WI: Reconstruction was successful in Louisiana, Georgia and South Carolina but still fails in the rest of the South?

[Oba Cahokia]

Louisiana, Georgia and South Carolina saw the most success with Reconstruction IOTL out of the rest of the South. So if these 3 states had avoided Jim Crow, Poll Taxes and Literacy Tests and solidfying Black Enfranchisesment while the rest of the South fall to white Supremacy the same as OTL? How would US politics and culture diverge or differ from OTL?

 

[danteheadman]

I have nothing to contribute to this thread, but I would love to read a TL about the history of an integrated and prosperous New Orleans. Their position at the end of the Mississippi should have made the city an incredible economic power. I wonder if a more successful Reconstruction / avoidance of Jim Crow would have enabled that.

 

[danteheadman]

More generally, I want to see a TL where both New Orleans (plus northern Jefferson parish and parts of St. Bernard and St. Tammanay parishes) and San Francisco (really most of the Bay Area) consolidate into NYC-style multicounty municipalities that economically dominate their respective states due to their commercially fortunate positions on the mouths of major waterways.

If I ever write one I'd call it Orion's Cities: Three Sisters of the United States. NYC in the northeast, NOC in the south, and SFC in the west. That'd be cool.

 

[durante]

More generally, I want to see a TL where both New Orleans (plus northern Jefferson parish and parts of St. Bernard and St. Tammanay parishes) and San Francisco (really most of the Bay Area) consolidate into NYC-style multicounty municipalities that economically dominate their respective states due to their commercially fortunate positions on the mouths of major waterways.

If I ever write one I'd call it Orion's Cities: Three Sisters of the United States. NYC in the northeast, NOC in the south, and SFC in the west. That'd be cool.

I agree that'd be cool! Someone once said that the USA has three cities: NYC, New Orleans, and San Francisco, everything else is just pale imitations of some combination of these.

I'd just like to see this come to fruition:

Amazon Developing Alt-History Reparations Series ‘Black America' | Essence

Will Packer and ‘The Boondocks’ Creator Aaron McGruder will envision a post-reparations America. [node:meta_description]

www.essence.com

ITTL Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama are given to free blacks after the end of slavery.

 

[durante]

To try to take a guess at what would happen; I'd imagine that in a TL where some former Confederate states are reconstructed and some are not, you'd likely see a large movement of African-Americans from the Jim Crow states to the Reconstructed states. And also likely a movement, albeit likely smaller at first, of whites the other way.

When the great migration occurs, African-Americans from the reconstructed south will be less likely to move north, whereas whites from the reconstructed south will be more likely than their counterparts.

I'd expect the reconstructed south to be majority black to this day.

 

[dcharles]

I have nothing to contribute to this thread, but I would love to read a TL about the history of an integrated and prosperous New Orleans. Their position at the end of the Mississippi should have made the city an incredible economic power. I wonder if a more successful Reconstruction / avoidance of Jim Crow would have enabled that.

NOLA guy here. One of our problems is that we're so far upriver. It's hard to compete with Galveston/Houston after the ships get to be a certain size. I'm no engineer, so no idea what happens if you dredge us into relevance.

 

[dcharles]

I agree that'd be cool! Someone once said that the USA has three cities: NYC, New Orleans, and San Francisco, everything else is just pale imitations of some combination of these.

Tennessee Williams was that someone.

“America only has three cities: New York, San Francisco, and New Orleans. Everywhere else is Cleveland.”

 

[dcharles]

If I ever write one I'd call it Orion's Cities: Three Sisters of the United States. NYC in the northeast, NOC in the south, and SFC in the west. That'd be cool.

Fuck "ever." I want to read it ASAP! Do it,buddy!

 

[durante]

Hopefully ITTL "A Confederacy of Dunces" movie gets made and the basketball team is called the New Orleans Jazz. (Seriously, Utah Jazz?)

 

[dcharles]

Hopefully ITTL "A Confederacy of Dunces" movie gets made and the basketball team is called the New Orleans Jazz. (Seriously, Utah Jazz?)

Well, we used to be the Jazz. We're good at naming shit, so Utah refused to give it back after the business moved.

Also, fuck Utah. They stole our fucking name.

 

[danteheadman]

NOLA guy here. One of our problems is that we're so far upriver. It's hard to compete with Galveston/Houston after the ships get to be a certain size. I'm no engineer, so no idea what happens if you dredge us into relevance.

Incredible prosperity and environmental devastation, probably.
But like New York destroyed and rebuilt it's maritime ecosystems at least once in the 20th century, so it'll probably be fine in the long run?

 

[dcharles]

Incredible prosperity and environmental devastation, probably.
But like New York destroyed and rebuilt it's maritime ecosystems at least once in the 20th century, so it'll probably be fine in the long run?

You should do some serious research on the topic. We're all interested.

 

[danteheadman]

You should do some serious research on the topic. We're all interested.

I don't have the time for real research

 

[AltoRegnant]

If I were to Hazzard a guess, this seems bad for the democratic party nationally. These states will be republican strongholds for at least a generation or two (especially sc and la,) and the only one I see not being a safe republican position is a swing state Georgia. This leaves the DRC with Virginia, the very deep south, and the planes. That just doesn't feel like the electoral base of a national party.

All three of them probably see more national investment, and it's very likely there's no great migration out of the south, but one to different parts of the south. Which strengthens them in the house and further weakens the democrats.

Otl the party switch was started when the democrats were more receptive to immigrants, which pivoted them to an urban party with Wilson's economic progressivism (and then FDR solidified it,) which is why they became pro-civil rights (outside the dixiecrats who pivoted to the nativist gop.) I don't know if that would happen ttl, since the Republicans still have such a strong base in the cities of the south

 

[danteheadman]

If I were to Hazzard a guess, this seems bad for the democratic party nationally. These states will be republican strongholds for at least a generation or two (especially sc and la,) and the only one I see not being a safe republican position is a swing state Georgia. This leaves the DRC with Virginia, the very deep south, and the planes. That just doesn't feel like the electoral base of a national party.

All three of them probably see more national investment, and it's very likely there's no great migration out of the south, but one to different parts of the south. Which strengthens them in the house and further weakens the democrats.

Otl the party switch was started when the democrats were more receptive to immigrants, which pivoted them to an urban party with Wilson's economic progressivism (and then FDR solidified it,) which is why they became pro-civil rights (outside the dixiecrats who pivoted to the nativist gop.) I don't know if that would happen ttl, since the Republicans still have such a strong base in the cities of the south

That might also avert the policy swap of the Southern Strategy. The Republicans would be and remain the left-leaning / liberal / abolitionist-cum-civil-rights party, and the Democrats would stay the Southern right-leaning / conservative/ landed slaveholding gentry white man's party.

Also hehe Hazzard

 

[dcharles]

That might also avert the policy swap of the Southern Strategy. The Republicans would be and remain the left-leaning / liberal / abolitionist-cum-civil-rights party, and the Democrats would stay the Southern right-leaning / conservative/ landed slaveholding gentry white man's party.

Also hehe Hazzard

But that's not what they were. Republicans were never left leaning. They were the heirs to the theory of "meritocracy." They were always super-capitalist. The parties of yesterday do not map cleanly on today's divisions, tbh.

 

[raharris1973]

Louisiana, Georgia and South Carolina saw the most success with Reconstruction IOTL out of the rest of the South. So if these 3 states had avoided Jim Crow, Poll Taxes and Literacy Tests and solidfying Black Enfranchisesment while the rest of the South fall to white Supremacy the same as OTL? How would US politics and culture diverge or differ from OTL?

Not sure how to realistically make this happen. It could help if the Federal government could 'gerrymander' the states by lopping off majority white counties of South Carolina, Georgia and Louisiana to neighboring states like North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, Florida, Arkansas and Texas, and adding majority black counties from any of those states or neighboring majority black Mississippi. I'm not sure how they would justify it.

 

[durante]

Not sure how to realistically make this happen. It could help if the Federal government could 'gerrymander' the states by lopping off majority white counties of South Carolina, Georgia and Louisiana to neighboring states like North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, Florida, Arkansas and Texas, and adding majority black counties from any of those states or neighboring majority black Mississippi. I'm not sure how they would justify it.

I've toyed with how to realistically give some teeth to reconstruction - I think avoiding Johnson's presidency (and the resulting reversing or Sherman's famous "forty acres and a mule" order) as well as actually allowing significant African-American participation in the Southern Homestead Act.

Maybe combine the two together and freed African-Americans are given 40 acres out of the land allocated to the Southern Homestead Act?

Southern Homestead Act of 1866 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Id love to find the breakdown by state. The land was available in Arkansas, LA, MS, AL, and FL.

Maybe Arkansas, and Florida are removed
from the area to which black homesteads are
allotted?

If a high enough percentage of a state population become land-owning black Americans, that state effectively becomes Jim Crow-proof, as poll taxes won't return whites to power.

 

[durante]

Alright.. so with an increased supply of labour and faster growing population due to lack of migration, a well a with proximity to Birmingham, the Southern Pittsburgh, I wonder if New Orleans could develop as a sort of Southern Detroit - a major automobile manufacturer.

 

[Pesterfield]

With Georgia more strongly Reconstructed what does that do to the Daughters of the Confederacy?

One of the first organizations was founded in Georgia, the other was in Tennessee so will probable still happen.
Anna Raines the leader of the group from Georgia appears to have done most of the work constitution, bylaws, and symbol.