If you want a culturally more "northern" or "southern" USA, how do you get it?

[raharris1973]

Is it possible to have something akin to the New England Puritan and then later reformist culture be dominant in Virginia? Or southern values be predominant in Massachussets?

Can one get much mileage by tweaking the founding (say Jamestown fails for a New England wank, or Roanoke succeeds for a Dixie wank), or is the culture too overdetermined by economics in turn overdetermined by climate?

 

[Delvestius]

It is unlikely that a "southern aristocratic" culture can evolve without slavery, and unlikely that slavery could exist in excess in areas that are relatively lacking in agricultural produce like New England, so there's not much of a chance of that happening. Perhaps for whatever reason (maybe the French or Dutch end up claiming New England) the Puritan settlers settle in Chesapeake and the Carolinas. This would provide a much more "egalitarian" and "slaveless" society, which eventually moves into the American northeast.

While I do believe this would make the north-south division less apparent, I do believe that the Agricultural south will always have less incentive to industrialize than the maritime northeast, thus generally becoming more conservative/less progressive than the north in most timelines.

 

[Socrates]

Ban slavery early and you have a more northern culture in the south. It's hard to do it in reverse because plantation economies don't work that far north, although you could maybe do it in places like Indiana, Illinois and Missouri.

 

[Alcsentre Calanice]

Ban slavery early and you have a more northern culture in the south. It's hard to do it in reverse because plantation economies don't work that far north, although you could maybe do it in places like Indiana, Illinois and Missouri.

In ancient times, slavery worked in every part of economy - why shouldn't it work in every part of the modern economy?

 

[Perfidious Albion]

I agree with G.Washington_Fuckyeah. There are forms of slavery other than Southern USA-style plantation slavery. Slaves can be used in mines; they can be used unloading ships; they can be used to do jobs around the house; they can be used, albeit with risk, to fight; they can be used as pleasure-slaves for unscrupulous masters. Human beings have devised plenty of means with which to subjugate and abuse each other. Equating all slavery with plantation slavery is like trying to equate all theft with the theft of cars.

The idea that slavery was an outdated institution destined for destruction is an affectation of Whig history. It was rendered illegal by a successful political movement containing plenty of laudable people who opposed it. It was not abolished because some businessman looked at the bottom line and decided it would be profitable to free the slaves; that had nothing whatsoever to do with it; it was abolished because a lot of people thought it morally wrong.

It's amazing to me that people still accept this bizarre idea that slavery was banned purely because of economics. Isn't it obvious that, if you don't expect anything from your labourers except to do what they're told and endure harsh and unpleasant conditions, rather than to make decisions where they could hurt you, it's convenient to only give them what's necessary to keep them alive? I thought it universally understood that it's convenient for employers to pay as low wages as they can get away with while not losing their workers to someone paying them more. If the employer is now, instead, a slave-owner and the worker is now, instead, a slave, this is ideal from the perspective of the former's interests.

 

[funnyhat]

is the culture too overdetermined by economics in turn overdetermined by climate?

Climate/economics were just part of it. The New England states were founded by Puritans; the South, by Anglicans. Those groups were already very different culturally when they were in England.

 

[Perfidious Albion]

Climate/economics were just part of it. The New England states were founded by Puritans; the South, by Anglicans. Those groups were already very different culturally when they were in England.

True. But it's also worth noting that there was slavery in the North as well, albeit mostly abolished in the years following the American Revolutionary War.

 

[funnyhat]

The idea that slavery was an outdated institution destined for destruction is an affectation of Whig history. It was rendered illegal by a successful political movement containing plenty of laudable people who opposed it. It was not abolished because some businessman looked at the bottom line and decided it would be profitable to free the slaves; that had nothing whatsoever to do with it; it was abolished because a lot of people thought it morally wrong.

That was one motivation, but not the only one. In fact, I'm doubtful that it was the majority viewpoint among abolitionists. The "free soil" movement actually opposed slavery on racist grounds: it didn't want black people to live in the country at all, whether free or slave, and wanted to ship them to Liberia or Latin America.

There were also many working-class Northerners who felt that the economic competition with slave labor was unjust. Their opposition to slavery was motivated more by a sense that they were victims of the system. This view was widespread in the big cities of the North. The plight of black people themselves was at most a secondary consideration.

There were also those who, from the time of the Revolution onward, simply thought that keeping millions of people in bondage could not last forever, and would eventually lead to a race war. The example of Haiti horrified many. As more nations in the Americas abolished slavery, this sense of foreboding grew.

But I agree that abolition was generally not motivated by a cold weighing of costs and benefits.

 

[Umbric Man]

Well, Plymouth colony was nearly founded on Manhattan Island. Delaware might've been founded by the Yankees who settled in Rhode Island's Aquidneck Island. And New Haven tried to settle Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Thus the entire Northeast is 'New England'.

That said - the Northeast and Midwest are the cultural, economic, and population metropole of the USA. And within them New England and the Great Lakes-touching areas (north OH-to-north IL, MI/WI/MN) settled by Yankees, rather than the Mid-Atlantic and Ohio River Valley-touching areas (mid/south-OH-to-IL) colonized by Quakers, is dominant. And these Yankees led the formation of the USA, abolished slavery, pushed Progressive politics in the early 20th century, are now leading some liberal pushback to the Bush era as we speak, etc. America really is dominated by Puritan values.

 

[Indicus]

Have the South win the ACW.​

 

[Perfidious Albion]

That was one motivation, but not the only one. In fact, I'm doubtful that it was the majority viewpoint among abolitionists. The "free soil" movement actually opposed slavery on racist grounds: it didn't want black people to live in the country at all, whether free or slave, and wanted to ship them to Liberia or Latin America.

There were also many working-class Northerners who felt that the economic competition with slave labor was unjust. Their opposition to slavery was motivated more by a sense that they were victims of the system. This view was widespread in the big cities of the North. The plight of black people themselves was at most a secondary consideration.

There were also those who, from the time of the Revolution onward, simply thought that keeping millions of people in bondage could not last forever, and would eventually lead to a race war. The example of Haiti horrified many. As more nations in the Americas abolished slavery, this sense of foreboding grew.

But I agree that abolition was generally not motivated by a cold weighing of costs and benefits.

All of that's absolutely fair.

I suppose that when I think of such things I'm more inclined to think of the British example, where the abolitionist movement was a moralist public movement predominantly driven by well-off people who didn't particularly suffer from the existence of slavery; there weren't slaves in the United Kingdom anyway so it wasn't about getting black people out of the country, nor, so far as I know, were people like Wilberforce worried about the effect of slave labour on white British workers' wages. Though perhaps you're about to tell me that I'm wrong on this and in fact most of the key British abolitionists were interested in the depressive effect of cost-free labour on white Britons' wages.

If that's true, I'd rather know it than be ignorant, but I confess it would sadden me as to the beauty and worth of human nature in this world.

Yet all such thoughts aside, it seems we agree on the essential conclusion that slavery was not abolished because of some 'inevitable march of progress' caused by economic imperatives, which for these purposes is the important thing.

 

[raharris1973]

My question for Umbric man though would be this, does placing the Puritan colonies among the agricultural bounty of the mid Atlantic states "corrupt" or soften the distinctive Puritan culture?


Your comment on the distinctive Puritan and Quaker "zones" of the northeast is also a reminder of distinctions elsewhere. For example the south was not monolithic. There were important differences between the upper south Chesapeake tradition and the South Carolina tradition derived from Anglo Barbadian settlers. If the the Anglo-caribbeans never settled on the mainland at All, or were the first English to survive in the Chesapeake that could change southern history quite a bit. And that's not to mention the differences you could get if the Dutch initially exploited the Chesapeake or Massachusetts bays instead of Englishman.

 

[Umbric Man]

My question for Umbric man though would be this, does placing the Puritan colonies among the agricultural bounty of the mid Atlantic states "corrupt" or soften the distinctive Puritan culture?


Your comment on the distinctive Puritan and Quaker "zones" of the northeast is also a reminder of distinctions elsewhere. For example the south was not monolithic. There were important differences between the upper south Chesapeake tradition and the South Carolina tradition derived from Anglo Barbadian settlers. If the the Anglo-caribbeans never settled on the mainland at All, or were the first English to survive in the Chesapeake that could change southern history quite a bit. And that's not to mention the differences you could get if the Dutch initially exploited the Chesapeake or Massachusetts bays instead of Englishman.

Hello!

I don't think it would. One geography published in England before the Mid-Atlantic came under English control actually had New England listed from its OTL coordinates down to the Chesapeake Bay - IE where the North in general begins. More importantly, the Quakers and Puritans did have many important similarities - a middle-class ethos (if Puritans were more even more community-based), a push for industry and commerce and hard work, respect for local and republican-esque governmental institutions, religious zealotry, and compared to the Deep South/Carolinian and Chesapeake Norman-pride heritages were decidedly Anglo-Saxon (never mind the Germans the Quakers bought in). So in a lot of ways you might see even more intense local settlement of the Mid-Atlantic by the town-minded Puritans but the local economies would be quite similar due to not being suited for plantation agriculture. The Puritans did still farm New England up as best they could, after all.

Even today, we can lump the Mid-Atlantic and New England as a 'Northeast' with similarities the way 'Midwest' takes their successor settlements in the Great Lakes and Ohio River Valley together as one.

 

[The Uchronian]

Is it possible to have something akin to the New England Puritan and then later reformist culture be dominant in Virginia? Or southern values be predominant in Massachussets?

Can one get much mileage by tweaking the founding (say Jamestown fails for a New England wank, or Roanoke succeeds for a Dixie wank), or is the culture too overdetermined by economics in turn overdetermined by climate?

Maybe, but, in all likelihood, Southern "Puritans", wouldn't be Puritans as we knew them; for a less optimistic view of what a Southron Puritan

Ban slavery early and you have a more northern culture in the south. It's hard to do it in reverse because plantation economies don't work that far north, although you could maybe do it in places like Indiana, Illinois and Missouri.

And even IOTL, things didn't work as well in Missouri as they did in places like Virginia and Kentucky, despite some efforts to make it so. If slavery had spread further north at all(like in the event that all territories were opened up to slavery automatically, following an alternate *Kansas-Nebraska controversy), it would have been rather limited in the long run; perhaps in some areas, they could have tried stuff like getting indenturees into mining or ranching, but that itself would only have so much success.

I agree with G.Washington_Fuckyeah. There are forms of slavery other than Southern USA-style plantation slavery. Slaves can be used in mines; they can be used unloading ships; they can be used to do jobs around the house; they can be used, albeit with risk, to fight; they can be used as pleasure-slaves for unscrupulous masters. Human beings have devised plenty of means with which to subjugate and abuse each other. Equating all slavery with plantation slavery is like trying to equate all theft with the theft of cars.

The idea that slavery was an outdated institution destined for destruction is an affectation of Whig history. It was rendered illegal by a successful political movement containing plenty of laudable people who opposed it. It was not abolished because some businessman looked at the bottom line and decided it would be profitable to free the slaves; that had nothing whatsoever to do with it; it was abolished because a lot of people thought it morally wrong.

It's amazing to me that people still accept this bizarre idea that slavery was banned purely because of economics. Isn't it obvious that, if you don't expect anything from your labourers except to do what they're told and endure harsh and unpleasant conditions, rather than to make decisions where they could hurt you, it's convenient to only give them what's necessary to keep them alive? I thought it universally understood that it's convenient for employers to pay as low wages as they can get away with while not losing their workers to someone paying them more. If the employer is now, instead, a slave-owner and the worker is now, instead, a slave, this is ideal from the perspective of the former's interests.

Somewhat true, but that other equally bizarre idea floating around out there, that the abolition of slavery was purely *politically* motivated(and that, by extension, as some claim, never would have been abolished without these political motivations at all), is also untrue: it was, in fact, a complicated mixture of both.

And, interestingly enough, when we even look at the actual data from that period, it shows us that, per capita, slaves were generally *always* outperformed by free farming families(don't recall the exact statistics, but I think it was something along the lines of 4 or 5 slaves to every free farmer). And that doesn't even take into consideration the already very real depressions of free white workers' wages & earnings in the South, any, by extension, what was feared to be possible in the North, should slavery have ever spread north of the Ohio.

Hello!

I don't think it would. One geography published in England before the Mid-Atlantic came under English control actually had New England listed from its OTL coordinates down to the Chesapeake Bay - IE where the North in general begins. More importantly, the Quakers and Puritans did have many important similarities - a middle-class ethos (if Puritans were more even more community-based), a push for industry and commerce and hard work, respect for local and republican-esque governmental institutions, religious zealotry, and compared to the Deep South/Carolinian and Chesapeake Norman-pride heritages were decidedly Anglo-Saxon (never mind the Germans the Quakers bought in). So in a lot of ways you might see even more intense local settlement of the Mid-Atlantic by the town-minded Puritans but the local economies would be quite similar due to not being suited for plantation agriculture. The Puritans did still farm New England up as best they could, after all.

Even today, we can lump the Mid-Atlantic and New England as a 'Northeast' with similarities the way 'Midwest' takes their successor settlements in the Great Lakes and Ohio River Valley together as one.

Mostly true, but I'll have to correct you on one thing: the Deep South/Carolinian elite tended to be just as prideful of Anglo-Saxon heritage as their northern counterparts, and perhaps rather more so in many cases, even before the Revolutionary War! And even more so after(yes, there were a slight few exceptions, but only a few.).

 

[dean6294]

What if the Mayflower (and subsequent Puritan migration) was to land in Virginia instead of Cape Cod?

This would certainly inject a different culture into that area.

 

[Socrates]

In ancient times, slavery worked in every part of economy - why shouldn't it work in every part of the modern economy?

Because when you have plantation slavery alongside it, which is far more profitable, the cost of slaves is driven above the cost of free labour in the north. Therefore there is no reason to implement such a practice that does not square very well with the concept of liberty that your nation claims to profess.

It's amazing to me that people still accept this bizarre idea that slavery was banned purely because of economics. Isn't it obvious that, if you don't expect anything from your labourers except to do what they're told and endure harsh and unpleasant conditions, rather than to make decisions where they could hurt you, it's convenient to only give them what's necessary to keep them alive? I thought it universally understood that it's convenient for employers to pay as low wages as they can get away with while not losing their workers to someone paying them more. If the employer is now, instead, a slave-owner and the worker is now, instead, a slave, this is ideal from the perspective of the former's interests.

I don't think anyone is arguing that slavery was banned purely for economic reasons. Decisions get made collectively by a society through an interplay of economic and moral reasons. The higher the economic cost of abolition, the more of a moral movement you need to overcome that. The difference between the north and the south was that the economic loss to the powerful of abolition was much, much higher in the south than it was in the north. That meant there was a far more concerted effort to provide a moral justification for slavery than in the north, which was the reason why the north abolished a lot earlier than the south would have on its own.

 

[Socrates]

Climate/economics were just part of it. The New England states were founded by Puritans; the South, by Anglicans. Those groups were already very different culturally when they were in England.

I find this argument to be largely pop history. The puritans were only one tiny chunk of the settlers and by the late 1700s had been thoroughly outnumbered by economic settlers from other religious backgrounds. The counter argument might be that "ah well, but the founding culture is what perseveres", but in that case, Georgia was founded by a guy that found slavery abhorrent. Culture is predominantly shaped by the way of life in the society in question: in the north that was based around urban trade, in the south that was based around being massive landholders.

 

[raharris1973]

What if the Mayflower (and subsequent Puritan migration) was to land in Virginia instead of Cape Cod?

This would certainly inject a different culture into that area.

It would - how would their survival rates compare in Virginia?

Would they reshape the demographics and culture of Virginia, or be swamped by other streams of settlement?

Importantly, if the Mayflower Pilgrims/Separatists settle in Virginia, does it make it more likely that John Winthrop's Puritan migration will aim for Virginia, or might it still aim for a location further north? These were two different groups and migratory waves.

 

[Perfidious Albion]

I don't think anyone is arguing that slavery was banned purely for economic reasons. Decisions get made collectively by a society through an interplay of economic and moral reasons. The higher the economic cost of abolition, the more of a moral movement you need to overcome that. The difference between the north and the south was that the economic loss to the powerful of abolition was much, much higher in the south than it was in the north. That meant there was a far more concerted effort to provide a moral justification for slavery than in the north, which was the reason why the north abolished a lot earlier than the south would have on its own.

You aren't arguing that. Indeed, I agree with this argument entirely and utterly, except for your first sentence.

I have, however, heard it argued numerous times on this board—less often in the generally more rigorous Before 1900 and After 1900 sections but much more often elsewhere—that the abolition of slavery was inevitable even if the American South was independent as the CSA and even if the USA never existed in the first place and the region that in OTL became the American South was a variety of independent republics. Indeed, it's often taken as a premise in short alternate history scenarios, rarely even questioned, that slavery would of course be abolished because of economic reasons sometime in the late 19th or early 20th century even without a strong domestic movement against racial inequality powerful enough to abolish it in spite of its economic importance. I believe the cause of this idea is a visceral association of slavery with something of the past which, in the modern era, must transition automatically to a more modern form of racial discrimination such as segregation, disenfranchisement and other forms of less formalised prejudice. I reject this idea.

It is my contention that slavery was abolished due to the American North's victory over the American South and enforcement of abolition upon it against the will of most of its white inhabitants, and that, if not for that victory or a victory like it, there would probably not have been abolition because any moral disquiet would not have triumphed over its economic importance and people raised in a society where they have to justify something against the outrage of outsiders makes them more inclined to come up with arguments to defend it and then come to believe them, as is demonstrated in the difference in opinions on slavery between the South in the time of the American Revolution and the South in the time of the American Civil War.