By a Fluke of the Gods: Cox Defeats Harding

[Хahar 🤔]

Looks like the Solid South will stay solid.

[PBrunsel]

Event Date: 5-20-1955
Event Description: Senator Earl Long meets with former Attorney General J. Edgar Hoover at a hotel restaurant in New Orleans, Louisiana. Long explains to Hoover that Attorney General Warren’s Justice Department has blackmailed him into supporting several New Day policies. “This is too great!” Hoover tells Long, “I can get back at Dewey, a bastard I hate, and Warren, the bastard I really hate.” Long and Hoover agree to go public about the Dewey-Warren blackmail on the day before Secretary Eisenhower’s atomic weapons plan is voted on.

Event Date: 5-27-1955
Event Description: W. Mark Felt meets with Senator Long once again in his Senate office. “Our ‘deal’ is still in place,” Felt reminds Senator Long, “The Justice Department needs your support for Ike’s plan. Do you understand that Earl?” The brother of “The Kingfish” tells Felt to, “Go to hell,” and leaves the room. Felt immediately gets on the line with Attorney General Warren and tells him about what happened at the meeting. “He’s going public,” Warren tells Felt, “Release the records immediately. We need to discredit Long.” Felt “leaks” the information of Senator Long’s mental problems to the Washington Post, a Dewey friendly paper. In the note explaining what this information is, Felt remembers to write, “President Dewey knows nothing about this.”

Event Date: 5-28-1955
Event Description: Washington explodes in controversy. “Senator Long’s History of Mental Problems” screams the headlines of the Washington Post. Long hunkers down in his office, calling J. Edgar Hoover every five minutes asking what is to be done. Hoover decides to release the blackmail story that night. “Then,” Hoover explains to Long, “It will look like the White House made up all this stuff to just discredit you. It will all appear like its fake. That simple, Long, nothing more.” That night, Long goes public with Hoover standing next to him. “I was blackmailed by Justice Department official Mark Felt,” Long tells the press, “My good friend John Edgar Hoover has told me that during his time at the FBI; this was quite common for Felt. This agent feels he can take the law into his own hands, and he did the same thing when it came to dealing with votes for the President’s plans.” For the next two hours, Long and Hoover droll away at the blackmail Felt had oversaw. At the White House, President Dewey meets with Attorney General Warren. After first telling Warren that he doesn’t believe that he’d do such a thing, Dewey lets Warren tell him what really happened. “It’s all true, Tom,” Warren explained, “I just wanted the New Day to succeed so much, I refused to let those reactionaries in the Senate ruin it. So I stretched the law a bit, no one was hurt. Long was probably going to go to prison anyway on embezzlement of public funds like every other Louisiana politician; I just got him shipped away to a mental institute instead of a jail cell.” This justification does not suit President Dewey, who immediately fires Attorney General Earl Warren, Assistant Attorney General Robert A. Taft III, and W. Mark Felt’s entire staff. “The Saturday Night Massacre” is played up by Ronald Reagan to the fullest. “Corruption, spying, blackmail and gross abuse of our nation’s laws,” Reagan tells the nation that night, “That along with taxing and spending is the Dewey legacy. Mr. President, if you have any sense of decency and any sense of honor, you’ll resign immediately.” The day has been an awful one for the entire nation.

Event Date: 5-29-1955
Event Description: President Dewey nominates Herbert Brownell for the position of Attorney General. An old friend from his days as a Senator from New York, Dewey hopes that Brownell’s integrity will help rebuild his image as an honest and efficient public servant. Brownell will be easily confirmed. “I want to make thus crystal clear,” Dewey tells the nation that night in a television address, “I never knew that former Attorney General Warren was blackmailing Senators for votes. Had I known, I would have never allowed it.” In Boston, Governor Kennedy responds to President Dewey’s address, “If the president can’t control his own administration, maybe its time we have a president who can.” “I wonder who that could be?” Dewey sarcastically asks his wife that night.

Event Date: 6-06-1955
Event Description: Secretary Dwight Eisenhower’s plan for the military goes down to defeat. Despite Senate Minority Leader Harry Truman finding some Democrats who would vote for it, in the end enough Republicans opposed this plan for a nuclear military for it to fail. “As Republicans and Americans,” Senator Margaret Chase Smith (Republican of Maine) tells her colleagues, “We can not support an act which would encourage other nations to build their atomic arsenals, and then lead the world into an atomic war.” The recent Warren Blackmail Scandal also played a role in defeating the plan. The President is wounded, and very few feel he can make a comeback.

Event Date: 7-15-1955
Event Description: Emmett Till, a 14-year-old Chicagoan visiting relatives in Money, Mississippi, walks out of Bryant's Grocery and Meat Market, where he and his cousins had bought candy and soda. Carolyn Bryant, the attractive wife of the store's owner Roy Bryant, is behind the counter. Till turns around and whistles at her. Upset, she storms out of the room. “This is the type of delinquency Kennedy keeps warning the nation about!” she cries to her husband Roy. Till and his cousins giggle, and leave the store and return home. Till’s grandpa will give him, as Till says “the worst wuppin’ of my life,” but he’ll recover and return to Chicago in August. Polices of past administrations have made the South safe even for ill-mannered boys.

Event Date: 8-04-1955
Event Description: Governor Joseph Kennedy, Junior, announces his candidacy for President of the United States. “The polices of the current administration our bankrupting both our treasury and our moral values,” Kennedy tells his audience in the Massachusetts State Capitol. Promising a fiscally conservative and moral administration Kennedy concludes his statement by declaring, “I am a Catholic, but I am also an American. I will only take orders from the people who elected me president. I look forward to an election where policy is discussed, and not religious beliefs.” With this line, Kennedy hopes to have diffused attack on his religion.

Event Date: 9-24-1955
Event Description: Secretary of Defense Dwight David Eisenhower suffers a massive heart attack while at his home in Abilene, Kansas. The stresses of the fight for his failed atomic weapons plan as well as weeks answering questions from a scandal crazed press has been too much for the 64-year old former Lieutenant Colonel. He survives the heart attack, but will resign from the post of secretary of Defense due to his heart condition. President Dewey wants him to reconsider, but Ike is adamant. He wants to retire from public service. Dewey will nominate General Omar Bradley for the post, and he will be easily confirmed.

Event Date: 12-01-1955
Event Description: Montgomery, Alabama, bus drivers decide to unionize. In response to this, Sheriff William “Bull” Connor declares that the mostly African-American union is illegal. Connor justifies this by claiming that if they would strike, it would endanger, “The public safety”, because people could not get to their jobs. The Reverend Martin Luther King, Junior, decides to fight this ruling. Sheriff Connor and Dr. King will face off as the Montgomery Bus Strike begins. Under the Taft-Hartley Act, striking is illegal. Dr. King, Montgomery NAACP Secretary-Treasurer Rosa Parks, Ralph Abernathy and other leaders will be thrown into jail for striking.

Event Date: 1-20-1956
Event Description: With one more year until the end of his administration, President Thomas Dewey begins to revamp the stagnant New Day. Today, he declares that Taft-Hartley should be overturned. Representative Milton Glenn (Republican of New Jersey) and Senator Alexander Wiley (Republican of Wisconsin) sponsor the Glenn-Wiley Act, repealing Taft-Hartley and making striking and unions legal once more. Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson vows to fight the act, as does House Minority Leader Sam Rayburn. President Dewey declares that he will “Welcome the opposition. It’s up to those two Texans if they want to oppose the right working men to strike.”

[PBrunsel]

Event Date: 1-29-1956
Event Description: The Glenn-Wiley Act passes in the House of Representatives. With an election approaching, many Southern Democrats did not want to offend their African-American constituencies by voting against the Montgomery bus drivers. “I’m no fan of unions,” Representative Kenneth Roberts (Democrat of Alabama) tells Minority Leader Rayburn “But I can’t pretend that those strikers aren’t voters.”

Event Date: 2-05-1956
Event Description: Senator Roman Hruska (Republican of Nebraska) and Vice-President Edward Arn begin to work with Midwestern Democrats to help pass the Glenn-Wiley Act. Deals are made with Democratic Senators Mike Mansfield (Montana), Joseph O’Mahoney (Wyoming) and Robert Kerr (Oklahoma), ensuring these votes in the Senate. Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson, however, has lined up several Eastern Republicans against the act.

Event Date: 2-07-1956
Event Description: The Glenn-Wiley Act fails in the Senate. Senator Joseph McCarthy, who is opposing President Dewey for the GOP presidential nomination, was able to rally enough Republicans to oppose the measure. President Dewey accepts his defeat with grace. “Obviously we now know who supports the rights of working men and those who don’t,” President Dewey tells the press. “Once again,” Ronald Reagan says that night, “Mr. Dewey is marginalizing an issue. Dewey’s love of unions simply shows his affinity for the ‘worker’s states’ in China and Vietnam, which he has refused to do a thing about.”

Event Date: 2-10-1956
Event Description: Dr. Martin Luther King, Junior, calls for an end of the Montgomery Bus Strike. The strike has affected the city enough to convince the mayor to allow the union to exist. King is changed by the experience. He vows he will fight for those in poverty and working for a living. His work will one day become enormous.  

Event Date: 3-15-1956
Event Description: The New Hampshire Primary is held. Despite being endorsed by the arch-conservative Nashua Union Leader, Senator Joseph McCarthy is defeated by President Dewey by a 66-34% margin. McCarthy vows to fight on. On the Democratic side, Governor Joseph Kennedy of Massachusetts defeats Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson, Senator and 1952 Democratic nominee Estes Kefauver, South Carolina Governor George Timmerman, and Illinois Governor Adlai Stevenson. Kennedy’s win helps establish him as the front-runner for the Democratic nomination.

Event Date: 3-16-1956
Event Description: With Governor Stevenson’s agricultural campaign appealing to the people of Minnesota, Governor Kennedy’s campaign manager, his brother Representative John Kennedy, advises him to debate the Governor. Kennedy will debate Stevenson, Kefauver and Johnson in St. Paul, Minnesota. The debate goes well for the handsome and charismatic Kennedy. However, Governor Stevenson appears well rounded in policy, but flat in personality.    

Event Date: 3-18-1956
Event Description: The Minnesota Primary is held, with President Dewey once again trouncing Senator McCarthy, in his own backyard. On the Democratic side, Governor Stevenson is narrowly defeated by Governor Kennedy. Following this defeat, Stevenson ends his long shot campaign for the White House. “That’s the problem with this era of television,” Stevenson comments while conceding the election, “If you look poorly on the TV, you can’t run for office. Its like selling soap flakes.” Stevenson endorses Kefauver for President.

Event Date: 4-01-1956
Event Description: The Wisconsin and Nebraska Primaries are held. President Dewey easily wins Nebraska after being endorsed by Senator Hruska, but narrowly loses Wisconsin to McCarthy. Despite this “defeat”, President Dewey has a comfortable lead in delegates. He will undoubtedly be the Republican nominee for president in 1956. On the Democratic side, Kennedy wins Wisconsin, but loses Nebraska to Senator Johnson. Kennedy, having performed well in heavily protestant Wisconsin, is the man to beat.

Event Date: 4-05-1956
Event Description: Senator Willis Robertson endorses Governor Joseph Kennedy for president on the eve of the Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Arkansas primaries. “Governor Kennedy has stood up for fundamental Christian values and conservative principles,” Robertson tells the nation at a press conference in Lynchburg, “I am proud to stand beside him as a friend.”

[PBrunsel]

Event Date: 4-06-1956
Event Description: Governor Kennedy wins Virginia and North Carolina by wide margins over southerners Johnson, Kefauver and Timmerman. Governor Timmerman withdraws from the race and decides to seek the office as a “favorite son” from South Carolina. Johnson won Arkansas with Kefauver taking his home state of Tennessee. President Dewey beat Senator McCarthy in every state except North Carolina, which narrowly voted for the anti-Communist agitator.

Event Date: 4-22-1956
Event Description: Governor Kennedy wraps up the race for the Democratic nomination with a win in the Pennsylvania Primary. Senator Johnson had tried Catholic baiting in the Pittsburg region, but the method only backfired on him. Kennedy and Dewey will now face each other in the general election. The race, between two wealthy easterners, will be a bitter one.  

Event Date: 5-09-1956
Event Description: Governor Kennedy speaks before a crowd of farmers in Sioux City, Iowa. “The President has abandoned you, America’s backbone, the farmer through this time of drought,” Kennedy tells the over-all wearing crowd of conservative farmers, “While he fights to give unions the right to strike against progress and criminals attorneys, he won’t even lift a finger to aide the people who feed this nation.” President Dewey had tried to give farm aide before, but it was stopped by Democrats in Congress.

Event Date: 6-11-1956
Event Description: The first negative ads of the 1956 election hit the airwaves. President Dewey attacks Kennedy for supporting an act outlawing unions ran by African-Americans. Governor Kennedy attacks Dewey for his tax increases, support of government welfare and allowing socialist states to exist in Asia. “The 1956 election will go down in history as one of the dirtiest races in history,” CBS’s Walter Winchell says that night, “And oh God am I ready for it!’

Event Date: 6-25-1956
Event Description: Vice-President Edward Arn calls Governor Kennedy, “A man who seeks to divide our nation along a faulty moral ruler,” at a Dewey Rally in Wheeling, West Virginia. Governor Kennedy has based a great deal of his campaign on moral values, and Arn blasts against it. “Kennedy wants to make you think it is a sin not to support him,” Arn jokes, “Well, the real sin would be throwing out a President who has done so much to help the regular folks in this country!”

Event Date: 7-04-1956
Event Description: Egyptian President Mustafa Al Nahhas Pasha declares that the Suez Canal is Egyptian, not international. This infuriates Britain, France and Germany, all of whom now find it harder to get their ships through it.

Event Date: 7-11-1956
Event Description: Secretary of State Herbert Hoover, Junior, and Lester Pearson, the Canadian Foreign Minister, begin to secretly funnel aide to British businessmen in Egypt. This aide, mostly money, is to be used to overthrow Egyptian President Pasha. The businessmen will incite rebellion, and then the Suez Revolution will begin. The Nazi installed pasha, having overseen a collapse of the Egyptian economy, will face nearly unanimous opposition to his decision on the Suez Canal.

Event Date: 7-23-1956
Event Description: President Dewey calls on Mustafa Al Nahhas Pasha to resign from office in a radio address heard worldwide. “Your rule is over,” he tells the Egyptian leader, “Your people are rebelling against you, you have no where to turn to. Resign now, and save yourself from the wrath of your own citizens.” Pasha listens, and resigns. The Nazi installed Egyptian leader is no more. The American-British Suez Revolution, lasting all of 12-days, is a success.

[PBrunsel]

Event Date: 7-30-1956
Event Description: The new Egyptian Government declares that the Suez Canal is no longer nationalized. Also, the British controlled Egyptian Government begins an agreement of friendship with Israel, a former British and Nazi controlled territory. Through the rein on Nazi-government in Egypt, nearly 50% of the Muslim population in the nation was exterminated by the evil regime. The primarily Christian nation of Egypt accepts the treaty of friendship and alliance with Israel, a Jewish nation filled with those Jews who survived the nearly 20-year holocaust. “Crisis has been averted in the Middle East,” President Dewey tells the nation that night, “I can see a future filled with civility and human goodness in that once troubled land.” President Dewey narrowly leads Governor Kennedy in the latest Gallup Poll by a 48-43% margin.

Event Date: 8-06-1956
Event Description: The Democratic National Convention nominates Governor Joseph P. Kennedy, Junior, for President of the United States. Despite Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson attempting a last second “Stop Kennedy” movement, Kennedy is easily nominated on the final ballot. Joe’s brother John, his campaign manager, advises him to make Senator Johnson his running-mate. Senator Johnson tells Kennedy, whom he can not stand, that he would serve him better as President as Senate Majority Leader. Johnson advises Kennedy to select Senator Stuart Symington of Missouri. A senator since 1947, Senator Symington has military credentials as a Japanese-American War veteran, Chairman of the Senate Armed Service Committee and as a friend as former President Douglas MacArthur. Governor Kennedy, a war hero himself, is impressed by these credentials. The Democratic Ticket for 1956 will be Governor Joseph P. Kennedy for President and Senator Stuart Symington for Vice-President. Governor Kennedy’s acceptance speech rips President Dewey as, “The biggest tax and spender since his hero Herb Hoover. Dewey wants us to pay and pay so criminals can have lawyers and go off to college.” This attack is not as brutal as the one launched by radio star Ronald Reagan. “President Dewey says he is the commander in chief of armed service,” Reagan laughs, “With all of his and Ike’s spending cuts, what will they be armed with? Spitballs?!” Reagan also starts the chant of “There he goes again” as he names off the “flip-flops” Dewey had done while being president, including his promise to never tarnish to office with scandal.   

Event Date: 8-19-1956
Event Description: Senator Stuart Symington attacks President Dewey as, “A secretive and sinister man.” Citing the Dewey-Warren Blackmailing Scandal of 1955 as well as the mysterious way ten Egyptian Government was overthrown in July. “This is the most secretive administration in history,” Symington says at a Kennedy-Symington rally in Detroit, Michigan, “This type of behavior is beneath the presidency. On Election Day, it is the responsibility of the American people to tell President Dewey that his government of shadows is not something we will tolerate in this country!” 

Event Date: 8-20-1956
Event Description: Vice-President Arn, at a dinner for Republican Women in Omaha, Nebraska, attacks Kennedy and Symington of making up scandals. “President Dewey has been cleared of all charges in the Blackmailing Scandal,” Arn proclaims, “The President is an honest, fair and hard working public servant. He fired those responsible for the scandal and made sure that justice was served. He is fit to sit in the president’s chair far more than merchants of scandal like Kennedy and Symington.” This attack leads Ronald Reagan, who is propping Kennedy for president more than any other media figure, to call Arn, “The Kansas Kook.”

Event Date: 9-12-1956
Event Description: President Dewey and Vice-President Arn are renominated by the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The New Day is celebrated by Senator Hubert Humphrey as, “The best hope for an America.” Former President Herbert Hoover applauds Dewey’s balanced budgets as, “Blessed are the young, for they are the ones who will inherit the national debt. President Dewey understands why we need balanced budgets. We need not curse the future generations with debt.” President Dewey declares that Governor Kennedy “Wants to divide us, while we as Republicans seek bipartisan unity.” His presidency has had mixed results. The 1956 Election is a toss-up.

Event Date: 9-18-1956Event Description: The Dewey Campaign unleashes a vicious attack on Governor Kennedy. “The world is in the balance,” the announcer says, “While President Dewey seeks peace, Governor Kennedy has a history of wanting war.” As the announcer names off the several incidences where Kennedy has called for military actions (especially against China in 1955), clips of soldiers marching off to fight in Japan is shown .The message is clear: Republicans are for peace, while Democrats want war. The ad is so controversial; it will only be aired once.

Event Date: 10-09-1956
Event Description: With the election approaching, Governor Kennedy meets with his wife Evelyn. She advises him to challenge President Dewey to a televised debate. With most Americans who vote owning a television set, she feels that Kennedy will be able to use his charm and good looks to close the 4-point gap he has behind President Dewey. At the White House, First Lady Frances Dewey tells her husband not to accept the challenge. However, the President, a former prosecutor, feels that he can easily defeat Kennedy in a debate. The President accepts, and the televised debate is scheduled to be held at the University of Michigan in Detroit. This will be an historic event.

Event Date: 10-17-1956
Event Description: President Thomas Dewey and Governor Joseph Kennedy debate on national television. The debate is a nasty one, with both candidates attacking each others integrity. “Why do you keep trying to tie me to that blackmail thing?” President Dewey snaps at Governor Kennedy when he brings up the issue, “You know I had nothing to do with that. Why don’t you look in the camera and tell everyone why you are trying to distort the truth?’ Kennedy responds to this by changing the subject, “Why don’t you tell the people why you raise taxes all the time? That’s actually the most important issue we can talk about today. Your Republican Party has always stood against the taxpayer.” “While your Democratic Party has always stood in once place, never embracing any progress!” Dewey snaps back. “Well it’s easy to support ‘progress’ when the middle class is the one taking the bill,” Kennedy laughs.  The debate is a vicious one, but in the end Kennedy is declared the winner. His snappy retorts to President Dewey come off as witty and as far less bitter than Dewey’s finger pointing and jeering. This debate has introduced America to the Kennedy style, while mustached Dewey once again looked like, as Alice Roosevelt-Longworth once said, “The little man on the top of the wedding cake.”

Event Date: 11-06-1956
Event Description: Governor Joseph Patrick Kennedy, Junior, is elected President of the United States over incumbent President Thomas Edmund Dewey. At Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, former Governor Joseph Kennedy, Senior, hugs his son as he cries, “I knew it! I knew you’d be President!” The election is won on a razor sharp vote count, with Dewey nearly winning the toss-up states of Illinois, New Jersey, and Florida. Kennedy won all three, but with some dubious help from crime land figures in all three states.

 

Joseph Kennedy/Stuart Symington (D): 269 EV; 49.9% of the PV
Thomas Dewey/Edward Arn (R): 262 EV; 49.8% of the PV
Others (Prohibition, Union, etc.): 0 EV; 0.3% of the PV

The Congress changes relatively little. The Democrats gain in the Senate and pick up two-seats in the House of Representatives. The House is in GOP hands by one seat, wi8th the Senate firmly in Democratic control.

The legacy of President Thomas Edmund Dewey is one that is argued to this day. Despite being an efficient and hard working executive who passed numerous social reforms, he failed to win a second term. The reason for this is a simple one. He was unable to convince the middle class that his reforms benefited them. Dewey lacked the charm of a Kennedy to show the people that he was “One of them”. Despite all of his progressive reforms, he lost out in the end. President Dewey was one of America’s most efficient, but least-loved chief executives.

[Lief 🗽]

Wonderful update, though I was really pulling for Dewey. Your Dewey would have been one of my favorite Presidents. Then again, in your timeline, it appears I would be an ardent Republican.

[Хahar 🤔]

Wonderful update, though I was really pulling for Dewey. Your Dewey would have been one of my favorite Presidents. Then again, in your timeline, it appears I would be an ardent Republican.

Yes, the parties seem to have switched places.

[Robespierre's Jaw]

Brilliant update, as usual . I really wanted President Dewey to win re-election though, we cannot have those Catholic Kennedy's running amok in the White House! LOL. I'm really loving this Republican Party in this TL, shame it didn't happen the way it did in RL. Damn Americans, you should have voted for James Cox in 1920!

[Bleeding heart conservative, HTMLdon]

This timeline is absoutely awesome.  Well done!!!

[gorkay]

Your timeline has some similarities to the one I'm currently doing. I'm going to have to stop reading it for fear of unconscious plagiarism!

[PBrunsel]

The Presidency of Joseph P. Kennedy, Junior

Event Date: 1-21-1957
Event Description: Joseph Patrick Kennedy, Junior, is worn in as President of the United States. A devout Catholic, President Kennedy refused to be sworn in on Sunday, January 20th. This religious observance delights Ronald Reagan, a born again Christian, “Our new president shows a great reverence for God. He understands that nay nation not under God will be gone under.” President Kennedy declares in his inaugural address, “The era of big government is over. We must now look to our own initiative to better ourselves. So my fellow Americans, ask not what the country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.” The new conservative administration differs from the Dewey Administration in a great many ways. Secretary of State James Byrnes (a former Senator from South Carolina and chief ally of President Cordell Hull) represents the power of Southern Conservatives in the new Kennedy Administration. Secretary of the Treasury Robert McNamara (a Ford Automobile corporate official who was a close friend of Kennedy’s father) is representative of the business friendly nature of the new government. Finally, Representative John F. Kennedy, the president’s brother and 1956 campaign manager, is named White House Chief of Staff. JFK (as he is known by the press) is a well known micromanager who has a personality that is both likeable and forceful. This combination of traits makes Jack Kennedy a perfect choice for Chief of Staff.

Event Date: 1-22-1957
Event Description: President Kennedy meets with Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson and House Minority Leader Sam Rayburn. The two Texans advise Kennedy to hold off on dismantling the entire New Day. “To be honest Joe,” Johnson tells Kennedy, “Some of Dewey’s programs are too popular to get rid of. To throw out the school loans or something like that could be political suicide. “First, it’s ‘Mr. President’ Lyndon,” Kennedy reminds the man with the Texas sized ego, “Secondly, we have to cut some programs to keep the balanced budget when we repeal Dewey’s tax hikes.” Senator Johnson advises him to repeal the Percy Legal Reform Act and oppose additional public works in the budget. President Kennedy accepts these suggestions, but vows he will bring night to the New Day.

Event Date: 1-23-1957
Event Description: Truck driver Willie Edwards safely drives his cargo of Coca-Cola soft drinks from Mobile, Alabama, to Little Rock, Arkansas. The Ku Klux Klan, now a local “club” for middle class white families, has no saw over the South and no need for violence.

Event Date: 1-30-1957
Event Description: President Kennedy addresses the nation for the first time over television. “My fellow Americans,” President Kennedy begins, “At this very hour, governments far off our shores are plotting the demise of our capitalist society.” He outlines the worker’s states in China and Vietnam (as well as the blooming socialist states in Cambodia and Laos). “These states constitute an ‘Axis of Evil’ in the modern world,” Kennedy tells the American people, “They seek to spread Marxism and Leninism throughout the world, the way the old empire of Communism, the failed Soviet Union, did.” Kennedy unveils the Kennedy Doctrine. Under his foreign policy plan, the United States will build up the military and aide, “Those who seek freedom in the lands of oppressive socialism.” The Democratic Party applauds President Kennedy’s plan. Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson tells the press Kennedy’s plan insures that we “Fight the socialists over there, and not over here.” However, Senate Minority Leader Harry Truman is skeptical. “I find it hard to believe,” Truman scoffs on CBS’s Issues and Answers, “That over spending on the military will affect the people of China at all. If anything, it’ll lead them to build their own weapons. That’ll lead to an arms race, and lady and gentlemen, the last thing this world needs is an arms race between the wealthiest nation and the biggest nation.” Later on, Senator Theodore Bilbo (Democrat of Mississippi) calls Truman, “A goddamned red traitor.” “If I’m a traitor,” Truman responds, “Then this country is in a heluva of shape.”  

Event Date: 2-03-1957
Event Description: Senator Joseph McCarthy (Republican of Wisconsin) meets with President Joseph Kennedy at the White House. “McCarthy,” President Kennedy says to him, “You’ve been friends with our family for years, and we have one more thing to ask of you.” Kennedy tells McCarthy he wants him, a Republican, to introduce the White House’s plans for military expansion in the Senate. Representative Carl Vinson (Democrat of Georgia) has agreed to be the primary sponsor of the bill. “You were a favorite of the MacArthur crew,” the President explains, “Your perfect for the job.” “I’ll do it,” McCarthy coughs. He’s feeling ill.

Event Date: 2-18-1957
Event Description: The Protection of Freedom Act is introduced by Representative Vinson. This act (given patriotic language by Chief of Staff John Kennedy) ends the Hoover-Dewey military cuts and increases funding for the CIA and FBI. President Kennedy doesn’t trust the socialist governments in Asia, and feels that only a strong military can counter their influence. In the Senate, Joseph McCarthy has already sworn himself to the plan. NBC’s Ronald Reagan has already begun boosting the program as, “Peace through strength.”

Event Date: 3-01-1957
Event Description: Leftist Thankin Nu’s Burmese People’s Party wins a landslide in the Burmese elections. Along with China, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, Burma now joins in Asia’s left-wing worker’s states. President Zhou Enlai of China, frightened by the Kennedy Doctrine’s belligerence, is beginning to think about an alliance of the Asian worker’s nations.

Event Date: 3-05-1957
Event Description: Former President Thomas Dewey attacks President Kennedy for targeting, “legitimate democracies”. “These nations [China, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and Burma] are not the new Soviet Union,” he tells a meeting of the Council on Foreign Relations in New York City, “These nations are governed by legitimately elected leaders, and constitute no threat to the United States.” Dewey outlines that the real threat is “out of control military spending” and “an arms race across the world.” Ronald Reagan derides Dewey as, “A well-meaning has been.”

Event Date: 3-09-1957
Event Description: The House of Representatives approves of The Protection of Freedom Act. Despite Speaker of the House Joseph Martin opposing the act, House Majority Leader Charles Halleck was able to get enough Midwestern Republicans to support the act. Halleck has become increasingly more open to a larger military since the socialist governments of Asia have begun to think about a unified alliance. The Senate, under firm control by the Democrats, is expected to easily pass the Kennedy Doctrine.

Event Date: 3-10-1957
Event Description: The military spending halts of President Dewey and the Hoover Commission are reversed today as the Senate passes the Kennedy Doctrine into law. Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson and Senator Joseph McCarthy, a somewhat turncoat Republican, had little trouble passing the plan through a compliant senate. The United States’ has entered the era of the modern military budget. Former President Herbert Hoover calls this day, “A black day for all peace loving Americans.”

Event Date: 5-01-1957
Event Description: The Canton Pact is established on the socialist holiday of May Day. This pact is an agreement between the socialist sates of Asia to ensure, “Mutual protection from enemy elements.” President Zhou Enlai of China arranges the pact to be named after a one-time Western friendly city in China. The leftist nations of Vietnam, Cambodia, Burma and Laos join the Canton Pact. This pact (with the exception of the populous nation of China) is generally not one of strong nations, but is shows a solidarity of the socialist nations of Asia. A “cold war” of sorts may be beginning between the United States and China.

Event Date: 5-02-1957
Event Description: Senator Joseph McCarthy dies while at home in Appleton, Wisconsin The 48-year old Senator had recently been instrumental in passing the Kennedy Doctrine in the Senate.

[PBrunsel]

Event Date: 5-03-1957
Event Description: China detonates its first atomic bomb in the Gobi Desert. President Kennedy meets with his closest advisors to discuss the ramifications. Secretary of State James Byrnes and Secretary of Defense William Westmoreland advise a coup against the socialist Enlai government. Former President Chiang Kai-Sheik has been plotting with members of the Chinese military since he was voted out of office to overthrow Enlai. With the aide of the U.S., the greatest socialist threat to the United States could be overthrown. However, Chief of Staff John Kennedy advises the president that such a plan could risk the presidency. “I will not allow my brother to play advocate to a dictator,” Jack tells the cabinet. President Kennedy agrees with his brother, for now.

Event Date: 5-10-1957
Event Description: Malcolm Little graduates Magna Cum Lada from Harvard Law School. Known for his passionate speaking style which helped Harvard defeat its rival Yale three times for the national mock trial championship, Little is asked by law firms in Omaha, New York City, Boston, Detroit and Los Angles to come and work for them. The new prosecutor accepts a position at a Detroit based law firm. He feels as a prosecutor in a town that is becoming engrossed in juvenile delinquency, he can make a difference in brining law to a troubled area.     

Event Date: 7-15-1957
Event Description: Former President James Middleton Cox dies of a stroke at the age of 87. His final moments were at his home in Kettering, Ohio, ironically named Trail’s End. His funeral will be attended by Presidents Herbert Hoover, Douglas MacArthur, Ernest McFarland, Thomas Dewey and incumbent Joseph Kennedy. This funeral, unlike that of President Cordell Hull (a very private man who’s own death was barely covered by the newspapers), is attended by many foreign dignitaries and average citizens. President Cox, considered the last progressive Democrat, lived a quite life after leaving office in 1925. His media empire of newspapers was able to fiancé the James Middleton Cox Presidential Library in Kettering, Ohio. The president will be buried there beside his wife.   

Event Date: 7-31-1957
Event Description: President Joseph Kennedy announces that the United States, “Has tossed its hat into the arena of space.” Ever since the fall of the Third Reich in Germany, the space program there has been lagging, however, the United States has been continuing research since the late 1940s. President Kennedy unveils a massive space program for the U.S., including landing a man on the moon by the mid 1960s. In Berlin, Chancellor Albert Speer sends orders to renew the German space agency. With rockets already used for warfare, the Germans are sure they can land a man on the moon before the Americans. The space race is on.

Event Date: 8-01-1957
Event Description: President Kennedy introduces his budget for the 1958-1959 Fiscal Year. Like President McFarland in 1949, his budget is a very conservative one. Despite huge spending increases for the military, the space program and intelligence agencies (all tenants of the Kennedy Doctrine), New Day programs are cut dramatically. New lawyer Malcolm Little rages against the decision to cut the Student Loan program. “I know that Kennedy got to go through Harvard on his daddy’s dime,” Little tells his fellow lawyers at his law firm, “But not everybody is so lucky to have a governor as their dad.” Little declares that he will no longer be a registered “Independent.” He switches his allegiance to the Republican Party and hopes to seek a seat in congress as soon as he has established himself as a lawyer.

Event Date: 8-03-1957
Event Description: Speaker of the House Joe Martin tells President Kennedy in a White House meeting that most of the budget will be fine with the House of Representatives. Senator Harry Truman, the minority leader also at the meeting, explodes. “Joe, what to happened to your spine?” Truman yells, “Joe, your cuts will have to be made elsewhere!” However, if the Republican-controlled House of Representatives pass the budget the Senate, under the thumb of Senator Lyndon Johnson, will easily pass the Kennedy budget.

Event Date: 8-21-1957
Event Description: New York Yankees pitcher Fidel Castro pitches a perfect game against the Boston Red Socks, the Yankee’s sworn rival. The Cuban born athlete, when asked by reporters what he thinks of his performance, responds, “I thank God, my mother and most of all the United States of America.” The extremely patriotic response leads Ronald Reagan to call Castro, “A hero for the entire world.”

Event Date: 9-04-1957
Event Description: Governor Orville Faubus (Democrat of Arkansas) sits in his office today as registration for the new school year goes on in the capitol at Little Rock. The governor will make a speech at the registration later today for new students. One of the students, Jefferson Thomas, is especially impressed by the more progressive Southern Democratic Governor Faubus. He tells his parents that night he’d like to be governor one day, “Just like Mr. Faubus. He’s a great man.” The Thomas Family, a poor family who has been helped by the governor’s unemployment aide policies, has a lot of respect for Faubus. 

Event Date: 10-02-1957
Event Description: With the greatest aviation hero of the Japanese-American War sitting in the White House, several movies based on that war come out this year. Today, The Last at Taierzhuang premiers. Commemorating the Second Battle of Taierzhuang, the film stars Cary Grant as Commander Patrick Sears, a hero of the battle, with Claude Rains as Dwight D. Eisenhower, Harold Goodwin as naval aviator Joseph P. Kennedy, and Karl Malden as the foul mouthed commander, Colonel George Patton. The film is a hit, winning the Academy Award for Best Picture. At the White House, President Kennedy and his family are given a private viewing of the film. “Excellent!” Kennedy exclaims, “But the kid playing me is far too handsome to play that role!”

Event Date: 10-22-1957
Event Description: Colonel Hank Kramer, who has been working as a “mole” for the CIA in Peking, meets with Secretary of Defense Westmoreland. He informs him that former Chinese President Chiang Kai-Sheik is planning a revolt against the government of China. Secretary Westmoreland informs Kramer that his rebellion will have to wait until the president is “convinced” of the importance of overthrowing the left-winged Enlai Government. The opportunity may be approaching.

Event Date: 11-03-1957
Event Descrioption: The Germans send the first animal into space. A dog named Otto enjoys the privilege of being first canine to experience zero gravity. As if to slight the Americans (who will in a few weeks put the first ape, one named Bonzo, into space), Chancellor Speer gives the dog to President Kennedy as a gift. The American-German space race is hotter than ever.

Event Date: 12-09-1957
Event Description: The House of Representatives approves of the Kennedy budget by the bare minimum of votes necessary. The Senate will also pass the act, over the loud objections of Senator Truman. The New Day has been gutted to make way for military spending hikes as well as an end to former President Dewey’s taxes on cigarettes and alcohol. President Kennedy hopes to cut taxes even more in 1958, and with the Congress very complaint towards his will in 1957, he sees no reason why it won’t be in 1958. 

Event Date: 12-19-1957
Event Description: Former President Herbert Hoover attends the opening of Meredith Wilson’s The Music Man. The story revolves around a small Iowan town, and to Hoover, it just seemed to great a play to miss.

[PBrunsel]

Event Date: 1-09-1958
Event Description: On his seventh birthday, Rudolf Freidrich Braun, the son of Adolf and Eva Hitler, enters St. Augustine School in Argentina. Being of great intelligence, the young Rudolf has learned enough Spanish in a monastery to finally enter school. However, no one is aware that the boy is the son of Adolf Hitler. In an event relating to school, Detroit attorney Malcolm Little wins a much publicized trial, defending the right of three undocumented Lebanese immigrant children to attend Henry Ford Intermediate Middle School. “No human being is illegal,” Little argues in his closing statement. The young attorney’s victory seems to assure that all American children, legally in the country or not, will be able to attend public schools. However, Senator Strom Thurmond (Democrat of South Carolina) views this ruling as one inviting open border anarchy, and begins writing a bill concerning the rights of illegal immigrants.

Event Date: 1-18-1958
Event Description: Senator Thurmond introduces the Immigration Reform Act of 1958. Under this act, all undocumented citizens in the United States would be unable to receive any government benefits, including Social Security, public welfare benefits, driver’s licenses, and even library cards. “This is bigotry, plain and simple!” the ever blunt Senate Minority Leader Harry Truman comments, “You can paint it as ‘the only way to make immigration fair’ or whatever you like, but bigotry is bigotry, no matter what color it is!” The passion of Senator Truman is matched by such public figures as Dr. Martin Luther King, Junior, attorney Malcolm Little, and former President Thomas Dewey. However, several leading Republicans, such as California’s Senators William Knowland and Richard Nixon, have signed onto the bill. The fact that a large number of California voters support immigration reform may have something to do with that…but just maybe, of course.

Event Date: 1-21-1958Event Description: With President Kennedy throwing his support behind the Immigration Reform Act, it passes in the Senate. The debate grew heated; however, so much that Ronald Reagan worried “That Truman and Thurmond would throw down and come to blows!” Truman openly accused Thurmond of, “Openly using immigrants as tools in a game to win votes for the midterms.” Thurmond declares that he wants order on the border and that Truman’s attacks are “completely insane. Perhaps his Missouri manure manners need to return to the Show Me State.” “If you can’t stand the heat, Senator Thurmond,” Truman responds, “You better stay out of the kitchen. Maybe you should return to a place where you don’t get a contrary opinion, probably South Carolina.”

Event Date: 1-22-1958
Event Description: The Immigration Reform Act is stalled in the House of Representatives. Speaker Martin, appalled by the New Day cuts he was forced to accept for the budget, arranges enough Republicans and Democrats to oppose the bill. “We will not falter when it comes to the rights of Americans, no matter where they may come from,” Speaker Martin tells the press. President Kennedy decides its time to take matters into his own hands. He meets with the Democrats who have sided against the bill, led by Representative Byron Rogers (Democrat of Colorado), in the Oval Office. “You know this is an election year,” he reminds them all, “If you want me to swing by your districts, you better vote for this act.” Chief of Staff John Kennedy calls over 50 congressmen that night, promising them of future favors and reminding them of the power of the presidency.

Event Date: 1-23-1958
Event Description: The Immigration Reform Act of 1958 passes in the House of Representatives. Despite mass protests outside of Congress by Dr. Martin Luther King, Junior, and the NAACP, enough Democrats keep in the party line to pass the act. President Kennedy signs the act as protesters picket the White House. “This is a sad day for America,” Dr. King tells a crowd of NAACP members; “I can only hope this mistake is one day reversed.” President Kennedy declares that this act will “Make our nation’s taxpayers fell safer. We now know that our hard earned dollars are going to legal American citizens and those who entered our country legally.”

Event Date: 2-01-1958
Event Description: The government of Syria is overthrown by British venture capitalists. President Shukri al-Quwatli of Syria was viewed as too anti-Israel by the pro-Israel government in Egypt. The new Syrian Government will not be friendly towards Israel, but it also will not be belligerent towards the Jewish state. President Kennedy applauds the new government as, “One which will help cement a lasting peace in one of our world’s most important regions.”

Event Date: 3-27-1958
Event Description: President Alexander Kerensky announces his resignation from office. The 77-year old Kerensky is suffering from heart trouble and an infection caused by a gash in his knee inflicted while he was ice skating on Christmas Day. The Russian Federation will have to be lead by a new man, Vice-President Leonid Brezhnev. A war hero during the Second Great War, Brezhnev declares in his acceptance address from the Kremlin, “The memory of Alexander Kerensky will live on in my administration. I will remember the lessons of his leadership.” Mayor of Moscow Nikita Khrushchev is not impressed. He will undoubtedly be the nominee of the Social Democratic Party to oppose Brezhnev in nest year’s election.

Event Date: 5-03-1958
Event Description: President Kennedy sings the most massive tax cut in American history. Senator Frank Lausche (Democrat of Ohio) and Representative Carter Glass, Junior (Democrat of Virginia) introduced the Lausche-Glass Tax Act. Those making more than $25,000 a year will be given large tax refunds and have a major cut in the Income Tax percentage. Though the wealthy will benefit the most, for they pay the most taxes, the middle class will benefit as well. President Kennedy has an approval rating of more than 60% in the latest Gallup Poll.

Event Date: 6-07-1958
Event Description: The Democratic Primary for Governor of Arkansas is held. Incumbent Governor Orval Faubus loses to Representative William J. Trimble. The progressive reforms of Governor Faubus were seen as too “liberal” for the conservative state. In Alabama, Judge George Wallace (a somewhat progressive running on the issue of immigration) narrowly defeats State Attorney General John Patterson in the Democratic Primary. Both Wallace and Trimble will be elected in November, but Governor Wallace will begin forming a “New South” coalition of more liberal Southern Democrats.

Event Date: 8-10-1958
Event Description: Ronald Reagan, a life long Democrat, endorses Senator William Knowland for Governor of California. His opponent, Attorney General Edmund “Pat” Brown, is seen as too liberal by Reagan, who calls Brown, “Moonbeam Brown”. Brown has opposed the Immigration Reform Act, whereas Knowland supported the measure. The Reagan endorsement is seen as a big boost for the Knowland campaign.

Event Date: 11-08-1958
Event Description: The Democratic Party makes gains in the Congressional elections, an oddity for politics where the incumbent party gains seats. The Democrats gain three seats in the Senate and twelve in the House of Representatives, taking the House of Representatives for the first tike since 1951.In California, William Knowland is elected Governor, defeating Pat Brown. He begins to once again eye the White House.  President Kennedy has been given a clear mandate for his conservative polices.         

[Lief 🗽]

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Haha, that's awesome.

Great update, as usual.

[Robespierre's Jaw]

Continues to be very good PBrunsel, as always . May I ask did the Suez Canal Crisis occur in this TL? I would assume that President Dewey would have been like RL President Eisenhower on the issue. I wonder if Governor Knowland will run for the White House in either 1960 or 1964. It should be very interesting indeed. I cannot wait to see the 1960 Presidential Election, hopefully President Kennedy loses to a good Republican!

[PBrunsel]

Event Date: 1-01-1959
Event Description: Fulgencio Batista sits in his Presidential Palace in Havana, Cuba and lights a cigar to celebrate the New Year. He is corrupt and comfortable, but with Che Guevara and his rebels (or rabble as Ronald Reagan has called them) dead and buried, he has no threat against him. The mafia is bankrolling his Havana casinos, and American tourists are pouring the money into his island.

Event Date: 1-02-1959
Event Description: NBC announces that it will begin a nightly news program. The lead anchorman will be famed radio caster Ronald Reagan. “The Voice of the Nation” will host his show during the day and be anchorman for one hour every night. “I promise a news broadcast free of bias,” Reagan tells the press as he accepts the honor of being the first NBC Nightly News anchor. History will show Reagan will run a professional and unbiased news program.

Event Date: 1-03-1959
Event Description: Alaska is admitted to the Union as the 49th state. President Kennedy is instrumental in filling the governorship, two senate seats and at-large congress seat with pro-drilling and pro-business Democrats. 

Event Date: 2-06-1959
Event Description: The United States rocketry program produces the first Titan-grade ballistic missile. This powerful rocket-based weapon is a slap in the face to the Germans, who have cornered the rocket industry since the 1940s. Chancellor Albert Speer responds to the news by scoffing at, “The American’s new toy.” In reality, Speer is scared witless by the rocket, and begins to pressure the German Reichstag to give more funding to the German rocket program.

Event Date: 2-22-1959Event Description: Germany launches the first weather satellite, Sturmauge. Chancellor Albert Speer declares this a major victory in the space race. “Our nation will serve as the lighthouse of the world,” Speer announces in a television address, “We will find the storms and warn the people of Earth.” President Kennedy is greatly surprised by the advanced weather satellite. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Director William Pickering, Kennedy’s own selection, assures the president that the United States’ own weather satellite, Vanguard II, will be just as advanced. It will be launched in two days, raining on the German’s parade.

Event Date: 3-04-1959
Event Description: President Joseph Kennedy speaks at a meeting of Evangelical Christians in Colorado Springs, Colorado. With Senator Absalom W. Robertson (Democrat of Virginia) and his son Pat standing beside him, President Kennedy extols the virtues of morality and attacks the, “Dangerous works of rock-and-roll and beatnik literature. This type of ‘art’ is causing a wave of juvenile delinquency, and must be curved to save our nation’s young people from a path to ruin.” The speech goes over well in Colorado Springs, but the Beatniks of San Francisco and New York, as well as the rock-and-rollers in Nashville feel that President Kennedy has morphed their art into something it is not.

Event Date: 3-18-1959
Event Description:  Beatnik poet Allen Ginsberg announces that the “community of beats” will meet together from May 5th to May 10th, 1960, in Bethel, New York, to read poetry, listen to folk songs, and, “spread the word of peace, understanding, social justice, and free love.” Called “Woodstock” by several beats, Ginsberg felt such a meeting is necessary for Americans to see the error of President Kennedy’s speech in Colorado. Senator Robertson calls this “Woodstock”, “A meeting of our nation’s laziest, craziest and smelliest citizens. The very idea of all those ‘beatniks’ meeting in once place should disgust all good parents. I only fear that Bethel, New York, will experience a decline in property values because the stench of all those unwashed hooligans will certainly have an effect.”

Event Date: 4-02-1959
Event Description: Nikita Khrushchev, the Mayor of Moscow and the nominee of the Social Democrat Party, is elected President of the Russian Federation. President Leonid Brezhnev, the nominee of the National Party, is defeated for reelection, due manly to an economic downturn which has been haunting Russia since the early 1950s. Khrushchev promises a more worker friendly government, scaring the heck out of President Kennedy and his administration. With China and Russia under socialist governments, more than 1/4th of the world’s land area is under leftist rule.

Event Date: 4-12-1959
Event Description: Vice-President Stuart Symington becomes the first American Vice-President to enter the Kremlin. Meeting with newly inaugurated President Nikita Khrushchev, Symington assures the Russian leader that the United States has no interest in interfering with Russian or Chinese government affairs. Khrushchev tells Symington that the Russian Federation and the Chinese Republic do not get along well at all. “Why don’t you try to get involved with Chinese affairs then?” Symington asks Nikita. “Are you mad?”  Khrushchev yells, “That could start a brutal war. The Chinese are so numerous that they would bury us!” The meeting goes well after that, with Khrushchev singing a trade agreement with the United States. Also, President Kennedy is signed on to visit the Kremlin before 1961.

Event Description: 5-01-1959
Event Description: Arriving on Mat Day, Vice-President Symington meets with President Zhou Enlai in Peking, China. A veteran of the Japanese-American War, Symington is given a hero’s welcome into the ancient city. Symington gives Enlai the same assurance he gave Khrushchev on April 12th, the United States will not intervene in Chinese governmental affairs. However, Enlai realizes that there are already American spies throughout the capitol city, his own government agencies have assured him of that fact. He tries to get Symington to swear that there will be no attempts to influence the upcoming Chinese President Election, but Symington can not promise that. “You need to talk to Kennedy,” he tells President Enlai. The Chinese leader tells Symington he has nothing to say to the leader of the free world.

Event Description: 5-03-1959
Event Description: Despite attempts by American agents to influence the election through voter fraud, President Zhou Enlai is reelected President of China. He and his Chinese Worker’s Party win 63% of the vote against former President Chiang Kai-Sheik and the National Party opposition. Kai-Sheik takes only 32% of the vote with scattered third parties winning the remaining votes. It appears that the people of China want the government of Enlai, even if most of the west does not.

[PBrunsel]

Event Date: 6-06-1959
Event Description: Emit Till graduates from high school in Chicago. He is now off to the University of Indiana to study business management. He hopes to one day be a business owner.

Event Date: 7-01-1959
Event Description: A failed car jacking in Queens, New York City, leads to a near riot as angry Latino youths of that area of New York City begin to break windows, vandalize loot stores and commit arson and muggings. The police are able to subdue the mob in a few hours, but more than $16 million in property damage has been wrought. Mayor Robert F. Wagner (Democrat) declares that the Congress needs to pass a tough new law against juvenile delinquency. “Our nation’s lawgivers must protect the law-abiding people of America,” Mayor Wagner lectures in a televised press conference. President Kennedy immediately gets to work on a juvenile crime law.    

Event Date: 7-04-1959
Event Description: President Kennedy addresses the nation on the issue of gang violence. “Our nation is experiencing a rise in juvenile crime that has not been seen in our proud 183 year history,” President Kennedy tells the nation in an Independence Day address, “To stop this fall into an abyss of crime, tough new laws must be made.” The president outlines a policy that includes minimum prison time increases, beefed up numbers of national patrolmen and a zero tolerance policy towards theft. “These laws may seem harsh or Draconian,” Kennedy ends his speech with, “But as your president, I have committed myself to protecting my nation from all enemies, foreign and domestic. I will be the protector of my nation’s citizens, and I hope the Congress feels the same way. Good night and God bless America.”

Event Date: 8-01-1959
Event Description: With Congress back from a brief summer break, Senator Barry Goldwater (Democrat of Arizona) introduces the Respect for the Law Act. Everything President Kennedy demanded in his July 4th address is included in this bill. Senate Minority Leader Harry Truman tells the Senate that, “Throwing a kid in jail won’t correct that kid completely. When he is let out of jail, the child of a Mexican immigrant in Kansas City will return to a neighborhood filled with poverty and hopelessness, leading the kid back to crime.” Truman calls for more federal aide to heavily Latino neighborhoods, but Senate Majority Leader Johnson ignores this petition. The Democratic Congress will easily pass this new crime act, and overtime the rise in juvenile crime will fall. “President Kennedy,” Ronald Reagan declares the night the crime bill is signed, “Is not just a great president, he is a great human being.”    

Event Date: 8-21-1959
Event Description: Hawaii is admitted as the 50th state. President Kennedy can not influence Hawaii as well as he did Alaska. State Senate President Hiram Fong, a progressive Republican, is elected one of the two new senators. Fong vows to fight for civil rights and expanded opportunities for minorities.  

Event Date: 9-13-1959
Event Description: Senator Prescott Bush (Republican of Connecticut) is approached in his office by several Republican businessmen, and most importantly former President Thomas Dewey. “Senator Bush,” President Dewey tells him, “We don’t like Knowland over in California. He doesn’t share the Republican values of social equality and moderation, like you do.” President Dewey asks Senator Bush to run for president in 1960. The Senator discusses a possible run for president with his wife Dorothy and his sons Prescott, Junior, and George Bush. George, a navy veteran who is going to run for Congress in Connecticut in 1960, tells his father to go for it. “You might not beat Joe Kennedy,” George tells his dad, “But you’d give him way more of a fight than Knowland.” Bush calls Dewey up the next day and tells him that he’s in the race.

Event Date: 10-02-1959
Event Description: The Twilight Zone premiers on CBS. Rod Serling, a dark writer, comic and television producer, declares this show, “Will take the problems of today, and morph them into things strange and absurd. Perhaps by seeing the most extreme and grotesque will lead those in the real world to perhaps see our real problems as things easier to handle.” President Kennedy, not a big television watcher by any means, will make watching The Twilight Zone a weekly priority.

Event Date: 10-31-1959
Event Description: An assassination attempt on Cuban President Fulgencio Batista is thwarted by the president’s massive secret service protection. The assassin, a former American marine and Communist sympathizer Lee Harvey Oswald, is captured and executed within three hours. The iron-fisted rein of President Batista continues on the isle of Cuba.

Event Date: 10-25-1959
Event Description: On Christmas Day, the United States spacecraft Liberty 9 takes pictures of the far-side of the Moon, beating the Germans who have tried to send their own ship Luna to the Moon, but failed. “This Christmas gift is one of the finest God could have given us,” President Kennedy tells the nation in an address from his home in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, “America is leading the exploration of space because of our ingenuity and work ethic.”

[PBrunsel]

Event Date: 1-03-1960
Event Description: Governor William Knowland (Republican of California) declares his candidacy for President of the United States. “I am running for president to save the Republican Party and the nation from oblivion,” Governor Knowland declares, “The oblivion of debt, desolation and depression. President Kennedy is leading us into this fate through his massive spending on the military, while President Dewey led our nation into this fate through his massive social spending. I want to be the president who balances the budget without cutting the needs of our military and most needy.” Herb Block, the famed political cartoonist, draws a cartoon the next day, honoring the hit musical Camelot, showing Governor Knowland dressed as a knight trying to balance the budget and still keep spending for the military up. The Governor sings, “The impossible dream.”

Event Date: 2-01-1960
Event Description: Dr. Martin Luther King, Junior, begins his travel through the American Southwest. He wants to see the sort of living conditions that the migrant immigrant workers experience. What he will find is squalor and inequality. The crusade against poverty has begun for Dr. King.

Event Date: 3-10-1960
Event Description: The New Hampshire Primary is held. While President Kennedy faces no serious opposition, the Republican Primary is a close one. Massachusetts Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, who barely survived reelection in 1958, narrowly defeats Senator Prescott Bush, New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller, and Governor William Knowland. Lodge and Bush finish first and second with 31 and 30% of the vote, with the rest getting the remainder of the votes. Senator Bush, who was hoping on victory in this important primary, hopes that this defeat won’t doom his candidacy.

Event Date: 4-07-1960
Event Description: Prescott Bush and William Knowland battle to a photo finish in the Wisconsin Primary, but Bush is the winner in a narrow victory. Also today, President Kennedy’s wife Evelyn gives birth to a son, Patrick Phillip Kennedy. The 1960 Campaign with an infant may well be a way for President Kennedy to appeal even more to family values voters. Bush, who is a model family man, benefits from this image far more than any of the other Republican hopefuls.

Event Date: 4-14-1960
Event Description: Nelson Rockefeller wins the Illinois Primary, barely finishing ahead of Governor Knowland. Prescott Bush finishes a disappointing third, while Henry Lodge finishes a distant fourth. This victory for Rockefeller can be credited with a last second endorsement from Senator Everett Dirksen, known as the “Wizard of Ooz” for his soothing oratory. The GOP Primary is still up in the air.

Event Date: 4-21-1960
Event Description: Governor Rockefeller uses a somewhat home state advantage to win the New Jersey Primary. Senator Bush finishes second once again, and is still strong in the primary. Governor Knowland pins his hopes for the nomination on a big win in the Texas Primary on May 5th, 1960.

Event Date: 4-28-1960
Event Description: Senator Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts wins an easy victory in his home state primary, but still takes only 67% of the vote. He finishes a distant fourth in the Pennsylvania Primary, which Senator Prescott Bush was able to narrowly win over Governor Rockefeller. Senator Hugh Scott (Republican of Pennsylvania) had endorsed Bush the week before the primary, helping him in his get out the vote on primary day. Lodge’s last place finish in a moderate Eastern state seems to doom his campaign. He vows to stay in the race until the Ohio and Indiana Primaries on May 5th, 1960.

Event Date: 5-03-1960
Event Description: Governor Knowland wins big in the Texas Primary. His anti-illegal immigration and pro-oil companies’ campaign caught on with the conservative voters in the Lone Star State. Senator Prescott Bush hits it off with the bakers in Texas and finishes a distant second. Texas, a reliable Democratic state, is not important to most Republicans besides Knowland.

Event Date: 5-04-1960
Event Description: Popular Ohio State Auditor James Rhodes endorses Senator Prescott Bush for President. With the Ohio Primary only a day away, this endorsement will help him greatly. Bush’s pro-business and pro-civil rights campaign is catching fire in the Buckeye State.   

Event Date: 5-05-1960
Event Description: Senator Bush wins the Ohio Primary by a wide margin, with Governor Rockefeller taking second and Governor Knowland coming in third. In Indiana, Knowland wins with Bush taking second. Senator Henry Lodge finishes fourth in both states, and drops out of the race. “It seems as if the best way I can serve my country is to remain in the Senate,” Lodge tells his supporters that night as he drops out of the race, “I am perfectly happy with that as well.” He shouldn’t get too comfortable, however. With no candidate leading in the delegate count, he may be drafted into the nomination at the Republican Convention.

Also today, Woodstock begins. Beatniks meet from the all over the world to spread a message of peace and free love. President Kennedy calls them, “Hoodlums.” The meeting goers on for five days, with drugs being used but no real trouble. 

Event Date: 5-12-1960
Event Description: The race for the GOP Presidential nomination remains a toss-up as Governor Knowland wins the Nebraska Primary, as he did in 1952, and the West Virginia Primary. Knowland has momentum, but lacks in money and organization, which Bush and Rockefeller have no shortage in.

Event Date: 5-13-1960
Event Description: In a candidate debate before the Oregon Primary, Governor Knowland makes a gaffe he will not be able to live down. When asked how he would deal with China if it tried to invade a territory, Tibet, with its newly expanded military. “As president I would not allow a socialist power to attack any nation,” Knowland responds, “I would declare a police action and stop China immediately.” “Even if that means an atomic war?” the moderator asks, somewhat surprised by the response. “If that’s what it takes to stop them,” is the Governor’s firm response. “Bill, you support an atomic war?” Senator Bush says, somewhat smirking at the gaffe. “Well…um…maybe..,” is all Knowland can spurt out. The gaffe is spinned by the media and by Rockefeller and Bush very skillfully. Governor Knowland will not recover.

Event Date: 5-14-1960
Event Description: Governor Rockefeller wins the Oregon Primary by a slim margin over Senator Bush. Rockefeller takes 38% to Bush’s 34% and Knowland’s 18%. Senator Wayne Morse, a favorite son candidate, takes 10%. His gaffe in yesterday’s debate took Knowland from a possible candidate to a hopeless also-ran.

Event Date: 5-19-1960
Event Description: Governor Rockefeller wins the Maryland by a big margin over Senator Bush. Rockefeller seems to have established himself as the front-runner for the nomination; however, he does not have enough delegates to clinch the nomination. Bush could still be the nominee or Knowland for that matter, if the GOP convention is one with no favorite going into.

[PBrunsel]

Event Date: 5-20-1960
Event Description: Governor Knowland declares that if he doesn’t finish at least second in Florida on May 26th, he will drop out of the race. He begins to pour his remaining funds into the Sunshine State, but with the momentum going against him, this seems like a last stand for the California governor.

Event Date: 5-26-1960
Event Description: Senator Bush takes the Florida Primary in an upset. Governor Knowland had spent the last of his money on the race, but still could only finish second. “We fought hard but in the end could not overtake the establishment in the Republican Party,” Knowland tells his supporters that night, “However; I know that we can make a difference there and reclaim this party for the taxpayer! It’s onto California and South Dakota, my friends

Event Date: 6-02-1960
Event Description: Governor Knowland wins California and South Dakota by big margins. The GOP Convention in July will be one width no candidate already selected.

Event Date: 7-12-1960
Event Description: The Republican Convention opens in Chicago, Illinois. “Republicans are going to compete for the singular honor of being creamed in the general election by President Kennedy,” Ronald Reagan jokes as the convention opens. Reagan is speaking sense, as the most recent Gallup Poll has President Kennedy at a 61% approval rating and leading all three Republicans by more than 10-points. Former President Herbert Hoover, old ailing after a fall in the bathtub a few days before, tells the convention, “Folks, unless God has some crazy plan, this’ll be it for me.” In his speech, President Hoover calls for a quick selection of a candidate. “It is imperative we get Kennedy and his crew out of the White House,” Hoover tells the convention, “We have to save the New Deal, the New Day and our nation!” Former President Thomas Dewey is doing major politicking for Senator Prescott Bush. Dewey feels Governor Rockefeller, a protégé of his, is making a huge mistake trying to take on the popular President Kennedy. “Rocky”, when told this by Dewey, laughs and tells him, “Tom, I don’t fear Joey Kennedy any more than I’d fear a tomcat.” “In that case Rockefeller,” Dewey warns him, “Kennedy is a tomcat with saber-tooth tiger teeth.” The first day of balloting has no clear front-runner. Bush and Rockefeller trade places as the first place leader, with Governor Knowland finishing consistently third.

Event Date: 7-13-1960
Event Description: Former Secretary of Defense Dwight Eisenhower takes the floor at the GOP Convention. “Our party stands for those in the world who seek peace,” Ike tells the cheering convention, “We must take the White House in 1960, and the peace of the world depends upon it.” Eisenhower views the Kennedy Administration as belligerent and claims they are, “Hungering for a fight with China and the rest of Southeast Asia.” The likable Ike, complete with a voice that sounds like Clark Gable behind a microphone, is seen as a possible compromise choice for president, and many Midwestern delegates begin to chant, “We like Ike!” However, after coming in third and fourth on the 17th and 18th ballots, Eisenhower disavows any interest in the nomination. “I refuse to seek any office from dog catcher to Grand High Supreme Lord of the Universe!” the rye Ike tells convention chairman Senator Everett Dirksen. There is still no front-runner for the nomination.

Event Date: 7-14-1960
Event Description: Senator Richard Nixon meets with Governor William Knowland, his old senate colleague, in his hotel room. “Bill,” Nixon tells Knowland, “You can’t win this nomination. It’s best that you call a spade and spade and just admit that you’re beat. It will help the party and the nation.” With his colleague Senator Nixon telling him that there is no chance for him to be the nominee, Knowland releases his delegates. The Knowland delegates, generally conservative, attach themselves to the pro-business Senator Bush. By the 29th ballot, Senator Bush has the nomination. “The great ballot battle is over,” Ronald Reagan reports, “The GOP Convention has shown what a great theatre democracy can be.” Senator Bush’s choice for Vice-President is, ironically, left to the convention. After three ballots, Senator Roman Hruska (Republican of Nebraska) is selected as the Vice-Presidential nominee. The progressive entrepreneur Senator Prescott Bush and the industrious conservative Senator Hruska enter the campaign with a great deal of work to do, trailing Kennedy-Symington by a margin of 57-39% in the latest Gallup Polls.

Event Date: 7-25-1960
Event Description: The Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles, California, renominates President Joseph P. Kennedy, Junior, and Vice-President Stuart Symington by acclamation. “The economy is booming, the nation’s military is strong and the Republicans only offer a return to tax-and-spend,” Vice-President Symington proclaims, “This nation must reelect President Kennedy to keep this nation safe and prosperous.”

Event Date: 8-06-1960
Event Date: Aviator Francis Gary Powers becomes the first man to enter space. The Germans have been beaten into space again, much to the chagrin of Chancellor Speer. These defeats in the Space Race, as the rush to the stars between the U.S. and Germany is now called by the press, are leading to Speer’s Conservative Party to lose much popularity in Germany. Willy Brandt, the leader of the German Labor Party, looks forward to the September Reichstag elections. In the U.S., however, popular President Kennedy is given another boost in the polls.

[PBrunsel]

Event Date: 8-11-1960
Event Description: Senator Prescott Bush calls for a “War on Illness” in a campaign speech in Los Angeles, California. “I’m rich, and so is President Kennedy,” Bush tells the crowd, “We can afford health care, but how about you?” He outlines a plan, while not universal healthcare like in Great Britain or France, covers nearly all middle class and working poor people in America. President Kennedy calls this plan, “Socialism right out of the playbook of Lenin.” This plan will require major tax increases, and that scares off many in the middle class who may have otherwise supported Bush’s health care plan.

Event Date: 9-01-1960
Event Description: Author Harper Lee, actually Nelle Harper Lee, publishes To Kill a Mockingbird. This book describes the vicious way mentally retarded people are treated in most of the United States. In the book, Arthur “Boo” Radley is a mentally retarded man accused of raping a young girl. Attorney Atticus Finch is able to not just clear the name of Mr. Radley, but find the real rapist and show the town of Mayfield, Alabama, that Boo is not a monster, but a person who was trying to defend the girl, Mayella Ewell, from her abusive father Robert Edward Lee Ewell. The book is a bestseller and will be made into a feature film in 1961.

Event Date: 9-08-1960
Event Description: Senator Roman Hruska addresses a rally of farmer’s in Wichita, Kansas. With former Vice-President Edward Arn standing at his side, Hruska calls President Kennedy a liar. “He promised you farm relief, but none has come to you,” Hruska reminds them; “He didn’t help you, why should you help him?” A few days later, Vice-President Symington will visit Wichita…during a rainstorm. “President Kennedy didn’t give you direct aide,” Symington tells a crowd, “But he could get you rain!” 

Event Date: 9-22-1960
Event Description: Willy Brandt’s Labor Party wins a massive victory in the Reichstag Elections in Germany. Though not socialist, Brandt’s party is more left-winged than Chancellor Speer’s Conservatives by a long shot. President Kennedy begins to fear an alliance between Russia and Germany, but with the two nations never liking each other, the odds of this seem very remote.

Event Date: 10-21-1960
Event Description: President Kennedy and Senator Bush meet at NBC studios in New York City in the only televised debate of the 1960 Presidential Election. The debate moderator, NBC Nightly News anchor Ronald Reagan, is a Kennedy supporter, but very fair and balanced. He asks tough questions to both candidates, and regains the respect of many who began to doubt his seriousness as a newsman during his anti-Dewey rants in the 1950s. President Kennedy consistently points out the economic growth of his presidency. “You have built prosperity by throwing the needy into poverty,” Bush accuses President Kennedy, “I love making money and low taxes, but I also have a heart for those who are the neediest, Mr. President.” “Rich men like you and I can afford to have ‘big hearts’,” President Kennedy reminds Bush, “However, the middle class may not be so lucky to have big pockets as well as hearts.” The line wins the night, with even Bush chuckling at the little joke.

Event Date: 11-08-1960
Event Description: The presidential election is a referendum on the economic prosperity of President Kennedy, and so the election is a landslide for the president. Despite Senator Bush and his running-mate Senator Hruska running an aggressive campaign focusing on reforming the budget to ensure the continuation of Dewey’s New Day policies, times are too good for Americans to vote out the president who gave them prosperity.

Joseph Kennedy/Stuart Symington (D): 441 EV; 59/9% of the PV
Prescott Bush/Roman Hruska (R): 96 EV; 39.8% of the PV
Others (Prohibition, Socialist Labor, etc.): 0 EV; 0.3% of the PV

The Democrats cement their numbers in the House and the Senate. It looms like clear sailing for Kennedy’s second term.                   

[Lief 🗽]

Wow, I can't believe you had me rooting for a Bush.

[HappyWarrior]

Wow, I can't believe you had me rooting for a Bush.

Me too, especially againest a Kennedy.  Shows how good a story teller you are.  I like Symington though, even if I do hate Kennedy.

[Robespierre's Jaw]

Continues to be a very good read PBrunsel. I'm rooting for Nelson Rockefeller in 1964! That's if he runs in '64, I hope he does . Also, what's Nixon doing in this TL?

[Хahar 🤔]

Event Date: 4-02-1959
Event Description: Nikita Khrushchev, the Mayor of Moscow and the nominee of the Social Democrat Party, is elected President of the Russian Federation. President Leonid Brezhnev, the nominee of the National Party, is defeated for reelection, due manly to an economic downturn which has been haunting Russia since the early 1950s.

Brezhnev was Khrushchev's protégé.

[PBrunsel]

Brezhnev was Khrushchev's protégé.

Well, a slight change in history could change that. After all, Brezhnev had tied himself to President Kerensky while Khrushchev opposed the Kerensky Government. With no Communism in Russia, the affects can be felt.

Also, Khrushchev was far too good a charecter to leave out another minute.