| January 11 |  |
Editor says, what if the close secession vote in Alabama had gone the other way? Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s). Please also note that due to the large number of changes necessary to justify such a scenario, we have left a number of details quite vague.
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In 1861, to the considerable embarrassment of the so-called "Fire-eater", the ardent secessionist William Yancey on this day, his home State of Alabama voted to remain in the Union by a margin of just 61 to 39.
Defeat of the "Fire-Eaters"The shift of just twelve votes was due in no small part to the slowing down of the momentum of secession, and Alabamians were starting to doubt mantra that "aye the Southern states all will stand together".
Robert Rhodes exulted that "Alabama is in a blaze, and we are all expecting a brush with the Federal Troops". Yet teversals in the plans for arming the South had begun to raise serious questions in the minds of many, particularly since the arrest of Jefferson Davis for gun-running on January 7th.
This harsh reality took the argument away from Yancey and his group known as the "Fire-Eaters", amongst the most effective agitators for secession and rhetorical defenders of slavery. Because determined attempts were now being made by Washington to dampen the blaze, the fire might yet blow over.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© "Look Away! History of the Confederate States of America" by William C. Davis (2002)Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Civil War AL Source: Wikipedia Labels: Civil War, Confederacy, America, 1860s, William Yancey.
~ This would have thrown an interesting spanner into the nascent CSA.
~ It sure would, but it's hard to see how it might have happened without numerous prior historical alterations. On principle, I prefer alt-history where the divergence comes down to a single small event.
A better candidate iis Virginia, which was so divided over secession that a pro-Union portion of the state actually seceded from Richmond's control, becoming the present state of West Virginia. The secession convention in Virginia was a bitter affair which the pro-secession forces physically prevented from ending until they had bullied and browbeaten their way to a vote in their favor. If this effort had failed, Virginia would have stayed in the Union.
That, in turn, might have meant a much shorter war, which perhaps would have ended in Union victory without an emancipation Proclamation (which Lincoln had formally issued only in September 1862 after the Union victory at Antietam made it look less like a measure of desperation). Ironically, Southerners might actually have kept their slaves longer if they hadn't panicked themselves into attempted secession after Lincoln's election--for with the war over before its focus could shift from simply preserving the Union to eliminating slavery, there would have been less political support for anything like the Thirteenth Amendment. Slavery would have ended eventually in the Soouth, but perhaps gradually, on a state-by-state basis as had already happened in the North. Even today there might not be an actual constitutional amendment barring it. (As it was, the Thirteenth Amendment took a long, long time to be ratified in some states; Mississippi only did it in 1993!)
© Today in Alternate History, 2013-. All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
