Would we better better off or worse off?

[Speck Tater]

A strictly hypothetical "alternate history" question.

If either the civil war had never happened because the south had been allowed to secede from the union, or if the south had won the right to secede by winning the war, would we all be better off or worse off today?

On the plus side, the fundies and RW zealots would have a Confederate country of their own to live in and govern as they saw fit, leaving the liberal Yankees to likewise have their own liberal government. People who didn't like living in a nation of "godless secular humanists" could just move south to the Confederacy.

On the minus side, would there be border skirmishes, or would the two countries coexists peacefully as we do with Canada and Mexico?

[DrWeird]

1. I guess it depends on the color of your skin.

If not perpetual slavery, I bet there would have been some kind of nazi-style holocaust in the Confederacy.

[Connie_Corleone]

2. Well, I would be worse off

I would be in slavery or murdered.

[bryant69]

3. Constant Border Skirmishes

Over the black population of the South. Southern SLaves trying to flee north. Maybe we'd construct a "friendship wall" to keep blacks from fleeing North.

Economically I think the south would languish. I think you might want to also review where the real center of the Klan's power was in the 1920s.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[theboss]

4. The World would be much worse off

North America would likely have four or five separate countries, none of whom would have been able to play a role on the world stage. It's hard to imagine what role this would have played in terms of World War I, the spread of Communism, WWII, etc.

[Killarney]

5. My theory

What the South would have done is used all their taxes to build up their weapons stash while the Northern liberals used all their tax money for things like equality, top-notch public education, health care for all, the pursuit of happiness. Then, the North would piss them off about something (gay marriage maybe) and they would use the Bible to start nuclear war and end up killing us all. But they wouldn't mind because the end times were going to come anyway and Jesus would bring them all to him in the Rapture so it's cool.

/sarcasm

[tom_paine]

6. No, the Confederacy would have allied with the Nazis or at least

signed a non-aggression pact.

Think about it! The Confederates and the Nazis shared so many philosophies

Negroes
Jews
Homosexuals (though to be honest, homosexuals were deeply closeted in the Old Confederacy, people talk about Slave Women and the Massas, but I'll bet there was no small share of Slave Men who got a nightly visit from Massa, too)
Liberal Democracy (sure, the Confederates talked a good game, but we see what they meant with their Lying Rhetoric today) -- they hated it
Voting Rights (only Party or Race Members allowed)

So much more.

No, if the Confederates had won, I am convinced that so would have the Nazis.

Hell, Dubya Bush might well have been Viceroy of Amerika in THAT alternate universe. And DU and DUers would have never existed.

The Freepers would be the Amerikan SS, happily exacting revenge against libruls everywhere.

And the Arizona Desert would be full of Death Camps as it will soon be full of the less murderous variety of Imperial Amerikan Gulag that is coming.

[olddem43]

7. The Confederate States would have become

much like South Africa and, by now, would likely have ended slavery and apartheid. Still, we and the CSA would both be greatly diminished, with even more problems than we have now.