Union of Southern American States

The **Union of Southern American States**, **Union of the South** or the UTS for short is one of the five North American states formed after the 2nd American Civil War. Born in the traditional lands of the American South, the Union was one of the main countries that was involved in the fighting during the war, and suffered tremendous damages, and what some would say a civil war of its own during the New Afrikan Uprising.

## Southern Union of America

### **Common Name**

The South, American South, UTS, Dixieland

### **Established**

1933

That, alongside dealing with post-war stress and rebels in Texas and the Black Belt have yielded little favors for the Union's development in recent years, but not all is bleak. Many are ambitious for the Southern Union's development, and look towards various countries as potential allies, most notably Canada, but it is anyone's guess as to whether the Union will see past the incoming decade of violence and war.

## History

### Old wounds

The American South, in the context of the 1890s, had stayed in quiet frustration since the first American Civil War ended nearly 30 years back. Many, alive to remember the war, still held resentment against the Federalists for winning the conflict, and the subsequent Spanish-American War rekindled old hatreds and wounds that people long thought were dead.

#### Migrant Riots

In early 1901, fueled by ongoing abuses by American soldiers and the devastation caused by the Insurgency Wars, around 2,000 civilians fled the occupied island, landing all over the Southern Seaboard, in New Orleans, Biloxi and Mobile, fueling the spark that would form the National Dignity Party. While some supported the rights of Cubans to attain asylum within the US, many didn’t follow the sentiment. Makeshift towns were created on the coast as a way to segregate migrant populations from the mainstream population, and while they didn’t mingle with the general public, that didn’t mean they were wanted.

Many politicians, including the founder of the NDP, Carter Glass, spoke out against allowing Cubans into America. While the North was more apathetic to those fleeing, as more people came into the US the more resistant the south became. Many newspapers published anti-Cuban and anti-migrant rhetoric. While the latter was not uncommon, it certainly was for the time period, many newspapers and politicians were more vocally hostile and radical in their hopes of removing Cubans from the south.

Six months later in mid-1901, the first hate crimes were reported against Cuban migrants, an incident which took place in Louisiana just outside of Baton Rouge. While no one was seriously injured these attacks would become very frequent, turning the issue into a national debate. The Democratic Party, using this topic to sway voters in anticipation of the 1902 general election, staged protests and demonstrations all over the south, in 15 cities. While the protests in question were not large, all too often crowds became violent, and reports of lynchings, arson and property damage escalated the situation. As unrest grew in the south, many congressmen from the area took it upon themselves to lash out against the North. While not openly opposing Federal rule, many blamed “northern” politicians for the state of affairs the region saw itself in. This attitude, once unthoughtful since the end of the first civil war quickly came back in the public eye, attracting many Democrats, and eventually gaining steam when the NDP was formed in 1903. These protests would not be the last, as many more took place in the following years, but they would soon slow down by 1904, and anti-Cuban demonstrations would cease completely by 1906.

### A slow rise

When the party was founded in Virginia on what some called “neo-Confederate” beliefs, not many people threw their support behind the NDP for the next few years, but crucially, passive and growing resistance by those in the Black Belt radicalized many white voters, who turned away from the Democrats. In the 1904 general election, the NDP, expectedly, won only a few thousand votes, mostly in its home state and no where else. But these results didn’t deter Glass, who was determined to see the party rise to challenge the Republican and Democrat stronghold in the US. With the formation of the BLF in 1903 followed by the Niagara Falls movement in 1905, the NDP, alongside the Socialist Party to the north, grew out of an emerging populist and what some call a “nostalgia” movement, aimed at rekindling southern culture through the preservation of the Confederacy and its legacy.

With support from many organizations like the United Daughters of the Confederacy in 1904, the party was given badly needed investments, which it used to start its own newspaper and establish political chapters in new states. Just one year later, the Party was finally seeing new growth, now having a solid base of voters in Tennessee, Texas, Lousiana, Mississippi and Alabama, small but loyal. Much of the success of the NDP was attributed to the growth of the BLF, as nationalism soon became a core tenant of the Front. In 1906, the NDP was very successful in many states, but not successful enough to win any representatives. Again, Carter was undeterred.

### Schism

In 1908, trouble began brewing for the young party. Since 1906, many incidents shook to destabilize the party, evidence of ideological infighting/splintering that arguably went back since the Riots of 1901. Carter, including groups such as the KKK in the NDP, became increasingly radical in his beliefs of white supremacy and segregation, flirting with new ideas of controlling the US government, and remolding the entire country upon the Party’s beliefs. But this was unattractive to the other side who controlled the party, those who wished to place emphasis on southern autonomy and weaken Federal authority. Glass’ initial success in courting many different groups to the party’s side would prove to be his undoing, and in 1908 in Richmond a party congress was called in order to fully iron out the growing issues of the party, though famously, this meeting was a complete disaster.

Both sides, those of Carter and the KKK versus southern nationalists and neo-Confederates turned on each other nearly immediately. Unable to find common ground with one and another, and in July the party officially split, with the neo-Confederates and nationalists forming the People’s Rights Party, which would attract the majority of old NDP voters in the south.

But even with this ideological fracturing, the new PRP would gain success like the NDP never had before, gaining representatives in the House for the first time in 1910 and seriously weakening the Democratic stronghold in the south. As event after event pushed more people to the three opposition parties of the US, the PRP would force out most Democrats by 1920, just in time for the new American Civil War.

### Civil War and New Afrikan Uprising

(Main article: Second American Civil War)

On July 3rd of 1920, with tensions rapidly escalating against Federal and mobilizing BLF guerrillas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Georgia and Alabama formally ceded from the United States government, forming the Union of Southern American States. During the war, the South wouldn’t suffer as significantly as the Midwest or New England, but due to the various uprisings in the Black Belt, especially in the wake of the formation of the New Afrikan Republic, the newly created nation would suffer in its attempts to remain somewhat peaceful during the war, as racial tensions were brought to a full boil.

### Postwar reconstruction

#### Martial law (1922-1925)

With the end of the Second American Civil War and evacuation of Federal forces to Hawaii, Texas or California, the American South found itself utterly alone, without recognition, and without allies. While the grandest visions of the People’s Rights Party were created, it came with a litany of problems, many of which remain unsolved to this day.

Unlike California or Hawaii, the South was not prone to labor unrest or disputes surprisingly, but was dealing with nothing short of a race war. Even with the dissolution of the Afrikan Republic, most of its leadership (of which it was already decentralized) went into hiding. Thousands of members escaped into the Peoples’ Union of America. The Union government, unwilling to recognize the independence of the American South, was forced to absorb thousands of refugees, many of which came from the South and Black Belt specifically. But for now, the Union was glad to see the BLF retreat to the Union, not having to deal with a Black insurgency on its land anymore by the end of 1922. The Black Belt however suffered the most damage out of any part of the south, and tens of thousands remained homeless, while the economy was in a free fall mostly due to the absence of any trade beyond its borders.

During this time, all Southern states were in martial law, snd the country itself was run by a council of different state governors. Rapid action was taken to stabilize the nation in these tumultuous years. A peace deal was finally settled in Texas, creating a new border along the Brazos river. Relations were normalized in Western Europe, Mexico, South America and the Caribbean, and soon the economy finally stopped its fall by 1924, and would slowly recover thereafter. In states like Florida or Arkansas, which suffered little damage, new initiatives were taken, employing young, able-bodied men in reconstruction projects all over the country, vastly decreasing the unemployment rate while spearheading construction efforts throughout 1922-1925. By 1924, the Governor’s Council (the ruling body of the UASS) declared that the Black Insurgencies of the early decade were “no longer a threat to the existence of the Union.” One by one, state by state, martial law was repealed, and slowly, civilian life returned to the South.

### Instability and controversy (1926-)

The period of martial law within the Southern Union was “ended” in 1926 as the first general elections were held. All males and some women, in states where women’s suffrage had passed, were allowed to vote. In the end, expectedly, the People’s Rights Party held an absolute majority over the Senate, House and the new presidency (WIP).

But while martial law had been repealed for millions, it persisted for a large minority of people, mainly within the new state of Houston. While it had been absorbed into the Union, with even the Republic of Texas recognizing the new border, it unofficially funded guerrilla and liberation movements who sought to be reunified. While martial law ended in most states, it persisted in the west, and an ongoing guerrilla war has drained much of the Union’s resources and men. While larger cities like Lubbock and Houston are pacified, most of the countryside is not, remaining a thorn in the side of New Orleans.

Worse was yet to come for the Union, however. The 1927 Spring Putsch in the People’s Union was met with suspicion in the American South. Some hoped it would mean either a collapse of New York’s leadership, or peaceful handover of Kentucky and parts of Virginia the north had occupied, but it would soon spell disaster for New Orleans. The Black Liberation Front, once dormant and in exile, was revived and funded by Union leader Elmer Allison. In response to race riots which engulfed parts of the north, the Southern Union once again asked for the deportation of BLF leadership to the south, where they’d be tried with treason. Allison, like all other American Union presidents, refused to accept the offer.

Slowly but surely, reports of insurgency in the Black Belt would increase since the early 30s, to the detriment of the Union’s stability and political attempts at gaining legitimacy.