1920 General Election: Donald Trump v. James Cox

[(Still) muted by Kalwejt until March 31]

Let's say Donald Trump is transported back in time to 1920, when he becomes the Republican nominee by the fact his platform in 2016 was basically identical to the Republican one at the time. He strictly opposes the Versailles Treaty and the disastrous League of Nations, desires to restrict immigration much in the style of the 1924 immigration act, help Blacks, end the "job-killing" Underwood tariff, and protect the inhabitants of the inner cities from the harmful influences of heroin (yes, a real 1920s issue), alcohol (his being a teetotaler gives him cred on this issue), and violence. Cox runs as real-world Cox, a standard-issue free-trade, segregationist Wilsonian Democrat.

Your choice?

In real-life 1920, Harding won in the largest popular-vote landslide evah, winning every county in New York, Iowa, Minnesota, etc., due to Wilsonian foreign policy irritating nearly every immigrant to the U.S.

[Vosem]

Cox based on this write-up, but it's very difficult to say. I can imagine how I'd vote in American elections going back to about ~1940, but before then the issues and the culture are so different, and historical events that are integral to how I see the world haven't happened to such an extent that it's hard for me to think about how I might've voted. Trying to insert my own values suggests to me that had I lived at that time I might've been a Hughes/Cox voter, and I'm uncertain any of those actually existed.

[(Still) muted by Kalwejt until March 31]

Cox based on this write-up, but it's very difficult to say. I can imagine how I'd vote in American elections going back to about ~1940, but before then the issues and the culture are so different, and historical events that are integral to how I see the world haven't happened to such an extent that it's hard for me to think about how I might've voted. Trying to insert my own values suggests to me that had I lived at that time I might've been a Hughes/Cox voter, and I'm uncertain any of those actually existed.

-Maybe North Carolina or parts of Kentucky? Hughes-->Cox voters, like Kerry-->McCain ones, generally existed in some very backward areas, to the extent they did so at all.

[JA]

Republican Presidential Nominee Warren G. Harding - 1920 campaign speech "Readjustment"

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Democratic Presidential Nominee James M. Cox - 1920 campaign speech "The World War"

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[(Still) muted by Kalwejt until March 31]

Cox based on this write-up, but it's very difficult to say. I can imagine how I'd vote in American elections going back to about ~1940, but before then the issues and the culture are so different, and historical events that are integral to how I see the world haven't happened to such an extent that it's hard for me to think about how I might've voted. Trying to insert my own values suggests to me that had I lived at that time I might've been a Hughes/Cox voter, and I'm uncertain any of those actually existed.

-The New Deal realignment was (mostly) not about constituencies (Truman's constituency and Wilson's were quite similar), but about what policies the parties stood for. It was FDR who turned the Democrats into a Progressive party, kicking southerners over to the Dem fringe. Before that, Progressives (Berniebros) had no natural home, having an ally in Wilson in 1916 (thus the Wilson win in Mahoning, which went for Hoover in 1932) and forming their own rump party in 1924. Before the New Deal, partisan issues included free trade v. protection, progressive v. flat income taxes, and civil rights v. lynching. The ultimate division, of course, was North v. South; Mississippi v. Vermont. Generally, Republicans were somewhat more pro-business and urban.

[Incipimus iterum]

Cox

[mencken]

Cox based on this write-up, but it's very difficult to say. I can imagine how I'd vote in American elections going back to about ~1940, but before then the issues and the culture are so different, and historical events that are integral to how I see the world haven't happened to such an extent that it's hard for me to think about how I might've voted. Trying to insert my own values suggests to me that had I lived at that time I might've been a Hughes/Cox voter, and I'm uncertain any of those actually existed.

-Maybe North Carolina or parts of Kentucky? Hughes-->Cox voters, like Kerry-->McCain ones, generally existed in some very backward areas, to the extent they did so at all.

Well, they both switched parties in order to vote against the first Black President.

[White Trash]

Cox based on this write-up, but it's very difficult to say. I can imagine how I'd vote in American elections going back to about ~1940, but before then the issues and the culture are so different, and historical events that are integral to how I see the world haven't happened to such an extent that it's hard for me to think about how I might've voted. Trying to insert my own values suggests to me that had I lived at that time I might've been a Hughes/Cox voter, and I'm uncertain any of those actually existed.

-Maybe North Carolina or parts of Kentucky? Hughes-->Cox voters, like Kerry-->McCain ones, generally existed in some very backward areas, to the extent they did so at all.

Well, they both switched parties in order to vote against the first Black President.

That's very simplistic and largely debunked.

[Murica!]

Cox based on this write-up, but it's very difficult to say. I can imagine how I'd vote in American elections going back to about ~1940, but before then the issues and the culture are so different, and historical events that are integral to how I see the world haven't happened to such an extent that it's hard for me to think about how I might've voted. Trying to insert my own values suggests to me that had I lived at that time I might've been a Hughes/Cox voter, and I'm uncertain any of those actually existed.

-Maybe North Carolina or parts of Kentucky? Hughes-->Cox voters, like Kerry-->McCain ones, generally existed in some very backward areas, to the extent they did so at all.

Well, they both switched parties in order to vote against the first Black President.

That's very simplistic and largely debunked.

That happens to be most of mencken's arguments.

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

Let's say Donald Trump is transported back in time to 1920, when he becomes the Republican nominee by the fact his platform in 2016 was basically identical to the Republican one at the time.

Well, they both switched parties in order to vote against the first Black President.

No.

[mencken]

Is everyone on here completely humorless?

[Murica!]

Is everyone on here completely humorless?

Well, humor is supposed to be at least amusing, no?