Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Location: Austin, TX/Chicago, IL/Houston, TX/Washington, DC
10,138 posts, read 16,049,308 times
Reputation: 4047
Advertisements
Washington DC became "Southern" the day they stripped Philadelphia of the status as the nations capital to build the nations capital in the "South". Washington DC's sole existence from then to now has been to be a city in the "South".
Thanks for giving us an amazing city.
Quote:
Therefore, the authority to establish a federal capital was provided in Article One, Section Eight, of the United States Constitution, which permits a "District (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States". The Constitution does not, however, specify a location for the new capital. In what later became known as the Compromise of 1790, Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and Thomas Jefferson came to an agreement that the federal government would assume war debt carried by the states, on the condition that the new national capital would be located in the Southern United States
Yeah it's in the South as much as Texas & Florida are. If you want to make a case that its not apart of the South then help me make a case that Houston, Miami/Fort Lauderdale, Atlanta, & Dallas/Fort Worth aren't either. And there's no way to win that argument, it just is what it is.
Wow... someone decided to shade in different colors on a map what they thought was what.... it must be true...
People make countless maps with their own regional subdivisions for many different purposes, but that isn't going to
and Virginia... with the capital of the confederacy, one of the largest concentrations of wealth in the early plantation south, hotbed of the early southern political aristocracy, and the place many of the people who moved to the Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee's ancestors first settled when they came to the new world.
That definitely can't be a Southern state... what was I thinking.
Someone is fooling themselves.
One of the interesting things about early Southern ancestry is some of it comes from immigrants through ports cities (Savannah, NOLA, Mobile, Charleston), but alot of it was also the descendents of earlier settlers from Virginia moving further south as more land was taken up.
DC was built in the south with a mixture of people and power from different places, but if you are going to separate Virginia from the South, then you are really fooling yourself.
Mid-Atlantic is more of an overlapping sub-region at best.
Wow... someone decided to shade in different colors on a map what they thought was what.... it must be true...
People make countless maps with their own regional subdivisions for many different purposes, but that isn't going to
and Virginia... with the capital of the confederacy, one of the largest concentrations of wealth in the early plantation south, hotbed of the early southern political aristocracy, and the place many of the people who moved to the Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee's ancestors first settled when they came to the new world.
That definitely can't be a Southern state... what was I thinking.
Someone is fooling themselves.
One of the interesting things about early Southern ancestry is some of it comes from immigrants through ports cities (Savannah, NOLA, Mobile, Charleston), but alot of it was also the descendents of earlier settlers from Virginia moving further south as more land was taken up.
DC was built in the south with a mixture of people and power from different places, but if you are going to separate Virginia from the South, then you are really fooling yourself.
Mid-Atlantic is more of an overlapping sub-region at best.
But things were so different in the Old South and Colonial days. Are you saying that we HAVE to abide by some pointless line that was drawn centuries ago, when DC has little to no southern characteristics today?
Location: Austin, TX/Chicago, IL/Houston, TX/Washington, DC
10,138 posts, read 16,049,308 times
Reputation: 4047
Quote:
Originally Posted by AlGreen
Are you saying that we HAVE to abide by some pointless line that was drawn centuries ago, when DC has little to no southern characteristics today?
No.
This is what I was just about to respond to you with earlier today. Here's the thing, I do try to distance Houston & Dallas from some cities in the South, not because I hate the South which I don't but because I feel the region is too vast to label everything as just "Southern".
The South is the name of the region, but the culture varies and have their own versions in every large city. Yes its true that Washington DC doesn't have "Southern" culture that same way. But its because of decades upon decades of transplants settling the area, immigration doing its work, and of course being the national capital helps with both of those things.
In 100 years from now, when Atlanta will be like that, would it no longer be in the South because its "Southern" culture is fading away or almost non-existent?
I agree some cities are more Southern than others, but the thing about it is, we need to distinguish Southern culture as more than just "Southern". My problem is "New South" just doesn't explain it. When people say Dallas & Houston are Southern, the very first thing that comes to my mind is the exact same cultural replica of Jackson, MS being both Dallas & Houston, except they are larger. I think of Dallas & Houston as some Southern with a bit of Tejano, and a few other things blended in.
Miami is Southern too, its just as much apart of the same region as Dallas & Houston, it always gets a free pass because those bastards let crazy amount of Latin American immigration come and wash out whatever "Southern" personality they had near the coasts. Rural Miami-Dade is still very much Southern like.
Washington DC is Southern, its just too far gone in the transplants and immigration point now to make it what it was meant to be, which was a Southern city. It was officially a Southern city before there even was a Texas, Florida, Oklahoma, Arkansas or so, and today because its apart of a mega region like Bos-Wash, it wants to ditch the region its in, absolutely not.
Washington DC is in the South, but its also apart of the "Mega Region" Bos-Wash too. Vancouver in Canada is in Canada but its also apart of the Mega Region called Cascadia which exhibits Seattle, WA & Portland, OR two American cities. Yet Vancouver is still Canadian despite having more in common with Seattle & Portland than Montreal & Toronto. Washington DC works the same way, its culturally neither Northeastern nor Southern personally but its still geographically in the South.
I think my biggest problem is that I don't get why Washington DC & Miami/Fort Lauderdale get the free pass whereas no one else does. Baltimore, its geographically and technically in the South, but its culturally very intertwined with Philadelphia and that region. Washington DC unlike Baltimore is missing something that makes it culturally Northeastern, it even feels that way when you're there, I think it may have to do with heavy industrial past or something but I don't know. It was a common characteristic amongst all "Northern" cities to have that and Washington DC just never really did.
Last edited by DANNYY; 03-22-2011 at 01:43 AM..
Reason: Tweak.
Meh, I've never seen any evidence supporting that DC or Maryland were ever culturally parallel to the lower south. I've always known them to be in the transitional area that starts in Virginia. They were even considered "northern" destinations during the Great Migration of the early 20th century.
DC has more proximity to the northeast and is really effectively northern in many aspects, IMO. Atlanta can be invaded with all the transplants and immigrants it wants, but it will still be completely surrounded by the south. There's a big difference between the two.
It's south of the Mason-Dixon line, so that makes it historically southern, but I have not seen how it culturally ever was. I could be wrong, though.
If you define to me what being culturally Southern is to you, I will be glad to search up and post some characteristics of olden day Washington DC.
Go ahead. You don't need my opinion to post pictures.
Even slavery in DC and Maryland wasn't the same as further south. These weren't the cotton states. The Mason-Dixon didn't accurately divide anything then and it doesn't now.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
