Best monarch or head of state to kill off early for a more prosperous future

[Hydra1234]

I actually say for the leaders of Haiti to die and loose now this will sound controversial but based on Cody video had the revolution failed haiti would not have been as poor as plus slave masters in the americas are not paranoid over haiti and to add to the video it's likely the lost cause myth either never comes around or is less popular this is based on the idea that many confederates believed that a race war or what happened to Haiti would occur it never did so in part the myth comes from there to justify their failed doomsday prophecy and later like birth of a nation say it was becoming Haiti had the Dems not """" saved"""" the south

Imo you don't have that with out if Haitian revolution fails

This drastically overemphasizes the importance of Haiti in contributing to American slavery. Slave revolts were already common place throughout the United States proper, and domestic affairs were more important to the public than international affairs up to the 20th century. The Haitian Revolution, for all its scale and violence, did not lead to any legal repercussions beyond a few states sending aid to the French. On the other hand, Nat Turner's rebellion, involving barely more than a hundred slaves, resulted in various laws for a colonization scheme, crackdowns on the rights free blacks, anti-literacy laws for slaves, and the construction of arsenals to put down future revolts. Plus, there's far more writings produced in direct response to Nat Turner that evolved the slavery argument from one of necessity and economics to being a positive good.

So long as there was a brutal plantation system present in the US, slaves would rebel against the system, spooking and radicalizing the aristocrats who would fight tooth and nail to preserve the slavery upon which they built their wealth.

I guess in a twisted way, Haiti would be better off in the present day, simply because it would not be a pariah state that everybody was trying to quash, but that success would be built on the lives of hundreds of thousands of more who would be enslaved, then oppressed in the immediate decades following. Even then, I'm not sure. French decolonization was not pretty, and it traded direct rule for economic hegemony in any place with a substantial population. Former French colonies in Africa are actually worse off in several metrics compared to Haiti.

 

[Aluma]

As is Lenin. :-D

Why not both? Michael, unlike Nicholas, was rather fine with giving into revolutionary demands and really disliked ruling, prefering the idea of letting the Duma do whatever
If he's successful they cant kill or remove him due to his popularity, and if the bolcheviques still become the leading revolutionary faction Lenin would de facto be leading Russia

 

[Ana Luciana II]

I don't deny the conditions were horrible but no source I read said Haiti scared some Brits in to abolition compared to the multiple sources we have of southerns being afraid of them being killed by their ex slaves the only impact I heard is economical as sugar trade was not that profitable when Haiti left , also the BBC says the defeat of the British trying to invade also changed opinion you can have the British still fail in 1790s and the french later take the island but this ignores that in Britain social changes and other economic changes were already occuring , so yes on the one hand we have a brutal system continue for a most likely two generations.

Haiti didn’t cause abolition but it emboldened the movement to be more radical. The reason the French abolished slavery in 1794 was because the Haitian ex-slaves had risen up and taken control of the North Haitian Plains. All the French did when they abolished slavery was recognise the freedom the Haitians had taken for themselves.
Abolition wasn’t something imposed on slaves by white abolitionists. It was something fought for by enslaved peoples with the aid of white allies.
Sudhir Hazareesingh’s Black Spartacus is a good source for the Haitian perspective on the revolution. In that book Hazareesingh talks about the positive influence Haitian revolutionary leaders - Biassou, Louverture, and Dessalines - had on free black political leaders in the United States in the 1820s-40s. Haiti demonstrated that slaves were not content with enslavement, that they were ready and willing to take freedom if they were given the opportunity, and for that many African-Americans looked to Haiti as inspiration for their own fight against slavery.
Further, I’d like to clarify that the Haitians didn’t scare the British into abolition. Rather the fear of slave uprisings spreading to places like Jamaica inspired some (not all) slave owners to back abolition rather than have their ‘property’ seized, again that’s per Hazareesingh.
You say slavery would have probably ended within two generations. But who’s to say it would have ended? The system wasn’t going to just end on its own. There was no incentive for it to end. The plantation system was the bedrock of colonial life. Rich whites and rich mixed race earned vast fortunes owning plantations, poor whites and poor mixed race worked as straw bosses and foremen. Slavery made millions for mainland France so the government in Paris was content. Everyone in a position to do anything about slavery benefits from its continuation, so why would they do anything to stop it? Without the revolution, without the slaves taking freedom for themselves, what pressure is there to abolish slavery?

I just wonder if something close to apartheid evolves when France abolishes slavery, if yes Haiti is not as poor but has bad race relations going to the future if not then it has well a better future, so yes if we assume the latter Haiti is not as poor today and might be as well off as modern day Dominican republic and a whole impact on American slavery

Haiti already had a system of racialised apartheid it was called the Code Noir. It prevented the mixed race and white people from fraternising and denied certain rights to mixed race people. Race relations were already in the toilet by 1790 frankly I don’t see how they could be any worse. The whites hated the mixed race people because they thought they were trying to knock the whites from their dominant position, the mixed race hated the whites for being racist and denying them full civil rights, the slave hated the people that owned them for obvious reasons.

Another question that Cody failed to address if the Congress of Vienna stills bans the slave trade how does France deal with it ? They can't import new ones so does a black market come to replace that or new laws appear to try to reduce the mortality rate or does the high mortality rate + the trade being abolish contributes to Haiti loosing it's profitability

How have the French retained Saint Domingue throughout the Napoleonic Wars in this scenario? A big reason they were able to hold on to it for so long IOTL was the tens of thousands of ex-slave soldiers coming down out of the northern plains to fight for them. Without these reinforcements I don’t see the meagre French garrison (6,000 IIRC but don’t quote me on that) holding out against the British for very long.

 

[Ana Luciana II]

I remember reading about a visitor to the island--he was having dinner with a French planter, a woman, who ordered one of the slaves to be thrown live into an oven for dropping a glass or something. Lost his appetite after that.

I generally have a pretty strong stomach when it comes to reading about atrocities. But the things the French did to the slaves in Haiti have given me nightmares. I recall, one of the French planter’s favoured methods for dealing with runaway slaves was forcing explosives inside the chest and rectum and blowing the slave apart. I don’t mean to be vulgar but you can understand (though not excuse) why Dessalines did what he did.

 

[Whiteshore]

forcing dynamite

Kinda too early for that, don’t you think, as Alfred Nobel won’t invent it until the mid/late-19th Century?

 

[Ana Luciana II]

Kinda too early for that, don’t you think, as Alfred Nobel won’t invent it until the mid/late-19th Century?

Noted, I’ve changed it to explosives as I can’t recall the exact weapon used.

 

[Hydra1234]

It was gunpowder.
From The Black Jacobins, page 12:

For the least fault the slaves received the harshest punishment. In 1685 the Negro Code authorised [sic] whipping, and in 1702 one colonist, a Marquis, thought any punishment which demanded more than 100 blows of the whip was serious enough to be handed over to the authorities. Later the number was fixed at 39, then raised to 50. But the colonists paid no attention to these regulations and slaves were not unfrequently whipped to death. The slaves received the whip with more certainty and regularity than they received their food…Mutilations were common, limbs, ears, and sometimes the private parts…Their masters poured burning wax on their arms and hands and shoulders, emptied the boiling cane sugar over their heads, burned them alive, roasted them on slow fires, filled them with gunpowder and blew them up with a match…”

 

[Aluma]

I mean, an haitian inventing dynamite would be one way to screw the french

 

[Mildtryth]

I never knew the fear of Haiti reached that far south so in this case Brazil stays a Portuguese colony for longer?

Not really - things on the cause of independence only really got underway when the Portuguese Cortes began trying to reverse the gains in regards to autonomy and free trade the colonies had gotten since João VI had fled here, but with the dilemma of how to gain independence with the minimum upheaval being less proeminent, i'd wager on republicanism getting more adherents, at least.

 

[Ana Luciana II]

I mean, an haitian inventing dynamite would be one way to screw the french

Coming soon Avengers of the New World - A Shameless Haitian-Wank

 

[Ana Luciana II]

It was gunpowder.
From The Black Jacobins, page 12:

Cheers.

 

[Silver01]

This drastically overemphasizes the importance of Haiti in contributing to American slavery. Slave revolts were already common place throughout the United States proper

Haiti directly inspired some like the 1811 german coast revolt.

, and domestic affairs were more important to the public than international affairs up to the 20th century. The Haitian Revolution, for all its scale and violence, did not lead to any legal repercussions beyond a few states sending aid to the French.

Haiti was already a worry before they committed the massacre of 1804 , white southerners moved forcefully to break up black communication networks and isolate their slaves from news from what occurred in haiti and also while no direct law was passed to the slaves Free blacks were barred from moving into Southern states, and those living there were encouraged (sometimes required) to leave.

On the other hand, Nat Turner's rebellion, involving barely more than a hundred slaves, resulted in various laws for a colonization scheme, crackdowns on the rights free blacks, anti-literacy laws for slaves, and the construction of arsenals to put down future revolts. Plus, there's far more writings produced in direct response to Nat Turner that evolved the slavery argument from one of necessity and economics to being a positive good.

I think you cant divorce Nat turner from haiti here heck I think you cant divorce any slave revolt from Haiti after it occurred, while its very debatable that nat turner was influenced by haiti most southers did not doubt it

So yeah IMO unless a big revolt occurs in the usa things like this and the fear that emancipation would mean white genocide simply are either not as popular or do not even evolve.

 

[Aluma]

Coming soon Avengers of the New World - A Shameless Haitian-Wank

You joke but I did want to make an haitian wank
Though my idea then was more ASB since I wanted to do a Magic Haiti where Voudou is very real and used to not only free the population from slavery but the rest of the world's as well

 

[Ana Luciana II]

You joke but I did want to make an haitian wank
Though my idea then was more ASB since I wanted to do a Magic Haiti where Voudou is very real and used to not only free the population from slavery but the rest of the world's as well

That sounds badass. I’ve always wanted to write an ASB where a Haitian soldier from OTL 1990 was sent back to the Ceremony at Bois Caïman. That or a TL about Sonthonax. Haitian AH is a rich well.

 

[TrickyApe]

Yet another reason for why Alexander I sitting on the throne of Russia was good for the country in the short term but bad in the middle and long terms, honestly if only Czarina Catherine had actually bothered to raise Paul I well that he could rule at least efficiently, we could've seen a much better off Russia.

Paul wasn't nearly as bad OTL as presented in the "Black Legend". And interesting POD would be to have Paul survive the coup and assert his authority uncompromisingly. I suspect his reign would end up looking more like that of his son Nicholas I than like the mad tyrant of the legend.

Alexander himself wasn't as bad as his detractors make out. A lot of his seeming vacillation and generally sphinx-like behavior was the result of weakness and fear of suffering his father's fate. It's not easy to act the "Emperor and Autocrat" when you have to worry about your notables getting upset over lack of chocolate.

 

[Aluma]

That sounds badass

Yeah!
My idea for a POD was having Bondye, the haitian creator deity who's seen in a mostly deistic fashion(unconcerned with human affairs and stuff) take a page of Exodus and decide that his people must be freed at all cost much like the biblical hebrews were freed from Egypt
With Louverture as a Moses-figure, a vèvè serving as equivalent of the chi-rho for the haitian flag and all of the haitian symbols, rituals and religious tradition working to a tee, allowing even those who never heard of him to free themselves while the British Empire is replaced as the main world power as their magic act as a more effective alternative to the industrial revolution

I’ve always wanted to write an ASB where a Haitian soldier from OTL 1990 was sent back to the Ceremony at Bois Caïman.

That sounds pretty cool!
Would it be a more passive story where the soldier sees the horror what happened since they're just one person or would they be a very knowledgeable soldier providing them with vital intel?

That or a TL about Sonthonax. Haitian AH is a rich well.

It is, they're a extremely underrated country

 

[Grimbald]

Jeff Davis, by natural causes, in the summer of 1864. I believe Alexander Stephens would have seen the "handwriting on the wall" and cut a reasonable deal in the Hampton Roads conferences. My proposed solution: All Southern states readmitted immediately. Northern army withdrawn within six months. Southern army to disband. All slaves who had left their positions declared free, those in place to be freed over next five years. Union to dedicate an amount equal to the prewar value of all slaves to rebuilding south including private property. Confederate money to be accepted at par. Confederate bonds held domestically also at par. Foreign held screwed. WVa recognized as a state after new plebicite to determine which counties it gets. South acknowledges Union will split California into three states. Any pension paid to one army shall be paid to both.

 

[dcharles]

Why not both? Michael, unlike Nicholas, was rather fine with giving into revolutionary demands and really disliked ruling, prefering the idea of letting the Duma do whatever
If he's successful they cant kill or remove him due to his popularity, and if the bolcheviques still become the leading revolutionary faction Lenin would de facto be leading Russia

A dissipated Czar and the OG Vladdy-Daddy, together at last?

That's a good premise for an AH sitcom.

 

[Hydra1234]

Haiti directly inspired some like the 1811 german coast revolt.

1811, yes, but that's for slaves in an area populated refugees from Haiti, both master and slave. Slave revolts were occurring for decades prior to Haiti.

Haiti was already a worry before they committed the massacre of 1804 , white southerners moved forcefully to break up black communication networks and isolate their slaves from news from what occurred in haiti and also while no direct law was passed to the slaves Free blacks were barred from moving into Southern states, and those living there were encouraged (sometimes required) to leave.

Correlation does not equal causation. The crackdown on Free Blacks began in the 1790s/1800s because manumission became more popular in that time period, owing to that time period where slaves were starting to become economically unviable and the slaveowners had not developed moral arguments for slavery in earnest yet. The idea of a free black obviously clashed with slavery, so the slaveowners started to oppose the idea in the South. Besides, the most serious restrictions were implemented in the 1820s/1830s. Florida, for instance, began their crackdown in the late 1820s.

I think you cant divorce Nat turner from haiti here heck I think you cant divorce any slave revolt from Haiti after it occurred, while its very debatable that nat turner was influenced by haiti most southers did not doubt it

I think you can. Slaves did not have reliable access to international news, so aside from some in Louisiana, it's very doubtful that the average revolting slave would even know where Haiti is, much less know that a successful revolt happened there. As for the white reaction, the writings call back to Haiti, but those seem to be a retroactive justification for the fears sparked by Turner. If Haiti was crucial to the fears of the slaveowners, the crackdowns and the fervor would have happened in 1804, not 1831/1832.

So yeah IMO unless a big revolt occurs in the usa things like this and the fear that emancipation would mean white genocide simply are either not as popular or do not even evolve.

And why wouldn't a big revolt occur in the future? The whole slavery argument was radicalizing fast in the antebellum era as slaveowners developed moral arguments to preserve slavery, turning an economic debate into one of morality. Besides, the white genocide theory was a small part of the moral arguments for slavery. The biggest argument was the idea that slavery was a positive good for the blacks, which were far more numerous in publication.

 

[Aluma]

A dissipated Czar and the OG Vladdy-Daddy, together at last?

That's a good premise for an AH sitcom.

Yup!
If you want to go the extra mile, if im not mistaken the german left party won a third of the seats around that time, if you could have them win another third(I dunno, there's no russian civil war so the bolchies could give them lots of money?) you could have a Red Imperial Germany as well
Imagine good ol' Wilhelm dealing with that