Confederate expectations.

VA grew a different Wheat than the West. It was specifically grown and Flour produced to export to Brazil. It was the main export swapped for Coffee.

The Confederacy did plan to expand Industrialization. It didn’t Think it could pay the Yankee Tax and be able to compete within the Union. Pretty Simple. It felt that the Protective Tariffs bled off Revenue that if separated from the Union would help Fund CSA Growth.

It has been extensively written about. South had a different Soil type than the North and Midwest. Farm Animals had a harder time in the lower South. Animals were Free Ranged because of this. Which meant no collection of litter, fertilizers.Soil Type difference caused Cotton Producers to Farm an area. After a period of time, 5 to 7 years or so, that parcel would be abandoned. New land would be slashed and burned. The Ash would neutralize the Soil. Then the process would start over. This cause improved land rates to be about half of what they were in the North and West. Which Meant that the Population holding compacity of Land was far less in the South. Which meant that productivity rates were less.

CSA never got that Far. Economically you have to adjust to survive. CSA would of been no different.
 
Let's not go too far into what if land, but without a Paris in the Confederacy, just getting to the level equivalent to Vienna, Budapest and Bucharest would have been hard.
They could have industrialized, but they did not have the homogeneity of Japan or the educational basis of Germany.
Because they were American they had advantages over Mexico and Brazil.
Some of the Confederacy's potential problems were internal.
The industrial powers in the 20th century were expansionist and one of those powers would have adjacent to the Confederacy.
 
Let's not go too far into what if land, but without a Paris in the Confederacy, just getting to the level equivalent to Vienna, Budapest and Bucharest would have been hard.
They could have industrialized, but they did not have the homogeneity of Japan or the educational basis of Germany.
Because they were American they had advantages over Mexico and Brazil.
Some of the Confederacy's potential problems were internal.
The industrial powers in the 20th century were expansionist and one of those powers would have adjacent to the Confederacy.

VA was Industrialized. The Limestone South was Industrialized. St Louis was Industrialized and so was Baltimore. If the Whole South had of left the Union, there would of been a lot more people Whistling Dixie. Your whole premise is based on the What If the CSA did no more that what the Biased 19th Century Political Propaganda said that they didn’t do!

The South spent more per person on Railroads than the North. They just didn’t have the Population Capacity to spend more. And yes that number counts Slaves.
 
I think this picture represents a severe lack of research on the Confederacy. The Confederacy was a democratic nation that had a vibrant free press...
Yet the first political prisoner the Confederacy jailed after they started the war was a Florida newspaper reporter who angered Braxton Bragg with what he wrote.

...indeed, Confederate leaders never found it necessary, unlike the Republicans, to shut down hundreds of newspapers and to jail dozens of newspaper editors. ;

Can you point me to a source that lists those hundreds of newspapers the Lincoln administration is supposed to have shut down?

The Confederacy also suspended habeas corpus less often and over a smaller area than did the federal government.

I'm sorry but that's completely false. Habeas corpus was suspended throughout the South, and the government appointed hundreds of habeas corpus commissioners who jailed thousands without trial.

Finally, one key ingredient missing from the OP's representation is that, as even John Nicolay admitted, most Southern leaders believed that the North would allow the South to leave in peace; they did not know that two months after they formed their nation, they would be facing an invasion from the North.

Ah if they just hadn't started that darned war who knows what might have happened?
 
Confederate expectations ? it is my opinion that they expected to continue as always and have resented that they couldn't ever since.
the south could have survived as an agrarian society and in fact did so and continue to do so in large part. the ex-confederacy's problems with achieving this were social protocols and greed.
in the south manual menial labor was not considered appropriate employment for white people. also cotton was still "King" for most of the south. however when push came to shove, poor whites found themselves side by side with blacks in the cotton fields. the south had already lost it's monopoly on cotton, as has been mentioned, but continued to grow it until it was virtually wiped out by the boll weevil. it was only then that they (southerners) realized that diversification would save them. sharecropping and tenet farming were already well established for labor and with the greed of cotton reduced and the introduction of diversification into other , mostly food crops, and a mix of industrialization ( which created jobs more appropriate for whites) the south plodded on into the modern era. i would remark also that i believe that owning and farming your own land with hired labor is still preferable to blue collar and many white collar jobs. much of the old south plantation lands are tree farms now with the same families in control.
before i catch heck let me say that i do not mean to imply that all southerners are lazy but they are motivated differently. i know many land owners that harvested their forests and planted crops like peach orchards, hay fields, melon patches, and peanut farms. i know one guy who set up his own timber mill and built his elaborate house with his own timber. southerners can be highly motivated, industrious, and resourceful, but not if it's is below their stature . this is not a unique trait to southerners but it was a major factor in the ACW and reconstruction.
 
Finally, one key ingredient missing from the OP's representation is that, as even John Nicolay admitted, most Southern leaders believed that the North would allow the South to leave in peace; they did not know that two months after they formed their nation, they would be facing an invasion from the North.
Considering that during the 60-61 winter a small danish provincial newspaper mention that secession would it would likely end in war.* I find It rather unlikely that the CSA leaders did not realize that they where likely heading for one...


*In their international news section where the text is obviously based on what was written in Copenhagen newspapers. and they based in on news from London. (similar to how much quick news is the exact same on many websites because it come from AP)
 
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