 This 1983: Doomsday page is a Proposal.
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| Capital | Muscle Shoals | ||||
| Largest city | Florence | ||||
| Other cities | Bolivar, Corinth, Cullman, Dalton, Dresden, Hickman, Jackson, Lexington, Mayfield, Murray, Rome, Russellville, Savannah, Scottsboro | ||||
| Language | English (official) | ||||
| President | |||||
| Vice President | |||||
| Population | 256,000 est. as of 2010 | ||||
| Independence | September 19, 1985 | ||||
| Currency | Confederate dollar (CS$) | ||||
The Confederate States of America (CSA) is the name used by several entities that attempted to establish themselves throughout the former southern and midwestern United States in the post-Doomsday world.
This particular version of the CSA was founded in 1985 in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, and dissolved in 1999. It was centered along the border of former Tennessee with the former states of Alabama, Mississippi and Georgia and also for a time included portions of the former states of Arkansas, Kentucky and Missouri.
Despite its short history, it is considered perhaps the most stable post-DD nations to have borne that name. The city-states it consisted of still exist, and as the locals learn more about the outside world, support is growing to relaunch the nation.
History
In the weeks after Doomsday in September and October of 1983, several towns in the mid-south region along the Tennessee/Alabama/Mississippi borders banded together for survival. Not wanting to give in to despair, civic, political and religious leaders began to take numerous steps to ensure the short- and long-term survival of the people in the region. They also began to take steps for some type of regional government to replace the U.S., as everyone suspected that the events of what they knew as World War III had likely destroyed the government, if not the rest of the nation.
Scouts were sent out to find out what had happened at least to the rest of the southeastern United States (and, if possible, the federal government itself). By mid-December, the destruction of several major cities and major military bases in the region had been confirmed.
Organizers of a provisional government for northern Alabama confirmed attacks on Birmingham and Montgomery and at the Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville. Survivors from Huntsville were heading towards Gadsden, or north towards the Tennessee border.
Tennessee saw its two biggest cities - Memphis and the capital, Nashville - destroyed. Chattanooga was also confirmed as destroyed. Southern Tennessee, and Jackson in western Tennessee, were the most stable known areas of the entire state; rumors persisted of a provisional government being set up in Knoxville and of survivors north of Nashville.
North Mississippi was for the most part unscathed, but Columbus Air Force Base and the capital of Jackson were both hit. Corinth and Tupelo were becoming the destination for survivors as far south as Oxford and Starksville, both college towns struggling to stay stable in the wake of the emergency.
Northwest Georgia weathered the initial weeks fairly well. Rome, the provisional capital, was handling food and medicine rationing, and law and order, so well that others in the region looked to it as a model. Atlanta and its suburbs were confirmed destroyed as was Chattanooga (on the Georgia border), and Columbus (which included Fort Benning). Scouts heard of another survivor community centered in northeast Georgia and in Athens, east of Atlanta and cut off from northern Georgia by the radiation from Atlanta.
Scouts also confirmed the existence of several survivor towns and cities stretching from Jonesboro in eastern Arkansas to Maysville and Madisonville in Kentucky, and as far south at Tuscaloosa, Alabama (where a proposal to establish a provisional state government was rejected as 'ridiculous').
After not having had any contact from any representative of the U.S. military or federal government outside of those already in the area, political leaders in the region met in Florence on January 5, 1984. The sense was that they were virtually independent of the United States and therefore able to proceed however they wanted or needed to. But how would they proceed?
Several factors converged over the next several months to lay the foundation of the formation of the CSA, among them being:
- The actions of actual and self-appointed federal agents in the area that were deemed detrimental to the public good and the long-term survival of the region. Namely, increasing denouncement of anything relating to southern and regional culture and incessant praise of U.S. culture, followed in later months by the development of a militia and terroristic-sounding threats to public safety.
- Long-standing area pride in "southern" culture, reflected not in anti-U.S. sentiment but more in popular culture, including music (Lynyrd Skynyrd, Hank Williams Jr.) and television (Dukes of Hazzard). Symbols of the old Confederacy, mainly the "Dixie" flag, were seen as heavily influential among the populace in support for the new nation to be called the Confederate States.
- An opportunity to start fresh, with a nation governed by laws seen as superior to the bloated, unaccountable entity that some thought the United States government was becoming.
- Most of the leaders did not believe they were worthy to establish their relatively small group of towns and states as the legitimate successor to the United States. They believed they were better off starting an entirely new nation.
Sentiment grew throughout 1984 for the prospective nation to adopt the name of the Confederate States of America. The designation came with baggage, but leaders felt they could reestablish the nation without the stigma of racism, and in the spirit of democracy and civil rights modeled by such U.S. historical figures as Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King, Jr.
However, some in the region resented the popular momentum towards the reestablishment of the Confederacy, and saw it as an affront to the United States and everything it stood for. These people decided to take matters into their own hands to perserve as much of the U.S. in the region as they could, but their actions and radicalism over the next several months would backfire on them and prove to be their undoing.
Throughout 1984, state governments were reestablished in the region. Mississippi was the first, on December 13, 1983, followed by Alabama (January 18, 1984); Georgia (January 26, 1984); Tennessee (March 12, 1984); and Arkansas (May 9, 1984). The leaders of Portageville, Missouri, established a de facto government for the "bootheel" region of former Missouri on December 4, 1983; 14 counties in far western Kentucky established a provisional government for themselves in February 1984.
While popular support for a new Confederacy grew, political leaders began to talk of secession from the U.S. They explained why secession and forming a new nation was better than declaring themselves to be the successor of the United States, and that the new nation could carry on the best values and practices of the U.S., while discarding the less-than-helpful practices of the U.S.'s government, including federal regulation. They pointed to a new opportunity to build a 'southern culture' that embraced people regardless of race, creed, sex or religion, but rejected the license, sex and violence that came from Hollywood and the national television networks (Christian church leaders were enthusiastic about the latter).
A small but active counter-culture, calling itself the Sons and Daughters of America, rose up in Muscle Shoals in March 1984, leading protests in front of the mayor's office. By July 4, the group - having spread into neighboring Tennessee and Mississippi - held a rally at the John McKinley Federal Building in Florence, Alabama, begging political leaders "to abandon your seditious activities and embrace United States authority". Being that the only bonafide federal authority in their eyes rested in the members of the Sons and Daughters of America, political, police and military leaders were not willing to accede.
Still, several eyes were kept on the group, which began, as quietly as possible, to build a militia. Members began to train in boot camps in and around Florence, Corinth and Shelbyville. The Sons and Daughters' attempts to keep their activities secret failed, however, as Tennessee National Guardsmen spied them at a self-built training facility outside Collinwood. Afterwards, Sons and Daughters leaders found themselves increasingly under surveillance from local and state police and National Guardsmen.
Panicked, the Sons and Daughters decided to make their move.
On January 19, 1985, Sons and Daughters chairman John Dowling, acting on self-professed authority as an agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, led a militia group sanctioned by his organization in an attempt to arrest Muscle Shoals, Alabama mayor James Sharp, on charges of sedition, terrorism and usurping the rightful authority of the United States.
Sharp was rescued by Muscle Shoals policemen and taken to safe haven at the Northwest Alabama Regional Airport, where National Guardsmen not loyal to the federal agents had established headquarters.
Dowling, and other Sons and Daughters leaders, were arrested after the failed attack on Sharp.
The group then filed suit on January 20, on behalf of the United States, against Sharp and Muscle Shoals in the only known remaining federal court in the region, the U.S. District Court for Northern Alabama, located at the McKinley Federal Building in Florence. The suit accused Sharp and other "instigators" of a host of charges, including treason and conspiracy.
On March 19, the court ruled that given the circumstances of the past several months, and that no military nor federal agency nor its representatives had made contact and established the ongoing existence of the federal government, it was reasonable to assume that a) the United States no longer existed, 2) no longer had any authority over the region and 3) therefore Muscle Shoals was an independent government, free to operate on its own or in conjunction with any other local governments if it wished to.
As the highest known federal court in the region (and the world), the Sons and Daughters had no other court to appeal to.
This ruling paved the way for Sharp to contact his counterpart in Florence, Eddie Frost, and leaders in the other communities they knew existed to begin to formalize their plans to form a "more humane and more successful" Confederacy.
On May 8, 1985, Sharp, Frost and 47 other people signed a Declaration of Independence to pave the way for the establishment of a new nation. The declaration reflected the signers' belief that the U.S. government likely no longer existed as a result of the events of Doomsday. The declaration also reflected their strong belief in the values that the United States historically represented, and
On August 1, 1985, leaders from 27 towns and cities in the Tennessee-Alabama-Mississippi region gathered in Muscle Shoals as part of a Constitutional Convention. Over the next 17 days they went over both the constitution of the 19th-century CSA and the United States constitution. What they settled on was a hybrid that mostly resembled the 19th-century CSA constitution, with additional amendments reflecting those added onto the U.S. Constitution since the Civil War.
States' rights were more emphasized than in the U.S. Constitution, but the national government was given limited rights that superseded state and local laws. The latter was done to ensure the "Equal Rights Amendment" had teeth; this amendment stated that "all people, regardless of race, gender or creed, are considered equal by law", banned slavery of all citizens (regardless of color, creed or gender) and made racial and credial discrimination punishable by law. Despite that provision designed to ensure equal rights to all people, and the placing of African-Americans in prominent positions in the Presidential Cabinet, Congress and the Army, racism still was a challenge at the local level.
The constitution was signed on September 19, 1985 in Muscle Shoals; the President of the Convention, Rick Hall of Muscle Shoals, was voted as provisional President by the convention delegates until elections could be held in 1986. The Muscle Shoals city government gave the Southgate Mall over to the new government; remodeling allowed it to host both the Senate and House of Representatives, the President's Office, the Supreme Court and various governmental offices; the Confederate Army was set up at Northwest Alabama Regional Airport.
Three states initially formed the CSA:
- Alabama (capital in Florence, consisting of the U.S. Congressional Fifth District and portions of the Fourth, Third and Seventh Districts)
- Mississippi (capital in Corinth, consisting of the U.S. Congressional First District)
- Tennessee (capital in Adamsville, portions of the U.S. Congressional Fourth and Seventh Districts).
A small national district was carved out of the territory of a former shopping mall in Muscle Shoals for the national government's use; it served as the home of both houses of Congress, the Supreme Court, the President's office and other national agencies. The Army was formally established at Northwest Alabama Regional Airport, which was renamed Fort Liberty.
In Congress's first joint session in January 1986, America the Beautiful was designated the official national anthem (reflecting the new country's ties to and history with the U.S.) and declared itself as being at war with the Soviet Union and all its associated allies (including Cuba). Congress also passed a resolution declaring its loyalty to the United States and to the other nations of the North American Treaty Organization.
Hall was nominally opposed during the 1986 Presidential race, and won with nearly 94 percent of the vote in the November 1986 elections. He took his oath as President on January 20, 1987, at the Muscle Shoals First Baptist Church, with both the Stars and Bars official flag and the United States flag in the background.
As word spread throughout the region of the new nation's existence, other provisional states and city states joined:
- The Kentucky counties of McCracken, Ballard, Marshall, Calloway, Carlisle, Fulton, Graves, Trigg, Livingston, Lyon, Caldwell and Hickman joined in December 1986 as the Commonwealth of Kentucky (having lost contact with Frankfort and not yet knowing of the newly formed commonwealth based in north central Kentucky outside Fort Knox). This Kentucky state's capital was placed in Mayfield.
- Georgia, with its capital in Rome and claiming all of northern Georgia down to Atlanta, joined in March 1987.
- Jackson, Tennessee joined as its own state in April 1987, claiming western Tennessee up to the Kentucky border.
- Arkansas, with its capital in Jonesboro, joined in April 1988.
- Missouri, consisting of the "bootheel" of pre-Doomsday Missouri and having its capital in Portageville, joined in July 1988.
For a short time in the late 1980s, the CSA was building the foundation for a strong future. The Confederate Dollar was approved as the nation's new currency (with Robert E. Lee on the CS$5 bill and Martin Luther King Jr. on the CS$10 bill) in 1987. Hall signed off on an initiative organized by the national government to rebuild the interstate highway system by 2007. He oversaw initiatives to rebuild electric plants throughout the nation and restart the railroad and aviation industries.
When troops from the rebel citystate of Toccoa attempted to invade eastern Georgia in 1989, Hall personally traveled to the region to attempt to negotiate with the Toccoan leaders; it resulted in an aborted attack on the President by the Toccoan rebels, and a counter attack by the Army of Georgia that led to an still ongoing state of war between the two sides.
Also in 1989, the Army of Tennessee explored the area of Fort Campbell, a U.S. military base that was abandoned after Doomsday. The region was made a territory associated with Tennessee and the CSA.
The CSA was rocked by the secession of Jackson in 1991, at the hands of leaders who came into conflict with Muscle Shoals and eventually seceded from the nation, becoming an isolationist, somewhat violent city-state.
While a blow to the young nation, the CSA would survive Jackson's secession.
What many observers thought did it in was a relatively weak President, Edward Bishop of Corinth, Mississippi, who served from 1993 through 1999. Bishop turned out to be much less successful than Hall in unifying the various factions that began to come into existence and build influence during his administration. At a time when a strong president - such as Hall - may have unified the groups, and even helped spur the new Confederacy to expand beyond its borders and connect with other regional survivor states, the CSA instead began to fracture.
During Bishop's Presidency, various political and state leaders began to push his or her own agenda. Some wanted more power simply for themselves, or for their states or cities. Some pointed to Jackson as the nation's Waterloo, casting doubt on the national government (and promoting themselves in the process). Several Congressmen, governors and pundits argued for a weaker central government, with states having more power and authority; others argued for a stronger central government - like the old U.S. A group of U.S. veterans gained a measure of popular influence and used it to argue for a reestablishment of the United States of America.
Issues over trade also divided the various states. Ongoing issues relating to travel, due largely to bandits attacking travelers along portions of the most heavily traveled highways and state froads, and especially with parts of the nation off-limits due to lingering radiation from the nuclear blasts of 1983, also helped split the young nation.
It should be noted that the states themselves were relatively stable - the issues with the bandits mainly affected interstate travel and were largely limited to state borders.
Arkansas was the first nation to leave, in 1998 over a perception of the CSA being "useless" to benefit its local affairs. Missouri seceeded shortly thereafter; cries from the public and from Congress largely fell on deaf ears, as states had much more authority to secede under the CS Constitution than they would have under the US Constitution. The new President traveled the remainder of the country to rally the people, and even traveled to Jonesboro and Portageville in a failed attempt to get the two states to return.
Meanwhile, Alabama state leaders came under the opinion that they could start their own nation; despite pleas from advisors not to, the Alabama state government, led by long-time governor Frost, began secession proceedings in the fall of 1998.
In reaction, Congress, mainly on the strength of pro-Confederate Alabama and Georgia Senators and Representatives and Tennessee's contingent, passed a series of bills aimed at granting the national government more power.
The measures were not to the liking of Georgia, however, which recalled its Senators and Representatives and replaced them with ones who favored a less powerful central government. Attempts to reverse the bills passed in the fall of 1998 and winter of 1999 became bogged down as senators and representatives from the various states squabbled and argued over every possible detail.
The squabbling overshadowed the third and final Presidential campaign. Dick Jordan, the mayor of Florence, ran against token opposition from Tennessee and Mississippi. He won the November elections with 79 percent of the vote and with only 42 percent of eligible voters going to the ballot. He began his short term January 20, 1999, just over two weeks before he would have become ineligible to be President.
Alabama formally seceded February 4, 1999, but Muscle Shoals seceded from Alabama that same night; the CS Government recognized Muscle Shoals from that point on as the capital of Alabama (Jordan reaffirmed his oath to the Confederacy and his resident status as an Alabaman allied with Muscle Shoals). Jordan tried valiantly to keep his country from falling apart, pleading with senators and representatives from all remaining states to not give up on the nation.
Perhaps seeing the proverbial handwriting on the wall, the CS Commonwealth of Kentucky seceded by a majority vote of its state legislature in March, and applied to become a part of another Kentucky state government out of Elizabethtown, near Fort Knox.
Georgia's legislature quickly followed with its own secession vote, which barely passed both houses of its senate and house of representatives. Conversely, Tennessee and Mississippi sent not only notes of confidence in the government from their respective governors, but troops to help protect Muscle Shoals and the capital from possible incursions by Alabama.
But with Tennessee dealing increasingly with bandit attacks on its various towns, and Mississippi becoming more reliant on Alabama, President Jordan and the CS Congress decided to pull the plug on the "Confederate experiment". A 90-day plan to wind down the central government and merge its functions into the remaining states was enacted, although the Constitution had no provision for such an act.
On July 2, 1999, legislatures of the three remaining states voted to secede from the CSA. By November 4, the mall where the government once operated stood as a mostly-empty museum, maintained by the Muscle Shoals government itself.
Even when Florence's newly elected mayor Sam Pendleton asked Muscle Shoals to join with it to help reform the CSA, he was declined - as far as the former leaders of the CSA were concerned, the country was dead and gone forever.
However, in the hearts and minds of the people of the eight states that made up the 20th-century Confederacy, it was alive and well. Movements to reunite the nation have been active since 1999, bolstered by a belief that the country technically still exists, not having been properly disbanded; according to the Constitution, the various city states could simply reunite, reform their respective states, and in turn the national government. Legal experts in the region have argued over this since the CSA dissolved.
Prominent political and civilian leaders throughout the region, and other areas of the former southeastern U.S. where word of the new nation had spread, have been working towards some sort of revival.
Movements to reunite the various Confederate states are ongoing, with one group hoping for a Second Constitutional Convention in 2011 or 2012. An organization, Restart the Confederate States of America, was formed in Rome on March 30, 2010.
The League of Nations currently has no position on the matter. Neither it nor the WCRB answered reporters questions on how either organization could have missed on these survivor states (and others) during the famous WCRB exploration of the southern U.S. in the late 20th century and during the 2000s.
The various city-states stretching over eight states still exist today, with an estimated total population of 256,000.
Government and politics
More to come...
Political subdivisions
The founding states effective September 24, 1985, were:
- Alabama
- Mississippi
- Tennessee
Alabama also hosted the national capital, Muscle Shoals.
These states joined in subsequent years:
- Georgia
- Jackson
- Kentucky
- Arkansas
- Missouri
The following areas were territories that, for various reasons, never became official states:
- Chattahoochee
- Hopkinsville, Kentucky/Clarksville, Tennessee/Fort Campbell (consisting of the abandoned/partly destroyed cities of Hopkinsville and Clarksville, and the abandoned Fort Campbell U.S. military base)
- Kentucky Lake
- Natchez Trace
- Tupelo
These areas were considered for statehood or territorial status, but for various reasons rejected invitations to join the CSA:
- Madisonville, Kentucky
- Toccoa, Georgia
- Tuscaloosa, Alabama
Constitution
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Executive
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Legislative
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Judicial
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Civil liberties
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Equal rights
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Differences from the United States
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Differences from the 19th-century Confederacy
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Economy
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Demographics
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Armed forces
More to come...