WI: Georgia remained abolitionist?

[The_Persian_Cat]

Hello all,

So, the colony of Georgia was founded by James Oglethorpe, a noted social reformer. In 1735, Georgia (under Oglethorpe's proprietorship) banned slavery -- both the slave trade and ownership of slaves -- becoming the only one of the Thirteen Colonies to do so. This was known as the Georgia Experiment, and it lasted until 1751, when slavery was again legalised in Georgia by royal decree, in part due to the influence of George Whitefield.

There are a few reasons why slavery was banned. First of all, obviously, there was the moral argument -- many felt slavery was a moral, social, and spiritual evil, and Oglethorpe (I believe?) was of this view. Secondly, Oglethorpe intended Georgia to be a place for England's worthy poor to live happy and healthy lives, and the growth of a planter aristocracy was preventing that goal. With so much of Georgia's farmland claimed by great plantations, there was no land left for the yeoman farmer, nor was there any way for the common man to earn a wage by working the land (since the plantations were operated by unpaid slave labour). Third, this was before the invention of the cotton gin in 1793. Colonies like Jamaica were dependent on slavery, but that wasn't quite the case yet in Georgia. The plantations at this point generally produced things like rice (often for export to other colonies, like Jamaica) rather than cash crops like cotton or sugar. Finally -- the Spanish. Oglethorpe argued that slaves were potentially destabilising since they might defect to Spanish Florida. Indeed, many English slaves did defect to Spain during the War of Jenkins' Ear (1739-1748), and so slavery remained abolished throughout the war.

But what if the Georgia Experiment had never ended? Is it possible for it to have continued indefinitely? Might Georgia have encouraged other colonies to abolish slavery, too? What would the US look like, if one of the states in the Deep South was also an abolitionist state?

 

[Don Corleone]

We would be a lot better off.

Georgia cuts off the westward expansion of slavery in the Deep South. It also allows the Constitution to include Jefferson's ban on westward expansion, as there will be only three states (VA, NC, SC) opposed. It took 9 ratifications to enact the Constitution. NC was a holdout in OTL anyway, and we have enough major national leaders from Virginia to convince Virginia to go along.

That leaves the Carolinas as a separate entity. Western NC was never slave territory and prime tobacco land doesn't stay prime. Eventually they're going to join the US.

World opinion will turn against slavery, and South Carolina will become increasingly a pariah nation. Slaves will escape to the US. They'll ally with Spain and Brazil while they can. Eventually their model becomes unsustainable and they nominally abolish slavery.

 

[George_Apley]

I don't know how Georgia remains abolitionist. It's hard to come up with an appropriate POD to make it so. South Carolina essentially seeds Georgia with the sort of gentry that all but guarantees that the shift to being a pro-slavery, plantation-based colony occurs. You'd have to find a way to stop South Carolina from becoming a hegemon over Georgia, which is essentially what it was (and continued to be through the early-19th Century).

 

[The_Persian_Cat]

I don't know how Georgia remains abolitionist. It's hard to come up with an appropriate POD to make it so. South Carolina essentially seeds Georgia with the sort of gentry that all but guarantees that the shift to being a pro-slavery, plantation-based colony occurs. You'd have to find a way to stop South Carolina from becoming a hegemon over Georgia, which is essentially what it was (and continued to be through the early-19th Century).

I'm afraid I don't understand. How was South Carolina a hegemon over Georgia, and why did South Carolina need a planter class in Georgia? And was this the case before slavery was reintroduced to Georgia in 1751?

 

[Wendell]

Very interesting idea.

 

[George_Apley]

I'm afraid I don't understand. How was South Carolina a hegemon over Georgia, and why did South Carolina need a planter class in Georgia? And was this the case before slavery was reintroduced to Georgia in 1751?

"Seeded" may have been too strong of a word, but South Carolina was culturally hegemonic over Georgia by the late-1730s and prospective Georgia planters, seeing the economic success in Charleston, began strongly pressuring Parliament to allow slavery in the colony. Some basic encyclopedia stuff can be found here: Georgia Encyclopedia: Slavery in Colonial Georgia. Maybe you can find a good POD in there somewhere.

 

[sampleswift]

I remember this from 8th Grade Georgia history. This is an interesting topic. It could lead to the end of slavery in the US earlier due to having enough support to bar it from the territories...
But it would be very difficult to make this happen.

 

[unprincipled peter]

The plantations at this point generally produced things like rice (often for export to other colonies, like Jamaica) rather than cash crops like cotton or sugar.

kind of off topic, but...
Massive fortunes were made off rice, so how is it not a cash crop? It was also, I think, slave intensive.

 

[The_Persian_Cat]

kind of off topic, but...
Massive fortunes were made off rice, so how is it not a cash crop? It was also, I think, slave intensive.

It was slave-intensive and profitable, that's true. But rice is not a cash crop. Georgia and other North American colonies produced rice in order to feed Jamaica and the rest of the West Indies. The rice trade existed only in order to support the sugar, etc trades. All of the land in Jamaica was dedicated to sugar production, and therefore Jamaica had to import food, and so British policy was to encourage the production of foodstuffs in North America in order to sustain the West Indies.

France did the same thing. The Louisiana Territory was mainly valuable as a source of food for Saint-Domingue. When France lost Saint-Domingue and it became Haiti, France sold Louisiana, because the cash would be more valuable than Louisiana on its own.

 

[Wendell]

Assuming minimal butterflies until after the War of Independence (not particularly plausible or likely I know), the Carolinas might hold out on ratifying the Constitution of the United States if it restricts slavery to where it already existed, but this could make the border disputes of those states much more interesting.

 

[George_Apley]

It was slave-intensive and profitable, that's true. But rice is not a cash crop. Georgia and other North American colonies produced rice in order to feed Jamaica and the rest of the West Indies. The rice trade existed only in order to support the sugar, etc trades. All of the land in Jamaica was dedicated to sugar production, and therefore Jamaica had to import food, and so British policy was to encourage the production of foodstuffs in North America in order to sustain the West Indies.

France did the same thing. The Louisiana Territory was mainly valuable as a source of food for Saint-Domingue. When France lost Saint-Domingue and it became Haiti, France sold Louisiana, because the cash would be more valuable than Louisiana on its own.

If your definition of "cash-crop" is that it has to be a commodity apart from foodstuff then okay, but generally I'd consider rice, the way it was cultured and harvested in the British-American south, to be a staple cash-crop. No willing, hired employees would ever have gone into those god-awful rice fields. The nature of mass-rice agriculture in North America required slavery. Without slavery, the rice crop would have developed totally differently and not been as productive.

 

[The_Persian_Cat]

If your definition of "cash-crop" is that it has to be a commodity apart from foodstuff then okay, but generally I'd consider rice, the way it was cultured and harvested in the British-American south, to be a staple cash-crop. No willing, hired employees would ever have gone into those god-awful rice fields. The nature of mass-rice agriculture in North America required slavery. Without slavery, the rice crop would have developed totally differently and not been as productive.

But is slavery what defines a cash crop? Cotton was also produced in Egypt and India, and while cotton production in both those countries was still brutal, it wasn't produced by slaves.

 

[George_Apley]

But is slavery what defines a cash crop? Cotton was also produced in Egypt and India, and while cotton production in both those countries was still brutal, it wasn't produced by slaves.

No, not necessarily. But I've always thought of it as an operation of scale for the benefit of a small number of planters. So cotton, tobacco, and indigo are cash crops absolutely, but so is foodstuff that's cultivated via mass agriculture primarily for export.

 

[The_Persian_Cat]

No, not necessarily. But I've always thought of it as an operation of scale for the benefit of a small number of planters. So cotton, tobacco, and indigo are cash crops absolutely, but so is foodstuff that's cultivated via mass agriculture primarily for export.

Okay, that makes sense. So rice is a cash crop when it's produced for export as a commodity, but not when it's meant to feed the community that produces it. I think I can see that.

 

[sampleswift]

Assuming minimal butterflies until after the War of Independence (not particularly plausible or likely I know), the Carolinas might hold out on ratifying the Constitution of the United States if it restricts slavery to where it already existed, but this could make the border disputes of those states much more interesting.

This could even lead to a Confederation of the Carolinas-esque situation (a less grimdark version of it from What Madness Is This), but I don't think the Carolinas would survive that long...

 

[SealTheRealDeal]

Which side of the ARW did the Georgian planters support? iirc Georgia was the most loyalist of the 13 Colonies. If removing the planters removes loyalists, then the patriots may win in the South much quicker. Likewise, if removing the planters removes patriots then Georgia may well remain a colony of Britain.

 

[sampleswift]

Which side of the ARW did the Georgian planters support? iirc Georgia was the most loyalist of the 13 Colonies. If removing the planters removes loyalists, then the patriots may win in the South much quicker. Likewise, if removing the planters removes patriots then Georgia may well remain a colony of Britain.

IIRC the main reason Georgian planters supported the Patriots was because the British Army supposedly claimed that any slaves who ran away and joined them would gain their freedom. The British usually didn't keep up their end of the deal.
I also Googled that the Patriots were most likely to have been from the backcountry (and less likely to have been planters), but this is Google, not a peer-reviewed source.

 

[Wendell]

This could even lead to a Confederation of the Carolinas-esque situation (a less grimdark version of it from What Madness Is This), but I don't think the Carolinas would survive that long...

No, they would be conquered.

 

[sampleswift]

No, they would be conquered.

Sounds about right... didn't expect much from them. Thanks.

 

[Wendell]

Sounds about right... didn't expect much from them. Thanks.

I'll be more specific. The land disputes the Carolnas had with the other states would likely prompt war. They would be dragged into the Union and slavery wound down.