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New (Extended) Script: Disunited States of America
🕑 Added 2024-07-26 03:44:35 +0000 UTCWhat if America never unified?
Today, America is the strongest country in the world. But this wasn’t inevitable. While people like to talk about the risk of the Civil War permanently dividing the union, a comparable time of crisis occurred in the late 1700s, after the Thirteen Colonies first got their independence from Britain.
Back then, the nascent Union was seriously vulnerable. The federal government, ordered not by the Constitution but by the weak Articles of Confederation, had very little power—America was basically as united as the European Union is today.
There was fiscal crisis, feuds over land in the west, and rebellion. In 1786, for example, anti-tax rebels under the leadership of Daniel Shays rose up to topple the Massachusetts government. While they were defeated, this contributed to a sense across the nation that something needed to be done. Shays’s Rebellion, together with Congress’s inability to raise taxes and fear of another invasion by Britain, drove the states to gather together and draft the US Constitution, truly uniting the country at last. [At least for a little bit]
But this wasn’t inevitable. What if the states failed to reach an agreement? What if America never united?
Well this is What Why How, and that’s what the video’s about.
Articles of Confederation: 1787-1795
Let’s rewind back to the late 1700’s. There was a lot of pressure for the American states to come together into a stronger union. But the many republics also had plenty of competing interests.
One key dispute during the 1787 Constitutional Convention was how to balance the power of the small states and the large states. This was ultimately settled by creating a Senate, where each state got equal power, and the House, where each state got power proportional to its population. But this Great Compromise was only passed narrowly; if a different slate of representatives traveled to Philadelphia in 1787, or if Rhode Island actually sent anyone at all, the states might not have found a suitable compromise.
And that’s where history changes.
With the states unable to reach an agreement, the Constitutional Convention is a failure. The delegates return home.
But, the crisis continues to grow; war debts continue to burden states, and when they impose taxes the people rise up in revolts. In 1789, the states again send delegates to a convention to reform the Articles of Confederation, this time in New York. And again, they’re unable to reach a compromise, with the Southerners walking away from the convention when it threatens to crack down on slavery. With the failure of the Philadelphia and New York Conventions, many states view the Articles of Confederation as irredeemable. The American states have proven themselves unruly and disunited.
In 1790, skirmishes erupt between the militias of New York and the New England states over whether Vermont, claimed by New York, should be admitted into the Confederation. Meanwhile, tax revolts erupt in Pennsylvania, with a mob descending upon Philadelphia.
Congress is unable to raise funds for a national army; instead, George Washington, the hero of the Revolutionary War, leads a voluntary force that barely liberates Philadelphia.
To the north, the New England states forge a new joint army under Henry Knox to confront New York, which sends an army under Philip Schuyler into Connecticut. The armies clash and New York wins, taking control of New Haven, Hartford, and putting into power a friendly government. Next, Schuyler marches on Boston.
With the union splitting apart into civil war, many in Congress call for George Washington to seize power as a dictator and invade New York. But… Washington refuses. Many, including Washington, still view monarchy as more dangerous than disorder; he doesn’t want to establish a dangerous precedent. Instead, Washington publishes a call for the states to settle their differences peacefully.
They don’t.
With New York threatening to crush New England, Pennsylvania and New Jersey join forces, rallying an army, marching against New York City, and capturing it. With Schuyler stuck sieging Boston, Governor George Clinton of New York has no option but the negotiation table.
In 1792, a peace conference is held in neutral Baltimore. There, New York agrees to compensate the other states for losses and abandon claims to Vermont [and the Erie Triangle]. But, more importantly, the states agree to dissolve their union and peacefully go their separate ways; the Articles of Confederation are dead.
Well, technically, Virginia and the other southern states remain in the Confederation for a few more years until the Carolinas and Georgia exit as well. Maryland, Delaware, and New Jersey forge an alliance, while the New England states forge a new confederation, including liberated Vermont.
The Union is dead before it even really began.
Divided States of America: 1795-1817
Over the 1790s, the states continue to jostle, skirmishing over disputed territory. Some settlers even forging new states entirely. All sorts of geopolitical mischief and skullduggery occur in this period. Pennsylvania and New York partition New Jersey, Maryland and Delaware unify to ward off their neighbors, and Aaron Burr proclaims himself Consul of the Northwestern Republic before losing a duel. Meanwhile, Britain begins to restore its influence over the colonies, crafting an alliance with New England.
While the American Revolution appears to have ended in disunion, revolution still explodes in France. War soon erupts between France and its enemies, with the war spreading to the coasts of America: Britain abducts sailors from Virginia and the southern colonies, while French pirates ransack American merchants on their way to Britain. Skirmishes also erupt in the Midwest between ambitious British expeditions and American settlers. In 1810, Virginia and Pennsylvania lead the middle states into war against Britain; New England and New York side with Britain, sparking war again between the republics.
Despite patriotic fervor, the war goes pretty horribly for the Middle States; Northern troops overwhelm Pennsylvanian defenses and sack Philadelphia, stealing the Liberty Bell and marching on Richmond. Most ‘horrifying’ of all, British troops free and arm slaves as they go, threatening to trigger a huge slave revolution.
But while the northern front goes horribly, the southern front goes fantastically; American forces under the command of the ambitious General Andrew Jackson conquer Florida from pro-British Spain, then march west to New Orleans, siege it for some time, then capture it at last in the name of the allied states. Louisiana is free. But, neither Britain or Virginia hear of this victory before Governor James Monroe of Virginia surrenders to British troops. Britain imposes humiliating conditions on the American republics, basically making them tributaries of the British Empire again in 1814.
When General Jackson hears of this, he leads his army of veterans, ruffians, and settlers up the Mississippi and to Richmond. Following in the footsteps of Napoleon, Jackson turns his troops against the government of Richmond, toppling Governor Monroe in a coup. His soldiers, raising their weapons, proclaim him the new Consul of America.
Over the next years, Jackson does not rest; he leads his army back and forth up the coast, dragging everything from Baton Rouge to Baltimore into his new republic.
But, with the real Napoleon dragged out of Europe by Britain, the British Empire is free to fill Philadelphia with redcoats. So, Jackson holds off from attacking the northern states.
Jackson’s Shadow: 1817-1848
Andrew Jackson is a clever dictator: he grants greater civil rights to white men without property and sets them against the planter elites, then positions himself as a Great Compromiser between them.
Over the 1820s, Jackson directs the American army on brutal campaigns to destroy and deport Native American societies further and further westward. In their place, planters build vast slave plantations. Along the Mississippi, conquered by Jackson, the Consul organizes new states. He also competes with Britain for the Northwestern states.
But peace in America is fragile. In the early 1830s, Jackson’s rule begins to buckle thanks to southern resistance to his high tariff on goods; planters want to sell cotton to Britain. This crisis escalates, with South Carolina proclaiming it has nullified Jackson’s tariff in 1832. Jackson marches his army and topples South Carolina’s government, but this just triggers wider rebellion against his dictatorship.
Seeing Jackson’s empire about to collapse, the northern states rally an army, secure British support, and march against the south. Opportunists like General Winfield Scott betray Jackson and join the invasion, which surrounds Jackson in Charlotte, North Carolina. Unwilling to be humiliated like Napoleon, Jackson goes down fighting.
The Consul of America is dead.
After Jackson’s death, Britain oversees the division of his empire into easily controllable states. America is once again split apart. [Pennsylvania awarded Maryland for its loyalty]
Over the rest of the 1830s and 1840s, American settlers continue to expand westward, slowly wiping up native resistance and occasionally butting elbows. Their economies are mostly twisted to serve British commercial interests; northern industry is stamped out in exchange for producing raw materials, while Southern states are forced, sometimes at gunpoint, to “reform” slavery into indentured servitude.
America is basically part of the British Empire in all but name.
Spring of Nations: 1848-1850
But British influence over America’s politics and economy enrages many, raising temperatures over and over.
In 1848, as revolutions erupt across Europe, the American pot boils over: Americans rise up again in a Second American Revolution against Britain. Across the continent, patriots attack British troops, tar and feather loyalists, and throw out pro-British governors.
But soon after, the counterrevolution begins. Planter elites in Virginia elbow out radical patriots, while in New York and Boston, merchant dynasties hijack the revolutions. These new governments make deals with Britain.
So, while Britain is technically thrown out and the occasional democratic constitution is put into place, the 1848 Revolutions in America don’t bring about the change people want.
But violence does continue in the South, where indentured servants rebel against plantation elites that have dragged their feet on promised freedoms. White militias ultimately put down the revolutions violently, while governments adopt radical policies to cement their supremacy.
Revolution isn’t just limited to Europe and America; it erupts in Mexico too, where the reigning emperor is overthrown. Not only that, but the many American settlers of California and Texas declare independence, organizing new republics of their own.
Industry and Nationalism: 1850-1905
In the second half of the 1800s, two major trends guide American history: industrialization and nationalism. With British control limited by the 1848 Revolutions, the American republics sponsor the rise of new industrial magnates; new railroads tie the republics closer and closer together. But the American states are far from matching the industrial power of Britain, which continues to hold huge economic influence over the American Republics.
In 1855, the Commonwealth of Louisiana, the largest American republic, collapses into civil war over slavery. This allows the ambitious republics of the eastern seaboard the opportunity for expansion. Virginia gobbles up Kentucky, Carolina reunites with Tennessee, and Georgian troops march to the Mississippi, where they shake hands with expansionist Texas, led by Consul Samuel Houston.
The Scramble for Louisiana reawakens the nationalist spirit of the American republics, with patriots calling for reunification—preferably by diplomacy, but by rifle and bayonet if necessary.
Over the 1860s and 1870s, the republics attack each other in several attempted wars of conquest. Britain attempts to play kingmaker with mixed results; it sells guns to Pennsylvania only to have that republic partitioned by its stronger neighbors.
Meanwhile, Consul Samuel Houston Jr of Texas wrestles Georgia into a new Southern Republic without much contest. In the West, the Mormons secede from California using gifted Gatling guns from Texas. The Republics of the Great Lakes, meanwhile, forge a new confederacy.
While its sister republics feud, New England, allies with old England, sends its sailors across the world. When European powers plant colonies in Africa, New England does too, earning some valuable turf in West Africa—a large portion of its colonists are freed slaves escaped from the South that the Bostonites don’t especially like.
Speaking of the South—while Texas doesn’t colonize Africa, it does send its adventuring gun-slingers to Central America; several Texan puppet-states pop up in the late 1800s, but each has a tragic end.
The Great War: 1905-1920
Colonial skirmishes in Africa finally bring Europe into a major war in 1905. On the one side is Britain and France, and on the other are the Triple Powers of Germany, Austria, and Russia.
Each American republic hopes the Great War is the prophesied moment of reunification, and that they’ll be the ones to do it; they plunge headstrong into war. Betraying their neighbors over petty territorial squabbles, the continent splits in two between a pro-German faction, led by New York, Texas, and Carolina, and a pro-British faction, led by Virginia, the Northwest, New England, and California.
Soldiers march proudly into war onto to be met by the horrors of modern technology.
Soon trenches scar the continent, with a generation of Americans losing their lives for inches of land. Artillery bombardment reduces cities on the frontline, like Philadelphia, New Haven, and St. Louis, to smoldering rubble.
Great suffering passes before fighting finally comes to a pause in 1918.
While the war has no victors, some republics have land gains to show for their losses.
New York, led for a generation by the populist Consul Theodore Roosevelt, has accomplished its revanchist aims—it annexes Vermont, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Philadelphia, and the Delmarva Peninsula.
To the south, Texas, led by hardline supremacists, puts puppets in charge of the newly independent states of Kentucky, South Virginia, and southern Illinois—aka New Egypt, forging an axis with Osage and Carolina. But these republics all face the threat of African secessionism and more radical ideologies.
Stuck between the ascendant powers of New York and Texas are the Northwest Confederacy, whose humiliated government faces repeated revolt from workers demanding reform, and Virginia, which has lost its economic glory and is now practically a failed state. To the north is the rump Federation of New England, where radical Catholics call for radical policies. And of course the Republic of Canada, once a key spoke in the wheel of the British Empire, has chosen its own path; Quebec is independent too.
America in the 1920s is not a hopeful place. The scars of the Great War run deep, but the next generation of leaders, many of them radical ideologues, believe a redo could finally unite America under their domination. Among these bloodthirsty psychopaths is none other than a man by the name of Jacob Featherston.
But even then, many in the American republics have hope for a peaceful future, a prosperous future, a democratic future–one where the many republics may even be molded back together into the United States of America.
BONUS PATREON-EXCLUSIVE:
The Rematch: 1925-1949
Economic desperation and radicalization grows over the course of the 1920s. The Roosevelt dynasty in New York successfully harnesses this, embracing many socialist policies to keep themselves in power.
In the Northwest Confederacy, workers finally topple the government in Chicago and proclaim a new United Communist Councils of America. New York and Texas send guns to the anti-communists, including a particularly heinous group called the Black Legion, led by Jacob Featherston. The communists win the civil war, uniting the states from Wisconsin to Ohio under a red banner.
In Texas, the ruling Ferguson family proves unable to address the new crises. In the 1930 election, the populist demagogue of Louisiana, Huey Long, wins power. But before Huey Long can take office, he’s assassinated. The South hurls itself into civil war between different ideologies. Ambitiously, Carolina, Osage, and the other Texas puppets organize an intervention force and intervene, crushing separatists.
But this awakens a beast: Featherston, at the head of Black Legion forces from the across the republics, begins a war against the foreign occupiers. The legions of Texas side with him and route the intervention force; Featherston crowns himself the Supreme Chief of the Southern Nation in Houston.
At first derided as a joke, Chief Featherston proves himself the opposite. Using his rabid mobs of supporters and black-booted paramilitary thugs, he purges Southern society of all opposition to his dictatorship. Then, he begins to reabsorb, one-by-one, Texas’s old puppets. By 1938, Featherston sits atop the greatest empire North America has ever seen.
This horrifies the other republics. California, the Communist Councils, and New York come together and sign a mutual defense pact. New England, on the other hand, turns to their own Featherston clone: a radio preaching ex-priest by the name Charles Coughlin. Coughlin and Featherston forge their own alliance against the “degenerative anti-patriotic hordes.”
As Featherston prepares for war, so too do his enemies. In 1939, Featherston plunges into war against the Communist Councils. Chicago calls for aid from its allies, who… do not answer. In fact, as a month of fighting goes by, New York invades and snatches Ohio before Featherston can do so.
As the year comes to a close, Featherston dominates everything between the Great Lakes and the mouth of the Mississippi. He extends his political purges, wiping up organized resistance. And he plays chummy with Consul Ted Roosevelt II of New York up until the very moment his tank legions cross the Potomac. Within a few months New York has fallen to Featherston’s troops. In 1941, Featherston does the same to California.
Meanwhile, Britain, on its last legs, struggles in another war against France.
In 1942, Featherston sweeps up Canada. By the end of that year, his American State stretches from sea to shining sea, with a new marble capital in Memphis. Now, there are a few remaining independent states: Quebec, for example, and New England too, which Featherston leaves alone as “papist containment zones.”
As the 1940s progress, Featherston makes good on his radical policies. He deports Hispanics, Native Americans, Asians, and African Americans from his empire in an industrial Trail of Tears, kicking many to Mexico or the Caribbean. While a large portion survive the trip, many don’t; Featherston doesn’t bother with humanitarianism. In fact, in several instances his underlings up to just burn down whole villages instead of bothering with deportation.
Despite his totalitarian efforts, Featherston and his economic ministers are unable to turn the American economy around, especially because Britain’s embargo. Seeing the Royal Navy as the last major threat to American peace, Featherston begins a gargantuan naval construction program and plots to bring the “American Revolution” to London.
In 1949, Featherston embarks on a grand tour of his empire. His plane explodes over Louisiana–assassins, unidentified, had smuggles a bomb aboard. After several weeks of searching, he’s pronounced dead without a body to bury. Doubtlessly, his corpse is rotting in putrid marshland.
The Tree of Liberty: 1949-Today
Over the course of the 1950s and 1960s, a series of successors struggle to fill Featherston’s shoes–and keep their head on their shoulders in the cut-throat politics of fascist America.
But government bureaucracy and in-fighting means the internal security forces are unable to respond when, in 1968, protests against the regime erupt across the continent. Rioters toss police out of New York, Chicago, San Francisco, and Houston. At their new capital in Memphis, the party-insiders call for the military to crack down on the revolution. But the military turns its guns on the party, claiming power and establishing rule-by-junta.
The generals of the new regime keep in place many of Featherston’s totalitarian policies, like suppressing dissident speech, but shrug off control in other sectors, like the economy. Instead the armed forces forge an alliance with the privatized mega-corporations. Military rule continues through the 1970s, squashing several attempted revolutions. In 1980, in the face of increasing unrest, the military agrees to hold “democratic” elections. Famed Hollywood actor Ronald Reagan, a favorite of the military, wins in a landslide. Reagan promises to balance between tradition and democracy. Perhaps going off-script, Reagan calls for the implementation of a nationwide constitution–the promised constitution of the Philadelphia Convention of so many generations ago.
Delegates from the many states gather in Memphis to draft Reagan’s constitution. But, when the military catches wind of some of the more liberal proposals, they arrest the delegates, depose Reagan, and restore military rule.
Protests erupt across the country, with many turning violent when the military doubles down. Tension and violence continue for years, until, in 1989, the military turns on itself; pro-democracy generals mutiny and join the revolution. Peace protests march into the military city of Memphis, flying the old flags of the United States.
The next decade isn’t easy, but with immense effort, the people build a new Union, based on democratic principles and respect for the sovereignty of the many states of the United States of America. The federal government, once with absolute power, has very little. The different states, once appendages of Featherston or feuding enemies, are now allies bonded together by mutual respect.
Entering into the 21st century, the United States of America is a beacon of liberty and hope for people across the world. Against all odds, the American people toppled authoritarian rule once again–others hope to do the same.
But of course, there are always issues. For one, many ignorant citizens of the US have grown nostalgic for the bolder days of Featherston. They deny his crimes, or, in secret, fantasize about reenacting them on new immigrants or other minorities.
But, on the other hand, most in America believe in the value of democracy, as they experienced the dark days of dictatorship themselves. For now, Americans have a republic, and they’re keeping it.
The future is uncertain, but the United States of America is unified–and on a good course–at last.
