An American Monarchy: A Parliamentary America TL by DKrol

[DKrol]

Defense Minister Curtis LeMay’s operational plan for Vietnam was a massive success. The first Marine deployment easily secured Saigon within a week, with defense analysts comparing it to General Eisenhower’s D-Day. The resounding victory in Saigon boosted American support for the new phase of the war, with many expecting it to be a quick affair that would only last a few months.

The air campaign was also a success. During the year and a half absence of American forces, the North Vietnamese had established a complex series of westernized highways and infrastructure projects to connect the nation, allowing for the easy movement of people and resources to the South in the re-unification effort. LeMay’s air campaign quickly destroyed that system, effectively separating the North and South by vehicular traffic. The only ways to travel from Hanoi to Saigon after the air campaign was either by farm roads or by ship, either along the coast or through the river system.

While the American military was raking up victories in Vietnam, foreign nations were huddling together to develop a response to the suddenly more aggressive Americans. British Prime Minister Harold Wilson convened a summit in Edinburgh, called the “Conference on the Future of Conflict in Southeast Asia”, and invited representatives from the Soviet Union, China, France, the United States, and Australia. Wilson had a special meeting with Soviet Premier Alexei Kosygin in advance of the summit in hopes of drawing up a peace deal, or at least a cease fire, in advance of the summit.

The Conference on the Future of Conflict in Southeast Asia faced a rough start. Prime Minister Thurmond refused to speak with Kosygin in private, instead demanding that all communications from Kosygin be relayed through French President Georges Pompidou. This infuriated Kosygin, who decided to not talk to Pompidou at all. The only line of communication from Kosygin to Thurmond required Wilson relaying what Kosygin had said to Pompidou to repeat back to Thurmond. One British aid at the summit described the event as “the most high-stakes game of telephone I’ve ever seen”.

The game of telephone went on for six days until, in frustration, Kosygin pushed past Thurmond’s aids and walked into the conference room set aside for the American delegation. Kosygin ordered everyone out of the room, including Foreign Minister William Fulbright and Defense Minister LeMay, and then locked the doors, leaving just himself and Thurmond. The leaders of the two most powerful countries in the world sat in the locked conference room of the George Hotel for more than five hours, talking in private until 3 in the morning.

When the door finally opened, Thurmond stepped out, joined by Kosygin. Both looked somber, tired, and worn down. The first person to speak was LeMay, who said “Well?” Thurmond cast a sideways glance at Kosygin, let out a little laugh, and replied “Sleep”.

[DKrol]

Soviet Premier Alexei Kosygin and Prime Minister Strom Thurmond held a joint press conference in The George Hotel in Edinburgh on December 12, 1969. This was the first joint press conference of Russian and American leaders since the fall of the Tsar. The press corps present expected the only news out of the press conference to be that no agreement had been reached. What came out of the Thurmond-Kosygin closed door meeting has been hailed as the greatest example of person-to-person diplomacy.

Thurmond shocked the world when he announced that he and Kosygin had reached an agreement for a ceasefire in Vietnam. Although the exact details of the deal were still in the works, a rough deal had been drawn up by the two leaders. Thurmond would halt the air campaign in the country side, which Kosygin felt was unfairly harming poor farmers, and the air drop in Hanoi would be called off in exchange for Kosygin pressuring his Vietnamese “peers”, as Kosygin referred to North Vietnamese President Ton Duc Thang, to allow American Marines to remain in Saigon and move into Hanoi while a plan for free, fair, and democratic elections were scheduled. In exchange for the cooperation in Vietnam, both the Soviet Union and the United States agreed to reduce the number of nuclear weapons produced over the next decade and work towards ending the arms race before 1990.

As the American Delegation loaded onto Air Force One in Edinburgh, political commentators at home were split over the deal. Analysts supportive of Labor and the Independent Democrats praised the deal, with Robert Stauss hailing it as “the best aversion to full-scale nuclear war”. Conservative leader Robert Taft was cautious to support the deal, telling Conservative Deputy leader Jerry Ford “The Soviets are very tricky. We’ve got to keep our eye on them before we jump on Thurmond’s wagon”. Conservative pundits and analysts like H.R. Haldeman cautiously applauded the negotiations, turning the phrase “trust but verify” into a household buzz word.

The only people not praising the Thurmond-Kosygin deal were the AIP MPs. Before the press conference in Edinburgh concluded, Environment and Agriculture Minister Barry Goldwater had phoned the other cabinet ministers still in the United States and organized a meeting to discuss the deal before Thurmond Defense Minister Curtis LeMay and Foreign Minister J. William Fulbright landed in Washington. Finance Minister John Connally, Interior Minister John Ben Shepperd, Health and Social Minister Orval Faubus, and Veterans Minister John Stennis met with Goldwater at his home in Virginia in the early morning hours of December 13. Goldwater was furious with Thurmond for negotiating with “those Commie bastards”, saying “We should be dropping the bomb on Moscow, not having tea with them in England!”

Connally was the most restrained of the ministers at the mini-Cabinet meeting, advising the ministers to wait until Thurmond got back and talk to the Prime Minister about their concerns. Connally reminded the group, rather pointedly, that Thurmond was the leader of the party and “everyone in this room agreed to be his deputy, to support him, and to work towards his goals”. Connally left the mini-Cabinet meeting as the sun was rising, leaving Goldwater and the other ministers to fume and simmer until Thurmond’s plane landed shortly after noon-time. Goldwater and the mini-cabinet were waiting for Thurmond on the tarmac.

After being berated for most the car ride to the Executive Residence, Thurmond dismissed the mini-Cabinet’s concerns. He was not turning red, Thurmond assured his ministers, the negotiations were all a part of the plan. There would be many more rounds of discussion, debate, and negotiation before any kind of arms deal was finalized. Thurmond told the concerned anti-Commies “That was the only the first step. If you’re going to kill a flower, you’ve got to get past the thorns”.

[Kingpoleon]

Connally, Ford, and the Independent Democrats ought to find enough votes between their respective caucuses/inner party allies to pass the deal.

[DKrol]

As Prime Minister Strom Thurmond was negotiating the deal to end the Cold War, negotiations were falling apart between Interior Minister John Ben Shepperd and the National Association of Letter Carriers.

In November of 1969, the contract for federal postal workers expired, leaving 200,000 unionized letter carriers without a guarantee for pay rate or conditions. Shepperd entered into negotiations with NALC President James Rademacher immediately, creating a stop-gap measure to keep postal workers on the job during the Christmas Season rush. The stop-gap deal expired on January 5, 1970, and Shepperd and Rademacher were miles apart on a new contract. The NALC, made up of members mostly from New York City, Philadelphia, and Washington, voted on January 12, after weeks of failed negotiations, to go on strike.

Thurmond ordered Shepperd to stop negotiations with Rademacher the minute he heard about the vote to strike, saying “We won’t waste our time talking to criminals” since it was illegal for federal employees to strike. Shepperd continued back-channel negotiations with the NALC against Thurmond’s orders once it became clear the devastating impact that the strike was having: The Dow-Jones fell from 4,667 on January 1 to 3,995 by January 14 and thousands of pieces of critical mail was left uncollected in post offices across the East Coast. Thurmond let the strike go on for three days, to see if the NALC was serious or “just playing chicken”, before taking action. On January 15, Thurmond placed a call to his old friend, New York State Police Superintendent John Barron.

Minutes after midnight on January 16, Thurmond issued Ministerial Directive 1005 - “Declaring a Nationwide State of Emergency”. Before the ink was dry on the directive, New York state police busted in doors and conducted a series of raids across New York City on the homes of post office management and other NALC-friendly labor leaders as other state police clashed with picketers in the streets. Under the details of the directive, police were authorized to “take any actions necessary to limit the spread of panic and propaganda”, leading many reporters to be harassed and their cameras destroyed when they attempted to cover the clashes and raids.

When the Commons convened later in the day, Thurmond came under heavy fire from all sides. Independent Democrat leader Julian Bond called the directive “a blatant abuse of power by this government that has not been seen in the history of democracy” and said that he would be traveling to New York “to stand with the abused postal workers”. Labor leader Richard Daley slammed the directive but called for cooler heads to prevail and urged “all parties to return to the negotiating table as equals”. Opposition Leader Robert Taft, who had developed a good personal relationship with Thurmond over the last year, was also critical of the directive’s anti-propaganda measures, saying “This nation was built on the freedom of the press. We cannot digress to the levels of King George and harass the press”. Thurmond remained defiant even in the face of such extreme opposition, saying “All I have done is within the powers of the Prime Minister and is for the good of our nation. The postal service must get back to work”.

In the short term, the directive had the opposite effect. As news of the police violence spread across the nation, more postal workers joined the strike, many just walking off the job in the middle of their shifts. By the end of the week, post offices in Chicago, Kansas City, Minneapolis, Denver, and San Francisco stood empty, with striking workers holding a picket line outside the doors. Some police chiefs, like Marc Belton of Denver, refused to follow the directive and arrest the picketers, choosing instead to cordon off an area around the picketers to “allow them to express their displeasure”.

As the strike carried on for several weeks, Thurmond’s strong arming approach fell apart. More and more police chiefs followed Belton’s approach as the strike spread to their cities and even John Barron, one of the fiercest police executives in the nation, started to tone-down the scale of operations in New York. While a few scabs were able to push through the picket lines, most post offices remained empty as the calendar turned to March. Thurmond and Finance Minister John Connally agreed to halt trading on the stock exchange as it neared a dangerous low of 2,500 as companies reported abysmal earnings, since bills could not be paid through the mail. Unrest was growing in the Commons, with some centrist AIP MPs begging Thurmond to open back up negotiations with the NALC. When Thurmond refused, reiterating that his government does not negotiate with criminals, Shepperd took matters into his own hands.

Shepperd met with the Executive Committee of the NALC, Labor leader Daley, and Opposition Leader Taft on March 4 in the basement of the old Senate Office Building on Constitution Ave. Shepperd believed that he could peel enough AIP MPs off of Thurmond’s whip to join with the Opposition to pass a new contract package with the postal workers. The negotiations went on for three hours before a deal was agreeable to all parties.

The next day, Daley introduced a bill in the Commons to end the strike, create a new contract for the postal workers, and get the postal service back to work. The bill called for a 25% increase in pay for postal workers who did not go on strike, a 10% increase for those who did go on strike, a guarantee that no striking employees would lose their jobs, and a Commons Committee to look into the privatization of the postal service. Thurmond told AIP MPs to vote against the bill but, in private, Deputy AIP leader George Wallace assured MPs that no negative actions would be taken if the whip was broken. Opposition Leader Taft made a motion to expedite debate on the bill and bring it to the floor for a vote the next day. The vote was almost a unanimous yes, as Thurmond figured it would be an easy way to kill the bill and get back to strong arming the strikers.

The final vote on the bill was greeted by a flurry of tensions. Shepperd was one of the first MPs to vote and then left the floor, retreating to his office to watch the votes come in in private. His actions could be considered treason by some in the AIP and, if it failed, he would certainly be sacked and sent to the backbenches. As the totals came in, Shepperd was taken aback. Thurmond had a change of heart once the vote began, changing the whip to Aye. The bill passed with 633 Aye, 7 Nay, and 10 MPs not voting.

At a press conference after the vote, as the news of the new deal spread across the nation, Thurmond told reporters “While I believe it is important to stand by your principles, when you’re the Prime Minister you’re not the only person you’re concerned with. The nation is your main concern and sometimes you have to put the good of the nation first. Interior Minister John Ben Shepperd showed this to me when he took it on his own accord to work towards a deal with the NALC leaders, even though it meant breaking the party whip and subverting my office”.

Shepperd slumped back in his desk chair, stunned as to how Thurmond could have known about the midnight negotiations.

[Kingpoleon]

Are Connally and Shepperd kind of the Tory-wing of the American Independents?

[DKrol]

Are Connally and Shepperd kind of the Tory-wing of the American Independents?

Yes. Stennis is too, to an extent. Since the Constitutional Crisis, Stennis has become much more fiscally minded rather than racist.

[Kingpoleon]

Are Connally and Shepperd kind of the Tory-wing of the American Independents?

Yes. Stennis is too, to an extent. Since the Constitutional Crisis, Stennis has become much more fiscally minded rather than racist.

OK. Are we going to see any new parties, maybe?

[DKrol]

Are Connally and Shepperd kind of the Tory-wing of the American Independents?

Yes. Stennis is too, to an extent. Since the Constitutional Crisis, Stennis has become much more fiscally minded rather than racist.

OK. Are we going to see any new parties, maybe?

I'll say this: By the turn of the century, AIP will not be the far-right party, the Conservatives will not be the center-right party, and Labor will not be the center-left party.

I've got to leave some suspense, don't I?

[Kingpoleon]

It's a yes-no question, but OK.

I'm probably an Independent Democrat/Tory swing voter ITTL. Gerald Ford seems to still be about like IRL, Connally seems less corrupt, and then the Independent Democrats seem pretty centrist. Is Ford very popular throughout Parliament ITTL, or has he alienated the Taft-Reagan wing?

[DKrol]

It's a yes-no question, but OK.

I'm probably an Independent Democrat/Tory swing voter ITTL. Gerald Ford seems to still be about like IRL, Connally seems less corrupt, and then the Independent Democrats seem pretty centrist. Is Ford very popular throughout Parliament ITTL, or has he alienated the Taft-Reagan wing?

Yes, there will be new parties.

Ford's pretty popular in Parliament. He's not really big on making waves or rocking the boat. He's a good deputy.

[VPH]

How did the Green Party start and who are some party leaders?

[Kingpoleon]

Peter Camejo is thirty in 1969 and Ralph Nader is thirty-five.Other than them, I expect maybe Frank Zeidler and William Henry Meyer might be some OTL elected officials who could join.

Sorry if none of that's relevant. Consider it speculation.

[DKrol]

How did the Green Party start and who are some party leaders?

Peter Camejo is thirty in 1969 and Ralph Nader is thirty-five.Other than them, I expect maybe Frank Zeidler and William Henry Meyer might be some OTL elected officials who could join.

Sorry if none of that's relevant. Consider it speculation.

Gaylord Nelson is the leader of the Green Party, founding it for the same reasons he was the main political driver behind Earth Day. Peter Camejo is the only "big name" Green MP, the rest are mainly from academia. Ralph Nader is a Green member of the Connecticut Legislature at this point in time.

[DKrol]

With the postal workers strike ended, Prime Minister Thurmond could return his attention to negotiating a landmark agreement with Soviet Premier Alexei Kosygin. Thurmond tapped Henry Kissinger, a major policy adviser to Republican politicians before the Constitutional Crisis, to lead the American delegation to Geneva, the city selected to host the first direct communications between American and Soviet diplomats in decades. Foreign Affairs minister Andrei Gromyko was selected to represent the Soviet Union at the table. Kissinger and Gromyko sat down for the first round of formal negotiations on April 3, 1970.

While Kissinger and Gromyko went back and forth in Switzerland, Thurmond and Defense Minister LeMay were struggling to develop an “in-between strategy” in Vietnam. Thurmond promised Kosygin that the air campaign in the middle of the country would be halted and he intend to follow through on that promise, as a show of good faith in the process. LeMay, who had masterminded a strategy capable of “beating the Commies in a matter of weeks”, was furious with Thurmond’s decision to throw off the plan. This anger boiled over during a Cabinet meeting on April 10, when LeMay slammed his notepad on the table and said “You asked me for a battle plan that would win the war. I spend weeks planning it, drawing it up, testing it out, and then you just throw it out over a cup of tea!” Thurmond shouted LeMay down, reminding him who was Prime Minister and who was “a shiny-chested MP”.

After the Cabinet meeting, an even angrier LeMay barged into Opposition Leader Robert Taft’s office and demanding a meeting with the Conservative leader. Taft sat down with LeMay over coffee and whiskey, as LeMay laid into Thurmond for everything from his leadership style to the brand of cologne the Prime Minister wore. Taft lent a sympathetic ear, telling LeMay that he himself was once an often neglected member of a Government. The two chatted for more than an hour and a half, with LeMay complaining about Thurmond and Taft boosting LeMay’s spirits. LeMay felt that he had found a real friend in Taft and the two agreed to sit down again in a week’s time.

At the next Cabinet meeting, LeMay kept quiet. Thurmond reported on Kissinger’s progress in Geneva, telling the Cabinet that a deal would be brought to the Government before the next cabinet meeting. The negotiations hinged on both nations agreeing to reduce their nuclear arm production in exchange for bringing democracy to Vietnam. Kissinger wanted to create a longer period of American occupation in Saigon and Hanoi before elections were held while Gromyko was pushing for a power-sharing agreement instead of elections. LeMay gave his update on the state of the war in Vietnam, saying only that the ceasefire appeared to be holding up.

After the meeting, LeMay went straight to Taft’s office. After several glasses of whiskey-spiked coffee, LeMay started to tell Taft about the current status of the negotiations, expressing his anger that Kissinger was “making all my work on the battle plan a waste”. Taft once again played the role of sympathetic side-kick, stoking LeMay’s ego and pouring the Jim Beam when his cup came up dry. The two talked, with LeMay letting Taft in on the Geneva Negotiations and Taft reminding LeMay that he was a brilliant general, for two hours before Taft called for a car and sent LeMay home.

On April 21, Kissinger and Gromyko announced that they had reached an agreement in Geneva. American Marines would be allowed to occupy Saigon and Hanoi until elections could be held, tentatively scheduled for June of 1972, and active combat in Vietnam would end. Both the Soviet Union and the United States would arm 25% fewer nuclear warheads in 1970, 50% fewer in 1972, and arm no new nuclear warheads in 1980. A second round of negotiations would be held in 1980 to ensure that both nations were following the commitment through and to discuss future nuclear arms reductions. The deal, codified as the Stopping the Unnecessary Growth of the Arms Race Treaty (SUGAR), was sent to the American House of Commons and the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union for ratification. A signing ceremony with Thurmond and Kosygin would be held later to officially signify “the thawing out of the Cold War”, as one columnist put it.

The Cabinet met every Friday in the McCormack Office Building, formerly known as the Old Executive Office Building. On April 24, LeMay arrived at the McCormack Building for that week’s Cabinet Meeting but he was barred at the gate to the building. Security officers said that LeMay’s credentials to entered the McCormack Building had been revoked by the Prime Minister. Furious and confused, LeMay ordered the security guard to phone Thurmond and demand an explanation. After a few minutes of hesitation the guard did as LeMay demanded, only to be told by a personal secretary of Thurmond’s that “Cabinet meetings are only for cabinet ministers”.

Later that afternoon, Thurmond announced he had held a Cabinet Reshuffle that afternoon. In the reshuffle, LeMay, Interior Minister John Ben Shepperd, Agriculture Minister Barry Goldwater, Sports, Media, and Culture Minister Spessard Holland, and Veterans Minister John Stennis were all sacked. When pressed why he felt such a switch was necessary, Thurmond told the press “every now and then a garden has to be pruned of the bad flowers”.

First Thurmond Government, April 1970
Prime Minister: The Rt. Hon. J. Strom Thurmond (AIP)
- Leader of the American Independence Party
Deputy Prime Minister: The Rt. Hon. George C. Wallace (AIP)
- Deputy Leader of the American Independence Party

Minister of Foreign Affairs: The Rt. Hon. J. William Fulbright (AIP)
Minister of Finance: The Rt. Hon. George C. Wallace (AIP)
Minister of Defense: The Rt. Hon. John B. Connally, Jr. (AIP)
Minister of Justice: The Rt. Hon. James O. Eastland (AIP)
Minister of Interior Affairs: The Rt. Hon. Orval E. Faubus (AIP)
Minister of Trade, Industry, and Business: The Rt. Hon. John Anderson, Jr. (AIP)
Minister of Labor and Employment: The Rt. Hon. Carl T. Hayden (AIP)
Minister of Health and Social Affairs: The Rt. Hon. John J. Sparkman (AIP)
Minister of Education: The Rt. Hon. John S. Wold (AIP)
Minister of Agriculture and the Environment: The Rt. Hon. Harry F. Byrd, Jr. (AIP)
Minister of Transportation: The Rt. Hon. Richard B. Russell, Jr. (AIP)
Minister of Infrastructure and Housing: The Rt. Hon. Lester G. Maddox, Sr. (AIP)
Minister of Veterans Affairs: The Rt. Hon. John L. McClellan (AIP.)
Minister of Native Affairs: The Rt. Hon. Paul J. Fannin (AIP)
Minister of Sports, Media, and Culture: The Rt. Hon. Harland D. Sanders (AIP)

Minister without Portfolio: The Rt. Hon. Ernest F. Hollings (AIP)

Leader of the Government in the House of Commons: The Rt. Hon. George C. Wallace
Chief Government Whip in the House of Commons: The Rt. Hon. Barratt O'Hara

[DKrol]

The Constitution of 1967 came out of riots, protests, and disobedience. Although a majority of those riots, protests, and disobedience had been quieted with the new constitution and the change in leadership, some carried on.

The most outspoken group after the Constitutional Crisis was the Weather Underground. The Chicago-based group advocated for the violent rejection of social norms and an embrace of socialism. For years, the Weather Underground limited its actions to throwing bricks in the windows of businesses and protesting major speeches by capitalist politicians. In 1970, the Weather Underground changed their game plan.

Speaker of the Commons Larry O’Brien scheduled the final vote on the SUGAR Treaty for June 1, 1970. The vote was supposed to commence shortly before noontime, allowing Prime Minister Strom Thurmond to make a tee-time with British Conservative Party leader Ted Heath and French President Georges Pompidou. Thurmond cast the first vote, a privilege that he instituted, and then left the floor. On his way out of the building, Thurmond stopped into the men’s restroom on the first floor. As he was washing his hands, Thurmond recalls there being “a loud boom, a shaking, and then everything fell apart”.

An investigation found that the Weather Underground had infiltrated the Commons and placed a bomb in the second floor men’s restroom with the intent of killing the Prime Minister. While they did not kill Thurmond, the Weather Underground were successful in inflecting several bruises, a large cut across the forehead, and a broken collarbone from the debris falling on top of Thurmond. Conservative Party Chairman Richard Nixon, who was attending the Commons to watch the vote on SUGAR, broke both his legs when he fell from the second floor to the first. Thurmond and Nixon were the only people injured in the attack.

The Weather Underground put out a statement taking responsibility for the Commons Bathroom Bombing. In the statement, they confirmed that Thurmond was their target because of his “continued abuse of the worker” during the postal workers’ strike. The statement explained that the vote on the SUGAR Treaty was chosen because “it [was] the single greatest example of the Thurmond Government”. Although the attack caused confusion on the floor and created disorder in the Commons, the SUGAR Treaty was passed 645 to 5.

In Prime Minister Thurmond’s statement after the attack, he only had once sentence. “I will not be scared by some angsty teenagers”.

[MyRescueKittehRocks]

Restore the Constitution of 1787

[DKrol]

The SUGAR Treaty was ratified by the Soviets a few months after it passed in the Commons, and the signing ceremony was held on January 5, 1971 in Edinburgh to commemorate the meeting that started the ball in motion. When Prime Minister Strom Thurmond returned to Washington, another foreign policy issue was placed on his agenda.

The global economy was very weak in the winter of 1971. Oil was selling at record-low prices while inflation was rising and wages were shrinking. The American stock market never fully recovered from the massive slide it took during the postal workers’ strike. When Finance Minister George Wallace released a recommendation that the United States stop tying the dollar to gold, the floor dropped out. Unemployment in the United States had sat at around 5.5% since the postal workers’ strike began in January. After Wallace’s announcement, it had rose to 6.3% in a two months’ span. Similar spikes were seen across the Americas, with especially large spikes in Canada, Mexico, and Nicaragua.

While the leaders of each nation attempted to counter the oncoming recession, Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau saw a greater solution. In April of 1971, Trudeau met with Mexican President Gustavo Diaz Ordaz in Montreal to seek a solution to the growing economic crisis. Trudeau also invited French President Georges Pompidou, because Trudeau was looking to Europe for the solution.

On April 21, 1971, Trudeau announced his intentions to form the North American Union, based on the European Economic Community. Trudeau argued that “bringing the great economies of the region together with the weaker economies will allow for a greater flow of capital, of people, and of resources that will result in greater economic prosperity for everyone”. President Diaz Ordaz echoed Trudeau’s message and declared his wholehearted support for building the NAU.

Trudeau and Diaz Ordaz then took to Washington to make the case for America to join. Thurmond and Wallace met with the pair, although both were skeptical. The Trudeau plan called for the essential removal of borders between NAU members, the creation of equal exchange rates between all currencies, and the implementation of uniform regulations across the national markets. Thurmond was not receptive to the idea of removing so much authority from the Commons and the Prime Minister and politely dismissed Trudeau and Diaz Ordaz. The two then paid a courtesy call to the Opposition, expecting to receive a similar response. Leader of the Opposition Robert Taft echoed many of the same concerns that Thurmond had had. It was Shadow Finance Minister George W. Romney who lent the first receptive ear.

As the former CEO of American Motors, Romney was supportive of business interests as an MP. He saw the NAU as the gateway to larger markets for businesses and lower costs for consumers. Romney gave his support to the NAU and fought for it at the next Shadow Cabinet meeting. Taft held a vote on the issue and found that a majority of the fiscally minded Shadow Cabinet agreed with Romney’s logic and supported the NAU. Taft held a press conference on December 5 and announced his support for the NAU Treaty.

Thurmond declared that the NAU was “bad for America” and declined to allow it on the floor of the Commons. While Trudeau feared that the NAU was dead, with Thurmond’s opposition, Taft and Romney found a second path. The Conservative Party Leader set out to gather enough signatures to put the NAU to a national referendum. He found an unexpected ally in the voice of disaffected AIP MPs, former Finance Minister John Connally.

[DKrol]

The fight for the NAU became the hot button issue for 1971. Candidates for local offices across the country became the central figures in the fight to get enough signatures to have the NAU on a nation-wide referendum.

Pro-NAU leaders like Shadow Finance minister George Romney and former Finance Minister John Connally traveled across the country, making the case that the NAU would be good for business, create jobs, and lower costs at the cash register. The main anti-NAU spokesman that emerged was AIP Deputy Leader, Deputy Prime Minister, and Finance Minister George Wallace. Wallace’s case against the NAU was built on the premise that it was a poor choice to remove important decision-making powers from the Commons and invest it in “the Canadian Parliament and the Mexican President”. Prime Minister Strom Thurmond was also a vocal voice for the “No” campaign but delegated most of the leadership responsibilities for that campaign to Wallace.

On July 6, the High Court announced that it had received a petition with more than 950,000 signatures, the minimum number required to place a referendum on the ballot. The Commons, one August 10, passed “The North American Union Referendum Act of 1971” giving the Prime Minister until December 31 to set a date for the referendum and sanctioning the formation of two campaign groups, a for and an against. Thurmond announced that the referendum would be held on December 12, in hopes that turnout would be low due to the holiday season and the short campaign season would lead voters to agree with the Prime Minister.

The Electoral Commission, a body established under the Mansfield Government to help set election guidelines and regulations during national campaigns, certified “Better Together” as the official pro-NAU group and “Stronger at Home” as the official anti-NAU group. Romney became the Chairman of Better Together, while Stronger at Home was led by New York Labor MP Robert F. Wagner, Jr. Polls at the outset found the race extremely close, with 37% of voters supporting Better Together, 35% supporting Stronger at Home, and 28% undecided.

As the campaign moved into the fall, Thurmond stepped up his involvement in the campaign. He appeared on the campaign trail to support Stronger at Home for the first time on October 3, speaking at a campaign rally in Charleston, South Carolina. Thurmond told the audience, made up of mostly white, middle-aged men, that “passing the [NAU Treaty] will bring a flood of immigrants into this country. Mexicans, Cubans – a whole lot of Hispanics. They’re going to come and take your jobs, make your homes unsafe, and put you out on the street. We need to defeat the NAU to keep good, hardworking Americans at work!” Thurmond’s incendiary rhetoric spread across the South, setting the NAU vote up to be divided along regional lines.

Romney sent Connally across the South to counter Thurmond’s message, trying to pull some moderate AIP voters to the Better Together side. Connally, speaking in the basement of a church in Arkansas, made a different pitch. He told the crowd “the Prime Minister wants you to be afraid. When people are afraid, they vote for people like Strom Thurmond. It was that way when he ran for President back in ’48. But I’m telling you the truth: there is nothing to be afraid of in the NAU. America will be the main decision maker in the NAU, I promise you. Our policies will not be dictated by Trudeau, Diaz Odraz, or even Fidel.” Connally went across the South, to AIP strongholds, and preached his message, both supporting the NAU and tearing down Thurmond as a racist fear-monger.

Polls found that the NAU campaign raised Connally’s approval ratings to 54% nationally, making him one of the most popular politicians in the country and leading several commentators to dub him “The Prime Minister-in-Waiting”.

[DKrol]

The NAU referendum battle came down to the wire. Better Together Chairman George Romney and Chief Spokesman John Connally crisscrossed the country up to the final hours of poll closings. Prime Minister Strom Thurmond became a much more vocal voice for the Stronger at Home campaign in the final weeks, speaking at events across the South, while campaign Chairman Robert F. Wagner, Jr. rallied Labor voters in the Northeast and Midwest. Polls taken the week before the vote was held gave Better Together a slight lead over Stronger at Home but within the margin of error.

NBC used the NAU referendum vote to showcase a new method of covering elections. A large electronic map was rolled out, with states lighting up based on how they voted. Green was used to represent yes votes, red for no votes. Although this plan worked well on color TV, it was a pain for the large portion of Americans who still owned black and white sets who strained to tell the difference between the two colors. NBC News President Reuven Frank, at a press conference the following day, announced that his network would continue to use the colored map for election coverage, saying “the rise of color TV sets is huge. NBC will be leading the changeover to color-based programming”.

At the end of the night, Better Together won out. The final vote totals were 40,131,722 “Yes” to 31,449,341 “No” for a total of 71,581,063 votes cast. Then began the process of Canadian, American, Mexican, Nicaraguan, Panamanian, and Hatian diplomats working out the details of the unprecedentedly large economic union. The 56%-44% victory was hailed by Conservative leaders as a sign of Prime Minister Strom Thurmond’s waning connection to the American electorate and began to call for a new election. Thurmond fought off the calls to dissolve Parliament, saying that his mandate was “just as strong as it was in October of ‘68”.

The mandate was certainly weakened, however, by a report published in the Washington Post on December 31, 1971. Intrepid reporters Carl Woodward and Bob Bernstein, citing an unidentified source, alleged that Thurmond had had several senior MPs and Cabinet Ministers followed and monitored their communications in an effort to hold a tight grip over his Government. The source also alleged that Thurmond had the Better Together campaign offices bugged.

Thurmond shrugged off the report as “a folly by two young journalists trying to make a splash in Washington”. But Woodward and Bernstein were undeterred and pledged to run a front-page expose in the coming weeks with greater details and named sources.

[DKrol]

Carl Woodward and Bob Bernstein kept their promise.

On January 10, 1972, the Washington Post ran a two-page piece, by Woodward and Bernstein, on “the greatest scandal in the history of this nation”. Citing a former FBI special agent, code-named “Fedora”, the report found that, allegedly, Prime Minister Strom Thurmond used federal government dollars to “have several senior MPs, including former Interior Minister John Ben Shepperd, followed and to have listening devices placed in several seemingly private locations in the House of Commons and other government offices”.

The report was supported by evidence from some of the MPs that it alleged were followed or recorded. Curtis LeMay, who was sacked as Defense Minister after holding several meetings with Opposition leader Robert Taft, said that he found a listening device inside of his watch, which was given to him by Thurmond after the party’s 1968 General Election victory. LeMay told Woodward and Bernstein that he always wears “that specific watch” and “almost certainly” had it on when he met in Taft’s office. He added, “Taft and I were the only people in the room. Even staff was kept out. I felt secure, private”.

Perhaps the most damning piece of evidence came from Better Together Deputy Communications Director Marlin Fitzwater, a Conservative Party operative. Fitzwater told Woodward and Bernstein that he had seen people “in official-looking vehicles” lurking outside of the Better Together headquarters in Baltimore and that the headquarters was broken into at one point “but we didn’t see anything taken. We assumed it was just some neighborhood kids who got rowdy.” Woodward and Bernstein were given unprecedented and unlimited access to the Better Together records and files. They found traces of graphite residue, which would not be noticed by a person not looking for it, on several strategy memos, indicative of the use of transfer paper. Using evidence from Fedora, they linked both the bugging of LeMay’s watch and break in at Better Together to Thurmond or, at the least, to the Government.

The Washington Post article was covered and re-published in newspapers across the country. As word spread, pressure was put on Thurmond to answer the questions that Woodward and Bernstein were raising. Thurmond, normally a very combative person, disappeared. He began using a rear entrance into the Commons and he stopped making appearances at the Government’s daily press briefings. At the first Prime Minister’s Questions after the second report was published, Thurmond was absent, leading Deputy Prime Minister George Wallace to say “The reports from Mr. Woodward and Mr. Bernstein are very concerning. I hope any investigation finds the answers to these alleged wrong doings”.

The following day, citing the “strange coincidence” of Thurmond’s absence, Opposition Leader Robert Taft submitted a bill in the Commons to establish a Commons Committee to look into Woodward and Bernstein’s allegations. With votes from AIP MPs alienated by Thurmond, the bill was able to pass with ease. His Majesty’s Committee in the House of Commons for Allegations of Official Misconduct in Government was established on February 12, 1972. Thurmond chose former Finance Minister John Connally, a strong critic of the Prime Minister, to lead the committee, hoping to prevent the committee from being called a rubber stamp.

Hot off his successful NAU campaign, chairing the Misconduct Committee only boosted Connally’s national profile.

[DKrol]

John Connally’s committee wasted no time in launching into its investigation.

The first witness called before the Committee was Henry Kissinger, a Conservative Party policy expert who led the American delegation to the negotiations in Geneva, who appeared to testify on February 20. Kissinger told the Committee that the Soviet conference rooms and hotel rooms in Geneva had had listening device placed in the telephones, on Prime Minister Strom Thurmond’s orders. According to Kissinger, the tapes from the recordings had been transcribed by an aid, the transcripts were faxed to Thurmond, and then both the tapes and the original transcripts were destroyed. He could provide no hard evidence, other than his own memory. The aid could not be contacted to testify. Kissinger also testified that Thurmond had told him that the British and French delegation at the Edinburgh Summit of 1969 had been listened in on, in order to "give us the upper hand" at the table, although Kissinger could also provide no hard evidence.

The next batch of testimony came on March 3, from former Interior Minister John Ben Shepperd. Shepperd admitted to breaking Thurmond’s orders to meet with National Association of Letter Carriers officials during the postal workers’ strike “but I did it in complete secrecy. It was after midnight, I drove myself. I wore a high-collar and a hat and we met in the basement. No one could have known I was there unless I was being followed”. Shepperd told the committee that he believed he was sacked by Thurmond for meeting with the NALC, something that Thurmond would only have known about “If he had me followed”. When pressed by pro-Thurmond AIP MPs, Shepperd softened his statement, saying “I guess it’s possible that someone just happened to see me, walking from my car to the door, but the fact that that person would get the information back to the Prime Minister – it’s too great of a coincide for me”.

The third testimony took a little longer to coordinate. Former Defense Minister Curtis LeMay was diagnosed with throat cancer in February of 1972, and his health took a dive. While Connally wanted to have LeMay testify sooner, allowing the committee’s report to coming out sooner, he recognized that LeMay’s health was more important and postponed the hearings. LeMay was cleared by his doctor to meet with the committee from his hospital bed at Walter Reed Army Hosptial. Only four MPs from the committee were allowed to meet with LeMay, on doctor’s orders, to reduce the stress of the event. Connally represented AIP, Donald Rumsfeld represented the Conservatives, John Lindsey represented Labor, and James Forman represented the Independent Democrats when the four met with LeMay on July 1.

LeMay, whose speech was limited due to his advancing throat cancer, showed the committee members the watch that Thurmond had given him after the 1968 victory and pointed out the listening device that was found inside the watch’s gears. When asked by Forman how the listening device was discovered, LeMay scribbled “Got mad. Threw it at a wall. It came out” on a small piece of paper. Lindsey questioned if it was really a listening device and not a just piece of the watch. LeMay gave both the watch and the device to Connally, instructing him to “take it to a jeweler. They’ll know”. The four committee members loaded in Forman’s AMC Gremlin and drove to the nearest jewelry store in Washington. The jeweler quickly confirmed that the piece was not “a normal part of a watch” but could not confirm that it was a listening device.

The Committee summoned former Intelligence Chief Richard M. Helms to look at the piece on July 12. Helms looked over the piece for an hour, looking at it with a magnify glass and cross-checking with Intelligence Department records. At the end of his testimony, Helms declared that the piece “Is certainly a device capable of listening, recording, and transmitting audio. The model is consistent with devices used by the American intelligence community in the early 1960s. The serial number has been removed, making it impossible to trace the origins on this specific device”.

Connally declared that the committee had heard “more than enough evidence” to deliver its report and officially ended the “investigatory period” of the committee on June 8, after hearing from Marlin Fitzwater, Bob Woodward, and Carl Bernstein about the break in at the Better Together headquarters. The committee released their report, titled “An Effort to Construct a Personality Cult: A Record of Abuse and Misconduct by the Government”, on October 1. The report tore in Prime Minister Thurmond, finding him personally responsible for the bugging of the Soviet delegation at the Geneva negotiations and the break in at Better Together headquarters and finding the he “more than likely” played a role in the bugging of LeMay’s watch and the following of Shepperd. The report also declared the 1970 Cabinet Reshuffle was “founded in an effort to build a cult of personality around [Prime Minister Thurmond] and give [Prime Minister Thurmond] a rubber-stamp in his cabinet and an iron grip over the government”. The official recommendation from the committee was direct.

“We recommend a motion of no confidence against the Thurmond government to be followed by a General Election to seat new MPs”.

[LLR]

I like this version of Watergate

[DKrol]

I like this version of Watergate

Thank you!

I'm actually still trying to come up with a good Watergate-esque name for it. Any suggestions are welcome.

[DKrol]

I've been informed by some readers that the amount I put into each post (i.e. multiple paragraphs) turn off readers. Is this a thought shared by many? If so, I will work to reduce the amount of content in each post.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

I've been informed by some readers that the amount I put into each post (i.e. multiple paragraphs) turn off readers. Is this a thought shared by many? If so, I will work to reduce the amount of content in each post.

A. Yes, it turns off readers, including the lazy, such as myself. Nevertheless, the other day, I took the time to skim through this, fascinating and fun stuff.
B. If you decide to shorten your posts simply to gain viewership,
          i.  It may not work.
          ii. You may produce a less satisfying story. I admit my own timeline may be a bit "too detailed", but it produces a story I'm proud of, and in the ideal world, it would be even more specific. The potential complexities of administrations, world events, and politics produces far too much that ought to be accounted for.

While your TL's certainly unorthodox (Thurmond!?) it's striking me as pretty good. Keep it up!