspect you'll still see a lot of Maryland regiments in the Union Army as well. The part that would be interesting to know is how this would affect the Union blockade. Not to say they couldn't maintain it despite lacking secure port facilities on the western shore of the upper Chesapeake, but it would likely make it more expensive in some ways.
 
Three things with this scenario:

1. Although it was assumed that the VP took over if the President died, it wasn’t codified into the Constitution, and it hadn’t happened before a President took office. After the Civil War, this will be the first rule patch in the Constitution whether the nation stays together or not.

2. The only way the South wins the war is with outside assistance. Lincoln made sure the British stayed out of the war - if Hamlin is less smooth and the CSA calls upon the British, they have a fighting chance.

3. In addition to Kentucky and Missouri as slave states that didn’t join the CSA, the state of Maryland was on the verge of voting to secede. This means Washington, DC is surrounded by Confederate territory and will almost certainly have to be abandoned. After the war, the USA will need a new permanent capital. Philadelphia is possible but it’s built up and too close to CSA territory. One possibility is Chicago, especially after the Great Chicago Fire.
I disagree with one of your points. The confederates did not require foreign aid to win the war. They simply needed to hold out long enough for the 1864 presidential election to come around and have a peace democrat win the election. Also I imagine that if the capital wasn't moved to Philadelphia, it would likely be New York it moved to.
 

samcster94

Banned
Three things with this scenario:

1. Although it was assumed that the VP took over if the President died, it wasn’t codified into the Constitution, and it hadn’t happened before a President took office. After the Civil War, this will be the first rule patch in the Constitution whether the nation stays together or not.

2. The only way the South wins the war is with outside assistance. Lincoln made sure the British stayed out of the war - if Hamlin is less smooth and the CSA calls upon the British, they have a fighting chance.

3. In addition to Kentucky and Missouri as slave states that didn’t join the CSA, the state of Maryland was on the verge of voting to secede. This means Washington, DC is surrounded by Confederate territory and will almost certainly have to be abandoned. After the war, the USA will need a new permanent capital. Philadelphia is possible but it’s built up and too close to CSA territory. One possibility is Chicago, especially after the Great Chicago Fire.
The British hated slavery, why would they help the South?
 
The British hated slavery, why would they help the South?
Well for a while the war wasn't officially about freeing the slaves, it was about restoring the Union. The British still had some reservations but the British hated the United States and would've loved nothing more than to see it split into two antagonistic parts. It wasn't until it looked like the South was definitely losing that the British finally stopped toying with the idea of recognizing the CSA.
 

samcster94

Banned
Well for a while the war wasn't officially about freeing the slaves, it was about restoring the Union. The British still had some reservations but the British hated the United States and would've loved nothing more than to see it split into two antagonistic parts. It wasn't until it looked like the South was definitely losing that the British finally stopped toying with the idea of recognizing the CSA.
I think backing the South would have been political suicide for the British
 

Thomas1195

Banned
If so, then they wouldn't have even considered it. Yet they did, almost went through with it on a few occasions.

Depends, Hamlin, a Radical, may declare a war against slavery from the beginning. And now helping the South would be a true political suicide for the Liberals.

And even if the war goes as OTL, opposition within the ruling Liberals were too much, notably John Bright, who played a key role in preventing British war entry.
 
As it happens, I wrote a TL on this very subject: From Fifth Wheel to the Driver’s Seat: A President Hannibal Hamlin TL

I can imagine Hamlin, being a radical Republican, would potentially announce a premature Emancipation Proclamation and drive many, if not all, of the border states into the Confederacy.

This is precisely what happened in my TL.

Three things with this scenario:

1. Although it was assumed that the VP took over if the President died, it wasn’t codified into the Constitution, and it hadn’t happened before a President took office. After the Civil War, this will be the first rule patch in the Constitution whether the nation stays together or not.

2. The only way the South wins the war is with outside assistance. Lincoln made sure the British stayed out of the war - if Hamlin is less smooth and the CSA calls upon the British, they have a fighting chance.

3. In addition to Kentucky and Missouri as slave states that didn’t join the CSA, the state of Maryland was on the verge of voting to secede. This means Washington, DC is surrounded by Confederate territory and will almost certainly have to be abandoned. After the war, the USA will need a new permanent capital. Philadelphia is possible but it’s built up and too close to CSA territory. One possibility is Chicago, especially after the Great Chicago Fire.

Agreed on #1, though I have mixed feelings about #2 (see below). I think #3 is avoided due to a harsh crackdown (more so than OTL) on Maryland's Confederates after Lincoln's assassination in the capital of Baltimore.

I disagree with one of your points. The confederates did not require foreign aid to win the war. They simply needed to hold out long enough for the 1864 presidential election to come around and have a peace democrat win the election.

This is what happened in my TL; Horatio Seymour wins in 1864 and agrees to an armistice with the South.
 
As it happens, I wrote a TL on this very subject: From Fifth Wheel to the Driver’s Seat: A President Hannibal Hamlin TL



This is precisely what happened in my TL.



Agreed on #1, though I have mixed feelings about #2 (see below). I think #3 is avoided due to a harsh crackdown (more so than OTL) on Maryland's Confederates after Lincoln's assassination in the capital of Baltimore.



This is what happened in my TL; Horatio Seymour wins in 1864 and agrees to an armistice with the South.
Sounds interesting, I'd like to read it but your link doesn't work :(
 
There's a TL out there where Lincoln is shot in DC and Lee actually sides with the Union in response because political assassination would have been so far beyond the pale.
 
Personally I've never understood why some people think this would cause LESS states to secede. The South hated Lincoln and many openly called for his assassination before he could take office. I can imagine Hamlin, being a radical Republican, would potentially announce a premature Emancipation Proclamation and drive many, if not all, of the border states into the Confederacy.

It's because an pre-war assassination of Lincoln means that the South loses their moral and political high ground. Secession occurred under the pretense that the Constitution allowed it (or at least didn't not allow it) but the murder of a sitting US president strips away the legal veneer and makes them look like a bunch of violent crazies. In our history it took a fair amount to work up to the war but if Lincoln is murdered right off the bat then it could certainly turn some public opinion in the South against "morally bankrupt" secession supporters. A lot of vocal people might have called for Lincoln's death but how many prominent Southerners are going to back that position when a US president (even an unpopular one) is gunned down in the street? Murder your political enemies was not a sentiment that would have been widely accepted even in that period of US history.

Personally I don't think that it would have stopped the secession attempt but I do think that it's a plausible argument and would certainly put a damper on early Southern legitimacy and enthusiasm.
 
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It's because an pre-war assassination of Lincoln means that the South loses their moral and political high ground. Secession occurred under the pretense that the Constitution allowed it (or at least didn't not allow it) but the murder of a sitting US president strips away the legal veneer and makes them look like a bunch of violent crazies. In our history it took a fair amount to work up to the war but if Lincoln is murdered right off the bat then it could certainly turn some public opinion in the South against "morally bankrupt" secession supporters. A lot of vocal people might have called for Lincoln's death but how many prominent Southerners are going to back that position when a US president (even an unpopular one) is gunned down in the street? Murder your political enemies was not a sentiment that would have been widely accepted even in that period of US history.

Personally I don't think that it would have stopped the secession attempt but I do think that it's a plausible argument and would certainly put a damper on early Southern legitimacy and enthusiasm.

Definitely and I can picture it could be used to further frame them badly.

I don’t the South will be escaping this however though.
 
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