Actually a good question. The Democratic Party split (twice) in 1860 over the South demanding a federal slave code be imposed on territories, regardless of the wishes of the inhabitants.
It seems fairly obvious the CSA, had its secession succeeded, would have demanded some large portion of the territories, with threat of war if not ceded.
They also planned to expand south into the Caribbean and elsewhere in Latin America.
They didn’t think that out either. Given the logistics of the time, the only way such expansion could be supported was by sea.
The US Navy and Royal Navy would have had something to say about seaborne invasions into Mexico, Cuba or Central America.
In general, the South didn’t think thru much about what it would do after secession. They firmly believed slavery would die if it didn’t expand, but they had no realistic way for it to expand. Which meant the logical thing to do would have been to negotiate a gradual emancipation.
But logic was in short supply in the South in 1860/61.
There's nothing obvious about the history of an alternate time-line, except that, being ALTERNATE to true history, it's obviously fictional.
Usually, one only turns to hypotheticals after one has exhausted all reference to factuals. But you've started your argument with hypotheticals. So, really, I guess this is a usual sort of argument, after all.
They also planned to expand south into the Caribbean and elsewhere in Latin America.
My first honest impulse was to respond 'totally unlike you-know-who', but I then it occurred to me that this was probably some intentionally vague reference to the old Knights of The Golden Circle conspiracy theory, our own version of the Elder Protocols libel. I now have to ask: Illuminati much?
They didn’t think that out either.
I graciously accept all your evidence at face value. Too bad you offered none.
Given the logistics of the time, the only way such expansion could be supported was by sea.
Is there a bridge to Cuba in our own time that I don't know about?
The US Navy and Royal Navy would have had something to say about seaborne invasions into Mexico, Cuba or Central America.
Ok, as someone who has actually read a book, I just have to ask, "what did the British say when the US got involved in Mexico, Cuba, and Central American?" I already know what the US would say: "Stop copying us!" Hypocrite.
In general, the South didn’t think thru much about what it would do after secession.
You JUST accused them planning the same campaign of expansion which the US itself would undertake. Now you're saying they didn't plan for afterward? Am I expecting a hypocrite to be consistent? Was that last question rhetorical?
They firmly believed slavery would die if it didn’t expand, but they had no realistic way for it to expand. Which meant the logical thing to do would have been to negotiate a gradual emancipation.
Ah, the old cotton-farming-caused-soil-exhaustion-and-required-ever-expanding-cultivation chestnut. I'll leave that one right here next to the first-shot-at-Sumter-started-the-war factoid like two components of logic bomb ready to go off. It will get used later, a sort of argumentative Chekhov's gun.
But logic was in short supply in the South in 1860/61.
Says the guy who just attempted to use logically contracdictive claims to accuse the South of wanting to act like the North.