History of the United States

The Immigration History of the United States

Immigration. It’s been the defining characteristic of America since before our country even began, so it’s important to remind ourselves of our rich history...of where we all came from to create this one-of-a-kind melting pot of people that is the United States in the 21st century. The first successful colony in America was established in 1607 in Jamestown, Virginia by English settlers. But, these first europeans arrived in a land that was already home to other people. To indigenous, Native Americans who thousands of years before had crossed over a land bridge from Siberia into what’s now the state of Alaska. They were the first explorers of this beautiful land, and they would spread throughout the entire continent and throughout central and southern America too. Native Americans thrived by harnessing the power of nature, and over time, they formed into many distinct groups, each with their own languages and cultures. Then, in 1492, as legend has it, Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue and arrived in the Bahamas and immediately encountered a group of these indigenous people called the Arawak. The Arawak were curious and friendly, but Columbus was filled with greed, and took some of them prisoner, demanding they show him where the gold they were wearing came from. Now, the Native Americans were so easy going and poorly armed compared to these Europeans - who had modern weaponry like metal-forged swords and armor, and even guns - that Columbus said “I could conquer the whole of them with 50 men, and govern them as I pleased.” And that’s exactly what he, and other Spanish conquistadors who came after him, did. They vanquished indigenous group after indigenous group with cunning and sheer brutality, and got a lot of help from diseases like smallpox that moved ahead of them and just wiped the natives out. “When smallpox was taken to the new world nobody in the new world had every seen a disease like this before. So the number of people who were susceptible was much greater. There was no natural immunity, so the number of people who could contract the disease and then spread, and the number of people to receive it once it’s been spread, was much higher.” “Some scholars think there may have been a population of 20 million native americans and the vast majority, perhaps 95%, were killed by old world diseases. A continent virtually emptied of its people. Once word of the discovery of the New World spread throughout the Old World - the kingdoms and empires of Europe - many people began to plan journeys of their own across the Atlantic Ocean. Starting around 1620, tens of thousands of British, German and Dutch - but mostly British Puritans - came to North America to escape religious persecution, or to search for better opportunity, or simply for an adventure. The Puritans spread throughout New England in the northeast, the Dutch settled along the Hudson River in New York and established rich, successful trading posts and cities like New Amsterdam (which we now call New York City). English Quakers established the Pennsylvania colony and its commercial center, Philadelphia. More than 90% of these early colonists became farmers. And, because they were living in small, widespread villages, disease didn’t spread as easily as it could back in Europe, which kept the death rate among settlers in America low. All these farmers needed large families to help them farm, which caused the population to boom, especially in the New England colonies. As land became harder to come by along the coasts, the roughly 350,000 Scottish and Northern Irish who arrived throughout the 1700’s settled inland in western Pennsylvania and along the Appalachians deep into the south. The British sent 60,000 prisoners across the ocean to Georgia, although the only thing many of these men were guilty of was being poor and out of work. Tobacco was a highly profitable cash crop in the southern colonies, so many British settled there and began to take advantage of the thriving slave trade. “Those of us who study immigration history think in terms of why people leave their homelands and why they come here. And those are generally encapsulated in two words: push and pull. Something pushes them out of their homeland and something pulls them to the United States. Now obviously in the earliest cases of slavery they were not necessarily pushed from their homeland, but they were taken from their homeland. But the reason why they were taken was because there was labor to be done here in the United States. It was a global force, the slave trade was fairly global - at least in the Atlantic - and later Asia would become involved in it as well. So here you have a forced migration.” Hundreds of thousands of Africans were mercilessly captured and taken prisoner in their own lands, then put on ships bound for America, where they were sold into a life of hard labor for no pay, and no chance at freedom. [Graph] This is the population breakdown of the country around 1790, shortly after the colonies’ hard-won war of independence with the British and the adoption of the American constitution, which made the country of the United States official. The Native American population was so decimated by disease, war, and migration to the west, that only about 100,000 were left inside the territorial United States. Out west, many Spaniards moved north from Mexico across the Rio Grande to settle in California, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. Not all of these settlers were of European descent. They all could speak spanish, but ethnically, they were a melting pot of whites, Indians and mestizos, or people of mixed race. French settlers established footholds mainly along the Saint Lawrence River and the Great Lakes, along the Mississippi River, and along the Gulf Coast, establishing the city of New Orleans. Their descendants are known as Cajuns. These French and Spanish populations would be incorporated into the United States in the coming decades through the Louisiana Purchase and the granting of statehood to the western territories. After more than four decades of relatively little immigration into America after its founding, in the 1830’s, tens of thousands of immigrants began arriving on her eastern shores, again, mainly from Britain, Ireland and Germany. Some were attracted to the cheap farmland that was made available by westward expansion, while others took advantage of the manufacturing boom in the cities sparked by the industrial revolution. The Irish were mainly unskilled laborers who built most of the railroads and canals, took jobs in the emerging textile mill towns in the Northeast, or worked in the ports. About half of the Germans became farmers, mainly in the midwest, and the other half became craftsman in urban areas. Asian immigrants - mainly from China - began crossing the Pacific to work as laborers, particularly on the transcontinental railroad or in the mines. [History Professor Scott Wong] “Immigration also during the 19th century was usually male dominated—males in their prime working years between the years of 18-25. The Irish being the one exception. Eventually there would be more Irish women who immigrated than Irish men. Immigrants to this day often follow established patterns. They leave on village or one city and go to another city in the United States because someone has already established that pattern for them. People go to where they know people. And those people here can often arrange for jobs and places to live and so on. It was often said that your first job coming off the boat was whoever picked you up at the docks. Now people say your first job is whoever picked you up at the airport. [Show graph] After tripling from the decade before, in just two more decades, from the 1830s to the 1850s, the amount of immigrants arriving in the US each year tripled again, to about 170,000. By the 1850s, when the total population of the country passed 20 million and things began to get a bit crowded, America’s first measurable anti-immigrant feelings began to take root, mainly targeting Irish-catholic immigrants who were arriving in large numbers to escape the poverty and death of the potato famine that was hitting them hard at home. But with a huge boom on the horizon, this early xenophobia was nothing compared to what would come later. Large, steam-powered ships took to the seas after 1880, replacing the older, slower sailing ships, which meant it was suddenly much faster - and cheaper - to cross the ocean, making the dream of a journey to America more accessible to many around the world. “Processed and ticketed, they waited for their ship. They boarded in many parts of Europe and in many kinds of vessels. Most to New York and some to other ports. But they had one thing in common—they were traveling steerage, and the steamship companies understood the profit in numbers.” [Chart] Before long, millions of immigrants were arriving on America’s shores. They passed through immigration processing stations like Ellis Island in New York and Angel Island in San Francisco Bay. This wave was much more diverse than before. Coming mainly from Southern Europe, it was led by Italians, Poles, Greeks, Swedes, Norwegians, Hungarians, Jews, Lebanese, and Syrians. “It was as if god’s great promise had been fulfilled. I’m going into a free land. I don’t think I ever can explain the feeling I had that time. It’s not my native land, but it means more to me than my native land—it means more to me than my native land…Any country on earth this never happen. And become a human being again--it’s a miracle...everybody had hopes. And one thing I was sure, and thousands like me: that the degradation, and the abuse, and the piration that we had in Europe, we wouldn’t have here.” This group was young, most were under 30 years old, mainly because an entire generation of the children of farmers and factory workers in Europe and the Russian empire couldn’t find work because the owners of the farms and factories preferred to have an efficient machine - that they didn’t have to pay - do the work instead of a human being. Well, this was fine by America, whose steel, coal, automobile, textile, and garment production industries were booming. It happily took in this pool of eager, hard workers and put them to work in its growing industrial cities. “As mills and factories sprouted across the land, cities grew up around them. In turn, the cities beckoned to workers by the millions from the American countryside and from overseas to fuel the burgeoning industrialization. What was once a rural nation was rapidly becoming an urban state. From 1860 to 1910, the urban population grew from over 6 million to over 44 million.” The United States also took full advantage of Europe’s paralyzation during the first World War. With millions dying in the midst of the bloodiest struggle the European continent had ever seen, every country there had to completely focus its industries on producing all the supplies - the guns, the uniforms, the tanks, the boats, the bullets - all the stuff needed to carry on and win the fight. But with many of its working-aged men on the front lines, in hospitals or at home after horrific injuries - or dead - the factories of Europe couldn’t meet all the demand, so US factories made up for the shortfall in production. Before long, the United States had leapt to the front ranks of the world’s economic giants. And when the Americans entered the conflict themselves in 1917, US industry was now tasked with supplying its own soldiers too. It was during this 50-year immigration wave, from about 1870-1920, when many well-off, white, native-born Americans began to consider mass immigration a danger to the health and security of the country. They started actively organizing to exert political power to slow it down. The first immigration law in American history was known as the Asian Exclusion Act. It was passed in 1875 and - you guessed it - outlawed Asians, specifically Asian contract laborers, from stepping foot on American soil, plus any other people considered convicts in their own countries. In 1921, Congress pushed through a law that marked a turning-point in American immigration policy--a law that passed the Senate 78-1. The Emergency Quota Act set strict limits on the amount of immigrants who would be allowed into the country each year. It was very effective. The number of new immigrants let in fell from over 800,000 in 1920 to just over 300,000 admitted in 1921. [CHART] If the pace of immigration had been like a raging river, this law acted like a dam. But that drop off in the flow of persons into America still didn’t satisfy the anti-immigration crowd who, just three years later in 1924, forced congress to tighten the quota even more, established the border patrol, and stated that any undocumented immigrants who entered the country were subject to deportation. It’s during this time that the definition of “illegal alien” was born, a term that would be used to stigmatize the next group the anti-immigration community’s crosshairs became fixed on: latin-american migrants living and working in the US Southwest. After the quota laws passed by the US Congress in the 1920’s, immigration was capped for the first time in American history. One of the exceptions to the strict quotas were documented contract workers from the western hemisphere who could come into and out of the US freely. The other major exception were the hundreds of thousands of refugees who were allowed in, mainly Jews escaping the horrors of the Holocaust during and after World War II, and the roughly 400,000 families who fled Cuba after the Castro-led revolution of 1959. The US entrance into World War II also meant many more Mexican workers were needed to fill in for all the young American men who were off fighting the Germans in Europe and the Japanese in the Pacific. At the end of this period, between 1944 and 1954, the number of immigrants coming from Mexico increased by 6,000 percent, as many Latin American workers were offered low wage agricultural jobs in the American Southwest as part of the bracero program. But large numbers of Mexicans without the necessary paperwork came in search of the American dream too, and what followed is one of the ugliest periods in US immigration history. With pressure mounting to do something about the thousands of immigrants easily crossing the southern border each year, President Eisenhower turned to Gen. Joseph Swing, who launched “Operation Wetback” in 1954. That derogatory name reveals the insensitivity of the policy, which directed hundreds of federal officials to lead thousands of local police officers on sweeps through neighborhoods throughout the American southwest, stopping any “Mexican looking” person and demanding to see their papers. If they didn’t have their papers, they were arrested and deported. Some estimates put the amount of illegal immigrants thrown out of the country above one million, leading to countless families being torn apart. In some cases, their American-born children were even sent away. Obviously, this program angered many Mexican-American citizens, and anyone else who saw it as a blatant violation of human rights on a massive scale. [History professor Miguel Levario] “What we have here is an aggressive and sort of paramilitary approach to deportation and mass deportation and of course the use of propaganda to address the issue of unauthorized Mexican workers in the United States. Because the Border Patrol agency was so small - I mean, they’re using local law enforcement - so while they’re out there trying to look for undocumented immigrants what aren’t they doing? Their own basic responsibilities of keeping neighborhoods safe, addressing burglaries, murders, whatever it could be. Operation Wetback was terminated in large part because of cost, in large part because it just became too taxing on local resources. We also found out that regardless of how far you sent them into the interior, within days, sometimes weeks, they were right back in there. The final era of immigration to America is the one we’re still currently in, which began in 1965 with the passage of the Hart-Celler Act. This law finally replaced the unfair quota system with a policy that gives preference to immigrants who have relatives already in the United States, or people with job skills that are highly sought after. All other past restrictions targeting specific groups were thrown out. This was one of the crown jewels in President Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society program and it fundamentally shifted who was allowed in. [CHART] In 1970, 60% of immigrants came from Europe, this number just fell off a cliff by the year 2000, when only 15% were from Europe. The one thing that didn’t change were the many undocumented immigrants from Latin America who continued to come across the border in search of a better life. So, in an effort to address this, in 1986, President Ronald Reagan signed the Immigration Reform and Control Act, which gave green cards to about 2.7 million immigrants. It was the largest single moment of legalization in American history. As a conservative from the anti-immigration party in modern America, the Republican Reagan compromised in exchange for more restrictions on employers who hire illegal immigrants, and tighter border security. But it was a flawed law in a number of ways, mainly, it didn’t effectively fix the broken system that was allowing businesses to hire illegal immigrants in the first place. So since the businesses could still break the rules, many low paying jobs remained for the millions of undocumented immigrants in America that the law didn’t legalize. The bill also didn’t adequately fund and equip the border patrol, which meant there was still a fairly consistent flow of people coming across the border. To fix some of these problems, Sen. Ted Kennedy introduced, and Congress passed, the Immigration Act of 1990, which President George H.W. Bush signed into law. This increased the number of legal immigrants entering the United States from around 500,000 per year to 700,000--an increase of 40%. This bill is also noteworthy because it was bipartisan, with a democratically-controlled congress working with a Republican president to pass major, common-sense immigration reform. Since the passage of that 1990 bill, about 1,000,000 immigrants on average legally achieve residence in the United States each year. These are the top ten countries ranked by the number of legal immigrants from these countries who came to the United States in 2013 according to the Department of Homeland Security. [Chart] According to the 2010 Census, these are the countries from which all immigrants currently in the United States came from, ranked by the total number of people in America who say they were born in each country. Today, 14.3 percent of the total American population is foreign born. That’s more than 45,000,000 people. The United States is home to nearly 20% of all the immigrants in the world. It’s estimated that more than 10 million of the immigrants in the United States are here illegally, living in the shadows. Thank you for watching, I hope you gained a greater appreciation for who we are as a nation and how immigration has allowed us to attract people from all over the rest of the world, how that is the single-most important factor in binding us together and making us such a dynamic country. This video was proudly created by the two-brother team that is the daily conversation, the video editor Brendan Plank and myself. Until next time, for TDC, I’m Bryce Plank. 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Untold History of United States - Bush & Obama: Age of Terror (Subtitulado Español)

"A nation that continues year after year investing more and more money on military defense rather than on programs of social improvement It is doomed to spiritual death. " "The source of all our mistakes is fear. Because of fear great nations act like cornered beasts, thinking only of survival " "Every nation in every country You have to make a decision now. Or he is with us, or you are with the terrorists. " "For most Americans 11-S was a terrible tragedy. For George Bush and Dick Cheney It was much more than that-- It was the opportunity to launch the agenda in which his neoconservative allies had been working for decades. " In the Project for the New American Century, in a recent report called "Reshaping America's Defenses" He says: "It is likely that the transformation process is long, In the absence of some catastrophic and catalyzing event, as a new "Pearl Harbor". Al Qaeda, in their minds, we had taken a "Pearl Harbor". And within minutes of the attack the Bush team went into action. Bush was in Florida, and Vice President Cheney and his legal adviser, David Addington, They took command arguing that the president, as commander in chief in war He could act without legal restrictions. On September 12, looking beyond Al Qaeda, the group of Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan, Bush counterterrorism chief Richard instructed Clark: "Find out if it was Saddam. Look for any connection. " If it was Iraq, Saddam, find out for me. And the reaction Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, or his assistant, Paul Wolfowitz? Donald Rumsfeld, when we talk about bombing Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, He said "there are no good targets in Afghanistan, We bombard Iraq. " And we said, "but Iraq has nothing to do with this." But it did not help much. Even before the 11 / S, Donald Rumsfeld He had asked for plans to attack Iraq. "Thirst devastating," he said, "Barredlo all, whether or not related" Within days Bush announced before a joint session of Congress that the US was going to embark on a global war. From now on, any country that supports terrorism It will be considered by EUU as a hostile nation. At home, 1,200 men were quickly arrested, and another 8,000 sought for questioning, the Muslim majority. Bush was quick to present Congress the Patriot Act. Senators did not have time to read the law, and even less to discuss it. Only Senator Russ Feingold, Wisconsin, voted against, saying: "Preserving our freedom It is one of the reasons why we are starting this new war against terrorism. We will lose this war without having shot himself if we sacrifice the liberties of the American people. " Bush hid the discussions at the White House with secrecy ever seen, and in 2002 she gave powers to the National Security Agency to eavesdrop without a court order and monitor mass mailings citizens, Eyes and ears in every room. violating legal supervision required by laws passed in 1978 because of the abuse of intelligence in previous decades. He hounded the public administration with constant alerts, increasing safety, and an early warning system of five levels. The system was sometimes used politically Rumsfeld and the State Attorney John Ashcroft, and in 2005, Tom Ridge, Secretary National Security, was forced to resign, Potential terrorist targets increased from 160 in 2003 more than 300,000 in four years. Surprisingly, Indiana highlighted with 8600 goals in 2006. The database included small zoos, donut shops, popcorn stalls, ice cream shops and Parade Mula in Columbia, Tennessee. Surrealism was increasing. At the beginning of the 2ªGM, Franklin Roosevelt warned: "War costs money, which means taxes and bonds and bonds and taxes. Abandon all luxuries and nonessentials. " But Bush cut taxes on the rich and told Americans: Volad and enjoy the places in the US. Gather your families and enjoy life. Ironically an agent of the Cold War, Zbigniew Brzezinski, who in 2007 he was criticized Bush for: "Five years of an almost continuous domestic washing brain. Where is the leader willing to say "Enough hysteria, stop this paranoia?" Even in light of future terrorist attacks, we can not rule, have common sense. Let us be faithful to our traditions. " Terrorism, he insisted, It was a tactic, not an ideology, and declare war on a tactic He made no sense. We must stop the terror. I appeal to all nations to do everything possible to stop these terrorist murderers. Thank you. Now watch this drive. The consequences of the global crusade of Bush They are felt abroad. Less than a month after the attacks US invaded Afghanistan It is supposed to destroy those same fans who had armed and trained to fight the USSR two decades earlier. War critics would point later that no Afghans among the 11 hijackers / S, 15 of whom they were Saudis, and that the US botched allowed Bin Laden and other leaders of Al Qaeda escape to Pakistan in early December. The CIA itself cornered thousands of suspects in Afghanistan and in the region. Although the US had always considered the good treatment of prisoners of war as a sign of their moral superiority, the Bush administration branded the detainees and he omitted the military trials necessary, placing them outside the requirements set by the 1949 Geneva Convention. When foreign governments criticized him Bush changed his mind about the Taliban prisoners but not with respect to Al Qaeda. He said: "I do not care what they say lawyers, we will throw them cane. " US led an unknown number of prisoners to secret locations in places like Thailand, Poland, Romania and Morocco, where torture and other "harsh interrogation techniques" They were implemented. Hundreds were imprisoned at the naval base Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. Peaking in 2003, passed through the prison about 680 men between 13 and 98 years. Five percent were captured by Americans. More than 80 percent were delivered, often in exchange for money, by a number of Afghan militias and Afghan and Pakistani bounty hunters. According to the Government only 8 percent were from Al Qaeda. 600 have been released, six convicted and according to the Government nine have died, most from suicide. Now, in 2012, 166 men from more than 20 countries Guantanamo remain. The Bush administration encouraged the CIA ten employ advanced methods of interrogation product of decades of investigation of torture and perfected by allied countries. In February 2004, General Antonio Taguba Major said his research He had been numerous cases of ... "Claros criminal abuses, sadists and free" in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. "There is no doubt that this administration He has committed war crimes. " Arthur Schlesinger Jr., a former Kennedy aide, He said that this policy of torture was "The challenge more continuous and radical the rule of law in American History. No act has done more harm the US reputation in the world ... ever! Although security in Afghanistan He worsened over the years and soldiers in the country rose from 2,500 to 30,000, for Bush, Afghanistan was a distraction. He was more focused on overthrowing the old enemy of his father, Saddam Hussein. Data intelligence sources, secret communications and statements of detainees, reveal that Saddam Hussein aids and protects terrorists including members of Al Qaeda. As Bill Casey in the 80s and Lyndon Johnson in Vietnam, Bush used false intelligence. There is no doubt that the leader of Iraq He is an evil man. After all, he has gassed his own people. We know it has been manufacturing massive destruction weapons. UN inspectors searched thoroughly visiting places mentioned by the CIA. They found nothing, but Bush insisted that the weapons were there. The British government has learned that Saddam He has tried to obtain uranium from Africa. Bush told Bob Woodward, Washington Post at the time: "I do not have to explain why I say things. I do not think anybody owes no explanation. " They were exceptional moments. The words charged new meanings fulfilling the prophecies of George Orwell in his novel "1984". First they steal the words, then steal their meaning. Expressions like "axis of evil", "war on terror", "Regime change", "waterboarding" "Preventive war". Civilians killed were now "collateral damage". CIA kidnappings, "Exceptional extraditions." And the most patriotic concept "homeland" It became a new and colossal federal agency as complex as the Pentagon. The French philosopher Voltaire said in the eighteenth century: "Those who can make you believe absurdities They can make you commit atrocities. " The situation was increasingly unreal. "Black Hawk Down", another Oscar-winning film, He appeared in late 2001 glorifying the heroism and US technology in Somalia in 1990. The game became more and more realistic and television reality TV programs, increasingly bizarre, They thrived in the hearings. Jenna, the tribe has spoken. The American media played the drums of war. MSNBC, General Electric, canceled Phil Donahue program three weeks before the war. Managers feared that the program could ... Which they did. CNN, FOX, NBC showed a about 75 generals and officers, almost all of which turned out to be working for military enterprises. Pentagon officials gave them information He is showing Iraq as an immediate threat. Major newspapers and magazines, including the New York Times, they launched the same message. A Bush adviser told the journalist Ron Suskind Suskind represented that "people who observes reality" but "the world does not work that way. We're an empire now. And act we create our own reality. " When France, Germany and Russia, as most of the Security Council, They refused to support the US, Bush and Rumsfeld bristled scoffed: They think of Europe as Germany and France. I do not. I think that's old Europe. The chips cafeteria Congress They were renamed as "freedom fries" It was like sauerkraut "liberty cabbage" in the 1st World War. Bush moved his new strategy in a speech at West Point in June 2002. We must take the battle to the enemy, destroy their plans and confront the worst threats before they appear. US would act unilaterally and preventive to overthrow any government considered a threat to the country. Cheney had said ... "If there is a 1 percent chance that Pakistani Al Qaeda help to build a nuclear bomb, we must consider it as a certainty to decide our response. In the world now begins the only safe way It is the action. And this nation will act. 60 countries became potential targets. Bush appealed to a moral crusade saying the United States must defend liberty and justice because these principles are right and true for everyone everywhere. Moral truth is the same in all cultures, Anytime and anywhere. It was a bold statement of American exceptionalism. Bruce Bartlett, who worked in the Bush and Reagan father he explained: "That's why George Bush is so clear the issue of Al Qaeda and Islamic fundamentalism. He understands because he is like them. Really he believes he is on a mission from God. Faith is based on believing things of no empirical evidence. I have a feeling of rest knowing that the words of the Bible "Thy will be done" They are a guideline of life. In early October 2002 Congress gave Bush go to war Iraq against their free will, where deemed appropriate, using whatever means, including nuclear weapons, it considered necessary. The resolution drew a direct line between Iraq and Al Qaeda. Among those who signed were Senators John Kerry and Hillary Clinton. This would cost them dear to both in their nominations for president. Not all were deceived. Expand this war It does not help our national security, It puts us in danger. Iraq was not a sanctuary for terrorists like now. Iraq, Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda, there was no connection and must dispel that idea for Americans to know the truth. Millions of people protested worldwide. Three million in Rome, one million in London, New York hundreds of thousands. Time magazine conducted an extensive survey in Europe. 84 percent believed the US It was the greatest threat to peace, 8 percent thought it was Iraq. Bush sent Secretary of State Colin Powell, the most respected member of the Government, UN to justify war. He told Powell: "Perhaps you believe" Saddam Hussein is determined to get a nuclear bomb. Powell spoke for 75 minutes. It was a shameful performance in which he presented false intelligence, Powell and later he considered as a setback in his career. But the speech, but it did not work abroad It had the desired effect on American opinion. Support for the war rose from 50 to 63 points. "The Washington Post" said that the evidence was "irrefutable". USA, without a resolution of the UN, He is marching inexorably to war. The truth was even darker. For Bush, Iraq was just the appetizer. After Iraq, the neocons and marked the main course. The Pentagon predicted a campaign five years and seven countries targeted. Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and the jackpot: Iran. It would be a war that remodel the world the neoconservativo style. There was much talk of "empire". The cover of the magazine "The New York Times" of January 5, 2003 said: "American Empire: making you see the idea" Bush was a daring man. In his youth he had shown a defiant attitude. Now overtake his illustrious father surpassing international law. The war ended up being the disaster predicted by critics. Iraqi society was torn. As Vietnam, dislocating the US, polarizing as the cost and low They increased. Surprisingly, he won the 2004 elections appealing to an even more fervent patriotism. In 2008, when Bush left office with the worst approval rating since Truman, not only had he mishandled two wars, or the rescue operation in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, but, above all, in the eyes of the people He had mishandled the economy which almost collapsed in 2008, ensuring the presidency for the Democrats. His successor, Barack Hussein Obama, son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Texas, raised in Indonesia and Hawaii, He became the US president number 47, creating high hopes for change. His words and mood showed the other side of the US. Constitutional, humanist, global, ecological ... Obama had spoken strongly against the war in Iraq. To which I refuse is a stupid war. Financed by many small donors through the Internet, astonished machinery the candidate of the Democratic Party Hillary Clinton in the primaries. Now he faced a retired military officer, the conservative John McCain in the presidential election. The wind was blowing in favor of Obama. Perhaps since Roosevelt in 1930 there was no such popular disgust with Wall Street and unnecessary imperialist wars. But then something unexpected happened. Obama failed to fulfill his promises and he became the first presidential candidate to reject public funding and accept private without limitations. McCain, who chose public, half raised money. Obama's founders approached Wall Street large wallets, as JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, and Citigroup and General Electric and other defense companies, computer giants and pharmaceutical as Big Pharma, that after years of support for Republicans Obama gave three times more money than McCain. Obama supporters protested few then. his victory It was applauded around the globe. He had come a new US. While conservatives said that Obama was a socialist the winner of the election, by far, It turned out to be Wall Street. Obama brought the same economic team that Clinton had done so much to deregulate the economy. "The New York Times" called them "Constellation rubinitas" being acolytes of the powerful Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin. After nearly destroying the world economy with novel speculative products, several large banks, insurance and mortgage lenders, prophesying the global collapse if they fell because they were too important, They accepted a bailout of 700 billion under very favorable conditions. In addition, the Federal Reserve He lowered the interest to the banks to 0 percent. Then it was almost unpatriotic question these bailouts. But some wondered: Can not we let some weak entities simply fall? Can not let these giants take the real value of their toxic assets? The public wanted revenge, It was a classic moment of depression as shown by Frank Capra. They sit here with their pure and they think how to kill an idea I done something happier to millions of people. One idea that has brought thousands of them here from across the country, bus in shipments and pans, I'll be standing !, to pass on to each other their simple and small experiences. look, I'm just a memo and I know. But I begin to understand many things. You are old as history. If they can not put their dirty fingers on a decent idea and squeeze and put it in his pocket, The collapse! As dogs, if they can not eat they bury it! The former president of the Federal Reserve, Paul Volcker, Obama urged to act. "Now, when you have the opportunity, and they have chest bare, You need to drive a spear into the hearts of these people on Wall Street who for years they have only been merchants of debt. " But it did not happen. forced rescue a terrified Congress and the media applauded. The Treasury did not sue bankers to use the money in new loans employers or the public, recortasen nor personal benefits. They also demanded that shareholders assume losses. Only taxpayers fund the rescue. The most workers would lose, pensioners, seniors with savings, homeowners, small business owners, students with loans, and especially African Americans who lost their jobs due to structural problems. Many simply lost sight the proverbial American dream to join the middle class. The myth of social promotion shattered. Bankers, or "gansteros" as they were called during the depression 30, They had talked about self-control, but they received record compensation for the next two years. While managers in UK and Canada earned 20 times what a worker in 2010, and in Japan 11 times, US executives earned 343 times what an average worker. The number of billionaires increased from 13 in 1985 450 in 2008. The minimum wage stagnated at 5.15 at the time from 1997 to 2007 the level of poverty was the greatest since the '60s. The average income of an American family They fell 40 percent, of $ 126,000 in 2007 to 77,000 in 2010. In 2011, the richest 1 percent He accumulated more wealth than the poorest 90 percent. The general anger led the movement "Occupy Wall Street" a protest not seen since the 30's. The right-wing party "Tea Party" showed another kind of anger, powered by focus groups like Americans for Prosperity, funded by the Koch brothers, conservative billionaires. The American people, not knowing who to blame the state of the economy, He gave the victory to the Republicans in the midterm elections of 2010. But in Washington it increased the confusion and paralysis. Obama, who had come to power surrounded by euphoria, now he is walking a fine line avoid making serious mistakes, but being unable to inspire change. During the 2008 campaign the constitutional professor had promised: "Transparency and the rule of law will be the foundation of this presidency. " But once in office he did not give up extra powers usurped by the Bush administration. Thus, a passive citizenship continued to allow being stripped naked scanners in airports, be spied upon, and he continued paying for vast security programs. Obama could not afford to lower alertness, because in the event of a terrorist attack the media would get hysterical, Republicans would make responsible and that could cost him the presidency. Have you ever during this time It is thought that a mandate is enough? One thing I have clear I prefer to be a great president of a single mandate than a mediocre two. Instead of fighting for transparency Obama proved to be an efficient manager the state of national security. Like Bush, he appealed again and again State secret regarding complaints of torture, exceptional extraditions and illegal wiretapping by the ASN. He denied the Habeas Corpus enemy combatants, maintained and authorized military commissions, without proper procedures, the murder of a US citizen in Yemen He accused of having ties with Al Qaeda. He surprised defenders of civil rights to carry the investigations of the Bush era to a new level, and persecute reporters and government informers using the Espionage Act of WW1. Only three cases had occurred in 92 years. Obama began six doubtful cases, almost all for exposing illegal activities of the government. The best known was Bradley Manning, Military intelligence analyst in Iraq, who leaked more than 260,000 diplomatic cables, war reports and videos distributed by Wikileaks, an organization of nonprofit accusations. The revelations of US war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan and its support dictatorships in the region They proved to be an important catalyst for the revolts in Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen, Libya and Bharein. However, the Obama administration has dismantled activity Wikileaks and he has threatened to pursue its co-founder. These acts are a clear message to whistleblowers: Committing war crimes as Bush and Cheney and you nothing will happen. Exponlos, and you risk your career and you will be punished. Or, like Manning, you'll rot in prison. One of the biggest advocates new standards of conduct, Jack Goldsmith, former head of the legal office of Bush, Cheney reassured and other neoconservatives in an article, saying that Obama was "Like Nixon going to China. The changes made will strengthen long-term core of the Bush agenda. It was a new world in the shade. In 2010, "The Washington Post" called him "An alternative geography of the United States, a secret country hidden from the public eye " Nearly a half million people had access and maximum security. More than 3,000 security companies public and private they coexisted. 1.700 million e-mails and communications They were intercepted and stored every day by the National Security Agency. Political commentator and constitutional lawyer Glenn Greenwald well he described this radical shift when he wrote: "The fundamental guarantee of Western justice from the Magna Carta, it was codified in the US by the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution ... " It could well have added the Fifth Amendment ... Without due process or the right to privacy, each of us living at the mercy watchman state. All this with the excuse to stop a terrorist threat terribly exaggerated. Obama's foreign policy seemed more reasonable that of Bush, and rejected unilateralism and anticipation that incensed world opinion. But the goal, world domination, little changed and even the methods were similar. In 2001, the former director NSA and CIA to Bush, General Michael Hayden, he felt comfortable with continuity between two very different presidents, saying that: "Americans have found the midpoint about what they accept their government to do. " He called it: "... Practical consensus ..." With limited experience in international affairs, Obama surrounded himself with hardline advisers. Including Defense Secretary Robert Gates, the time of the CIA Bill Casey, in the 80. Hillary Clinton, Secretary of State, It was also hardliners. In an early speech Clinton presented a version of American history soaked triumphalism unadorned and historical amnesia. "Let me say clearly. US can, must and will lead in this new century. The third world war that so many feared never came. Many millions of people escape poverty and they exercised their human rights for the first time. These are the benefits of a global structure forged for many years by US leaders of both parties. It would be difficult to find and ask the millions who died in the years in which the United States intervened in their countries they thought. The people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Philippines, Central America, Greece, Iran, Brazil, Cuba, Congo, Indonesia, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Chile, East Timor, iraq and Afghanistan, among others. In Afghanistan, Obama, calling it "war of necessity" He doubled the bet Bush. Pressured by the end of 2009 to send more troops He caved. A military adviser said: "I do not know how you can challenge the chain of command in this case" ie that the High Command could resign in protest. The CIA director, Leon Panetta, said: "No Democratic president can go against military advice, especially if you have requested. So do it " he recommended, "do what they say." When he made the decision, Obama did not have the courage of John Kennedy. In December it announced an increase of 30,000 troops to nearly 100,000. More or less the same as the USSR deployed in his disastrous invasion of Afghanistan. He announced the troop increase in Westpoint, reminding the cadets the US had invaded Afghanistan because it had taken to Al Qaeda. But avoided mention that almost all the preparation 11 / S did not take place in Afghanistan, but in Germany and Spain apartments and flight schools in the US, or that only half of the 300 members of Al Qaeda were then in Afghanistan, and many were in Pakistan, an allied country. I got a president in two wars would receive the Nobel Peace Prize that month was, first, surreal. But when the world heard the defense of Obama of unilateralism and American preference, the depreciated value of the prize as Kissinger 36 years ago. I think the US should be Reference of conduct in war. That's what differentiates us from those whom we fight. Obama feared bogged down in Afghanistan as Johnson in Vietnam. What underdeveloped, and terribly poor and illiterate Afghans needed It was economic aid, education and social reform. USA spent 110.000 billion in military programs in 2011 but only 2,000 million developing sustained. With all this money circulating, as in Vietnam, corruption reached epic proportions. Distrust among supposed allies, NATO and Afghanistan soared. Hamid Karzai, the US-backed Afghan president, He announced that Pakistan would support if war against the US. In 2012, Afghan soldiers and police many US soldiers killed which they had to scatter the troops. Meanwhile, the demoralized US forces They left Iraq in December 2011. About 4,500 soldiers never return home, more than 32,000 were injured, many of them seriously. Iraqi deaths ranged from 150,000 and over one million. Two million Iraqis have left the country. The irony was fantastic. Sunni Hussein to overthrow the US had favored Shiite dominance in Iraq, which became an ally of Iran, Iran and thus proved to be the winner of the war. The Bush administration had estimated that the war in Iraq cost between 50 and 60 billion. Rumsfeld said it expected 100 billion was absurd. In 2008, when Bush left office, US had spent 700 billion, not including assistance to veterans. Economists projected a long-term cost up to three billion dollars. Obama welcomed the troops at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, ending the war so as dishonest as it was beginning. We leave in Iraq a sovereign, stable and independent state. In contrast to the old empires, we do not make these sacrifices by land or resources. We do it because it is right. You do not forget that you are part of a succession of heroes spanning two centuries, from your grandparents and parents who fought against fascism and communism, and you have brought justice those who attacked us on 11 / S. And that endorsed Bush's lies about the connection between Iraq and 11 / S. Just he spoke these words Iraq was ravaged by a new series of suicide bombings. Currently, Iraq is on the brink of civil war. Among the most critical to both wars were the mayors of the country, who met in Baltimore in June 2011 and called 126.000 million the war budget to rebuild the cities. The mayor of Los Angeles said: "Let us build bridges in Baghdad and Kandahar instead of or Kansas City Baltimore leaves me flabbergasted. " For many Americans, tired of wars, a ray of light peeked through the clouds in May 2011. A daring night action by Navy Seals ended with Osama bin Laden, who lived quietly in the shade of the Pakistan Military Academy. With the euphoria US that created the assault, celebrating the power and skill of the Seals, who executed Bin Laden and they threw his body into the sea, Obama appeared in a new light, opposed to Bush as effective president in the war, willing to use any means necessary to hunt the enemy. In fact, a wolf in sheep's clothing. After a firefight, they killed Osama bin Laden and they took his body. Even a famous film involved that torture had provided Bin Laden's death. Although in reality it was because of police work and ordinary espionage after almost ten years. For God and Country, Geronimo is dead. Oh my God! However, the US ability to love himself I was again in full swing, and there was no controversy about bringing Bin Laden wounded for trial, USA cone made in Nuremberg, where the Nazis were shown and belittled. But a trial was the last thing he wanted most. Those who accepted torture They could well tolerate retaliation. But who really won? After billions of dollars spent on two wars, hundreds of thousands dead, an endless war on terror, the loss of civil liberties and confidence in a presidency, and the near collapse of the financial structure, neutral observer might say the US had obtained a Pyrrhic victory, and that losses they had become useless. Bin Laden and his twisted vision a new caliphate were dead, but he had gotten more than he had dreamed. He had incited the greatest empire in history to reveal their worst side, and, like the Wizard of Oz, He did not seem so big and powerful. Who are you? I am the great and powerful ..! Wizard of Oz. Bin Laden's martyrdom eyes of his followers, He secured his place in the history books as the person who weakened and perhaps He helped destroy the world order. Some might call Atila Hannibal or the myth of Rome, Robespierre for the former France, Lenin tsarist Russia, even a modern Hitler to the British Empire, He agonized in its wake. Bin Laden was gone. But what would the US now? still haunted by his demons, he turned his attention to China as a new threat, and he continued trying to Russia as an ancient and keeping Iran North Korea and Venezuela as regional threats. Looking for a more efficient way and practicing austere war, Obama announced in 2012 First used in Vietnam, the drone, when equipped with missiles would convert the new face of war and the preferred weapon of Obama. He personally drew up the blacklist. Before 11 / S US had opposed to extrajudicial killings in other countries, condemning in particular those of Israel in Palestine. But in 2012 the Air Force and the CIA had an army of 7,000 drones used primarily in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan. Obama extended use to Yemen in 2009 where there were fewer than 300 militants. In mid-2012 the number was over 1000, while continuing attacks drone indignant to the Yemeni people. In 2012 Obama added to the list Gaddafi's followers and Islamic rebels In Philippines and Somalia. The impact of this form of war They are discovered. The number of civilian victims of these attacks They are cause for protest in the government itself and several human rights organizations. The judge asked the Pakistani pump Times Square how he could risk the lives of innocent women and children, and he replied that US drones regularly killed women and children in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Surely the cat was out of the bag, and in 2012 more than 50 countries, some friends and other enemies of the US, They had acquired drones. Israel, Russia, India and Iran secured who had made lethal drones, but the most comprehensive program was the Chinese. As with the nuclear bomb, he started an arms race. Bush had continued Russia to NATO expansion Clinton, breaking the promise that his father did Gorbachev. Obama joined Albania and Croatia, and despite leaving 500 bases in Iraq, the Obama administration, in addition to the 6,000 US bases, maintains about 1,000 overseas bases, covering the entire globe. USA, in late 2007, He had military presence, according Chalmers Johnson, in 151 of the 192 UN countries. In 2008, Africom, based in Germany, He was added as Sixth Command, responsible to increase the US military presence in Africa. SOUTHCOM, based in Miami, It was reorganized in 2010 to increase the military presence in Latin America, with bases, surveillance systems and anti-drug and counterinsurgency programs focused on "... As seen in Venezuela." The Fourth Fleet was deployed in 2008, for the first time since the 2nd GM. Weave is now ten battle groups patrolling international waters. "US Navy, a global force for good. " In 2011, the US sold a staggering 78 percent of world arms. During the Bush administration the Pentagon doubled its spending to 700,000 million. Although the actual Pentagon budget It confused in secret uses and different government departments, in 2010, according to the National Priorities Project, US spends actually a ... ... Between the army, intelligence and national security. A domain across the spectrum: land, sea, air, space and cyberspace. In November 2011 Secretary of State Clinton, He took off his gloves with China: When I call ... I meant a considerable increase in military presence in the Asia-Pacific region to contain China. From the Opium War of the nineteenth century, China has been humiliated again and again by foreigners: Britain, Japan, Russia. He fought US in Korea in the 50s. China is a country proud. It is the second largest economy in the world. A hybrid, partly nationalized capitalist part, he has replaced US as Asia's largest trading partner. But in 1996, the Chinese were humiliated again US-including atomic threat, in another confrontation over Taiwan. And with economic interests and to protect naval routes, it was decided to modernize its army. In 2012, the Pentagon estimated China spent one 160.000 billion. But given the secrecy of the Chinese system the actual budget is unknown. Although only a base abroad, its hardness in disputes over oil, gas and mineral islands and territories of Southeast Asia It has caused tensions with neighboring countries. Internally, the government, communist in name only, remains stagnant, determined to modernize, and brutally determined to repress dissent where the only party It has been questioned. Western democracies, while they are doing business in China, They have condemned these policies, no effect. But, ominously, China has attracted again the rage of critics with China, US hardliners, whose animosity data the McCarthy era. It is preparing a new confrontation. US has returned to Asia seeking new allies, restructuring its fleet, deploying its invisible planes bases within striking distance China 2017. It has reinforced its military alliances with neighboring countries to China, especially Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and the Philippines, and he has sent 2,500 marines to Australia. It is the first long-term deployment in Asia from Vietnam. The Chinese were angry with the Obama administration sell weapons worth 12,000 million to Taiwan in 2010 and 2011. They have accused US attempting to surround them. Fear USA by others it should not be underestimated. As he noted by the conservative politician Samuel Huntington in 1996: West has not won the war for superiority their ideas or religions, but because of its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact, the rest never forget. Experts in China progressives fear that the US is using the manual that Truman used against the USSR to contain China. As in that case, the West protest by the internal policies of China. But now, owning a trillion in US Treasury bonds, Chinese could hurt its economy in a way that the USSR could not. The historian Alfred McCoy explained the true interests writing: "In 2020 the Pentagon hopes to patrolling around the globe ceaselessly a shield with three layers ranging from the stratosphere to exosphere, implemented by armed drones. This shield should be able to blind an army disabling terrestrial communications, aviation and naval operations. But warns McCoy, the illusion of technological invincibility he has failed in the past to arrogant countries, like Germany in the 2nd GM or the US in Vietnam. With irony, McCoy reminds us the exclusive global lethality could offset any future losses economic capacity. and that "the fate of the US could be determined the first thing to happen in this century: a military debacle result of technological illusion or a new technological regime with enough power to perpetuate its global dominance. " But as the popular series Star Wars films shows, a nation that dominates the world with their technology it becomes a tyranny ... Stand up, my friend. ... Hated by those who are subjected. China could be the first empire emerge in a nuclear world, but an empire based in the US or Britain would be a disaster. Great Han chauvinism it would be better that American exceptionalism. The former leader of defense Joseph Nye noted that the failure of the dominant powers by not integrate the emerging powers of Germany and Japan in the global system of the twentieth century provoked two world wars catastrophic. We can not allow history to repeat itself. The Chinese should ignore the American example and the US must change course. Henry Wallace was concerned that if the US was so bad the USSR when they were economically and militarily superior, What would the Soviets USA if the situation were reversed? It never happened, but he understood that this race downhill there would be no winner. We reached the end of this series and we must ask with humility: US to review the last century, Have we dealt with wisdom and humanity to the rest of the world? A world in which a hundred, or thousand, or two thousand richest have more wealth that the poorest billion? Are we right to patrol the globe? Have we been an agent of good, understanding, peace? We must look in the mirror. Perhaps our narcissism us We have become angels of our despair? The claim of victory in the 2nd GM and justification for launching the bomb on Japan, even if it was addressed to the USSR, are the founding myths of our domain and our national security. And the country's elites have benefited from it. The pump has allowed us to win by any means, what it makes us, because to win, just. And to be fair we are for good accordingly. Under these conditions no more moral than ours. As Secretary of State Albright said: "But if we have to use force It is because we are USA; We are the indispensable nation. " For threatening humanity with the pump our mistakes are forgiven, and our cruelty is justified as a well-intentioned aberration. But the rule does not last long. Five great empires have collapsed in the span of a generation since World War 2: Britain, France, Germany, Japan and the USSR. Three other empires earlier in the twentieth century: Russian, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman. If history is a barometer American dominance will also end. We reject wisely be the colony of an empire and most we would deny any imperialist claim. Perhaps that is why we hold both the myth of American exceptionalism. Uniqueness, benevolence and American generosity. Perhaps in that fantastic notion lies the seed of our redemption. And the US can keep up vision that seemed to be within reach in 1944 when Wallace was almost president, or in 1953 when Stalin died with a newly elected president, or JFK and Khrushchev in 1963, or Bush and Gorbachev in 1989, or Obama in 2008. History shows us that the road could have been different. We will have more opportunities like that, Are we ready? I remember Franklin Roosevelt the last day of his life, he telegraphed to Churchill: "I underestimated the Soviet problem everything possible, because these problems, in one form or another, they appear every day and almost all are solved. " Appease situations that arise. Let things happen excess unreacted, looking at the world through the eyes of the opposite. To this we must share the needs of others with true compassion and empathy, relying on the collective will of the world to survive future times, ending the nuclear threat and climate change. Can not we give up our exceptionalism and our arrogance? We can not stop talking about domination? Or to ask God to bless us above others? Hardliners and nationalists protest but his path has proven to be wrong. One woman told me 70: "We have to feminize the planet." Then I thought it was weird but now I realize that there is power in love. Real power in real love. Let's find a way to respect the law, no jungle, but of civilization, with which we unite and parked our differences to preserve what really matters. Herodotus wrote in the first century BC: "The first story was written in the hope to preserve from oblivion the remembrance of what men have been. " And for that reason the history of man is not only blood and death, but also honor, achievement, gentleness, memory and civilization. There is a way to go to reminisce. And then we can start, step by step like a baby, to reach the stars. In a final analysis, our most basic common link It is that we all inhabit this small planet, We breathe the same air, we care for the future of our children, and we are mortal.

The History of U.S. Elections (1964-2016)

[Bryce] To gain some historical perspective on 2016, let’s look back at the previous 13 presidential elections. In 1964, less than a year after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the power of the Democratic Party was at its peak. President Lyndon Johnson had just signed the historic Civil Rights Act into law in July. The result? Johnson trounced the ultra-conservative Barry Goldwater in the most lopsided popular vote margin in presidential election history. 1968 was the most tumultuous election year of the century. [King] “Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the lord!” Both Martin Luther King, Jr and Robert Kennedy were assassinated, and with protests raging over the war in Vietnam, LBJ chose not to run for reelection. [Johnson] “I will not accept the nomination of my party for another term as your president.” The result was a major political realignment, as Republican Richard Nixon took advantage of racial resentment. But the segregationist George Wallace - an independent - was a major beneficiary, winning most of the deep south. [Wallace] “Why don’t you young punks get outta the auditorium.” The backlash was strong among whites over the Democratic Party’s embrace of Civil Rights and Johnson’s ambitious Great Society programs to fight poverty. That realignment was on full display in 1972 as incumbent President Nixon destroyed his opponent, George McGovern, and won 49 states. News stories on the Watergate scandal that would force Nixon to resign from office two years later were just beginning to break. The ‘72 election is also notable for the attempt on the life of the Democratic frontrunner George Wallace, who was shot five times and paralyzed from the waist down, ending his campaign. With the Republicans reeling from the fallout over Nixon - [Nixon] I shall resign the Presidency.” 1976 was the only time in the 24 year-period from ‘68-’92 that a Democrat won the presidency. That candidate was deeply religious southerner Jimmy Carter, who was - momentarily - able to switch the South back to Democratic control in his narrow victory over Nixon’s successor, President Gerald Ford. In 1980, the Republican former governor of California, Ronald Reagan offered a more optimistic vision for an American economy weakened by high unemployment and inflation. [Reagan] “Is there more or less unemployment in the country than there was four years ago?” The Iran hostage crisis was the nail in President Carter’s political coffin, helping Reagan win more electoral votes than any non-incumbent presidential candidate in history. Four years later, Reagan’s Democratic challenger, Walter Mondale, only managed to win his home state of Minnesota and the District of Columbia--which has never voted Republican. Mondale’s uphill battle against a popular sitting president was pretty much impossible from the start with the economy booming under Reagan. Mondale did make some history by choosing Geraldine Ferraro as his running mate, the first woman nominated to a major-party presidential ticket. In 1988, the Republican torch was passed to Vice President George HW Bush--who had spent most of his adult life serving the country. To fend off Democrat Michael Dukakis, Bush turned to the dark arts, unleashing a series of negative attacks against his opponent, who failed to respond in kind. [Narrator] “Dukakis not only opposes the death penalty, he allowed first degree murderers to have weekend passes from prison. One was Willie Horton, who murdered a boy in a robbery, stabbing him 19 times.” While Bush’s electoral college victory margin was convincing, his too-close-for-comfort popular vote margin and underwhelming voter turnout foreshadowed a tough road to reelection. And in 1992, Bush’s reelection was made much tougher when he alienated his conservative base by breaking a campaign pledge against raising taxes. [H.W. Bush] “Read my lips: No. New. Taxes.” Bush should’ve been flying high after leading a decisive American victory in the Persian Gulf War... [Frontline Narrator] “The man often derided as a political wimp had maneuvered his generals, his country, and the most world...” But the economy dipped into recession, opening the door for a young charismatic southern democratic governor named Bill Clinton. Clinton and Independent Ross Perot, who ran an incredibly strong third-party campaign, picked Bush apart and held him to just 37.4% of the popular vote. Clinton’s 43% was enough to give him a convincing electoral college victory. Going into the 1996 election, Clinton was very beatable after failing to enact his main target: health care reform. But the economy was booming, the world was peaceful, and the Republicans nominated the uninspiring Bob Dole, a man 23 years older than Clinton. Ross Perot ran a second time, and his 8.4% again undercut the Republicans, cementing Clinton’s reelection, and making him the first president since Woodrow Wilson to win two terms without crossing the 50% threshold in the popular vote. The November 7, 2000 election between Clinton’s Vice President Al Gore, and Texas Republican governor George W. Bush, was the most dramatic - and controversial - since 1876. For the first time in 112 years the eventual winner failed to win the popular vote. The race came down to Florida, where Bush led Gore by less than 1,000 votes, out of more than 5.8 million cast. After more than a month of recounts and court battles, the U.S. Supreme Court (in a 5-4 decision) awarded Florida’s 25 electoral votes, and the presidency, to Bush. Bush’s 2004 reelection was defined by two things: the war on terrorism. [W. Bush] “The people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon.” And the war in Iraq, which Bush launched under the false assertion that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein possessed nuclear and biological weapons. Senator John Kerry - the current U.S. Secretary of State - was the Democratic nominee. Kerry’s critiques of Bush were undermined by his vote authorizing the Iraq War, and a smear campaign to cast doubt on his record as a Vietnam war hero. Bush’s margin of victory was the smallest ever recorded for an incumbent president and, just like his 2000 victory, was not without controversy, as the results from Ohio were highly questionable after numerous voting irregularities came to light. Going into the 2008 election, the stage was set for a Democratic wave. Bush and his Iraq War were deeply unpopular with an American people yearning for change, opening the door for two historic candidacies. Barack Obama - a young, freshman senator from the state of Illinois - burst onto the scene to challenge the junior senator from New York, former First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, for the Democratic nomination. The two superstars battled for an entire year, debating more than 20 times. Fueled by the energetic support of young Americans, commanding oratory, and a brilliant grassroots-driven campaign, Obama came from behind to narrowly secure the nomination. The Republicans chose Senator John McCain as their nominee, a political moderate and former war hero. Recognizing the power of Obama’s movement-oriented campaign, McCain made a desperate play, tapping a little known Alaskan governor as his running mate. But Sarah Palin quickly proved to be unqualified in the eyes of most American voters, eroding McCain’s credibility. [Couric] “Can you name a few?” [Palin] “I have a vast variety of sources where we get our news too. Alaska isn’t a foreign country.” [TV News Reporter #1] “The stock market is now down 21%” [Reporter #2] “We’re now down 43%” [Reporter #3] “I have never, live, looked at the DOW Jones Industrial board and seen a 600 point loss.” [Reporter #4] “Who knows where this is going to end up. I mean this is volatility we haven’t seen, of course, since way before you and I were born, even before our grandparents. You know, 1929.” [Reporter #5] “So almost everything there completely wiped out. And the NASDAQ everything and more has been completely wiped out.” [Bryce] With the economy collapsing on Bush’s watch, and hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars flowing into Wall Street banks to keep them solvent, Obama and his democratic party surged to victory. The election of the first African American president turned a higher percentage of his fellow citizens out to vote than in any election since the tumultuous 1968 campaign. [Charles Gibson] “Barack Obama will be the 44th President of the United States.” [Crowd cheering loudly] [President-elect Obama] “It’s been a long time coming. But because of what we did on this day, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to America.” 2012 was defined by three things. President Obama’s all-hands-on-deck approach to rescuing the economy; the Republican Party’s efforts to block Obama at all costs; and Obama’s signature achievement, the Affordable Care Act that dramatically reduced the number of Americans without health insurance. With the economy recovering slowly, Obama seemed beatable. But on May 2, 2011, the President announced the death of Osama bin Laden, the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, hunted by the US Government for 10 years. [President Obama] “The United States has conducted an operation that killed Osama bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda.” The moment - celebrated as a victory in the War on Terror - helped cement Obama’s image as a formidable Commander-In-Chief. [Crowd singing national anthem] “Gave proof through the night, that our flag was still there.” Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney captured the Republican nomination. [Mitt Romney] “Too many Americans are struggling to find work in today’s economy.” He was a capable opponent, but after making hundreds of millions of dollars as a capital investor, he was labeled as a representative of the increasingly vilified 1%. [Protesters chanting] “Whose streets? Our streets!” The Occupy Movement, led by protesters who encamped at Zuccotti Park in Manhattan’s financial district, had focused the world’s attention on social and economic inequality. In the end, Obama was carried by his best-in-history political organization - still fully intact after his ‘08 campaign - and secured a larger-than-expected reelection victory. 2016 is set to be another historic, first of it’s kind election for the United States. But will it be the first time we elect someone who has never served their country before? Or the first time America chooses a woman as it’s leader? Until next time, thanks for watching, and subscribe for more original videos like this.

History of the Southern United States

The history of the Southern United States reaches back hundreds of years and includes the Mississippian people, well known for their mound building. European history in the region began in the very earliest days of the exploration and colonization of North America. Spain, France, and England eventually explored and claimed parts of what is now the Southern United States, and the cultural influences of each can still be seen in the region today. In the centuries since, the history of the Southern United States has recorded a large number of important events, including the American Revolution, the American Civil War, the ending of slavery, and the American Civil Rights Movement. Native American civilizations In Pre-Columbian times, the only inhabitants of what is now the Southern United States were Native Americans. The most important Native American nation in the region was the Mississippian people, who were a Mound builder culture that flourished in the Midwestern, Eastern, and Southeastern United States in the centuries leading up to European contact. The Mississippian way of life began to develop around the 10th century in the Mississippi River Valley. Notable Native American nations that developed in the South after the Mississippians include what are known as "the Five Civilized Tribes": the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek and Seminole. European colonization = Spanish exploration= Spain made frequent exploratory trips to the New World after its discovery in 1492. Rumors of natives being decorated with gold and stories of a Fountain of Youth helped hold the interest of many Spanish explorers, and colonization eventually followed. Juan Ponce de León was the first European to come to the South when he landed in Florida in 1513. Among the first European settlements in North America were Spanish settlements in what would later become the state of Florida; the earliest was Tristán de Luna y Arellano's failed colony in what is now Pensacola in 1559. More successful was Pedro Menéndez de Avilés's St. Augustine, founded in 1565; St. Augustine remains the oldest continuously inhabited European settlement in the continental United States. Spain also colonized parts of Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas. Spain issued land grants in the South, from Kentucky to Florida and into the southwestern areas of what is now the United States. There was also a Spanish colony location near King Powhatan's ruling town in the Chesapeake Bay area of what is now Virginia and Maryland. It preceded Jamestown, the English colony, by as much as one hundred years. = French colonization= The first French settlement in what is now the Southern United States was Fort Caroline, located in what is now Jacksonville, Florida, in 1562. It was established as a haven for the Huguenots and was founded under the leadership of René Goulaine de Laudonnière and Jean Ribault. It was destroyed by the Spanish from the nearby colony of St. Augustine in 1565. Later French arrived from the north. Having established agricultural colonies in Canada and built a fur trading network with Indians in the Great Lakes area, they began to explore the Mississippi River. The French called their territory Louisiana, in honor of their King Louis. France claimed Texas and set up several short-lived forts there, such as the one in Red River County, built in 1718. In 1817 the French pirate Jean Lafitte settled on Galveston Island; his colony there grew to more than 1,000 persons by 1818 but was abandoned in 1820. The most important French settlements were established at New Orleans and Mobile. Only a few settlers came from France directly, with others arriving from Haiti and Acadia. British colonial era Just before they defeated the Spanish Armada, the English began exploring the New World. In 1585 an expedition organized by Walter Raleigh established the first English settlement in the New World, on Roanoke Island, North Carolina. The colony failed to prosper, however, and the colonists were retrieved the following year by English supply ships. In 1587, Raleigh again sent out a group of colonists to Roanoke. From this colony, the first recorded European birth in North America, a child named Virginia Dare, was reported. That group of colonists disappeared and is known as the "Lost Colony". Many people theorize that they were either killed or taken in by local tribes. Like New England, the South was originally settled by English Protestants, later becoming a melting pot of religions as with other parts of the country. While the earlier attempt at colonization had failed on Roanoke Island, the English established their first permanent colony in America in Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607, at the mouth of the James River, which in turn empties into Chesapeake Bay. Settlement of Chesapeake Bay was driven by a desire to obtain precious metal resources, specifically gold. The colony was technically still within Spanish territorial claims, yet far enough from most Spanish settlements to avoid colonial clashes. As the "Anchor of the South", the region includes the Delmarva Peninsula and much of coastal Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia . Early in the history of the colony, it became clear that the claims of gold deposits were vastly exaggerated. Referred to as the "Starving Time" of the Jamestown colony, the years from the time of landing in 1607 until 1609 were rife with famine and instability. However, Native American support, in addition to reinforcements from Britain, sustained the small colony. Due to continued political and economic instability, however, the charter of the Colony of Virginia was revoked in 1624. The primary cause of this revocation was the revelation that hundreds of settlers were dead or missing following an attack in 1622 by Native American tribes led by Opechancanough. A royal charter was established for Virginia, yet the House of Burgesses, formed in 1619, was allowed to continue as political leadership for the colony in conjunction with a royal governor. A key figure in the Virginia Colony and Southern political and cultural development generally was William Berkeley, who served, with some interruptions, as governor of Virginia from 1645 until 1675. His desire for an elite immigration to Virginia led to the "Second Sons" policy, in which younger sons of English aristocrats were recruited to emigrate to Virginia. Berkeley also emphasized the "headright system," the offering of large tracts of land to those arriving in the colony. This early immigration by an elite contributed to the development of an aristocratic political and social structure in the South. English colonists, especially young indentured servants, continued to arrive along the southern Atlantic coast. Virginia became a prosperous English colony. The area now known as Georgia was also settled. Its beginnings under James Oglethorpe were as a resettlement colony for imprisoned debtors. = Rise of tobacco culture and slavery in the colonial South= From the introduction of tobacco in 1613, its cultivation began to form the basis of the early Southern economy. Cotton did not become a mainstay until much later, after technological developments, especially the Whitney Cotton gin of 1794, greatly increased the profitability of cotton cultivation. Until that point, most cotton was farmed in large plantations in the Province of Carolina, and tobacco, which could be grown profitably in farms of smaller scale, was the dominant cash crop export of the South and the Middle Atlantic States. In 1640, the Virginia General Court recorded the earliest documentation of lifetime slavery when it sentenced John Punch to lifetime servitude under his master Hugh Gwyn for running away. The first slavery law in the British colonies was enacted by Massachusetts to enslave the indigenous population in 1641. During this period, life expectancy was often low and indentured servants came from overpopulated European areas. With the lower price of servants compared to slaves, and the high mortality of the servants, planters often found it much more economical to use servants. Because of this, slavery in the early colonial period differed greatly in the American colonies from that in the Caribbean. Often Caribbean slaves were worked literally to death on large sugar and rice plantations, while the American slave population had a higher life expectancy and was maintained through natural reproduction. This natural reproduction was important for the continuation of slavery after the prohibition on slave importation after about 1780. Much of the slave trade was conducted as part of the "Triangular Trade", a three-way exchange of slaves, rum, and sugar. Northern shippers purchased slaves using rum, made in New England from cane sugar, which was in turn grown in the Caribbean. This slave trade was generally able to fulfill labor needs in the South for the cultivation of tobacco after the decline of indentured servants. At approximately the point when tobacco labor needs began to increase, the mortality rate fell and all groups lived longer. By the late 17th century and early 18th century, slaves became economically viable sources of labor for the growing tobacco culture. Also, further South than the Mid-Atlantic, Southern settlers grew wealthy by raising and selling rice, indigo, and cotton. The plantations of South Carolina often were modeled on Caribbean plantations, albeit smaller in size. = Growth of the Southern colonies= For details on each specific colony, see Province of Georgia, Province of Maryland, Province of North Carolina, Province of South Carolina, and Colony of Virginia. By the end of the 17th century, the number of colonists was growing. The large population centers were still in the northeastern and middle colonies, leaving the southern colonies of Maryland, Virginia, North and South Carolina a rural frontier land. The economies of these colonies were tied to agriculture. During this time the great plantations were formed by wealthy colonists who saw great opportunity in the new country. Tobacco and cotton were the main cash crops of the areas and were readily accepted by English buyers. Rice and indigo were also grown in the area and exported to Europe. The plantation owners built a vast aristocratic life and accumulated a great deal of wealth from their land. They supported slavery as a means of working their land. On the other side of the agricultural coin were the small yeoman farmers. They did not have the capability or wealth to operate large plantations. Instead, they worked small tracts of land and developed a political activism in response to the growing oligarchy of the plantation owners. Many politicians from this era were yeoman farmers speaking out to protect their rights as free men. Charleston became a booming trade town for the southern colonies. The abundance of pine trees in the area provided raw materials for shipyards to develop and the harbor provided a safe port for English ships bringing in imported goods. The colonists exported tobacco, cotton and textiles and imported tea, sugar, and slaves. The fact that these colonies maintained an independent trade relation with England and the rest of Europe became a major factor later on as tension mounted leading up to the American Revolutionary War. After the late 17th century, the economies of the North and the South began to diverge, especially in coastal areas. The Southern emphasis on export production contrasted with the Northern emphasis on food production. By the mid-18th century, the colonies of Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia had been established. In the upper colonies, that is, Maryland, Virginia, and portions of North Carolina, the tobacco culture prevailed. However, in the lower colonies of South Carolina and Georgia, cultivation focused more on cotton and rice. American Revolution The southern colonies, led by Virginia, gave strong support for the Patriot cause in solidarity with Massachusetts. Georgia, the newest, smallest, most exposed and militarily most vulnerable colony, hesitated briefly before joining the other 12 colonies in Congress. As soon as news arrived of the Battle of Lexington and Concord in April 1775, Patriot forces took control of every colony, using secret committees that had been organized in the previous two years. After the combat began, Governor Dunmore of Virginia was forced to flee to a British warship off the coast. In late 1775 he issued a proclamation offering freedom to slaves who escaped from Patriot owners and volunteer to fight for the British Army. Over 1000 volunteered and served in British uniforms, chiefly in the Ethiopian Regiment. However they were defeated in Battle of Great Bridge and most of them died of disease. The Royal Navy took Dunmore and other officials home in August 1776, and also carried to freedom 300 surviving former slaves. After their defeat at Saratoga in 1777 and the entry of the French into the American Revolutionary War, the British turned their attention to the South. With fewer regular troops at their disposal, the British commanders developed a "southern strategy" that relied heavily on volunteer soldiers and militia from the Loyalist element. Beginning in late December 1778, the British captured Savannah and controlled the Georgia coastline. In 1780 they seized took Charleston, capturing a large American army. A significant victory at the Battle of Camden meant that royal forces soon controlled most of Georgia and South Carolina. The British set up a network of forts inland, expecting the Loyalists would rally to the flag. Far too few Loyalists turned out, however, and the British had to fight their way north into North Carolina and Virginia with a severely weakened army. Behind them most of the territory they had already captured dissolved into a chaotic guerrilla war, fought predominantly between bands of Loyalist and Patriot militia, with the Patriots retaking the gains the British had previously made. The British army marched to Yorktown, Virginia where they expected to be rescued by a British fleet. The fleet showed up but so did a larger French fleet, so the British fleet after the Battle of the Chesapeake returned to New York for reinforcements, leaving General Cornwallis trapped by the much larger American and French armies under Washington. He surrendered. The most prominent Loyalists, especially those who joined Loyalist regiments, were evacuated by the Royal Navy back to England, Canada or other British colonies; they brought their slaves along, but lost their land. However, the great majority of Loyalists remained in the southern states and became American citizens. Antebellum era After the upheaval of the American Revolution effectively came to an end at the Siege of Yorktown, the South became a major political force in the development of the United States. With the ratification of the Articles of Confederation, the South found political stability and a minimum of federal interference in state affairs. However, with this stability came weakness by design, and the inability of the Confederation to maintain economic viability eventually forced the creation of the United States Constitution, in Philadelphia in 1787. Importantly, Southerners of 1861 often believed their secessionist efforts and the Civil War paralleled the American Revolution, as a military and ideological "replay" of the latter. Southern leaders were able to protect their sectional interests during the Constitutional Convention of 1787, preventing the insertion of any explicit anti-slavery position in the Constitution. Moreover, they were able to force the inclusion of the "fugitive slave clause" and the "Three-Fifths Compromise." Nevertheless, Congress retained the power to regulate the slave trade, and twenty years after the ratification of the Constitution, the law-making body prohibited the importation of slaves, effective January 1, 1808. While North and South were able to find common ground in order to gain the benefits of a strong Union, the unity achieved in the Constitution masked deeply rooted differences in economic and political interests. After the 1787 convention, two discrete understandings of American republicanism emerged. For the North, a Puritanical republicanism predominated, with leaders such as Alexander Hamilton and John Adams. In the South, Agrarian republicanism formed the basis of political culture. Led by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, the Agrarian republican position is characterized by the epitaph on the grave of Jefferson. While including his "condition bettering" roles in the foundation of the University of Virginia, and the writing of the Declaration of Independence and the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, absent from the epitaph was his role as President of the United States. The development of Southern political thought thus focused on the ideal of the yeoman farmer; i.e., those who are tied to the land also have a vested interest in the stability and survival of the government. = Antebellum slavery= In the North, where slaves were mostly household servants or farm laborers, every state abolished slavery; New Jersey was the last in 1804. Slavery was also abolished in the Northwest Territory and its states. Therefore, by 1804 a North-South line over slavery emerged; it was called the Mason–Dixon line While about a third of white Southern families were slave owners, most were independent yeoman farmers. Nevertheless, the slave system represented the basis of the Southern social and economic system, and thus even non-slaveowners opposed any suggestions for terminating that system, whether through outright abolition or case-by case manumission. This chart shows how dependent the south was on foreign trade, and why it was so violently opposed to abolition, since slaves provided the labor needed to support the cotton economy. = Nullification crisis, political representation, and rising sectionalism= See also, Nullification and Nullification crisis Although slavery had yet to become a major issue, states' rights issues surfaced periodically in the early antebellum period, especially in the South. The election of Federalist John Adams in the 1796 presidential election came in tandem with escalating tensions with France. In 1798, the XYZ Affair brought these tensions to the fore, and Adams became concerned about French power in America, fearing internal sabotage and malcontent brought on by French agents. In response to these developments and to repeated attacks on Adams and the Federalists by Democratic-Republican publishers, Congress enacted the Alien and Sedition Acts. Enforcement of the acts resulted in the jailing of "seditious" Democratic-Republican editors throughout the North and South, and prompted the adoption of the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions of 1798, by the legislatures of those states. Thirty years later, during the "Nullification" crisis, the "Principles of '98" embodied in these resolutions were cited by leaders in South Carolina as a justification for state legislatures' asserting the power to nullify, or prevent the local application of, acts of the federal Congress that they deemed unconstitutional. The Nullification crisis arose as a result of the Tariff of 1828, a set of high taxes on imports of manufactures, enacted by Congress as a protectionist measure to foster the development of domestic industry, primarily in the North. In 1832, the legislature of South Carolina nullified the entire "Tariff of Abominations," as the Tariff of 1828 was known in the South, prompting a stand-off between the state and federal government. On May 1, 1833, President Andrew Jackson wrote, "the tariff was only a pretext, and disunion and southern confederacy the real object. The next pretext will be the negro, or slavery question." Although the crisis was resolved through a combination of the actions of the president, Congressional reduction of the tariff, and the Force Bill, it had lasting importance for the later development of secessionist thought. An additional factor that led to Southern sectionalism was the proliferation of cultural and literary magazines such as the Southern Literary Messenger and DeBow's Review. = Sectional parity and issue of slavery in new territories= Another issue feeding sectionalism was slavery, and especially the issue of whether to permit slavery in western territories seeking admission to the Union as states. In the early 19th century, as the cotton boom took hold, slavery became more economically viable on a large scale, and more Northerners began to perceive it as an economic threat, even if they remained indifferent to its moral dimension. While relatively few Northerners favored outright abolition, many more opposed the expansion of slavery to new territories, as in their view the availability of slaves lowered wages for free labor. At the same time, Southerners increasingly perceived the economic and population growth of the North as threatening to their interests. For several decades after the Union was formed, as new states were admitted, North and South were able to finesse their sectional differences and maintain political balance by agreeing to admit "slave" and "free" states in equal numbers. By means of this compromise approach, the balance of power in the Senate could be extended indefinitely. The House of Representatives, however, was a different matter. As the North industrialized and its population grew, aided by a major influx of European immigrants, the Northern majority in the House of Representatives also grew, making Southern political leaders increasingly uncomfortable. Southerners became concerned that they would soon find themselves at the mercy of a federal government in which they no longer had sufficient representation to protect their interests. By the late 1840s, Senator Jefferson Davis from Mississippi stated that the new Northern majority in the Congress would make the government of the United States "an engine of Northern aggrandizement" and that Northern leaders had an agenda to "promote the industry of the United States at the expense of the people of the South." With the Mexican War, which alarmed many Northerners by adding new territory on the Southern side of the free-slave boundary, the slavery-in-the-territories issue heated up dramatically. After a four-year sectional conflict the Compromise of 1850 narrowly averted civil war with a complex deal in which California was admitted as a free state including Southern California thus preventing a separate slave territory there, while slavery was allowed in the New Mexico and Utah territories and a stronger Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 was passed requiring all citizens to assist in recapturing runaway slaves wherever found. Four years later, the peace bought with successive compromises finally came to an end. In the Kansas-Nebraska Act, Congress left the issue of slavery to a vote in each territory, thereby provoking a breakdown of law and order as rival groups of pro- and anti-slavery immigrants competed to populate the newly settled region. = Election of 1860, secession, and Lincoln's response= For many Southerners, the last straws were the raid on Harper's Ferry in 1859 by fanatical abolitionist John Brown, immediately followed by a Northern Republican presidential victory in the election of 1860. Republican Abraham Lincoln was elected president with only 40% of the popular vote and with hardly any popular support in the South. Members of the South Carolina legislature had previously sworn to secede from the Union if Lincoln was elected, and the state declared its secession on December 20, 1860. In January and February, six other cotton states of the Deep South followed suit: Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas. The other eight slave states postponed a decision, but the seven formed a new government in Montgomery, Alabama in February: the Confederate States of America. Throughout the South, Confederates seized federal arsenals and forts, without resistance, and forced the surrender of all U.S. forces in Texas. The sitting President, James Buchanan, believed he had no constitutional power to act, and in the four months between Lincoln's election and his inauguration, the South strengthened its military position. In Washington, proposals for compromise and reunion went nowhere, as the Confederates demanded complete, total, permanent independence. When Lincoln dispatched a supply ship to federal-held Fort Sumter, in South Carolina, the Confederate government ordered an attack on the fort, which surrendered on April 13. President Lincoln called upon the states to supply 75,000 troops to serve for ninety days to recover federal property, and, forced to choose sides, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina promptly voted to secede. Kentucky declared its neutrality. Civil War The seceded states, joined together as the Confederate States of America and only wanting to be independent, had no desire to conquer any state north of its border. After secession, no compromise was possible, because the Confederacy insisted on its independence and the Lincoln Administration refused to meet with President Davis's commissioners. Instead of diplomacy, Lincoln ordered that a Navy fleet of warships and troop transports be sent to Charleston Harbor to reinforce and resupply Fort Sumter. Just before the fleet was about to enter the harbor, Confederates forced the Federal garrison holed up in the fort to surrender. That incident, although only a cannon duel that produced no deaths, allowed President Lincoln to proclaim that United States forces had been attacked and justified his calling up of troops to invade the seceded states. In response the Confederate military strategy was to hold its territory together, gain worldwide recognition, and inflict so much punishment on invaders that the Northerners would tire of an expensive war and negotiate a peace treaty that would recognize the independence of the CSA. Two Confederate counter-offensives into Maryland and southern Pennsylvania failed to influence Federal elections as hoped. The victory of Lincoln and his party in the 1864 elections made the military victory only a matter of time. Both sides wanted the border states, but the Union military forces took control of all of them in 1861-1862. Union victories in western Virginia allowed a Unionist government based in Wheeling to take control of western Virginia and, with Washington's approval, create the new state of West Virginia. The Confederacy did recruit troops in the border states, but the enormous advantage of controlling them went to the Union. The Union naval blockade starting in May 1861, reducing exports by 95%; only small, fast blockade runners—mostly owned and operated by British interests—could get through. The South's vast cotton crops became nearly worthless. In 1861 the rebels assumed that "King Cotton" was so powerful that the threat of losing their supplies would induce Britain and France to enter the war as allies, and thereby frustrate Union efforts. Confederate leaders were ignorant of European conditions; Britain depended on the Union for its food supply, and would not benefit from an extremely expensive major war with the U.S. The Confederacy moved its capital from a defensible location in remote Montgomery, Alabama, to the more cosmopolitan city of Richmond, Virginia, only 100 miles from Washington. Richmond had the heritage and facilities to match those of Washington, but its proximity to the Union forced the CSA to spend most of its war-making capability to defend Richmond. = Leadership= The strength of the Confederacy included an unusually strong officer corps—about a third of the officers of the U.S. Army had resigned and joined. But the political leadership was not very effective. A classic interpretation is that the Confederacy "died of states' rights," as governors of Texas, Georgia, and North Carolina refused Richmond's request for troops. The Confederacy decided not to have political parties. There was a strong sense that parties were divisive and would weaken the war effort. Historians, however, agree that the lack of parties weakened the political system. Instead of having a viable alternative to the current system, as expressed by a rival party, the people could only grumble and complain and lose faith. Historians disparage the effectiveness of President Jefferson Davis, with a consensus holding that he was much less effective than Abraham Lincoln. As a former Army officer, Senator, and Secretary of War, he possessed the stature and experience to be president, but certain character defects undercut his performance. He played favorites and was imperious, frosty, and quarrelsome. By dispensing with parties, he lost the chance to build a grass roots network that would provide critically needed support in dark hours. Instead, he took the brunt of the blame for all difficulties and disasters. Davis was animated by a profound vision of a powerful, opulent new nation, the Confederate States of America, premised on the right of its white citizens to self-government. However, in dramatic contrast to Lincoln, he was never able to articulate that vision or provide a coherent strategy to fight the war. He neglected the civilian needs of the Confederacy while spending too much time meddling in military details. Davis's meddling in military strategy proved counterproductive. His explicit orders that Vicksburg be held no matter what sabotaged the only feasible defense and led directly to the fall of the city in 1863. = Abolition of slavery= By 1862 most northern leaders realized that the mainstay of Southern secession, slavery, had to be attacked head-on. All the border states rejected President Lincoln's proposal for compensated emancipation. However, by 1865 all had begun the abolition of slavery, except Kentucky and Delaware. The Emancipation Proclamation was an executive order issued by Lincoln on January 1, 1863. In a single stroke it changed the legal status, as recognized by the U.S. government, of 3 million slaves in designated areas of the Confederacy from "slave" to "free." It had the practical effect that as soon as a slave escaped the control of the Confederate government, by running away or through advances of federal troops, the slave became legally and actually free. Plantation owners, realizing that emancipation would destroy their economic system, sometimes moved their slaves as far as possible out of reach of the Union army. By June 1865, the Union Army controlled all of the Confederacy and liberated all of the designated slaves. The owners were never compensated. Many of the Freedmen remained on the same plantation, others crowded into refugee camps operated by the Freedmen's Bureau. The Bureau provided food, housing, clothing, medical care, church services, some schooling, legal support, and arranged for labor contracts. The severe dislocations of war and Reconstruction had a severe negative impact on the black population, with a large amount of sickness and death. = Railroads= The Union had a 3-1 superiority in railroad mileage and an overwhelming advantage in engineers and mechanics in the rolling mills, machine shops, factories, roundhouses and repair yards that produced and maintained rails, bridging equipage, locomotives, rolling stock, signaling gear, and telegraph equipment. In peacetime the South imported all its railroad gear from the North; the Union blockade completely cut off such imports. The lines in the South were mostly designed for short hauls, as from cotton areas to river or ocean ports; they were not designed for trips of more than 100 miles or so, and such trips involved numerous changes of trains and layovers. The South's 8,500 miles of track comprised enough of a railroad system to handle essential military traffic along some internal lines, assuming it could be defended and maintained. As the system deteriorated because of worn out equipment, accidents and sabotage, the South was unable to construct or even repair new locomotives, cars, signals or track. Little new equipment ever arrived, although rails in remote areas such as Florida were removed and put to more efficient use in the war zones. Realizing their enemy's dilemma, Union cavalry raids routinely destroyed locomotives, cars, rails, roundhouses, trestles, bridges, and telegraph wires. By the end of the war, the southern railroad system was totally ruined. Meanwhile, the Union army rebuilt rail lines to supply its forces. A Union railroad through hostile territory, as from Nashville to Atlanta in 1864, was an essential but fragile lifeline—it took a whole army to guard it, because each foot of track had to be secure. Large numbers of Union soldiers throughout the war were assigned to guard duty and, while always ready for action, seldom saw any fighting. = Sherman's March= By 1864 the top Union generals Ulysses S. Grant and William T. Sherman realized the weakest point of the Confederate armies was the decrepitude of the southern infrastructure, so they escalated efforts to wear it down. Cavalry raids were the favorite device, with instructions to ruin railroads and bridges. Sherman's insight was deeper. He focused on the trust the rebels had in their Confederacy as a living nation, and he set out to destroy that trust; he predicted his raid would "demonstrate the vulnerability of the South, and make its inhabitants feel that war and individual ruin are synonymous terms.". Sherman's "March To the Sea," from Atlanta to Savannah in fall, 1864, burned and broke and ruined every part of the industrial, commercial, transportation and agricultural infrastructure it touched, but the actual damage was confined to a swath of territory totaling about 15% of Georgia. Sherman struck at Georgia in October, just after the harvest, when the food supplies for the next year had been gathered and were exposed to destruction. In early 1865 Sherman's army moved north through the Carolinas in a campaign even more devastating than the March Through Georgia. More telling than the twisted rails, smoldering main streets, dead cattle, burning barns and ransacked houses was the bitter realization among civilians and soldiers throughout the remaining Confederacy that if they persisted, sooner or later their homes and communities would receive the same treatment. Out-gunned, out-manned, and out-financed, defeat loomed after four years of fighting. When Lee surrendered to Grant in April 1865, the Confederacy fell. There was no insurgency, no treason trials, and only one war crimes trial. Reconstruction Reconstruction began as soon as the Union Army took control of a state; the start and ending times varied by state, beginning in 1863 and ending in 1877. Slavery ended and the large slave-based plantations were mostly subdivided into tenant or sharecropper farms of 20-40 acres. Many white farmers owned their land. However sharecropping, along with tenant farming, became a dominant form in the cotton South from the 1870s to the 1950s, among both blacks and whites. By the 1960s both had largely disappeared. Sharecropping was a way for very poor farmers, both white and black, to earn a living from land owned by someone else. The landowner provided land, housing, tools and seed, and perhaps a mule, and a local merchant provided food and supplies on credit. At harvest time the sharecropper received a share of the crop. The cropper used his share to pay off his debt to the merchant. The system started with blacks when large plantations were subdivided. By the 1880s white farmers also became sharecroppers. The system was distinct from that of the tenant farmer, who rented the land, provided his own tools and mule, and received half the crop. Landowners provided more supervision to sharecroppers, and less or none to tenant farmers. = Material ruin and human losses= Reconstruction played out against a backdrop of a once prosperous economy that lay in ruins. According to Hesseltine, :"Throughout the South, fences were down, weeds had overrun the fields, windows were broken, live stock had disappeared. The assessed valuation of property declined from 30 to 60 percent in the decade after 1860. In Mobile, business was stagnant; Chattanooga and Nashville were ruined; and Atlanta's industrial sections were in ashes. In Charleston, a journalist in September 1865 discovered "a city of ruins, of desolation, of vacant houses, of widowed women, of rotten wharves, of deserted warehouses, of weed-wild gardens, of miles of grass-grown streets, of acres of pitiful and voiceful barrenness." Reports from Confederate officials show 94,000 killed in battle and another 164,000 who died of disease, with about 194,000 wounded. The Confederate official counts are too low; perhaps another 75,000-100,000 Confederate soldiers died because of the war. The number of civilian deaths is unknown, but was highest among refugees and former slaves. Most of the war was fought in Virginia and Tennessee, but every Confederate state was affected as well as Maryland, West Virginia, Kentucky, Missouri, and Indian Territory; Pennsylvania was the only northerner state to be the scene of major action, during the Gettysburg campaign. In the Confederacy there was little military action in Texas and Florida. Of 645 counties in 9 Confederate states, there was Union military action in 56% of them, containing 63% of the whites and 64% of the slaves in 1860; however by the time the action took place some people had fled to safer areas, so the exact population exposed to war is unknown. The Confederacy in 1861 had 297 towns and cities with 835,000 people; of these 162 with 681,000 people were at one point occupied by Union forces. Ten were destroyed or severely damaged by war action, including Atlanta, Columbia, and Richmond, plus Charleston, much of which was destroyed in an accidental fire in 1861. These eleven contained 115,900 people in the 1860 census, or 14% of the urban South. Historians have not estimated their population when they were invaded. The number of people who lived in the destroyed towns represented just over 1% of the Confederacy's population. In addition, 45 court houses were burned. The South's agriculture was not highly mechanized. The value of farm implements and machinery in the 1860 Census was $81 million; by 1870, there was 40% less, of $48 million worth. Many old tools had broken through heavy use and could not be replaced; even repairs were difficult. The economic calamity suffered by the South during the war affected every family. Except for land, most assets and investments had vanished with slavery, but debts were left behind. Worst of all were the human deaths and amputations. Most farms were intact but most had lost their horses, mules and cattle; fences and barns were in disrepair. Prices for cotton had plunged. The rebuilding would take years and require outside investment because the devastation was so thorough. One historian has summarized the collapse of the transportation infrastructure needed for economic recovery: One of the greatest calamities which confronted Southerners was the havoc wrought on the transportation system. Roads were impassable or nonexistent, and bridges were destroyed or washed away. The important river traffic was at a standstill: levees were broken, channels were blocked, the few steamboats which had not been captured or destroyed were in a state of disrepair, wharves had decayed or were missing, and trained personnel were dead or dispersed. Horses, mules, oxen, carriages, wagons, and carts had nearly all fallen prey at one time or another to the contending armies. The railroads were paralyzed, with most of the companies bankrupt. These lines had been the special target of the enemy. On one stretch of 114 miles in Alabama, every bridge and trestle was destroyed, cross-ties rotten, buildings burned, water-tanks gone, ditches filled up, and tracks grown up in weeds and bushes. . . . Communication centers like Columbia and Atlanta were in ruins; shops and foundries were wrecked or in disrepair. Even those areas bypassed by battle had been pirated for equipment needed on the battlefront, and the wear and tear of wartime usage without adequate repairs or replacements reduced all to a state of disintegration. Railroad mileage was of course located mostly in rural areas. The war followed the rails, and over two-thirds of the South's rails, bridges, rail yards, repair shops and rolling stock were in areas reached by Union armies, which systematically destroyed what it could. The South had 9400 miles of track and 6500 miles was in areas reached by the Union armies. About 4400 miles were in areas where Sherman and other Union generals adopted a policy of systematic destruction of the rail system. Even in untouched areas, the lack of maintenance and repair, the absence of new equipment, the heavy over-use, and the deliberate movement of equipment by the Confederates from remote areas to the war zone guaranteed the system would be virtually ruined at war's end. = Political Reconstruction, 1863-1877= Reconstruction was the process by which the states returned to full status. It took place in four stages, which varied by state. Tennessee and the border states were not affected. First came the governments appointed by President Andrew Johnson that lasted 1865-66. The Freedmen's Bureau was active, helping refugees, setting up employment contracts for Freedmen, and setting up courts and schools for the Freedmen. Second came rule by the U.S. Army, which held elections that included all Freedmen but excluded over 10,000 Confederate leaders. Third was "Radical Reconstruction" or "Black Reconstruction" in which a Republican coalition governed the state, comprising a coalition of Freedmen, Scalawags and Carpetbaggers. Violent resistance by the Ku Klux Klan and related groups was suppressed by President Ulysses S. Grant and the vigorous use of federal courts and soldiers in 1868-70. The Reconstruction governments spent large sums on railroad subsidies and schools, but quadrupled taxes and set off a tax revolt among conservatives. Stage four was reached by 1876 as the conservative coalition, called Redeemers, had won political control of all the states except South Carolina, Florida and Louisiana. The disputed presidential election of 1876 hinged on those three violently contested states. The outcome was the Compromise of 1877 whereby the Republican Rutherford Hayes became president and all federal troops were withdrawn from the South, leading to the immediate collapse of the last Republican state governments. = Railroads= The building of a new, modern rail system was widely seen as essential to the economic recovery of the South, and modernizers invested in a "Gospel of Prosperity." Northern money financed the rebuilding and dramatic expansion of railroads throughout the South; they were modernized in terms of rail gauge, equipment and standards of service. the Southern network expanded from 11,000 miles in 1870 to 29,000 miles in 1890. Railroads helped create a mechanically skilled group of craftsmen and broke the isolation of much of the region. Passengers were few, however, and apart from hauling the cotton crop when it was harvested, there was little freight traffic. The lines were owned and directed overwhelmingly by Northerners, who often had to pay heavy bribes to corrupt politicians for needed legislation. The Panic of 1873 ended the expansion everywhere in the United States, leaving many Southern lines bankrupt or barely able to pay the interest on their bonds. = Backlash to Reconstruction= Reconstruction was a harsh time for many white Southerners who found themselves without many of the basic rights of citizenship. Reconstruction was also a time when many African Americans began to secure these same rights. With the passage of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, the 14th Amendment and the 15th Amendment, African Americans in the South began to enjoy more rights than they had ever had in the past. A reaction to the defeat and changes in society began immediately, with vigilante groups such as the Ku Klux Klan arising in 1866 as the first line of insurgents. They attacked and killed both freedmen and their white allies. By the 1870s, more organized paramilitary groups, such as the White League and Red Shirts, took part in turning Republicans out of office and barring or intimidating blacks from voting. Origins of the New South, 1877–1913 The classic history was written by C. Vann Woodward, The Origins of the New South: 1877-1913, which was published in 1951 by Louisiana State University Press. Sheldon Hackney, explains: "Of one thing we may be certain at the outset. The durability of Origins of the New South is not a result of its ennobling and uplifting message. It is the story of the decay and decline of the aristocracy, the suffering and betrayal of the poor whites, and the rise and transformation of a middle class. It is not a happy story. The Redeemers are revealed to be as venal as the carpetbaggers. The declining aristocracy are ineffectual and money hungry, and in the last analysis they subordinated the values of their political and social heritage in order to maintain control over the black population. The poor whites suffered from strange malignancies of racism and conspiracy-mindedness, and the rising middle class was timid and self-interested even in its reform movement. The most sympathetic characters in the whole sordid affair are simply those who are too powerless to be blamed for their actions." = Race: from Jim Crow to the Civil Rights movement= After the Redeemers took control in the mid-1870s, Jim Crow laws were created to legally enforce racial segregation in public facilities and services. The phrase separate but equal, upheld in the 1896 Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson, came to represent the notion that whites and blacks should have access to physically separate but ostensibly equal facilities. It would not be until 1954 that Plessy was overturned in Brown v. Board of Education, and only in the late 1960s was segregation fully repealed by legislation passed following the American Civil Rights Movement. The most extreme white leader was Senator Ben Tillman of South Carolina, who proudly proclaimed in 1900, "We have done our level best [to prevent blacks from voting]...we have scratched our heads to find out how we could eliminate the last one of them. We stuffed ballot boxes. We shot them. We are not ashamed of it." With no voting rights and no voice in government, Blacks in the South were subjected to a system of segregation and discrimination. Blacks and whites attended separate schools. Blacks could not serve on juries, which meant that they had little if any legal recourse. In Black Boy, an autobiographical account of life during this time, Richard Wright writes about being struck with a bottle and knocked from a moving truck for failing to call a white man "sir." Between 1889 and 1922, the NAACP calculates that lynchings reached their worst level in history, with almost 3,500 people, three-fourths of them black men, murdered. African-Americans responded with two major reactions: the Great Migration and the Civil Rights Movement. The Great Migration began during World War I, hitting its high point during World War II. During this migration, Black people left the racism and lack of opportunities in the South and settled in northern cities like Chicago, where they found work in factories and other sectors of the economy. This migration produced a new sense of independence in the Black community and contributed to the vibrant Black urban culture seen in the emergence of jazz and the blues from New Orleans north to Memphis and Chicago. The migration also empowered the growing American Civil Rights Movement. While the Civil Rights movement existed in all parts of the United States, its focus was against the Jim Crow laws in the South. Most of the major events in the movement occurred in the South, including the Montgomery Bus Boycott, the Mississippi Freedom Summer, the March on Selma, Alabama, and the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.. In addition, some of the most important writings to come out of the movement were written in the South, such as King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail". As a result of the Civil Rights Laws of 1964 and 1965, all Jim Crow laws across the South were dropped. This change in the South's racial climate combined with the new industrialization in the region to help usher in what is called the New South. Rural South Agriculture's Share of the Labor Force by Region, 1890: The South remained heavily rural until World War II. There were only a few scattered cities; small courthouse towns serviced the farm population. Local politics revolve around the politicians and lawyers based at the courthouse. Mill towns, narrowly focused on textile production or cigarette manufacture, began opening in the Piedmont region especially in the Carolinas. Racial segregation and outward signs of inequality were everywhere, and rarely were challenged. Blacks who violated the color line were liable to expulsion or lynching. Cotton became even more important than before, even though prices were much lower. White southerners showed a reluctance to move north, or to move to cities, so the number of small farms proliferated, and they became smaller and smaller as the population grew. Many of the white farmers, and some of the blacks, were tenant farmers who owned their work animals and tools, and rented their land. Others were day laborers or impoverished sharecroppers, who worked under the supervision of the landowner. Sharecropping was a way for landless farmers to earn a living. The landowner provided land, housing, tools and seed, and perhaps a mule, and a local merchant loaned money for food and supplies. At harvest time the sharecropper received a share of the crop, which paid off his debt to the merchant. By the late 1860s white farmers also became sharecroppers. The cropper system was a step below that of the tenant farmer, who rented the land, provided his own tools and mule, and received half the crop. Landowners provided more supervision to sharecroppers, and less or none to tenant farmers. There was little cash in circulation, since most farmers operated on credit accounts from local merchants, and paid off their debts at cotton harvest time in the fall. Although there were small country churches everywhere, there were only a few dilapidated schools; high schools were available in the cities, which were few in number, but were hard to find in most rural areas. All the Southern high schools combined graduated 66,000 students in 1928. The school terms were shorter in the South, and total spending per student was much lower. Nationwide, the students in elementary and secondary schools attended 140 days of school in 1928, compared to 123 days for white children in the South and 95 for blacks. The national average in 1928 for school expenditures was $70,700 for every 1000 children aged 5–17. Only Florida reached that level; seven of the eleven Southern states spent under $31,000 per 1000 children. Conditions were marginally better in newer areas, especially in Texas and central Florida, with the deepest poverty in South Carolina, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Arkansas. Hookworm and other diseases sapped the vitality of a large fraction of Southerners. Creating the "New South" In the decades after World War II, the old agrarian Southern economy evolved into the "New South" – a manufacturing region with strong roots in laissez faire capitalism. As a result, high-rise buildings began to crowd the skylines of Atlanta, Birmingham, Charlotte, Raleigh-Durham, Houston, Dallas, Nashville, and Little Rock. King Cotton was dethroned. There were 1.5 million cotton farms in 1945, and only 18,600 remained in 2009. The Census stopped counting sharecroppers because they were so few. The industrialization and modernization of the South picked up speed with the ending of racial segregation in the 1960s. Today, the economy of the South is a diverse mixture of agriculture, light and heavy industry, tourism, and high technology companies, and is becoming increasingly integrated into the global economy. State governments aggressively recruited northern business to the "Sunbelt," promising more enjoyable weather and recreation, a lower cost of living, an increasingly skilled work force, minimal taxes, weak labor unions, and a business-friendly attitude. With the expansion of jobs in the South, there has been migration of northerners, increasing the population and political influence of southern states. The newcomers displaced the old rural political system built around courthouse cliques. The suburbs became the base of the emerging Republican Party, which became dominant in presidential elections by 1968, and in state politics by the 1990s. The South urbanized as the cotton base collapsed, especially east of the Mississippi River. Farming was much less important. The need for cotton pickers ended with the utilization of picking machines after 1945, and nearly all the black cotton farmers moved to urban areas, often in the North. Whites, who had been farmers, usually moved to nearby towns. Factories and service industries were opened in those towns for employment. Millions of Northern retirees moved down for the mild winters. These well-to-do retirees often moved into expensive homes located near the ocean, which, over the years, resulted in increasingly expensive hurricane damages. Tourism became a major industry, especially in venues such as Williamsburg, Virginia, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, Orlando, Florida, and Branson, Missouri. Sociologists report that Southern collective identity stems from political, demographic and cultural distinctiveness. Studies have shown that Southerners are more conservative than non-Southerners in several areas including religion, morality, international relations and race relations. In the 21st century, the South remains demographically distinct with higher percentages of blacks, lower percentages of high school graduates, lower housing values, lower household incomes and higher percentages of people in poverty. That, combined with the fact that Southerners continue to maintain strong loyalty to family ties, has led some sociologists to label white Southerners a "quasi-ethnic regional group." Apart from the still-distinctive climate, the living experience in the South increasingly resembles the rest of the nation. The arrival of millions of Northerners and millions of Hispanics means the introduction of cultural values and social norms not rooted in Southern traditions. Observers conclude that collective identity and Southern distinctiveness are thus declining, particularly when defined against "an earlier South that was somehow more authentic, real, more unified and distinct." The process has worked both ways, however, with aspects of Southern culture spreading throughout a greater portion of the rest of the United States in a process termed "Southernization". Southern presidents The South has long been a center of political power in the United States, especially in regard to presidential elections. During the history of the United States, the South has supplied many of the 44 presidents. Virginia specifically was the birthplace of seven of the nation's first twelve presidents. Presidents born in the South and identified with the region include: George Washington of Virginia. Thomas Jefferson of Virginia. James Madison of Virginia. James Monroe of Virginia. Andrew Jackson, born in either North Carolina or South Carolina, identified with Tennessee. John Tyler of Virginia. James Knox Polk, born in North Carolina, identified with Tennessee. Polk was born in North Carolina, but spent his adult and political life in Tennessee. Zachary Taylor of Virginia. Andrew Johnson, born in North Carolina, identified with Tennessee. Johnson was born in North Carolina, but spent his adult and political life in Tennessee. Lyndon Baines Johnson of Texas. Jimmy Carter of Georgia. Bill Clinton of Arkansas. One President was born in the South, and is identified both with the South and elsewhere: Woodrow Wilson, was born and raised in the South. His academic and political career was in the North but he retained strong ties with the South. Presidents born outside the South, but generally identified with the region: George H. W. Bush was born in Massachusetts, but spent his adult life in Texas. George W. Bush, born in Connecticut, lived from early childhood in Texas. Presidents born in Southern states, but not primarily identified with that region, include: William Henry Harrison, born in Virginia, identified with Midwest Abraham Lincoln, born in Kentucky, left at age 7; identified with Illinois. Dwight D. Eisenhower, born in Texas], left at age 2 and identified with Kansas. This list encompasses members of the Whig Party, Republican Party and the Democratic Party; in addition, Washington, while officially non-partisan, was generally associated with the Federalist Party. They have also supplied Presidential losers: Charles Pinckney of South Carolina – 1804 election, 1808 election Henry Clay of Kentucky – 1824 election, 1832 election, 1844 election William Crawford of Georgia – 1824 election Hugh White of Tennessee – 1836 election John Breckinridge of Kentucky – 1860 election John Bell of Tennessee – 1860 election) John W. Davis of West Virginia – 1924 election J. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina - 1948 election Al Gore of Tennessee – 2000 election (Former) Candidates for President: Newt Gingrich, Speaker of the House 1995-1999 Herman Cain, Businessman See also American Civil War American gentry Border states Confederate States of America Culture of honor Culture of the Southern United States Dueling in the United States South European colonization of the Southern United States Free and slave states History of the United States Politics of the Southern United States Southern literature Southern United States Triangular trade Footnotes Further reading Abernethy, Thomas P. The South in the New Nation, 1789–1819. LSU Press. Alden, John R. The South in the Revolution, 1763–1789. LSU Press. Ayers; Edward L. The Promise of the New South: Life after Reconstruction Oxford University Press, 1993 online edition Bartley, Numan V. The New South, 1945–1980. LSU Press. Craven, Avery O. The Growth of Southern Nationalism, 1848–1861. LSU Press. Craven, Wesley Frank. The Southern Colonies in the Seventeenth Century, 1607–1689. LSU Press. Coulter, E. Merton. The Confederate States of America, 1861–1865. LSU Press. Coulter, E. Merton. The South During Reconstruction, 1865–1877. LSU Press. Current, Richard, ed. Encyclopaedia of the Confederacy Davis, William C.. Look Away! A History of the Confederate States of America. New York: Free Press. ISBN 0-684-86585-8. Hesseltine; William B. A History of the South, 1607-1936 Prentice-Hall, 1936 online edition Hill, Samuel S. et al. eds. Encyclopedia of Religion in the South Hubbell; Jay B. The South in American Literature, 1607-1900 Duke University Press, 1973 Key, V.O. Southern Politics In State and Nation, a famous classic Lamis, Alexander P. ed. Southern Politics in the 1990s Louisiana State University Press, 1999. Logan, Rayford,The Betrayal of the Negro from Rutherford B. Hayes to Woodrow Wilson,, 1997. Mark, Rebecca, and Rob Vaughan. The South: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of American Regional Cultures, post 1945 society Marrs, Aaron W. Railroads in the Old South: Pursuing Progress in a Slave Society Moreland; Laurence W. et al. Blacks in Southern Politics Praeger Publishers, 1987 online edition Paterson, Thomas G. ed.. Major Problems in the History of the American South. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. ISBN 0-395-87139-5. readings from primary and secondary sources Richter, William L. The A to Z of the Old South, a short scholarly encyclopedia Shafer, Byron E. and Richard Johnston, eds. The End of Southern Exceptionalism: Class, Race, and Partisan Change in the Postwar South excerpt and text search Sydnor, Charles W. The Development of Southern Sectionalism, 1819–1848., Broad ranging history of the region Tindall, George B. The Emergence of the New South, 1913–1945 Tucker, Spencer, ed. American Civil War: A State-by-State Encyclopedia 1019pp excerpt Volo, James M. Encyclopedia of the Antebellum South Woodward, C. Vann. Origins of the New South, 1877–1913. LSU Press. External links Documenting the American South - text, image, and audio collections. Journal of Southern History articles in JSTOR Southern Historical Association, The major scholarly society The Society of Independent Southern Historians contains a bibliography of endorsed works concerning Southern history, biography, literature and culture; Lost Cause of the Confederacy perspective.

What if the United States Didn't Exist?

In the grand scheme of Human history, The United States of America is an incredibly new country. From it's culture, and the scale of it's military and economic might, The U.S. has been influential since it's inception. In the span of just two centuries, It went to a disunited band of colonies, Into the strongest power that has ever been seen. Even by it's creation, The United States drastically changed the course of history. So, as a thought exercise, What if it didn't exist? What if, in an Alternate Timeline, The United States of America never existed? Opens up a lot of questions, doesn't it? For this Alternate Timeline, Let's go back to the 1770's, the American Revolution, As tension grew between the Colonies and the British. In this alternate scenario, war begins. The American Rebels fight against the British Regulars. There were many numerous occasions the U.S. could have been defeated. All it simply took was not having the aid of one foreign ally. An ally who would love to get back at the British. Yes, that's right, the French. The French involvement in the American Revolution saved the rebellion, And without it, the militia surly would've lost. And this wasn't a small contribution, The French involvement meant funding to Rebels, Supplies, guns, men, and ships, Particularly to distract the British Naval fleet And France wanted revenge so badly, They put themselves in massive debt, Just to aid the Americans. This would come back to haunt them later, I'll talk about that soon. Say in this alternate scenario, France is more fiscally responsable And realize they can't win a war without tanking their finances, And the U.S. is left out to dry. After years of holding out against Native American, British, and German Regulars, it's just too much. So, the Rebellion crumbles, The British seize control, And most of the Continental Congress goes into exile, Or are arrested. Perhaps negations occur between the two to make amends, But this is hard to predict. In this Alternate Timeline, the Revolution is crushed, And the experiment that was the United States of America is in the history books. A failed Rebellion over anger with the British Parliament. It can't be left unsaid that there is still bitterness among A sizable portion of the Colonial population. There's still this culture within the Colonies that resent the loss. While the war ends and a majority of American Colonists Simply move on with their lives, There's still a mentality similar to "The South will rise again." The relationship between the two is forever changed. The 13 Colonies were already kind of different From the rest of the British Realms, But now, going into the 1790's and the 19th century, It would still be painted as the rouge Colony Which still has an independent tendency. There are immediate changes that result from the U.S. not existing. When the U.S. won the Revolution, In the Treaty Of Paris, It was given all of the land east of the Mississippi River. In this alternate scenario, The 13 Colonies simply remain the 13 Colonies. This changes multiple things. Including the path of the British Imperial ambitions, And the politics of North America as a whole. Let's talk relationships. In this Alternate Timeline, The American Colonists don't have the best relationship with their neighbors. Catholic French Quebec is to the north, And would be despised by the deeply Puritan Colonists. And the numerous Native Americans to the west Would be an issue as well, Except for a few Tribes, but I'll discuss that later. In our timeline, when the U.S. was born, Quebec was pushed up to where it is today, And the Natives were under American control, But with control of this land under the British Parliament, American Colonists are sort of stuck on the coast. In this scenario, Canada, as we think of it, Simply doesn't exist. What eventually became Canada had a large population boost after the war From loyalists that fled the independent United States. It's said that these loyalists were the initial boost That brought Canada as a territory for Britain. Being happy to be under the King's rule and all. But without independence, These loyalists stay in the Colonies. So, Canada doesn't have an influx of English speaking Brits. But, you know what it does have? French-Canadians. This land was once under control of the French In something known as New France. But France lost this land after the Seven Years War. French Colonists were allowed to stay and keep their culture, As long as they stayed loyal to the British King. Thus, Quebec was born, In this alternate scenario, Quebec never looses this land And stays incredibly large. One that takes up all of the Great Lakes, The Ohio River, And goes up into the Norther Seas of the Atlantic. Had Quebec continued to be allowed to rule these lands, The Midwest and the Great Lakes are French-Speaking, Deeply Catholic territories. But there is a third culture as well. Most of the land south of the Ohio River Is entirely populated by Native American Tribes. If the treaty with the Natives continued, Then the British protect Native land rights in the Deep South. Inside this territory was what was known As the Five Civilized Tribes by the Americans; The Creek, Choctaw, Cherokee, Chikasaw, and Seminole. They were called this because of their general acceptance Of many Colonial practices into their society. And the Colonists held, by comparison, Pretty good views of the Natives as well, In comparison to other minorities. It was often thought that if the Native Tribes simply adopted European culture, They'd be on equal footing with the Colonists. As decades go by in this Alternate Timeline, Interaction with British-Americans and the Quebec-Canadians, Slowly alter these five Tribal societies Into adapting more European practices. Not much can be said other than the Native Tribes of the South Remain prominent members who may eventually adopt Colonial ways. Who knows? It's commonly taught in school that the American Revolution Had an immediate impact throughout the world. And that's true, Just, not in the way we think. Remember when I said France Was a key ally to the American Rebels? That aid required money. That money had to come from somewhere, And the French Monarchy didn't have it. The Monarchy put itself into a large amount of debt. This debt created a financial crisis, And without getting into too many details, This was the crisis which led to the chain of events That eventually brought down the Monarchy, Led to the French Revolution, And eventually, Nepoleon. In this Alternate Timeline, Britain crushes the American Rebels, Since France doesn't get involved. Sure, the French Monarchy is still in debt, But without this financial crisis, because no war, They can kick that can down the road By at least a few decades. By doing so, Napoleon's opportunity to seize power doesn't happen. The Napoleonic Wars never occur, The Holy Roman Empire is not obliterated by the French Invasion, And hundreds of little German States aren't reorganized Into 30 with the Confederation of the Reich. There is never a rise of Prussia And so, the German Empire is never formed. It can't be underestimated how much Napoleon not coming to power affected global history. As Napoleon's forced invaded Spain and Portugal, Bringing their Colonies into chaos. In this Alternate Timeline, without the United States, There is no immediate military catastrophe to weaken these Empires. They remain prominate and powerful. Throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, The New World is still primal state for European colonization. The British and Spanish are pretty much the only ones left, With the Russians and Alaska. Which leaves New Spain and the question, It's doubtful the Spanish would've risked war over the territory If the British wanted it enough. The British expand slowly across the North American continent. However, what changes is how they interact with the Native Tribes Instead of the Americans. Manifest Destiny was a uniquely American ideal That wouldn't exist in the Alternate Timeline. Instead, it's likely the British would interact with the Native Tribes And give them autonomy. Essentially splitting North America up into Native dominated provinces in the west with white Colonists. This is the undoubtable effect of the United States Loosing the Revolution and not existing. The transformation of British Imperial policy around the world. Think of it like soul searching, But with warships. Loosing the United States ended the first Empire And the British funded exploration ships To go find new lands to settle. This led to the discovery of Australia and New Zealand. It also leant to the British to become more invested In conquering lands in Africa and all of India. With North America though, Britain simply invests in this massive territory of land. As industrialization arrives, The British ban slavery and the Slave Trade as a whole. This would create extreme unrest in the United States. But the British still ban slavery, And the issue is finished by the 1830's. The British still have access to the bountiful amount of Oil, natural gas, and coal left untapped in North America. The change here is the balance in power in the world. Not only that, but the balance of power in Europe. Germany remains divided for the entire 19th century, Meaning WWI and WWII never occur. Yet, some alternate war probably would happen. As for North America, The British dominion of North America is a diverse land. The 13 Colonies still exist, And are culturally different from the rest of the continent. Native Americans make up a predominant section of western North America, While white Colonists dominate the western coast. This is, however, simply one scenario. We'll never truly know what will happen, This is just one thought exercise. The United States has always been a land where people from around the world Have came to create a new life. And since I'm here, and I have a life, That means that in some point in history, My ancestors had to have gotten on that boat Or flew, as I like to imagine, And just stayed in the United States until generations later, I was born. I've always kind of wondered where my ancestors came from, So, in sponsorship with Ancestry, I actually found out. Now, for reference, My entire family has absolutely no idea where we came from. It was never discussed, And the furthest back I can trace my roots is Buffalo, New York. Since my last name is Franklin, I suspected, maybe I have ties to Britain, But, I was never really sure. Also, my skin is so pale, I thought, Maybe there is some Northern European DNA in there, too. Without either side knowing where we came from, I decided to take a test for myself. And just in time, Ancestry contacted me. They have a service called Ancestry DNA. They mailed me a box, I spit in a tube, And then sent it into a lab. Using their DNA cross-referencing and gene comparisons, Ancestry DNA was actually able to pinpoint, Using my DNA, Where my ancestors had actually come from, Or, at least the general area. Basically, comparing my genes to the similar genes of Ethnic groups from around the world. And the results were pretty surprising. According to the test, I have 36% British ancestry, Most likely from England. So the last name actually makes sense. The next was pretty surprising. 30% Scandinavian, particularly Norway or Sweden. Being from the Midwest, I thought, maybe German, But nope, no German genes. Just Scandinavian. The next highest was 20% Irish, And then a random 7% from Italy and Greece. Somewhere in the Mediterranean. The 7% actually makes sense, because, for some reason, My brother looks something like this. Maybe he got more of those genes. And then, theres assorted genes from the rest of Europe, And even 2% Jewish, 1% Middle Eastern. So, there must have been an interesting story in there somewhere. The oddest thing is that, I thought when I'd find out, I'd feel different somehow. I don't know. But, to be honest, Maybe it's just from having my own suspicions for this entire time, But, I don't really feel different at all. Yeah, I may have ancestors from this certain place, But, I'm 100% American. I've lived in Ohio my entire life. I like football. Stars and stripes, that sort of thing. Also, I had a friend who started loving a certain country Way too much once he found out he had heritage from it. So, I'm not gonna go down that path. But, learning about where your ancestors came from, Does tell a fascinating story. And it can be quite an experience. Honestly, I suggest you give it a try. We're in an age now where you can find out your history just from spitting in tube. So, why not try it out? Ancestry DNA is an international service available in 30 or so markets. So, really, anybody can use it, not just Americans. Discover details about your unique family history, And go to ancestry.com/althistory, Or, click on the link in the description to get a 10% discount. If you find anything out, Then tweet using the hashtag My Ancestry. This is Cody of Alternate History Hub.