Collaborative Presidential Elections - New

[Kitteh]

1896
Cleveland entered office extremely popular, but the economic devastation caused by the Panic of 1893 quickly made him deeply unpopular. The Democratic party was closely divided in 1896 between supporters of the gold standard and advocates of free silver. William Jennings Bryan was the leader of the silver faction, however silver delegates decided to support Vice President Horace Boies for the nomination as he would have more appeal to Cleveland supporters (it was also rumored that Bryan did not want to contest an election the Democrats seemed sure to lose). President Cleveland, who had previously declared that he would not be a candidate for reelection, decided to stand as an independent Gold Democrat in opposition to the pro-silver Democratic ticket. Cleveland knew he would not be reelected but hoped to deny either side a majority in the electoral college to force the election into the House where gold democrats could forge a deal with either side. William McKinley easily won the Republican nomination. The unpopularity of the Cleveland administration and a highly effective campaign ensured that McKinley easily won the election.

Governor William McKinley (R-OH)/Governor Levi P. Morton (R-NY) 207 electoral votes, 48.7% of the popular vote
Vice President Horace Boies (D-IA)/Congressman Richard P. Bland (D-MO) 166 electoral votes, 40.6% of the popular vote
President Grover Cleveland (ND-NY)/Senator William Freeman Vilas (ND-WI) 11 electoral votes, 11.8% of the popular vote

[Kitteh]

1916
The beginning of World War I in Europe lead to great division in the United States congress. The Socialist Labor party was strongly opposed to any American intervention in Europe, as was President Clark and the majority of the Democratic party. Republicans, however, supported increasing American military strength in preparation for eventual war, and many even called for active intervention on the side of the UK and France. At the 1916 Republican convention, the pro-war faction took control of the party and nominated General Leonard Wood for president and senator Henry Cabot Lodge for vice president. The Republican platform called for American entry into WWI while taking a relatively progressive stance on economic issues, calling for the introduction of an income tax and the federal reserve.

Incumbent vice president William Smith opposed entry into the war, and he and a number of other anti-war Republicans founded the "National Republican" party. Hoping to pick up support, the Democrats joined with the National Republicans and nominated President Clark and Vice President Smith for reelection. The Democratic platform was anti-war and opposed the Federal Reserve. Angry at the economic conservatism of the Democratic platform, former nominee William Jennings Bryan left the party to run on the Prohibition ticket, and selected representative Charles Randall of California as his running mate. Bryan campaigned on a platform of economic populism, restriction of immigration, pacifism and prohibitionism.

The Socialist Labor party had built up a strong base in the Western states since it's 1912 defeat and had managed to pass laws instating instant runoff voting in many states it controlled, but these states had few electoral votes. The party was the most strongly opposed to war of any of the parties. The party nominated famous author Upton Sinclair, who had been elected to congress in 1914, for president and Congressman Victor Berger for vice president.

The election was extremely close. The pro-war Republicans were strong among WASP voters in the Northeast, but very weak elsewhere. The Socialist Labor party picked up the overwhelming support of German, Irish and other immigrant voters, as well as their traditional base of organized labor and western populists. Bryan played to stereotypes of ethnic Socialist Labor supporters as heavy drinkers, attacked Sinclair's opposition to segregation and prohibition, and had campaign surrogates spread anti-semitic propaganda against Berger. These tactics attracted many poor Southern protestants who had previously supported Socialist Labor, in addition to populist Democrats. The Democrats picked up the support of some former Republicans but were hurt by the defection of much of their base to Sinclair or Bryan.

In the end, Sinclair managed to win a plurality of the popular vote and eek out a narrow majority in the electoral college due to the division of the other parties.

Congressman Upton Sinclair (SL-NJ)/Congressman Victor Berger (SL-WI) 273 EVs, 32.1% of the popular vote
President Champ Clark (D-MO)/Vice President William Smith (NR-MI) 137 EVs, 27.6% of the popular vote
General Leonard Wood (R-NH)/Senator Henry Cabot Lodge (R-MA) 65 EVs, 25.4% of the popular vote
Former Congressman William Jennings Bryan (PH-NE)/Congressman Charles Randall (PH-CA) 56 EVs, 13.9% of the popular vote
Others 1%
*Results indicate first preferences in states with IRV, Socialist Labor won the 2PP vote in all such states.

However, once again, the Socialist Labor lacked a majority in Congress. With the support of the congressman from the Prohibition party, who supported most of the Socialist Labor economic platform, they could count on a majority in the House, but they were far short of a majority in the Senate.

Composition of congress (I'm adding this because with the multi-party direction this TL seems to be heading its going to be more important):

House:
164 Socialist Labor
100 Democratic
93 Republican
65 Prohibition
14 National Republican

Senate:
33 Socialist Labor
26 Republican
26 Democratic
10 National Republican
5 Prohibition

[Kitteh]

1928
The two-party system in the United States had long considered dead for some time now, but the rise of a number of small parties in the 1924 election final convinced everyone that the current first-past-the-post system was unsustainable. In 1925 the 19th Amendment was passed, which set up a system of instant runoff voting for all house and senate elections, and a two-round runoff system for president (in this timeline there was no national prohibition amendment so our 19th amendment was the 18th and so forth). In order to satisfy the smaller states, the electoral college was preserved, with the top two candidates in terms of EVs advancing to the second round.

The 1928 election featured a more heavy emphasis on foreign policy than any other election since WWI. Europe had been devastated by WWI, and this had lead to the rise of radical movements across the continent. Russia had gotten out of the war early due to the 1917 revolution. Because of this the new Soviet Union was recovering faster than the rest of Europe, and many working-class Europeans looked to the Communist state as a model to emulate. Communist movements took power in Hungary and subsequently in Romania following the Hungarian-Romanian war, and worker's strikes and riots had already broken out in the United Kingdom and France, which were just barely suppressed. A civil war between forces supporting the Kaiser and Communist revolutionaries had begun in Germany in 1921, but after a long struggle the Monarchist forces triumphed in 1926. The victorious conservative forces were convinced that democracy was inherently unstable, and in the aftermath of the war media baron Alfred Hugenberg and his Deutschnationale Volkspartei, (DNVP) established an authoritarian regime with the support of the Kaiser. Meanwhile, Benito Mussolini had taken power in Italy as the head of a fascist movement, and the Mussolini and Hugenberg governments formed a close alliance to fight against Communism.

The ripple effects of these events were felt in the United States. Many on the left wing of the Socialist Labor party supported the Communist movements of Europe. The majority of the party was ambivalent to the Communists and opposed entangling the United States in European affairs. During the German Civil War some Socialist Labor party members (especially German-Americans, who were a strong constituency for the party, proposed financially supporting the Communist side, but this idea was strongly opposed by the other parties and shot down by the Socialist Labor leadership. President Berger was personally sympathetic to the concerns of the left, especially given his Austrian Jewish heritage, but he remained silent on the issue, preferring instead a policy of containing fascism in Europe diplomatically through the League of Nations, while remaining neutral, although friendly towards the Communist states of Europe. This left the United States without any clear allies, as the governments of the UK and France were still angry at the Americans for not intervening in WWI, and without much international support Berger's valued League of Nations quickly became little more than a joke.

In the 1928 election, the Socialist Labor party renominated President Berger and Vice President Roosevelt. They campaigned on the strength of the economy, while largely avoiding foreign policy and downplaying the divisive anti-segregation and anti-prohibition stances in their platform.

The Democratic party nominated Governor and former candidate Al Smith for President and Senator Cordell Hull of Tennessee for Vice President. In response to the nomination of an anti-segregation and anti-prohibition ticket for the third time, many Southern conservatives walked out of the Democratic convention and joined the Christians of America party (which in response renamed itself for the third time as the Christian Alliance). Many commentators noted the increasingly similarity of the Democratic and Socialist Labor platforms, which at this point only differed slightly on economic issues where the Democrats were somewhat more moderate.

On the Republican side, Calvin Coolidge finally got his chance to be nominated for president, and chose former Illinois governor Frank Lowden as his running mate. Coolidge campaigned on  a platform of lower taxes, smaller government, and an isolationist foreign policy.

The newly renamed Christian Alliance once again nominated popular evangelist Bill Sunday for President, along with former Democratic senator James Reed of Missouri for Vice President. The Christian party had managed to spread it's message widely through the sermons of a number of evangelists, including Sunday and the newly rising Charles Coughlin. The Sunday campaign's rallies attracted hundreds of thousands of attendees, far more than any other candidate's. The Christian Alliance platform strongly opposed the "Godless Communism" in Europe and supported the regimes of Hugenberg and Mussolini. Sunday attacked the Socialist Labor Party as Communist sympathizers, and launched anti-Catholic and anti-Semitic attacks against Smith and Berger, respectively. The Christian Alliance party was also opposed to the capitalist platform of the Republican party, however, which they blamed for fueling Communism.

This election was also the first in which the Communist party was a significant force. The Communists nominated William Foster for President and Earl Browder for Vice President, and picked up significant support from radical workers and left-wing Socialist Labor supporters, attacking the government for being insufficiently committed to socialism and allowing the victory of the Right in the German Civil War.

First Round results:

President Victor L. Berger (SL-WI)/Vice President Franklin D. Roosevelt (SL-NY) 194 EVs, 32.1% of the popular vote
Pastor Billy Sunday (CA-IA)/Senator James Reed (CA-MO) 121 EVs, 25.3% of the popular vote
Fmr Governor Calvin Coolidge (R-MA)/Fmr Governor Frank Lowden (R-IL) 121 EVs, 23.2% of the popular vote
Fmr Governor Al Smith (D-NY)/Senator Cordell Hull (D-TN) 55 EVs, 15.5% of the popular vote
William Foster (C-MA)/Earl Browder (C-NY) 0 EVs, 3.9% of the popular vote

President Berger came out on top in the first round, and went into a runoff against Sunday. The Democrats and Communists endorsed Berger in the second round, while the Republicans remained neutral.

Second Round:

President Victor L. Berger (SL-WI)/Vice President Franklin D. Roosevelt (SL-NY) 334 EVs, 56.3% of the popular vote
Pastor Billy Sunday (CA-IA)/Senator James Reed (CA-MO) 197 EVs, 44.7% of the popular vote

House:
172 Socialist Labor
109 Christian Alliance
71 Republicans
45 Democrats
3 Communists
15 Others

Senate:
34 Socialist Labor
21 Republicans
20 Christian Alliance
13 Democrats

11 others

[Kitteh]

1936
After 1936, it was clear to most that Socialist Labor had become the dominant party of America. Socialist Labor had won four consecutive elections and they still held a majority in Congress counting their close allies the Democrats (who by this point were pretty clearly a junior partner of the Socialists rather than a fully independent political party). The Socialist Labor party had passed through a number of wide-ranging reforms that had turned the United States into comprehensive welfare state with universal national healthcare, old age pensions, unemployment benefits, and a strong public school and university system, and the American National Bank, all of which were the envy of the world. In a country deeply divided along racial, religious, and regional lines, Socialist Labor was the only party that enjoyed broad national support. Some commentators even predicted that Socialist Labor would lead the country for the rest of the 20th century.

However, a number of events would come together to bring down the Socialist Labor government. The first was the outbreak of the Spanish civil war in 1933. Roosevelt was highly opposed to letting another nation in Europe fall to Fascism, and his administration decided to intervene heavily on the Republican side. The United States sent money and military advisers to Spain, used the United States navy to blockade Nationalist-controlled ports to block German and Italian aid, and supplied the Republican government with hundreds of tanks and airplanes.  The intervention was extremely controversial, and in the 1934 midterm elections Socialist Labor and their allies narrowly lost their majority in Congress.

The Republican side triumphed with American support in 1935. Unfortunately, the new Republican government was very unstable, and only a few months after the war another war broke out between moderate Republicans and radical Communists supported by the USSR. Due to the heavy intervention of the Soviet union, the Communists triumphed, and by 1936 Spain was under the control of an authoritarian, Soviet-aligned Communist government. This was seen as a major embarrassment to Roosevelt, and turned Americans strongly against the war.

The worst was yet to come for the government, however. The war had been a major boost for American manufacturing, but the end of the war led to the closure of many factories that had been producing military equipment. Combined with a slowing economy in Western Europe and contractionary monetary policy by the National Bank (which restricted the money supply because it believed that inflation was a major threat), the United States economy collapsed. The Roosevelt administration wanted to respond with major public works programs to fight unemployment, but they were opposed in Congress by the Republicans (who preferred a laissez-faire approach) and the Christian Alliance (who supported the idea in theory but didn't want to do anything that might help the Roosevelt administration just before an election), and none of President Roosevelt's major initiatives were able to pass Congress. The economy only got worse without any intervention from the government.

By the time the 1936 Socialist Labor convention rolled around, President Roosevelt was deeply unpopular, with an approval rating in the 20s according to opinion polls (a new invention). Nevertheless, he was nominated for reelection along with Vice President Perkins with no significant opposition from his own party. The Democrats also declined to nominate their own candidate and instead supported the Roosevelt-Perkins ticket.

The Christian Alliance party was benefiting strongly from the collapse of Socialist Labor. However, the popularity of its longtime leader Billy Sunday was fading, as his style of massive public preaching was being replaced by new radio-based preachers such as Father Charles Coughlin. Coughlin was widely expected to challenge Sunday for the nomination, however he surprisingly decided not to run and instead endorsed Governor Huey Long of Louisiana, a former Socialist Labor member who had defected to the Alliance after the federal intervention against the KKK int he south. Long faced a tough battle against the deeply entrenched Sunday, however his charismatic speech on the convention floor sealed the nomination. Long chose Gerald L. K. Smith as his running mate, and ran on an extremely populist platform calling for massive wealth redistribution and public spending to fight unemployment, which appealed to many working class former Socialist Labor supporters. The Christian Alliance also strongly opposed Communism in Europe, supported the Hugenberg and Mussolini governments, called for high tariffs and restriction of immigration, and warned of the influence of the "International Jewish Conspiracy."

The Republican party nominated New Hampshire Governor Henry Styles Bridges for president and Kansas Governor Alf Landon for vice president. The Republicans had seen a rise in support among the nation's growing middle class and they were strong contenders for the presidency. Bridges and Landon campaigned on a platform calling for cutting back the size of government, reducing taxes, and abolishing the National Bank. The Republicans also called for high tariffs to protect American manufacturing.

Also running was Congressman Norman Thomas of New York, a former left-wing Socialist Labor representative who had switched to the Communist party. Thomas ran to the left of Roosevelt, saying that the president had no interest in true wealth redistribution and was too unsupportive of the Soviet Union. Thomas chose famous activist Helen Keller as his running mate and picked up the support of many former Socialist Labor supporters.

The first round of the election was extremely close. President Roosevelt ran an extremely vigorous campaign defending his record and attacking the opposition parties for blocking all efforts to help the economy in Congress. But with voter fatigue after 20 years of Socialist Labor rule, the economic depression, the defection of many of his supporters and terrible approval ratings he failed to make it into the second round.

Governor Henry Styles Bridges (R-NH) 237 EVs, 30.9% of the popular vote
Governor Huey Long (CA-LA)/Mr Gerald L.K. Smith (CA-MO) 231 EVs, 31.1% of the popular vote
President Franklin D. Roosevelt (SL-NY)/Vice President Frances Perkins (SL-NY) 63 EVs, 27.6% of the popular vote
Congressman Norman Thomas (C-NY)/Ms Helen Keller (C-CT) 0 EVs, 10.4% of the popular vote

(It is speculated that had he not run, most of Thomas's support would have gone for Roosevelt, putting him in the second round)

The second round was extremely close. A number of Socialist Labor supporters found Long's economic views appealing, but Long's antisemitism and Protestant nativism was deeply unpopular among the Socialist Labor base of Catholics, "ethnic" whites, and Jews. President Roosevelt did not endorse either candidate in the 2nd round, and Thomas called for his supporters to sit the 2nd round out. There were large protests against both candidates, with hundreds of thousands of leftists taking to the streets in New York, Chicago, Boston, and Milwaukee, among other places.

The second round was extremely close and the outcome was not known for days following the election:

Governor Henry Styles Bridges (R-NH)/Governor Alf Landon (R-KS) 281 EVs, 50.7% of the popular vote
Governor Huey Long (CA-LA)/Mr Gerald L.K. Smith (CA-MO) 250 EVs, 49.3% of the popular vote

Congress was similarly divided:

House
147 Republicans
140 Christian Alliance
81 Socialist Labor
27 Democrats
18 Communists
11 Others

Senate:
32 Christian Alliance
31 Republicans
25 Socialist Labor
6 Democrats
4 Communists
2 Others

The Republicans and the Christian Alliance combined could get a majority, but they disagreed on almost every issue except tariffs and immigration restrictions. Socialist Labor and the Christian Alliance also theoretically agreed on some economic issues, but President Bridges was strongly opposed to any deficit spending and the Republicans had just enough votes in the House to block a veto override. Commentators predicted lots of fighting in the next government.

[Kitteh]

Also, I really like how this timeline is going. Good job everyone!

[Kitteh]

1952
President Patton was the first president in fifty years to successfully implement conservative economic policies. Patton decided to avoid any drastic changes to Socialist Labor's welfare programs, which remained popular, and focused on moderately trimming government spending, eliminating some wealth taxes that Socialist Labor had implemented during the war, somewhat curtailing the rights of unions, and paying down some of the wartime debt. A significant foreign policy challenge came just months after Patton took office when the Chinese and North Korean governments invaded South Korea, but Patton responded swiftly by sending US troops to aid the South (which was supported by all major parties except the Communists). By 1952, US troops had successfully repelled the attack, and the war had settled into a stalemate. The majority of Americans approved of Patton's domestic and foreign policies, and he was widely viewed as a capable, moderate leader.

Many on the right-wing were not satisfied by Patton, however, as they saw him as too moderate and conciliatory towards the left at home and the USSR abroad. In 1952, he faced a primary challenge from General Douglas MacArthur, who Patton had removed from command in Korea for insubordination in 1951. Patton had the support of the overwhelming majority of the Christian Alliance establishment and easily defeated MacArthur at the Christian Alliance convention.

However, MacArthur was not going to stand for defeat. MacArthur and a small number of conservative delegates walked out of the Christian Alliance convention and founded a new political party, the American Party, with the support of some right-wing Republicans. MacArthur chose Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy (who defected from the Republican party) as his running mate. MacArthur and McCarthy ran on a platform that called for expanding the North Korean war to include overthrow of the Communist Chinese government, using nuclear weapons against China, enacting strong anti-union laws, fighting against perceived Communists domestically, and strongly supporting segregation in the South.

The Socialist Labor party nominated their 1948 vice-presidential candidate, California governor Earl Warren, for president, and Idaho senator Glen H. Taylor for vice-president. They campaigned on a traditional Socialist Labor platform, promising to reinstate wealth taxes and support unions. For the first time, the party did not attempt to downplay the anti-segregation planks of their platform, with Governor Warren and Senator Taylor making impassioned appeals for civil rights for blacks on the convention floor.

The Republicans nominated senator John J. Williams of Delaware for president, who was very popular nationwide for his anti-corruption efforts. Williams picked noted conservative Robert Taft as his running mate in an attempt to secure right-wing support. The Republican platform supported major tax and spending cuts and a non-interventionist foreign policy.

The Communist party was still a significant force in this election. While they were strongly opposed by the majority of Americans, they picked up the support of some left-wing Socialist Labor supporters who opposed the Korean War. The Communists nominated a historic ticket of Paul Robeson for president and Virginia Foster Durr for vice president, marking the first major black candidate for president as well as the first ticket where no candidate was a white man.

The outcome of the presidential campaign was never in doubt; President Patton's strong approval ratings guaranteed he would be reelected. Warren ran a passionate campaign nonetheless, while "Whispering Willie" was uncharismatic and failed to gain much traction. All the parties attacked MacArthur as a dangerous radical.

First Round:

President George S. Patton (CA-CA)/Vice President Richard Russell Jr. (CA-GA) 306 EVs, 33.4% of the popular vote
Governor Earl Warren (SL-CA)/Senator Glen H. Taylor (SL-ID) 140 EVs, 24.3% of the popular vote
Senator John J. Williams (R-DE)/Senator Robert Taft (R-OH) 48 EVs, 15.5% of the popular vote
General Douglas MacArthur (AM-VA)/Senator Joseph McCarthy (AM-WI) 37 EVs, 16.3% of the popular vote
Paul Robeson (C-NY)/Virginia Foster Durr (C-AL) 0 EVs, 9.5% of the popular vote

Despite a spirited effort by Socialist Labor, the second round was the largest landslide since the introduction of the runoff system.

President George S. Patton (CA-CA)/Vice President Richard Russell Jr. (CA-GA) 471 EVs, 61.0% of the popular vote
Governor Earl Warren (SL-CA)/Senator Glen H. Taylor (SL-ID) 60 EVs, 39.0% of the popular vote

House
Christian Alliance 279
Socialist Labor 105
Republican 99
American 31
Communist 3
Other 13

Senate:
Christian Alliance 48
Socialist Labor 25
Republican 21
American 4
Other 2

The Christian Alliance held a massive majority in the House and a near-majority in the senate. Notably, Senator Joseph McCarthy was defeated by a Socialist Labor candidate.

[Kitteh]

This is an alternate history, I highly doubt Elizabeth Perkins would've been anywhere near president.

Alternate history does not mean you can change the personalities of people completely. I felt like the last post was somewhat biased towards your views, and not the circumstances of the timeline.

Yeah, I agree with this. The point of these things is to come up with possible ways history could have gone differently, not to totally twist things far away from plausibility.

[Kitteh]

1968
The Goldwater presidency was dominated by conflict. Goldwater, a strong believer in states' rights, refused to push any federal civil rights legislation. This volatile situation in the South continued to devolve, and mostly peaceful protests gave way to large scale race riots that required the President to call in the national guard.

On foreign policy, President Goldwater decided soon after taking office to send American troops to Vietnam, something that former President Taft had opposed. This was escalated in 1966 to a full declaration of war on North Vietnam. American troops had pushed quickly into North Vietnamese territory, closing about half the ground to Hanoi, however Communist guerrilla attacks from Laos and Cambodia had forced the Americans to abandon their offensive and refocus on defending the South. The war was fiercely opposed by many Americans, especially young people, and there were mass student protests on campuses across the US.

But it was in 1967 that all hell finally broke loose. After years of negotiating, President Goldwater had finally gotten Republicans in Congress to support his Right to Work act. Immediately after the act had been introduced in Congress, a group of longshoremen in Seattle went on strike to protest. The Socialist Labor party and their union allies were strongly opposed to the bill, but they also made the tactical decision to oppose the strike for fear of being associated with radical protest movements. The longshoremen continued to strike, and they were quickly joined by workers across the country, so that within a few days a wildcat general strike had broken out across the country. The strikers were joined by students, Mexican-American farmworkers, and African-Americans. Tens of millions of people took to the streets across America, and the strike brought the country to a halt. Police forces responded angrily, and on Monday, April 11th, 1967 (a date that would go down in infamy as "Red Monday") President Goldwater called in the national guard to break the strike. The protesters responded violently and riots broke out across the country. By the time the riots were quelled a week later, over 100 police and protesters had died. The majority of the American public supported Goldwater's response. The events solidified his falling approval ratings, and the Right to Work Act passed. The events had been devastating to Socialist Labor and their mainstream union allies, as their response to the strike and support for action against the rioters had lost them the confidence of their base.

In 1968, President Goldwater and Vice President Judd were easily renominated by the GOP. Goldwater's only opposition came from Ohio Senator Robert Taft Jr., who criticized Goldwater for abandoning his father's non-interventionist foreign policy. Goldwater campaigned as a strong leader and the only person who could keep the country together. The Republican platform had a moderate position on civil rights, supporting efforts to enact civil rights at the state level but also opposing federal legislation on states' rights grounds.

Taft found little support in the Republican primaries, but he was determined to carry on his father's legacy. Taft left the GOP to found the Libertarian party, and chose economist Murray Rothbard as his running mate.

Socialist Labor was extremely divided heading into the elections. An early favorite for the nomination was former Attorney General Robert Kennedy, who was well known nationwide and was popular among African-Americans and others groups who had been drifting away from Socialist Labor for his civil rights advocacy. However, Kennedy was assassinated early into the campaign, leaving Socialist Labor without a clear leader. The Socialist Labor convention in Chicago was deadlocked, until Mayor Richard Daley stepped in behind Ohio Senator Frank J Lausche as a compromise candidate. Lausche won the nomination and selected former ambassador and head of the Peace Corps Sargent Shriver as his running mate. The Socialist Labor called for civil rights and anti-poverty measures as a way to end the division in the country while opposing the radical protest movements. There were massive protests outside the convention by many left-wingers who felt that the party was selling out its principles. A number of prominent members of the Socialist Labor left, including Eugene McCarthy and George McGovern, walked out of the convention to join the Communists.

Actor John Wayne won the Christian Alliance nomination for president and chose Governor George Wallace as his running mate. The Christian Alliance was at this point almost exclusively a Southern party and had lost most of their support to the Republicans. Wayne ran a campaign strongly opposed to civil rights, and hoped to put pressure on Goldwater to keep him from moving too far to the center.

The Communist party had been gaining strength rapidly among African-Americans, students, and workers who supported the 1967 strike. Activist Martin Luther King Jr. was widely expected to run again as the Communist candidate, however after he was assassinated the Communists turned to his wife, Coretta Scott King, as their candidate. King's running mate was Glen H. Taylor, the Socialist Labor vice presidential candidate in 1952. King had been defeated for reelection as Idaho senator in 1952, however in 1954 he ran for Congress in the district in suburban Maryland where he lived while Senator and won. Taylor was now one of the most senior and respected members of the House, and a leading figure in the left-wing of the Socialist Labor party before he joined the Communist party in 1967 after the Socialist Labor response to Red Monday. The Communists aligned themselves with the protest movements across the country, supported civil rights, radical anti-poverty legislation, and an end to the war in Vietnam. In a first for a major political party, the Communists added a platform plank supporting legalized abortion (which was opposed by Socialist Labor and fiercely opposed by the Christian Alliance, while President Goldwater supported it in theory but felt it should be left up to the states). The Communists also officially broke with Moscow and took an independent position in this election.

A number of radical left groups, who opposed the Communist Party's emphasis on electoral politics, nominated Huey P. Newton for president and Bernardine Dohrn for vice president under the Socialist Freedom party banner. The Socialist Freedom party viewed electoral politics as futile and sought to build a revolutionary far-left coalition.

First Round:

President Barry Goldwater (R-AZ)/Vice President Walter Judd (R-MN) 397 EVs, 33.3% of the popular vote
Ms Coretta Scott King (C-AL)/Congressman Glen H. Taylor (C-MD) 48 EVs, 21.1% of the popular vote
Mr John Wayne (CA-CA)/Governor George Wallace (CA-AL) 47 EVs, 18.6 % of the popular vote
Senator Frank J. Lausche (SL-OH)/Mr Sargent Shriver (SL-MA) 46 EVs, 22.2% of the popular vote
Senator Robert Taft Jr. (L-OH)/Mr Murray Rothbard (L-NY) 0 EVs, 4.0% of the popular vote
Mr Huey P. Newton (SF-CA)/Ms Bernardine Dohrn (SF-IL) 0 EVs, 0.8% of the popular vote

President Goldwater came out first by far in the first round, but his opponent in the second round was not known for a number of days. In the end, despite receiving the second-most votes, the Socialist Labor party finished fourth in the electoral college, and Coretta Scott King went into the runoff against Goldwater, by far the best result ever for a Communist candidate in the US.

The President won an overwhelming reelection victory over the Communist party, the largest victory since the passage of the 19th Amendment.

President Barry Goldwater (R-AZ)/Vice President Walter Judd (R-MN) 460 EVs, 61.4% of the popular vote
Ms Coretta Scott King (C-AL)/Congressman Glen H. Taylor (C-MD) 78 EVs, 38.6% of the popular vote

[Kitteh]

Robert Kennedy was assassinated in 1968 in this timeline. See my last post.

[Kitteh]

Hey, I like your contribution. Just in the future if you change where it says color=yellow to color=gold it makes it a little easier to read (personally I can't read anything in yellow without highlighting it). Also, if you want to make a fifth candidate show up on the electoral map (instead of just toss up grey) you can do this:
Take: &AK=0;3;3
and make it: &AK=5;3;3

If you do that with your map, for example, it gives you this:

You can only do that for up to 5 candidates, though. Anything above 4 shows up as brown, so a 5 and 6 would look the same.

The format that the atlas uses for these maps is [State]=[Candidate who won];[Electoral Votes];[Percentage that candidate got in state]

So you can change it in a lot of fun ways, like showing Wyoming with 100 EVs:

Or removing Wyoming altogether:

These can all be cool to use in alt history scenarios, although in this one we seem to be assuming that all the states had the population they historically did and that they all joined the union at the time they did.

Was the 22nd amendment passed in this timeline?

Not so far, so any President could seek a third term if they wanted .

Also, we seem to be operating under the assumption that you do not have to be a native born citizen (that would have disqualified President Berger).

[Kitteh]

Unfortunately it seems like the previous TL is dead. It had a great run, though.

I'll start a new one:

1864:
Abraham Lincoln went into the 1864 election with a fairly strong record, as the war looked more and more like a Union victory. However, he was faced with opposition on both sides as his administration broke apart. Radical Republicans were angry at Lincoln's slowness to end slavery and demanded harsh treatment of the South in the case of the likely Union victory. The Radical Republicans nominated Senator Charles Sumner for President and Senator John P. Hale under the banner of the Liberty Party. Meanwhile, the Democrats won the support of many moderates when they abandoned their anti-war stance in favor of a platform emphasizing national unity, calling for victory in the war, followed by reconciliation with the South and a repeal of Lincoln's emancipation proclamation and preservation of slavery. The Democrats nominated McClellan and War Governor of Tennesse Andrew Johnson as their ticket. A number of pro-peace Democrats nominated Senator Daniel W. Voorhees and Representative Clement Vallandingham as pro-peace candidates on the Peace Democratic party (popularly known as the Copperheads). However, most peace Democrats stayed with McClellan because they believed he presented the best chance to defeat Lincoln and the Republicans.

General George McClellan (D-NJ)/War Governor Andrew Johnson (D-TN) 125 EVs, 43.1% of the popular vote
President Abraham Lincoln (R-IL)/Vice President Hannibal Hamlin (R-ME) 108 EVs, 42.5% of the popular vote
Senator Charles Sumner (L-MA)/Secretary of the Treasury John P. Hale (L-NH) 0 EVs, 11.2% of the popular vote
Senator Daniel W. Voorhees (C-IN)/Representative Clement Vallandingham (C-OH) O EVs, 3.9% of the popular vote


The split in the Republican vote allowed McClellan to be elected president.

[Kitteh]

We were so close to finishing it Its not dead dead yet, just kinda dead .

Okay, if you want to continue it that's fine. It would be nice to see it finished, but tbh I lose interest in TLs as they approach the modern era, which is why I've given up on it.

[Kitteh]

This was one of the best timelines we've done in this thread, hands down.

Should we bump the 1864 one and go from there?

(It kinda got really off course from where it started, but, oh well)

It looks like the 1864 one would result in a win for the Confederacy, and not only did we already do that, but I don't know if I"m up to try to go into the whole alternate Union vs. Confederacy politics thing again. I'd rather not, personally.

Ok, that's fine. I was just proposing that one because the old TL looked dead and I wanted to start something. Somebody else should propose something now.

[Kitteh]

Okay, since no one else has, I'll jumpstart this. Our point of departure will be where William H. Crawford died from the stroke he survived IRL in 1823.

1824
Since the collapse of the Federalist Party the Democratic-Republicans had been the nation's only political party. For the 1824 election, the Democratic-Republican caucus in congress had chosen William H. Crawford as their party's nominee. However, Crawford died unexpectedly of a stroke, leaving the party with no clear nominee. A number of candidates entered the race. Most of Crawford's supporters gathered behind Senator Andrew Jackson, who was popular in the South, where most of Crawford's support came from. Jackson won a close and divided election over House Speaker Henry Clay and Secretary of State John Quincy Adams.

Popular Vote:

States with divided electors:
MD: 8 Jackson, 3 Adams
IL: 2 Jackson, 1 Adams


States with no popular vote:
LA: 3 Jackson, 2 Adams
SC: 11 Jackson
DE: 3 Jackson
NY: 31 Adams, 4 Clay, 1 Jackson
VT: 7 Adams
ME: 8 Adams, 1 Jackson
GA: 9 Jackson

Total:
Senator Andrew Jackson (DR-TN), 151 EVs, 49.4% of the popular vote
Secretary of State John Quincy Adams (DR-MA), 89 EVs, 31.8% of the popular vote
Speaker Henry Clay (DR-KY), 21 EVs, 14.0% of the popular vote

Jackson won a strong victory, but with very polarized results. While Jackson's votes outnumbered Adams's and Clay's votes combined, in a number of states Clay's and Adams's combined votes would have swung the outcome, including Ohio, Illinois, and Maryland. Following the election there was a lot of talk among the supporters of the two men about forming a unified front to oppose Jackson in the next election.

[Kitteh]

I was unaware we could make maps from 1828 using the EVC. I thought it was 1848 and onwards.

It is technically only 1848 and onwards with the EVC, but if you take the part where it says "year=1848" and change it to "year=1828" it gives you a map of the US in 1828. Then you just delete all the states that weren't in the union at that point as well as those that didn't hold a popular vote (like I did in my last post). 1824 seems to be the earliest year you can do, anything earlier than that and the map comes up blank. Idk why it seems to have earlier years built in but it doesn't let you do them on the EVC app.

[Kitteh]

*bump*

1836
President Adam's second term would be even more controversial then his first. The South strongly opposed the Tariff of Abominations, and when President Adams refused to lower the tariff some Southerners began calling for secession. The crisis hurt Adams's popularity, and in 1834 the Nationals lost control of Congress. The Democrats could not overcome President Adams's veto, so they were unable to lower the tariff on their own. After a long standoff, Senate President Pro Tempore Hugh Lawson White reached a deal with Adams known as the Compromise of 1835 whereby the tariff would be gradually lowered, and the charter of the national bank, which was due to expire in 1836, would be renewed for another eight years. White immediately became very popular across the country for having solved the national crisis and prevented secession, and in 1836 the Democrats nominated him for President.  The National Party was split between radicals who supported Senator Daniel Webster and moderates who supported Vice President William Henry Harrison. Most Nationals knew that their only chance of winning was to nominate the popular war hero Harrison, and Harrison won the nomination and chose Willie Person Mangum of North Carolina as his VP to appeal to the South. Despite Harrison's popularity, White was regarded as a national hero and a moderate, while voters were tired of National government. White won the election easily.

Senator Hugh Lawson White (D-TN)/Governor Martin Van Buren (D-NY) 203 electoral votes, 55.4% of the popular vote
Vice President William Henry Harrison (N-OH)/Senator Willie Person Mangum (N-NC) 91 electoral votes, 44.8% of the popular votes
Others: 0 electoral votes, .8% of the popular vote

[Kitteh]

So far in this TL:

Presidents
Andrew Jackson (D-TN) 1824-1828
John Quincy Adams (N-MA) 1828-1836
Hugh Lawson White (D-TN) 1836-

Vice Presidents
John C Calhoun (D-SC) 1824-1828
Henry Clay (N-KY) 1828-1832
William Henry Harrison (N-OH) 1832-1836
Martin Van Buren (D-NY) 1836-

[Kitteh]

I'm going to take the next one.

[Kitteh]

1844
President Clay's term had been dominated by foreign policy. Texas had repeatedly asked to join the United States, which was strongly supported in the South but opposed in the North as a Southern power-grab to expand slavery.President Clay and the mostly Northern Whigs opposed annexation and so no action was taken on the issue, despite the fierce opposition of the mostly Southern Democrats.  Meanwhile, negotiations with Britain over the Oregon boundary dispute were going nowhere. In 1844 President Clay and VP Webster were renominated by the Nationals on a platform that mostly opposed annexation of Texas while calling for the Oregon issue to be set aside while American settlers moved into the territory. The National platform attempted to appease Western expansionists by supporting a Homestead Act and federal funding to build roads in the Western territories to help settlers.

Former President Van Buren attempted to win the Democratic nomination again, but by this time the Democrats were dominated by Southerners who favored Calhoun over Van Buren. Van Buren's small chances at the nomination were killed when letters written by him opposing the annexation of Texas were found and made public. Former VP John Calhoun won the nomination over Van Buren by a massive margin. Deeply angry at the Democrats, Van Buren and his supporters walked out of the Democratic convention. Calhoun and the Democrats took a strong stand in favor of Texas annexation, while also supporting a tough position against Oregon to win over Westerners. The Democrats chose for VP Senator William Allen of Ohio, an ardent Oregon expansionist who favored annexing all of the Oregon territory up to the 54th parallel and called for war with Britain if they refused. However, the Democratic position was undercut by Calhoun's previous statements against a tough position on Oregon, and the Nationals vigorously attacked Calhoun for his flip-flopping on the issue. Meanwhile, Southern Democrats opposed the proposed Homestead Act because they were afraid it would lead to Northerners settling the West instead of Southern slaveowners. This position also cost them support among Westerners.

Van Buren and his supporters met in Albany, NY, where they formed a new political party composed of the few remaining Northern Democrats. Officially known as the Free Democratic Party, the party was popularly known as the "Barnburners". The party nominated Van Buren for President and Representative John P Hale of New Hampshire for VP on a platform that strongly opposed annexation of Texas while attacking the Nationals on economic issues and supporting a lowered tarriff and the abolition of the National Bank (President Clay had just gotten the Banks' charter, set to expire that year, re-extended).

The anti-slavery Liberty Party had also been growing in prominence under newspaper editor James G. Birney. Birney's campaign got more attention this year than in the past, and he picked up some support from anti-slavery Nationals who thought Clay was too moderate but disliked Van Buren.

On election day, the Nationals fell just short of a majority:

President Henry Clay (N-KY)/Vice President Daniel Webster (N-MA) 40.3% of the popular vote, 133 EVs
Former Vice President John C Calhoun (D-SC)/Senator William Allen (D-OH) 36.4% of the popular vote, 91 EVs
Former President Martin Van Buren (Barnburner-NY)/Representative John P. Hale (Barnburner-NH) 23.0% of the popular vote, 51 EVs
Mr James G. Birney (Liberty-MI)/Mr Salmon P Chase (Liberty-OH) 1.1% of the popular vote, 0 EVs
Others .2%

With no majority, the election went to Congress. Calhoun offered Van Buren the Vice Presidency, but Van Buren was bitter from his loss at the conventions and refused to negotiate with Calhoun. As the situation dragged on with no resolution, some Southerners began threatening secession. Clay and Webster wanted above all to keep the country together, so they came to an agreement with the Democrats where Clay and Webster would be reelected but Texas would be allowed to join the union. This deal, known as the Compromise of 1844, was controversial in the North; Clay's supporters said it was the only way to keep the country united, but it was strongly opposed by anti-slavery Northerners and some National politicians defected to the Liberty party over the Compromise.

[Kitteh]

I'd do the next one but Drj/Spamage back to back gets a little tiring.

[Kitteh]

The Scott Presidency would be marked by the utter collapse of the Democrats. Scott, himself opposed to slavery, nonetheless saw that a pragmatic path would have to be taken. He refused utterly to allow for the expansion of slavery into the territories or into California, while at the same time not directly harming slavery in the South. The Democrats, however, made themselves out to look like radicals and quasi-secessionists in comparison.

1852
At the Nationals' convention, President Scott was nominated unanimously and paired with Senator John J. Crittenden for Vice President. Meanwhile, the Democrats, in continuing their downward spiral, nominated Senator Andrew James Butler of South Carolina for President, and former Senator Franklin Pierce--a doughface--for Vice President.

President Winfield Scott (National-New Jersey)/Senator John J. Crittenden (National-Kentucky) 261 electoral votes, 54% of the popular vote
Senator Andrew James Butler (Democrat-South Carolina)/Former Senator Franklin Pierce (Democrat-New Hampshire) 35 electoral votes, 41% of the popular vote
Others: 0 electoral votes, 5% of the popular vote

Note: the reason that South Carolina is only at >50% margins is because the state senate decided SC's electoral vote allocation back in those days, thus there is no popular vote shade to give to it. Thus, I give it the "standard" one.

In this TL there was an amendment passed during AJ's term that required all states to do popular vote.