Forrest Fire

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

29 July 1967 - Gulf of Tonkin
The point of departure for this time line is an accident known as the Forrest Fire that takes place on the USS Forrestal.  Unlike our time line, the carrier sinks with a loss of over 3000 lives including Lt. Cmdr. John McCain.

With the Secretary of Navy position empty at the time, Defense Secretary McNamara becomes the administration scapegoat for this disaster and is sacked.  This single day tragedy causes a sharp polarization of US public opinion, but it also forestalls the talking up of success prior to the Tet Offensive, thus reducing the impact of the event.  As a result, Johnson looks to win the Democrtaic nomination without too much fuss and thus stays in the race and easily secures the nomination.

Tragedy and confusion beset the Republican Party on June 5, 1968 when their presumptive nominee, Richard Nixon was assassinated by Sirhan Sirhan in the Ambassador Hotel after giving a victory speech for the California primary.

The raucous Miami convention lasts six days before the candidates are finally selected.  Governor Nelson Rockefeller is chosen to run  for President and his surprise choice of the freshman Senator from Tennessee, Howard Baker is accepted as his running mate.

While Rockefeller does weaker than Nixon in most of the country, he is able to, thanks to the split in Democratic ranks caused by George Wallace, and performing better in the northeast, to eke out an electoral vote majority:

276 Rockefeller/Baker
171 Johnson/Humphrey
 91 Wallace/LeMay

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Rockefeller had three major people to concern him at the start of his term: Ho Chi Minh, Ronald Reagan, and George Wallace.
   After the failed Tet Offensive, while Vietnam was a concern it didn’t look to be a real problem.  Furthermore, he knew that his expertise was not in foreign affairs, so he decided to delegate Vietnam to Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird and Secretary of State Harold Stassen.
   Ronald Reagan looked to be the inheritor of the conservative wing from Goldwater who had led the party to such a disaster in ’64.  Reagan hadn’t caused any trouble after he’d lost the nomination in Miami, but hadn’t been energetic in campaigning for Rockefeller which had contributed to him losing California by a mere 1200 votes.  Rumors indicated that the ex-Democrat might bolt parties again and might take a considerable portion of the right wing with him if he departed.
   Which meant that George Wallace was foremost in Rockefeller’s thoughts.  Unlike Thurmond 20 years earlier, Wallace had done surprisingly well outside of the South, getting some 16% of the popular vote overall.  If Wallace could manage to expand his appeal even further, he might be able to turn his American Independent Party into something more than the usual one-election third party.  he needed to blunt him, and blunt him quick.  While there was no way he would consider rolling back the civil rights laws, the “law and order” theme that Wallace used was one Rockefeller was more than willing to co-opt.  The Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1969 and the Environmental Protection Act of 1970 were twin pillars of a campaign against “the villains who seek to pollute our land and our people” and were both considerably stricter than similar laws which passed in our time line under Nixon.
   The 1970 midterms were an exception to the usual rule of midterm losses by the party in power, with the GOP gaining seats in both the House and Senate, managing to bring the Senate within reach with a 51-48-1 balance of power.  Everything is looking rosy for the GOP, but there is a nagging problem of inflation to be dealt with, which has reached the unheard of heights of almost 5% in the last quarter of 1970.  Something would have to be done.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

By January 1971, the process of Vietnamization that Secretary Laird had put in place was coming along nicely and had allowed for US troop strength in country to be reduced to under 100,000 soldiers, if you didn’t count the close to 50,000 USAF security troops at the airbases.  (USAF security forces were offically airmen, so for PR reasons, they had been beefed up considerably as they didn’t get counted in the number of soldiers the US had in Vietnam.)  While the AFRVN was still small, riverine and coastal patrols had been handed over to the Vietnamese, altho there were still American liason officers with them (such as Lt. John Kerry who didn’t get those three Purple Hearts in this time line).  The Paris Peace Talks were proceeding slowly, but with the anti-war movement more muted than it was in our time line, Rockefeller felt no strong need to bring the war to a quick ending.

However, Rockefeller had another war that needed winning, the one against inflation.  To do that he proposed a set of temporary price controls intended to act as a firebreak against inflation.  Price controls being what they are over the next 18 months they became less temporary and more burdensome until finally Rockefeller chucked them, but not before managing to help start the Libertarian Party, but more about them later since they were not a factor in the 1972 elections.

With Rockefeller all set to run again, the only question was who would the Democratic nominee be. Wallace had decided to return to the Democratic Party, and was easily able to win its nomination.

The election was close and hard fought and is oft cited as an example of what a Vice Presidential nominee can do as both Vice President Baker and Senator Hart helped their candiates to eke out narrow victories in their homestates of Tennesee and Michigan respectively:

273 Rockefeller/Baker
265 Wallace/Hart

Third parties had played a role in both Tennesee and DC.  In Tennesee and several other states the remnants of Wallace’s 1968 American Party had fielded a slate of candidates because they were not happy with Wallace for reaching out to liberal wing of the Democratic party with his choice of running mate.  In DC, the People’s Party, and an Independent Democrat slate had managed to siphon enough black Democratic voters away from Wallace to enable Rockefeller to get DC’s 3 electoral votes despite getting only 32% of the vote there.

The GOP also had control of the Senate, but just barely as it was a 50-50 tie with the Vice President as the controlling vote, but the House remained in Democratic hands.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

It's been a while, but I feel inspired to continue this now, so I will.

1973 was a year of transition in many ways.

Vietnam
In Vietnam, the last of the U.S. Marine units, save those at the embassy, were withdrawn, and the U.S. Army had only some special forces and training cadres in country.  Riverine units in the Mekong no longer had U.S. Navy advisors, tho there were some Coasties with them. The South Vietnamese navy was also beefed up with the transfer of several ships including the USS Des Moines and the USS Salem.  Their sister ship, the USS Newport News had seen service in Southeast Asia with its 8" guns and was ready to be decomissioned after close to three decades of continuous use, but its sisters had been held in reserve since 1960 and thus were more than able to provide useful service for the South Vietnamese.

In contrast to the other branches of the U.S. military, the USAF had a considerable presence in Vietnam including some 40,000 airbase security personnel who routinely engaged in missions beyond their airbases to neutralize Vietcong guerillas before they could attack.  ARVN troops repulsed an attack by North Vietnamese units in August with the only U.S. forces engaged being air support and forward air controllers from the USAF.  The rest of the military was not happy that the air force was the branch that was getting the lion's share of U.S. effort there, but as its involvement caused the least controversy back home, the preceding six years had seen a gradual shift of responsibility for things Vietnamese to the Air Force. However, USAF strength in Vietnam had reached its peak in 1973 and future years would see a drawdown.

Middle East
The Yom Kippur War reached a somewhat different conclusion.  Instead of Operation Nickel Grass, the American resupply of Israel, Rockefeller and Secretary of State Stassen reached an accomodation with the Soviets that  nether of them would engage in resupply of Israel or the Arab states while the war continued.  This left Israel without the ability to launch its counteroffensive in the Sinai and thus the armistice reached in November left Egypt in control of the east bank of the Suez. While Israel retained control of the Golan Heights, further south the Syrians had reached the southeastern shores of the Sea of Galilee and the Israelis had been unable to push them back.  However, while there was a tempory reduction in oil supplies, there was nothing anywhere as severe as the oil shock of 1973-1974 in our time line.

Back Home
There were two major political events in 1973 in the United States. One was the resignation of Maryland Governor Spiro Agnew due to a tax evasion scandal.  The other side of the Potomac would prove more important in the long run.  In a messy four-way race, John Dalton won the Virginia Governor's race, becoming the first statewide official to win as a Libertarian.  (In our time line, Dalton won the race for Lt. Governor as a Republican in 1973.)  The comfortable two party system looked like it might break down, or this might be just another blip, but only time would tell.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Needless to say, the unexpected election of Governor Dalton in Virginia improved the profile and the chances of the new Libertarian Party across the nation.  A number of Republicans disastisfied with Rockefeller and Democrats disastisfied with Wallace (who was already gearing up for a third presidential run in 1976) considered the new party, especially after Sen. Goldwater announced in February that he would be running for relection in 1974 as a Libertarian.

However, it is difficult to start a new party from scratch.  For the most part, Libertarian candidates in the 1974 races would manage a respectable 10 to 20% of the vote in most races they ran in, thereby causing a lot of runoffs for offices that required a majority and not mere plurality to win.  However, Goldwater would end up being joined by two other Libertarians in the Senate.  Senator Keating was elected on a Conservative-Libertarian fusion ticket in New York while Senator Eckerd of Florida would win in Florida, unseating two Republican incumbents.  The Republicans would also lose the New Hampshire seat but to a Democrat.  Thus the Democrats were back in control of the Senate once more 51-46-3 however they lost ground in the House with both the Republicans and the Libertarians having a net gain in seats.  The GOP widely blamed the Libertarians for causing them to lose control of the Senate, especially since they had viewed the open seats in Iowa and Nevada as theirs to pickup from the Democrats. Given the power of incumbency, the Nevada loss was especailly hard to stomach as the 35 year old Harry Reid might now keep that seat in Democratic hands for decades.  (In our time line, Reid lost a close race for the Senate to Paul Laxalt in 1974 for that open Nevada seat.)

[Colin]

Very interesting. One question though what was the other party in the Virginia governors race? Also what is the makeup of the House in this scenario?

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Very interesting. One question though what was the other party in the Virginia governors race? Also what is the makeup of the House in this scenario?

In our time line there was a short-lived Virgina Conservative Party active in the 1965 election and got which got 13% of the vote then.  With Wallace doing better in this time line, I see them still hanging around (tho not necessarily under that name) and managing to get 5 to 10% of the vote in the 1973 election.  Enough votes to affect the election, but not enough to actually win.  Dalton was a fiscal conservative, but he was no racist, so I can't see him wanting or accepting the VCP's nomination if it were still in the race.

Aside from the House remaining Democratic so far, I haven't given it a lot of thought, mainly because I wasn't about to think about all 435 races, so I'd just be handwaving anyway if I gave exact numbers.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

January 1975 was time for some spring cleaning now that the elections were out of the way thought Rockefeller.  Any trouble that was raised could be cleaned up before next election.

The on-again off-again Paris Peace talks were on again though Rockefeller had long since given up on any idea that either the North Vietnamese or the South Vietnamese were particularly interested in peace. However, the South Vietnamese now appeared to be strong enough to hold on their own, so his only interest was in arrange a peace deal with the Notrh so that he could get the POW's freed. He had almost been on the verge of approving Operation Linebacker back in '73 when the Yom Kippur War had shown how effective Soviet SAMs could be.  Now the Air Force said it had developed better counter measures and so he was willing to let them try.

At least half the navy was sure to howl about his next decision.  There would be no third Nimitz class carrier.  They were too expensive and left the government held hostage to the one shipyard capable of building the behemoths.  The Nimitz should have been in commission two years ago but labor problems had slowed the construction of both her and the Eisenhower and substantially increased the cost. Instead, he approved the plan put forward by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Elmo Zumwalt and approved the construction of eight sea control ships to take the place of retiring Essex-class carriers. At 35,000 tons displacement they would be a bit larger than the ships they would be replacing, but far smaller and less costly than ordering more Nimitz-class budget busters.  The USS Yorktown (CVS-70) should be ready to commission in four years.  The way things were going at Newport News, the Eisenhower might still be stuck in the building dock.

Now back from Defense to State, and the prickly issue of China.  The people there were advising him to recognize the People's Republic, but he hadn't been willing to take the political heat that he would take from abandoning Taiwan.  He decided to tell Stassen to undertake a cautious first step.  Offer Mao recognition of the PRC and support of it taking the permanent seat on the Security Council but only if the PRC renounced the use of force as a means of reunifying China and if the PRC renounced its policy of refusing to have official relations with any country that recognized the ROC.  If the US sent ambassadors to both Berlin and Bonn, he wasn't about to let Peking tell him he couldn't also send one to Taipei.

Domestically, Rockefeler realized that he was too much of a lame duck to get anything done, especially with the Democrats back in control of both houses.  He had too things to get done, put the best candidate on the ticket in 1976 and make preparations for what he would do after the Presidency

Baker had been a decent Vice President, but he'd been selected to balance the ticket, and Rockefeller wasn't interested in having him as the next president.  However, with Justice Douglas' stroke on December 31, it was obvious he would retire soon.  Rockefeller was thankful he hadn't backed Minority Leader Ford's efforts to impeach Douglas back in 1970 as they might have embittered Douglas to hang on despite his incapacity.  Nominating Baker for the Supreme Court would take him gracefully out of the Presidential race and enable him to unmistakably signal the sort of candidate Rockefeller wanted by who he chose as a replacement, even if that man himself didn't end up getting the nomination.  There were a number of Democrats, in both North and South, who were unhappy with the direction Wallace had led the party of Jefferson and Jackson.  Reaching out to one of them would help build the Republican party in the direction Rockefeller wished it to go.


April 1975 saw the fruits of Rockefeller's efforts.  A peace treaty was signed in Paris, formally ending the Vietnam War.  On the way home, Rockefeller stopped off for a brief visit in Peking, which so far was the only result of his decision to approach China. Once he was back in Washington, he attended the swearing in and innauguration of the 40th Vice President of the United States, who as his first major effort would shepherd the Defense appropriation bill authorizing contruction of the Yorktown class carriers through the Senate.  Under the circumstances it was only appropriate that rather than the Chief Justice, Associate Justice Baker was the one who administered the oath to the new Vice President and fellow southerner, James Earl Carter, the former Governor of Georgia.

[Bacon King]

A good story- please continue!

[True Democrat]

Very good, but I think Maine would have gone Republican in 1968, Muskie wasn't on the ticket.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

It was June 1975 and Ronald Reagan was facing what would be the most important decision of his political career to date.  Some of the people he trusted said he should continue the fight against Rockefeller for the soul of the Republican Party. Others said he join Goldwater in the new Libertarian Party.  Both groups said he should run for President.  There were things about both parties he liked and the one thing he was certain of was that he would do whatever he could to defeat Wallace should he try to run a third time. He decided to ask his most trusted advisor what she thought.

"Well, Ronnie.  If you run as a Libertarian, the nomination will be yours for the asking, but I can't see a Libertarian winning the White House in '76 and you would have the best chance, as you might be able to carry California.  You'd be able to set your stamp on a new party and mold it in your image, but you'd never be President, if you did so.

"If you run as a Republican, it'll be a tough convention, maybe as bad as Miami in '68 and all you'll be doing placing a marker for '80 or '84, since there's no way Rockefeller would let you ge the nomination this time."

Ronnie nodded.  Nancy had reflected what he was thinking about his chances, but he still had some thinking to do.
Speaker Albert was nodding also, but not in contemplation of the future, but  of the past.  Rep. Matsunaga who had just left his office had seen to that.  He led a faction of thirty-seven Representatives were not happy about the direction Wallace had taken the party of Jefferson and Jackson and he had come to politely inform him of what they had decided to do about it.  They weren't joining the Republicans or the Libertarians as some had done, no they were simply going to declare themselves Independent and force the Democrats to either placate them or spurn them.  However this meant that for the first time since Champ Clark in the 65th Congress, that a Speaker would not command a majority in automatic support, not that support had been automatic on anything except paper, but it was going to complicate things, and the Little Giant from Little Dixie did not need complication right now. Perhaps it was a curse of Little Giants to see their party fracture he mused.
Rockefeller nodded sagely.  His sources within the Kennedy camp confirmed that RFK was going to challenge Wallace for the Democratic nomination, leaving his Senate seat open, and he knew just the man to fill it.  He'd already been Governor and President, so why not Senator?  It would also provide the excuse he would need to avoid having to pick between supporting Carter or Stassen.  Either one should be able to defeat Reagan for the nomination.  The rumors about his possibly seeking the Libertarian nomination were just wishful thinking in their part thought Rockefeller.  Reagan wanted to be president and he had to know there was only one way to get it.
One never accomplished anything worthy by being timid, thought Reagan.  Besides, with both the Republicans and Democrats likely headed for a bruising nomination battle, the prospect of a Libertarian winning the presidency might not be as bleak as the experts thought, after all the experts had said he'd never get elected governor, hadn't they?

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

September 5, 1975
Wallace had tried hard to remake the Democratic Party in his image, helped by the decision of quite a few to leave for other pastures, but he knew that he was not yet done.  While Bobby, with his famous last name, would be a problem next year, he wasn't the only potential trouble maker.  That was why he was in Sacramento instead of back in Montgomery.  If the race hadn't been decided by the time the primaries came to California, Gov. Brown's support could well end up being crucial, not only for winning the nomination, but also California in the general election, given that Reagan had announced his plans to run for President under the Libertarian banner.

... This is a CBS Special Report ...
Democratic Presidential candidate and Alabama Governor George Wallace has been shot outside the California State House this afternoon after a meeting with California Governor Jerry Brown.  More details once we have them.

September 7, 1975
George shook his head in silent disagreement, when he was told yet again by a well-wisher how unfortunate it was that he'd been shot.  Granted, he'd rather have not been the target of Miss Fromme, but it had only been a flesh wound.  Brown had all but told him at their meeting that he was going to support Kennedy, but now there was no way he could disparage Wallace that publicly after he'd been shot while under the "protection" of the California State Police.  Even better, Bobby would get a lot less mileage out of his brother having been shot.  There were still many months of campaigning ahead, but he was all but guarenteed the nomination now.  That bit of fortune was worth the pain it had cost.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

November 20, 1975
Robert Francis Kennedy was not having a happy 50th birthday.  Wallace-backed candidates had won all three Governorships that were up for election.  Louisiana and Mississippi were no surprises, but he'd had hopes that Julian Carroll's independent candidacy would win, but he hadn't even made the runoff election.  With Wallace effectively in control of the Democratic party apparatus, Bobby was faced with unpalatable choices.

He could ignore the writing on the wall and run for the Presidential nomination anyway, but that would mean giving up his Senate seat, and that was too high a price to pay for windmill tilting.

He could wait.  Surely if Wallace lost another general election, the party would move on and find someone else.  But would that someone else be him?  He doubted it.  The party was swinging back to conservatism and forgetting that it had been the party of Bryan, Wilson, and Roosevelt.

There was one other option to be considered, and besides giving him a chance to run for President in the future, it would, if rumors were true, upset the plans of another arrogant SOB, and that by itself was almost enough to make him do it, even without the other considerations.  Time to call Hugh Scott about movng some furniture, he thought as he picked up the phone.

Friday, November 25; this is Washington Week in Review with your moderator, Paul Duke
Many a politician's plan for a quiet Thanksgiving dinner went out the window Wednesday when Senator Bobby Kennedy announced that he would not only be dropping his quest for the Democratic nomination next year, but that he would be crossing the Senate floor by switching to the Republican party.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

I thought I'd resume working on this timeline, if only to encourage others to get of their duffs and work on their own timelines.
There were plenty of people upset at Bobby Kennedy's decision to switch parties.  George Wallace wasn't one of them at first.  While he wouldn't have minded crushing Bobby at the Democratic Convention in New Orleans (not New York City as in OTL), Kennedy's inglorious retreat was just as satisfying, or so George Wallace thought for the first few days.  December 1975 proved to be a tumultuous month politically as various effects of Kennedy's decision played out.

By the time the second session of the 94th Congress convened on Monday, January 5, 1976, two more Democratic Senators had bolted to the Republicans, and three others had declared themselves Independent. Surprisingly Teddy Kennedy wasn't one of them, as he chose for now at least to remain a Democrat.  A Republican defected to the Libertarians, leaving the Republicans with a 47-46 plurality over the Democrats, with four Libertarians and three independents holding the balance.

The Libertarians offered to support Minority Leader Hugh Scott of Pennsylvania as Majority Leader in return for Goldwater receiving the largely ceremonial post of President pro tem.  Rather than engage in a deal which they saw as enhancing the prospects of the Libertarian Party, the Republicans rejected it, so the Libertarians remained neutral in the mid-session leadership fight in exchange for receiving a position for one Libertarian on each Senate committee.  Combined with the votes of the disaffected Independents, this was enough to allow the Democrats to retain organizational control of the Senate for now.
Bobby's party switch had  scuttled Rockefeller's plans to run for the Senate in New York as a means of remaining aloof from the contest of who should get the Presidential nomination.

He needed something to serve as a plausible distraction.  Since running for the Senate was out, Rockefeller needed something else. During his ten years as Governor of New York, it had already been remarked by some that Nelson had an Edifice Complex, so it was not at all unexpected that he would put his energy into an infrastructure project.  Gaining sufficient bipartisan support, Rockefeller signed into law on July 4, 1976 the Providing for America's Transportation: the Railway Improvement, Overhaul, and Transformation Act, commonly known as the PATRIOT Act.  It committed the United States to not only revitalize the existing train tracks, but to building true high-speed rail.  By 1983, the Northeast Corridor would be served by USA (Ultrafast Surface Aerodynamic) trains that ran at a scheduled 150 mph and could go faster during tests.  Boston to Washington would take 3 hours, nonstop, city center to city center, with additional lines under construction.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

As expected, the Democratic convention that July in New Orleans is a coronation for George Wallace.  The real question is what steps might Wallace be willing to undertake to heal the fracturing Democrats.  Quite a few of the remaining liberals in the party, along with those who had already bolted, had met the week before in New Orleans for what had been billed as a meeting of the Progressive Democratic Alliance.

The various Independent Democrats had in several States formed splinter parties to nominate them for local or Congressional office, but they knew they weren't well enough organized to run a Presidential candidate of their own.  Yet if Wallace didn't take steps to placate them, they'd bolt, and in several States, Wallace would have to make last minute efforts to put his name on the ballot if the local Democratic Party refused to back him.

Wallace knew that and was willing to make several concessions.  The Democratic platform would be a model of brevity in 1976 as many issues were sidestepped, and he accepted as his running mate, Senator Frank Church of California. Peace was salvaged for now, but it was a peace not unlike that the Whigs had obtained for their party in 1852.
Distracted by his training, Rockefeller was able to stay aloof from the Presidential nomination contest. Secretary of State Stassen had hoped for Rockefeller's support, but without it he declined to do more than allow his name be put in nomination. Stassen attracted no support in either Iowa or New Hampshire and would receive only a couple of favored son delegates from Minnesota.

Vice President Carter would not have an easy road to the nomination.  While quite a few Democrats had bolted from the Wallace-led Democrats to the Republicans, putting one at the top of the ticket ruffled feathers.  Several other candidates vied for the nomination, of which Senator Percy of Illinois, Senator Packwood of Oregon, and Governor Sargent of Massachusetts are the most notable.  (In this timeline, Michael Dukakis did not unseat Sargent in 1974 and he never becomes Governor of Massachusetts.)

Percy comes in first place in the Iowa caucuses, while Sargent comes in first in New Hampshire.  Carter is able to come in a close second in both contests and is able to portray both losses as due to neighbor state influences.  No one candidate has a majority of delegates supporting him by the time the gavel bangs to open the 1976 Republican National Convention in New York City.

With 2356 delegates voting, the 1st round of balloting was:

Sargent 882 (1179 needed to select)
Carter 842
Percy 481
Packwood 101
Reagan 8 (Reagan had already accepted the Libertarian nomination two weeks earlier in Philadelphia, his running mate was Rep. Phil Crane of Illinois.  But there were those who hoped to lure him back to the Republicans.)
Others 32

For the fourth round, Packwood threw his support behind Sargent:

Sargent 1003 (1179 needed to select)
Carter 852
Percy 491

Both Carter and Sargent courted Percy, with both offering him the running mate slot.  As Percy would later recount in his memoirs, he finally chose to back Carter because he taught Sunday school. Percy had come to the attention of his own mentor, Joseph McNabb, who had been president of Bell & Howell before Percy, when McNabb had been teaching the Sunday school class he was in and had been impressed by the then young Chuck Percy.

So on the sixth round, Percy backed Carter and the Republicans would leave New York united around a Carter/Percy ticket.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

It proved to be a spirited campaign.  There were a total of five presidential debates, one with all three of Carter, Wallace, and Reagan; Reagan getting a single one-on-one debate with Wallace and Carter, and a pair between Carter and Wallace.  No one bothered to hold a debate for Vice Presidential nominees Percy, Church, and Crane.  Wallace made some foreign policy hay over Rockefeller's tentative outreach efforts to the PRC and made Carter seem mushy on defense issues.  Reagan challenged Carter over the economy, since unemployment and inflation were both up to the stratospheric level of 6% each.

The election ended hinging on Illinois where a recount would determine if for the first time since 1824 for the Presidency, and 1836 for the Vice Presidency, the election ended up heading to Congress.

Carter/Percy: 252 EV 38% PV
Wallace/Church: 215 EV 34% PV
Reagan/Crane: 45 EV 27% PV
Illinois: 26 EV (too close to call)

With Reagan holding a 174 vote lead over Carter in the initial results, the Republicans were hopeful they could overtake him, but the Chicago machine made certain that Wallace would have a chance to win in the House, as Reagan ended up getting Illinois' 26 EVs.

The Senate would not be difficult. The Republicans and the Libertarians had both made gains in the Senate, so that the balance of power in that body was 50-41-9.  With a 50 vote bloc, the Republicans could prevent Church from getting the Vice Presidency, but the Libertarians were able to hold out for Goldwater receiving the President pro tem spot in exchange for their votes to enable Percy to get the 51 votes needed for him to become Vice President.

The House was a mess.  No party had a majority of Representatives, let alone State delegations, and the various Independents and Progressives elected from various places made things even more muddy.  Before the House could elect a President they would first need to select a Speaker.

While the Democrats did have a plurality they could cobble into enough votes to elect a Speaker, they had to decide who since Speaker Albert had retired, Majority Leader O' Neill had lost in a three-way race while standing as a Democrat in Massachusetts, thanks to Progressive Party candidate John Kerry taking enough votes to allow the Republican to win the district, and Minority Leader John J. McFall had successfully run for reelection as an Independent rather than as a Democrat.

It took almost a week, and agreeing to some rules changes that weakened the power of the Speakership, but on January 10, Jim Wright of Texas became Speaker of the House of Representatives.

It took another four days before sufficient of the Independents and Progressives were corralled by the Speaker to allow for the House to elect a President on January 14, just 6 days before he was to take office.

Wallace: 26 States
Carter: 5 States
Reagan: 2 States
Divided: 17 States

Thus despite having a plurality of both the Popular and the Electoral votes, despite having come ever so close in Illinois to winning outright, Jimmy Carter would not be President, but instead George Wallace of Alabama would become the first President elected from the old Confederacy since the Civil War.

This would also be the first time since Adams/Jefferson in 1796, that the President and Vice-President would not be elected from the same party.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

With only 6 days before securing election and the nomination, Wallace was in a position of being forced to scramble to get a cabinet in place.  He decided that for now, those members of the Rockefeller crowd he could stomach would be allowed to stay a while longer.  None at the cabinet level of course, but the holdovers would complicate Wallace's ability to act on his policy goals, though not as much as if there had been nobody in the posts.

Wallace's Initial Cabinet (names in bold are the same as in OTL under Carter)
Secretary of State: Zbigniew Brzezinski (was NSA under OTL Carter)
Secretary of the Treasury: W. Michael Blumenthal
Secretary of Defense: John Connally (former SoNavy under Kennedy ; had become a Republican by 1977 in OTL)
Attorney General: Joseph A. Califano, Jr. (was SoHEW under OTL Carter)
Secretary of the Interior: Cecil D. Andrus
Secretary of Agriculture: Robert Bergland
Secretary of Commerce: Brock Adams (was SoTrans under OTL Carter)
Secretary of Labor: Ray Marshall
Secretary of HEW: Daniel Patrick Moynihan (was a freshman Senator in OTL)
Secretary of HUD: Philip Klutznick (was SoC under OTL Carter)
Secretary of Transportation: (see below)

Wallace was able to nominate 10 of the 11 cabinet posts before he and Vice President Percy were sworn in on the 20th, tho none of them would be confirmed by the end January.  As for the the 11th, Secretary of Transportation, there was no nominee, nor would there be.  While Transportation had become a separate department under Johnson, it had received a considerable boost under Rockefeller.  Wallace decided that he would shove Transportation back into Commerce from whence it had come, and to force Congress' hand, he made no appointments to any position in the Department.  It was a brash move, one of many during the contentious time Wallace had in office.  With no majority in either House of Congress, it would take a brash man to get anything done, and as both admirers and critics agreed, Wallace was a brash man.

[Psychic Octopus]

I'm loving this.

[Psychic Octopus]

Update!

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

It's been a while, but I finally have a small update.
The first real crisis that the Wallace administration faced came of March 9, 1977, when a group of 15 African-American Muslims of the Hanafi Movement led by Hamaas Abdul Khaalis took over three buildings in Washington D.C., the local office of B'nai B'rith, the Islamic Center of Washington, and last but not least the District Building where the local government for the District of Columbia was housed.

The first two takeovers occurred peacefully enough, but according to the statements of the survivors at the District Building, when an elevator unexpectedly opened on the fifth floor, one of the gunmen shot at the occupants and then the other three went on a shooting spree.  Thirteen people died there, including Mayor Walter Washington and D.C. Council Members Marion Barry and John A. Wilson.

Only the fact that there wasn't a force prepared to storm the other two buildings gave the FBI a chance to use its preferred tactic of negotiation.  It took seven tense days, but ultimately the situation was defused, despite Wallace's flamboyant rebuttal to one of Khaalis' odder demands, the banning of the recently released film Mohammad, Messenger of God, by screening it in the White House theatre and then recommending others see it as well as it was a truer portrayal of Islam than the curs who had killed Mayor Washington and twelve other innocents.

Politically, there were those who blamed the lack of security at the District Building on the lack of full autonomy for the District or on Wallace in particular, tho the latter charges were largely seen as mere political opportunism as Wallace had only be in office forty-eight days.  However, the former did lead to by the end of 1977 an amendment giving the District of Columbia most of the characteristics of a State to pass Congress and be sent for ratification.  (The amendment would ultimately fail, with only twenty-four States ratifying it before the Amendment expired in 1984.)

The incident also led to the formation of units to deal with hostage situations like this. Within the FBI, the Hostage Rescue Team to handle domestic incidents, while for foreign incidents  the United States Air Force's Delta Squadron was formed.
Corresponding events in real life:
The hostage taking described here actually happened, but with fewer hostage takers and the outcome was different and resolved in two days, with only two people killed at the District building, a reporter and a security guard, altho Marion Barry was badly wounded.  The demand about the film was one of the actual demands.

A DC Representation Amendment was sent to the States in 1978 and was approved by only sixteen States before expiring.

The Army's Delta Force was formed in 1977, but the HRT wasn't created until 1982.  The decision that in this timeline it would be the USAF's Delta Squadron is due to the fact that USAF "base security personel" largely took over the United States role in Vietnam under Rockefeller, hence in this timeline the USAF has both the planes and the men to rapidly place a small fighting force anywhere in the world without having to involve the other armed services.