Confederate political parties

[Asenath Waite]

How might political parties have developed in a surviving confederacy? From the little reading I've done there's a lot of discussion about how officially there was sort of a consensus during the war that parties were bad but if they'd won the war it seems likely that this sentiment would have faded. I'm thinking a ruling party representing the slaveowners and ruling class with close ties to the military develops and that if there was any sort of left-wing party that emerged in opposition it would be a coalition of the Appalachian parts of the confederacy, big cities, religious minorities and (if they were even allowed to vote) Native Americans. It's also possible though that the franchise would be severely restricted to property owners (along with literacy tests) in some states, maybe so severely that a national opposition party would never be able to develop.

[MABA 2020]

I doubt the Confederacy would have been real democracy, slavery and democracy are incompatible

[Samof94]

I doubt the Confederacy would have been real democracy, slavery and democracy are incompatible

Tsarist Russia wasn’t democratic and it had serfdom until the 1860’s.  It depended on serfdom for its economic success.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

There would probably be a (con)federalist pro-tariff mercantile party, and a states rights anti-industrial planter party. Kind of like a continuation of Cotton Whigs vs Jacksonian Democrats mixed with Federalist/Republican (or more Federales/Unitarios like in 19th century Argentina) debates over centralisation of the government, which would be necessary for the CSA to survive in the long term. One party would be isolationist/pro-British and another more pro-French and slavery expansionist in Mexico and possibly Cuba.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I doubt the Confederacy would have been real democracy, slavery and democracy are incompatible

Tsarist Russia wasn’t democratic and it had serfdom until the 1860’s.  It depended on serfdom for its economic success.

The Russia economy was industrializing rapidly in the late 19th century though and again from 1907-1914.

Russia's vast size, culture and dependence on leadership from the top meant that this did not happen over night though and it started later than say Britain or America, or even Germany.

So to say it depended on it for success, I would disagree with it simply because Russia's future success depended on moving away from it. However, it is correct to say to that point serfdom was vital to the economy if that makes sense.

Russia had and still has vast resources and the makings of an industrial powerhouse and an economic juggernaut but it has almost always been sabotaged from the top.

[Samof94]

I doubt the Confederacy would have been real democracy, slavery and democracy are incompatible

Tsarist Russia wasn’t democratic and it had serfdom until the 1860’s.  It depended on serfdom for its economic success.

The Russia economy was industrializing rapidly in the late 19th century though and again from 1907-1914.

Russia's vast size, culture and dependence on leadership from the top meant that this did not happen over night though and it started later than say Britain or America, or even Germany.

So to say it depended on it for success, I would disagree with it simply because Russia's future success depended on moving away from it. However, it is correct to say to that point serfdom was vital to the economy if that makes sense.

Russia had and still has vast resources and the makings of an industrial powerhouse and an economic juggernaut but it has almost always been sabotaged from the top.

Of course, I’d agree here. I said that serfdom was strictly enforced pre industrialization. Even when they moved away from it, peasants often lived in tightly controlled villages with little economic mobility.

[darklordoftech]

There would probably be a (con)federalist pro-tariff mercantile party, and a states rights anti-industrial planter party. Kind of like a continuation of Cotton Whigs vs Jacksonian Democrats mixed with Federalist/Republican (or more Federales/Unitarios like in 19th century Argentina) debates over centralisation of the government, which would be necessary for the CSA to survive in the long term. One party would be isolationist/pro-British and another more pro-French and slavery expansionist in Mexico and possibly Cuba.

Trade, banking, and “internal improvements” seem like issues that could divide the Confederate elites just as they divided the pre-Civil War and post-Reconstruction elites.

[wimp]

I doubt the Confederacy would have been real democracy, slavery and democracy are incompatible

Tsarist Russia wasn’t democratic and it had serfdom until the 1860’s.  It depended on serfdom for its economic success.

Union of Confederate Socialist Republics maybe?

[America Needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

Political Parties were explicitly outlawed by the Confederate Constitution.

[Agonized-Statism]

Politics would largely be based on the caste system of Bacon's Rebellion: the Southern aristocracy playing poor whites off the slaves to keep themselves in power. National parties would be looser associations of state parties with the Confederacy's heavy emphasis on states' rights.

I suspect that the CSA would first get an anti-administration movement based in populist anger, blaming poor living conditions post-Civil War on the central government. This would eventually mature into a small-government, nativist, anti-interventionist, evangelical, "True Confederate" faction. The Southern elites would try crash-course industrialization after realizing that cotton was out and oil was in, and would eventually develop an establishment, law-and-order, imperialist party. This establishment party would be somewhat reformist and attract most former slaves after abolition in the 20th century. An illegal Communist Party resembling our Black Panthers is likely to develop in the black community then.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

There would probably be a (con)federalist pro-tariff mercantile party, and a states rights anti-industrial planter party. Kind of like a continuation of Cotton Whigs vs Jacksonian Democrats mixed with Federalist/Republican (or more Federales/Unitarios like in 19th century Argentina) debates over centralisation of the government, which would be necessary for the CSA to survive in the long term. One party would be isolationist/pro-British and another more pro-French and slavery expansionist in Mexico and possibly Cuba.

It is perhaps ironic is that Alexander Stephens, who had been a Whig, was almost Jeffersonian in his opposition to the policies of conscription and centralization from the Democrat Jefferson Davis.  Possible that might have played out long-term in a reconfiguration of coalitions away from the patterns of the 1st and 2nd party systems.

[Orser67]

I think it would have been very contingent on exactly how the war and its aftermath went, but the two most obvious cleavages imo would be former Whigs and former Democrats on the one hand, and pro- and anti-administration on the other.

Assuming a Confederate victory in the Civil War, I could imagine a sort of neo-Jacksonian coalition forming around Davis's policies in support of a relatively centralized national government, a strong defense of slavery, glorification of the Confederate war effort, and expansionist foreign policy. On the other side you've got some of the old-time Whig aristocracy, Appalachian yeomen, urban merchants and factory owners, and anyone else who doesn't fit into the dominant Davis coalition (and isn't completely incompatible with the anti-Davis group).

ETA: although it's pretty closely related to the Democratic-Whig divide, another major potential cleavage worth mentioning might be the Deep South and the Upper South, which you can see reasonably well in this 1860 map.

[StateBoiler]

A party called the Conservative Party existed in North Carolina politics during the Civil War. They elected Zebulon Vance as governor in 1862. The party per Vance's Wikipedia page was a coalition of former Whigs and Democrats with Unionist sympathies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zebulon_Baird_Vance

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

I doubt the Confederacy would have been real democracy, slavery and democracy are incompatible

Tbf the initial Athenian democracy was built on slavery.

[StateBoiler]

I doubt the Confederacy would have been real democracy, slavery and democracy are incompatible

Tbf the initial Athenian democracy was built on slavery.

And Roman.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

I doubt the Confederacy would have been real democracy, slavery and democracy are incompatible

Tbf the initial Athenian democracy was built on slavery.

And Roman.

The Roman Republic was an oligarchy, not a democracy.

[StateBoiler]

I doubt the Confederacy would have been real democracy, slavery and democracy are incompatible

Tbf the initial Athenian democracy was built on slavery.

And Roman.

The Roman Republic was an oligarchy, not a democracy.

Aren't most states that call themselves democracies by fact oligarchies? Philosophical question.

I get there's the whole patrician vs. plebeian discussion, but we have patrician vs. plebeian separations in all of the western world today even if it's not codified in law.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

Aren't most states that call themselves democracies by fact oligarchies? Philosophical question.

Just going by Plato-Aristotle-Polybius' definitions of constitutions. The Senate held day-to-day power and was made up of ex-magistrates that were themselves elected by an aristocratic assembly.    

I don't know what Aristotle would call today's representative democracies. Probably categorise them as moderate democracy.

I get there's the whole patrician vs. plebeian discussion, but we have patrician vs. plebeian separations in all of the western world today even if it's not codified in law.

Patrician/plebeian wasn't really a meaningful distinction by the late Republic. Plenty of wealthy plebeian families had forced their way into the Senatorial class by then.

[The Mikado]

I definitely think that a lasting CSA would develop party politics (or at least pseudo party politics) eventually. States like NC, TN, and LA had very strong Whig Parties just a decade removed and a lot of the ex-Whigs were never really on board with Davis even if they were on board with secession. I'd expect those three states would become the base of a lot of politicians opposed to Davis and his successors. (Remember, the CSA had a single six year term limit for President, like modern Mexico)

EDIT: House apportionment by state for the 1860s in the Confederate Congress:

AL: 9
AR: 4
FL: 2
GA: 10
KY: 12 (Let's assume that in the war only the 11 states that actually seceded are in this CSA, so we'll ignore the KY ones)
MO: 7 (ditto)
LA: 6
MS: 7
NC: 10
SC: 6
TN: 11
TX: 6
VA: 16

So without KY and MO, that Confederate House would have 87 members. Add 22 Senators and you have a CSA Electoral College of 109.

[StateBoiler]

I definitely think that a lasting CSA would develop party politics (or at least pseudo party politics) eventually. States like NC, TN, and LA had very strong Whig Parties just a decade removed and a lot of the ex-Whigs were never really on board with Davis even if they were on board with secession. I'd expect those three states would become the base of a lot of politicians opposed to Davis and his successors. (Remember, the CSA had a single six year term limit for President, like modern Mexico)

EDIT: House apportionment by state for the 1860s in the Confederate Congress:

AL: 9
AR: 4
FL: 2
GA: 10
KY: 12 (Let's assume that in the war only the 11 states that actually seceded are in this CSA, so we'll ignore the KY ones)
MO: 7 (ditto)
LA: 6
MS: 7
NC: 10
SC: 6
TN: 11
TX: 6
VA: 16

So without KY and MO, that Confederate House would have 87 members. Add 22 Senators and you have a CSA Electoral College of 109.

To use Vance as an example when he was North Carolina Governor, I wouldn't say he was anti-Jefferson Davis and the Confederacy, but he prioritized North Carolina's interests first ahead of the national Confederate state. His faction was definitely at odds with Davis' leadership. (He served as Governor again post-military appointed governors, was selected in the U.S. Senate and served until his death in 1894.)  I'm not aware of many other Confederate politicians that were able to form independent identities of Davis, although "Confederate politics" is not exactly a topic historians have focused on much for several reasons. (I know Davis won a re-election for president, but did he have a George McClellan-like figure opposing him?)

[Orser67]

I definitely think that a lasting CSA would develop party politics (or at least pseudo party politics) eventually. States like NC, TN, and LA had very strong Whig Parties just a decade removed and a lot of the ex-Whigs were never really on board with Davis even if they were on board with secession. I'd expect those three states would become the base of a lot of politicians opposed to Davis and his successors. (Remember, the CSA had a single six year term limit for President, like modern Mexico)

EDIT: House apportionment by state for the 1860s in the Confederate Congress:

AL: 9
AR: 4
FL: 2
GA: 10
KY: 12 (Let's assume that in the war only the 11 states that actually seceded are in this CSA, so we'll ignore the KY ones)
MO: 7 (ditto)
LA: 6
MS: 7
NC: 10
SC: 6
TN: 11
TX: 6
VA: 16

So without KY and MO, that Confederate House would have 87 members. Add 22 Senators and you have a CSA Electoral College of 109.

To use Vance as an example when he was North Carolina Governor, I wouldn't say he was anti-Jefferson Davis and the Confederacy, but he prioritized North Carolina's interests first ahead of the national Confederate state. His faction was definitely at odds with Davis' leadership. (He served as Governor again post-military appointed governors, was selected in the U.S. Senate and served until his death in 1894.)  I'm not aware of many other Confederate politicians that were able to form independent identities of Davis, although "Confederate politics" is not exactly a topic historians have focused on much for several reasons. (I know Davis won a re-election for president, but did he have a George McClellan-like figure opposing him?)

The Confederate president actually served a six-year term and had a one-term limit. Davis served as provisional president until he won election to a full term without opposition in late 1861.

[StateBoiler]

I definitely think that a lasting CSA would develop party politics (or at least pseudo party politics) eventually. States like NC, TN, and LA had very strong Whig Parties just a decade removed and a lot of the ex-Whigs were never really on board with Davis even if they were on board with secession. I'd expect those three states would become the base of a lot of politicians opposed to Davis and his successors. (Remember, the CSA had a single six year term limit for President, like modern Mexico)

EDIT: House apportionment by state for the 1860s in the Confederate Congress:

AL: 9
AR: 4
FL: 2
GA: 10
KY: 12 (Let's assume that in the war only the 11 states that actually seceded are in this CSA, so we'll ignore the KY ones)
MO: 7 (ditto)
LA: 6
MS: 7
NC: 10
SC: 6
TN: 11
TX: 6
VA: 16

So without KY and MO, that Confederate House would have 87 members. Add 22 Senators and you have a CSA Electoral College of 109.

To use Vance as an example when he was North Carolina Governor, I wouldn't say he was anti-Jefferson Davis and the Confederacy, but he prioritized North Carolina's interests first ahead of the national Confederate state. His faction was definitely at odds with Davis' leadership. (He served as Governor again post-military appointed governors, was selected in the U.S. Senate and served until his death in 1894.)  I'm not aware of many other Confederate politicians that were able to form independent identities of Davis, although "Confederate politics" is not exactly a topic historians have focused on much for several reasons. (I know Davis won a re-election for president, but did he have a George McClellan-like figure opposing him?)

The Confederate president actually served a six-year term and had a one-term limit. Davis served as provisional president until he won election to a full term without opposition in late 1861.

Could've swore I remember reading he'd been "re-elected" in 1864 or 1865. Thanks. Bit of a key difference then between the U.S. and Confederate Constitution at the time, as it would be more than 80 years until the U.S. Constitution had presidential term limits.