What if the CSA won the American Civil War?

Long term, I think a later CS victory option is better, because they are more likely to try to officially enlist blacks in the army (Cleburne Memorial; there were already blacks voluntarily enlisting in the history records. See Richmond's parade, Louisiana Home Guard, Henry Brown, Calvin Scruggs, Louis Napoleon Nelson, etc). That kind of shared experience to me would build bonds that would encourage black civil rights in the CS earlier than OTL.
Cleburne is a poor example to use on hypothetical civil rights and abolition in the South, the man was a foreigner and thus not a part of the culture that had such a big interest in perpetuating slavery, and his proposal about freeing slaves to fight for them was rejected for the surprisingly sound logic of "if we start freeing slaves then what's the whole point of the rebellion?" Actual attempts at offering freedom in exchange for military service were just the desperate grasping at straws by an already dead Confederacy, they'd have never done this as long as there was an actual chance at winning. And without abolition and Reconstruction the South would still fear slave rebellions which would continue to shape the relations between whites and blacks. Plus, there's still the fact that large numbers of black people in the South, both slaves and freedmen, would have enlisted in the Union Army which attempted to stymie their efforts towards independence.
 
I honestly don't think the CS would keep slavery into the late 80s, early 90s. The Union did offer the Corwin Amendment, which they rejected, so that looks to me like slavery's not the hill they'd die on, to use a phrase.
They literally did die to protect slavery.
 
JJohnson scenario has racial relations being better than even modern times.
I find it...reasonable....and it's main problem is it hits our biases.

Logically we 'get' that society that frees its slaves not under duress feels reasonably confident in itself. It's also logical to assume that a society could choose to not do things like lynching, setting dogs protesters or stealing the property of free blacks. Refraining from doing so does tend to engender more good will in comparision to those societies that engage in such practices. If you start from that as a starting point after a 100 years or so you could end up with a society with less recrimination and "history" than otl.

I think this reasonably possible. I also think, selling this idea to the majority of posters on otl present day Alternate History.com who care about the American Civil War is more ASB than a successful Sea Lion.

The illusion of slavery is not being shattered by a late victory, if anything it would be vindicated and reinforced.

After you have a ton of freed blacks, armed blacks, worst of all educated blacks, going back to antebellum conditions is not possible. You could and probably would try, but it wouldn't work.


The lost cause revisionism was caused by wrong ideas, not resentment.Many falsehoods were promoted, trying to link the resentment to the policies "pushed" on the Southerners doesn't work because it ignores the amount of revisionism that was applied in the subsequent decades and the propaganda that shaped the creation of anti-black groups.

Yes, there were a lot of wrong ideas as well as some right ones, like the Yankees had more factories, and people. But, I think it defies common sense to suggest that lost causers didn't resent losing the war. To say policies and laws were laid down that White resentment to those polices didn't have something to do with the subsequent treatment of black people is to defy logic.

It is also reasonable to suggest that, without that resentment, behavior toward black people would be improved in some atls.


Having slavery being protected nationwide over state rights shows that short of revolution slavery can hardly be abolished without very strong popular support, something that I cannot see emerge short term.

1890 or 1900 or 1910 would be soon enough. A lot can change in 30-40 years. Dieing to defend slavery doesn't mean you won't mellow with age or that your children or grandchildren would do the same.

Do I find Cleburne's memorial being accepted as working, probably not. In fact Cleburne keeping his mouth shut, being promoted to Corps command, and doing something bigger during the Atlanta Campaign would be a more believable PoD. But long term, yes, I could see the Confederacy eventually becoming a reasonably decent nation and I think the legacy of the otl blinds us unreasonably to that possiblity.

The Confederates were not the noble hereos of the lost cause movement. But they are also not the cartoon villians that I sometimes feel they are portrayed as in modern media. I think we have not yet found the proper distance to see and judge them.
 
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