TL-191: Filling the Gaps

[Nivek]

IIRC McSweeney was mentioned in one of the books to be from a farm in Nebraska.

I knew he was a midwestern, not his specific state, well at least there a notorius nebraskan in TL191.

Established: July 14, 1944
Disbanded: January 1, 1947

That was fast, did Fidel Castro and co moved quick to be accepted as state or going their way when the Dixie Ship sank?

 

[Zoidberg12]

That was fast, did Fidel Castro and co moved quick to be accepted as state or going their way when the Dixie Ship sank?

Well, Cuba was a hot-bed of anti-Confederate and anti-Freedomite sentiment during GWII, so it only makes sense that the state would be admitted into the union somewhat quickly.

 

[Nivek]

Well, Cuba was a hot-bed of anti-Confederate and anti-Freedomite sentiment during GWII, so it only makes sense that the state would be admitted into the union somewhat quickly.

That was pretty true and canon, seems they were unable to grasp control over goverment and abandon ship over like the texans but they got quickly a functional goverment nice.

 

[rob2001]

I thought Morrell made his Headquaters for the Atlantic military district in Atlanta. That's what was in the last book.

 

[bguy]

I knew he was a midwestern, not his specific state, well at least there a notorius nebraskan in TL191.

Upon rechecking the books I can't find anywhere where McSweeney identifies his home state, so it appears I was incorrect about him being from Nebraska.

 

[Zoidberg12]

That was pretty true and canon, seems they were unable to grasp control over goverment and abandon ship over like the texans but they got quickly a functional goverment nice.

Seems like a good consensus to me.

All in all, it seems that the majority of Cubans, both white and (especially) black, hated the CSA so much that they were more than happy to be a part of the USA and have some measure of stability. I imagine that IITL Cuban separatism is, by 2016, mostly irrelevant, much like Puerto Rican separatism IOTL 2016.

 

[Zoidberg12]

These are my thoughts on the treaty that ended the Second Great War in Europe. This is loosely based on the treaty that was described in Timeline-191: After the End, but with a number of changes and rewording.

The Treaty of Aachen

The day was Friday, August 11th, 1944. The Second Great War, the most deadly and terrible war in all of human history, was finally over after three long years. The Confederate States of America, Great Britain, France and Russia, the four main Entente Powers of the Second Great War, were all but defeated. It was on this date that delegates from the victorious and mostly European Central Powers/Quadruple Alliance, the United States of America, Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire, Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Ireland, Norway, Denmark, Poland, Ukraine, Belarus, Finland, Lithuania, Lativa, Estonia and Livonia, meet with the delegates of the defeated European Entente Powers, Great Britain, France [1] and Russia, in the ancient German spa town of Aachen (traditionally known in English and French as Aix-la-Chapelle), a town right on the border with the Netherlands. The Treaty of Aachen, not to be confused with the treaty that ended the War of Devolution in 1668 or the treaty that ended the War of the Austrian Succession in 1748, would formally mark the surrender of the European Entente Powers to the Central Powers/Quadruple Alliance.

The terms of the Treaty of Aachen were as follows:

• The Entente Powers are to recognize of the United States of America's occupation of the erstwhile Confederate States of America and the erstwhile Dominion of Canada.
• The Entente Powers are to recognize Germany’s occupation of Belgium, with King Leopold III still on the Belgian throne [2].
• Germany is to occupy northwestern France for a period of no less than twenty years, an occupation to be over by Tuesday, August 11, 1964.
• France hands over French West Africa, French Equatorial Africa and Madagascar to Germany.
• France hands over territory disputed with the Dutch in French Guiana to Dutch Surinam.
• France hands over French Saint-Martin to Dutch Sint Maarten.
• France hands over its colonies in the West Indies, French Guiana, French Polynesia and Clipperton Island to the United States of America.
• France is forced to grant independence to Morocco.
• Great Britain hands over the Bechuanaland Protectorate, the Nyasaland Protectorate, Sierra Leone, the Gold Coast and Gambia to Germany.
• Great Britain hands over British Somaliland to neutral Italy.
• Great Britain hands over the Sinai Peninsula to the Ottoman Empire.
• Great Britain hands over territory disputed with the Dutch in British Guyana to Dutch Surinam.
• Great Britain hands over Gibraltar to neutral Spain.
• Great Britain hands over Malta to Austria-Hungary.
• Great Britain is forced to hand over the Suez Canal to Germany and an international occupation force of the Central Powers nations of Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire and the neutral European powers of Italy, Spain, Portugal and Greece.
• Great Britain hands over its colonies in the West Indies, British Honduras, British Guyana, the Gilbert Islands and the Pitcairn Islands to the United States of America.
• Great Britain is forced to peacefully and gradually abandon the Indian subcontinent by January 1, 1950.
• Great Britain is forced to end its suzerainty over the Kingdom of Egypt and the the Sultanate of Oman.
• Great Britain is forced to agree to the holding of referendums in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa over the dominion status of these nations on Wednesday, November 1, 1944 [3].
• Great Britain is forced to recognize the independence of the Republic of Ireland.
• Russia loses some of its territory to the German puppet state of Belarus.
• Russia loses the Petsamo region to the German puppet state of Finland.
• Russia is forced to recognize the independence of the German puppet states of Poland, Ukraine, Belarus, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Livonia.
• Great Britain, France and Russia are all forced to admit to war guilt for the Second Great War and are to pay a huge level of restitution for the damages caused in the Second Great War.
• Britain and Russia are forbidden from maintaining large armies or navies, or from possessing any weapons of mass destruction.
• France is temporarily demilitarized and forbidden from possessing any weapons of mass destruction.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[1] Under a provisional Republican government led by General Philippe Pétain and Admiral François Darlan. The French Fourth Republic was established on February 1, 1946.

[2] King Albert I abdicated in the autumn of 1917 after the end of the First Great War. His sixteen year-old son Leopold became King Leopold III and was under a regency. The former king Albert I moved to London and lived in exile for the rest of his life. He died in 1960 at the age of 85.

[3] On this date, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa all voted to become republics. All of these nations then established the office of President to replace the British monarch as head of state.

 

[Zoidberg12]

List of Governors of Mississippi

23. John J. Pettus (Democratic) (1859-1863)
24. Charles Clark (Independent) (1863-1867)
25. Benjamin G. Humphreys (Independent) (1867-1871)
26. James L. Alcorn (Independent) (1871-1875)
27. John M. Stone (Independent) (1875-1879)
28. Robert Lowry (Independent) (1879-1883)
29. Anselm J. McLaurin (Whig) (1883-1887)
30. Andrew H. Longino (Whig) (1887-1891)
31. George Earle Chamberlain (Whig) (1891-1893)
32. Absolom M. West (Radical) (1893-1895)
33. Edmond Noel (Whig) (1895-1899)
34. John Sharp Williams (Whig) (1899-1901)
35. James K. Vardaman (Radical-Liberal) (1901-1905)
36. George Earle Chamberlain (Whig) (1905-1907)
37. John Sharp Williams (Whig) (1907-1909)
38. Henry L. Whitfield (Whig) (1909-1911)
39. Earl L. Brewer (Whig) (1911-1915)
40. Lee M. Russell (Whig) (1915-1919)
41. Henry L. Whitfield (Whig) (1919-1921)
42. Dennis Murphree (Whig) (1921-1923)
43. Paul B. Johnson Sr. (Whig) (1923-1927)
44. Dennis Murphree (Whig) (1927-1929)
45. Thomas L. Bailey (Whig) (1929-1933)
46. Martin Sennet Conner (Whig) (1933-1935)
47. Hugh L. White (Freedom) (1935-1939)
48. Fielding L. Wright (Freedom) (1939-1944) †††
49. Ross Barnett (Freedom) (1944)
-. Dwight D. Ironhewer (Military) (1944- )*

††† = Committed Suicide
* = As head of the Delta Military District

 

[Zoidberg12]

Who are the governors of Mass? I'd guess, given the fact it seems like TTL US politics fit pretty well into the UK political spectrum of the same era (Socialists=Labour, GOP=Liberals, Dems=Tories), Mass would be as blue TTL as it is OTL (given the fact that the style of the Cons would be popular in Mass).

Here you go!

List of Governors of Massachusetts

25. John Albion Andrew (Republican) (1861-1866)
26. William Gaston (Democratic) (1866-1869)
27. Alexander H. Bullock (Republican) (1870-1872)
28. William Claflin (Republican) (1872-1874)
29. William B. Washburn (Republican) (1874-1876)
30. Thomas Talbot (Republican) (1876-1878)
31. Alexander H. Rice (Republican) (1878-1880)
32. John Davis Long (Republican) (1880-1872)
33. Benjamin F. Butler (Democratic) (1882-1886)
34. George D. Robinson (Democratic) (1886-1888)
35. Oliver Ames (Democratic) (1888-1890)
36. John Q. A. Brackett (Democratic) (1890-1891)
37. William E. Russell (Democratic) (1891-1895)
38. Frederic T. Greenhalge (Democratic) (1895-1896)
39. Roger Wolcott (Democratic) (1896-1900)
40. Winthrop Murray Crane (Democratic) (1900-1903)
41. William L. Douglas (Democratic) (1903-1906)
42. Curtis Guild Jr. (Democratic) (1906-1909)
43. Eben Sumner Draper (Democratic) (1909-1911)
44. Eugene Noble Foss (Democratic) (1911-1914)
45. David I. Walsh (Democratic) (1914-1916)
46. Samuel W. McCall (Democratic) (1916-1919)
47. Calvin Coolidge (Democratic) (1919-1921)
48. Frank G. Allen (Democratic) (1921-1925)
49. Alvan T. Fuller (Democratic) (1925-1927)
50. Calvin Coolidge (Democratic) (1927-1929)
51. Channing H. Cox (Democratic) (1929-1933)
52. Joseph B. Ely (Democratic) (1933-1937)
53. Charles F. Hurley (Democratic) (1937-1939)
54. Christian A. Herter (Democratic) (1939-1943)
55. Maurice J. Tobin (Democratic) (1943- )

 

[bguy]

34. James K. Vardaman (Whig) (1899-1901)

Would Vardaman have been a Whig? OTL he was (in addition to being a virulent white supremacist) a populist and the leading opponent of the Bourbons in Mississippi, so he doesn't seem like he would fit at all into the plantation aristocracy dominated Whig Party.

I think the disposition of Vardaman actually really gets right to the heart of the question that we've never really fully resolved in this thread: who exactly are the Radical Liberals? Are they just the party of the Confederates' racial minorities and urban progressives (in which case men like Vardaman, Tom Watson, and Benjamin Tillman would not belong to the party) or do the Radical Liberals also include (at least pre-FGW) the agrarian populists (in which case they would include economically liberal, racially regressive figures like Vardaman, Watson, and Tillman)? Your 1891 Confederate presidential election article seems to support the later idea with the Radical Liberal Party forming from an alliance of the Radical Party (presumably the original party of the racial minorities and urban progressives) and the Liberal Party (presumably the original party of the agrarian populists), and I think that makes a lot of sense. But if we go with that theory that the Radical Libs will accept white supremacists as long as they are economically liberal then Vardaman would be a Rad-Lib.

36. John Sharp Williams (Radical-Liberal) (1903-1907)

Conversely OTL John Sharp Williams was a scion of the plantation aristocracy and the leader of the Mississippi Bourbons, so he would seem a natural Whig Party man.

47. Channing H. Cox (Democratic) (1919-1921)

Per the novel canon, Calvin Coolidge was Governor of Massachusetts in 1920. (In Blood and Iron Coolidge opens for TR at his 1920 campaign rally in Massachusetts and is identified as Governor Coolidge.)

 

[Zoidberg12]

Hey guys. I need some more ideas for the Confederate election of 1897.

All in all, this is the election when Governor James Stephen Hogg of Texas, a professional politician as opposed to a general or military man, is nominated by the Whig Party and elected President. This is a victory for the progressive faction of the Whig faction against the conservative, pro-Gist faction of the Whig Party. By the time of the 1903 election, the latter faction is all but irrelevant.

This also seems like a good time for the Radical and Liberal Party to merge into the Radical-Liberal Party. I think Craigo mentioned that said merger happened later, but it makes a lot of sense that it would happen at this point in 1897. The two parties could see the opportunity to merge and thus capitalize on Gist's overwhelming unpopularity to try and seize the Grey House. According to Turqiouse Blue's map, the Rad-Lib's won the same states they won in 1891 plus Arkansas, Mississippi and Cuba. I imagine many of the voters in these states were probably fed up with the planter class elites sitting in their ivory towers in far-off Richmond and not really caring about them and their interests. This would have especially been the case with the Hispanic state of Cuba. In spite of this, the Rad-Libs still lose the election, but its less of loss or more of a victory (depends on whether your'e glass half-full or glass half-empty guy).

 

[Zoidberg12]

Would Vardaman have been a Whig? OTL he was (in addition to being a virulent white supremacist) a populist and the leading opponent of the Bourbons in Mississippi, so he doesn't seem like he would fit at all into the plantation aristocracy dominated Whig Party.

I think the disposition of Vardaman actually really gets right to the heart of the question that we've never really fully resolved in this thread: who exactly are the Radical Liberals? Are they just the party of the Confederates' racial minorities and urban progressives (in which case men like Vardaman, Tom Watson, and Benjamin Tillman would not belong to the party) or do the Radical Liberals also include (at least pre-FGW) the agrarian populists (in which case they would include economically liberal, racially regressive figures like Vardaman, Watson, and Tillman)? Your 1891 Confederate presidential election article seems to support the later idea with the Radical Liberal Party forming from an alliance of the Radical Party (presumably the original party of the racial minorities and urban progressives) and the Liberal Party (presumably the original party of the agrarian populists), and I think that makes a lot of sense. But if we go with that theory that the Radical Libs will accept white supremacists as long as they are economically liberal then Vardaman would be a Rad-Lib.

Like you said, the latter is pretty much the case.

Conversely OTL John Sharp Williams was a scion of the plantation aristocracy and the leader of the Mississippi Bourbons, so he would seem a natural Whig Party man.

Should I switch Vardaman and Williams then? It seems to make sense.

Per the novel canon, Calvin Coolidge was Governor of Massachusetts in 1920. (In Blood and Iron Coolidge opens for TR at his 1920 campaign rally in Massachusetts and is identified as Governor Coolidge.)

I fixed it and made Coolidge a two-non-consecutive term governor.

 

[bguy]

All in all, this is the election when Governor James Stephen Hogg of Texas, a professional politician as opposed to a general or military man, is nominated by the Whig Party and elected President. This is a victory for the progressive faction of the Whig faction against the conservative, pro-Gist faction of the Whig Party. By the time of the 1903 election, the latter faction is all but irrelevant.

That makes sense. From this point on the Whigs start running more economically liberal candidates like Hogg, Clark, and Wilson which is presumably in reaction to the Liberal Party cutting into their vote among the less well off voters.

This also seems like a good time for the Radical and Liberal Party to merge into the Radical-Liberal Party. I think Craigo mentioned that said merger happened later, but it makes a lot of sense that it would happen at this point in 1897. The two parties could see the opportunity to merge and thus capitalize on Gist's overwhelming unpopularity to try and seize the Grey House. According to Turqiouse Blue's map, the Rad-Lib's won the same states they won in 1891 plus Arkansas, Mississippi and Cuba. I imagine many of the voters in these states were probably fed up with the planter class elites sitting in their ivory towers in far-off Richmond and not really caring about them and their interests. This would have especially been the case with the Hispanic state of Cuba. In spite of this, the Rad-Libs still lose the election, but its less of loss or more of a victory (depends on whether your'e glass half-full or glass half-empty guy).

Hmmm. What you are saying makes a lot of sense, but I'm still reluctant to overwrite a previously written article unless we have an overwhelming reason to do so. Maybe the story of the 1897 election is that it was the election that the Radicals and Liberals should have won but threw away because they weren't able to work together. (And their disgust over losing this election is what led to the subsequent merger.) Craigo's Brandeis article list Thomas Watson as a candidate that year, and its certainly easy to envision Watson trying to court rural white voters by playing up his white supremacy but such a tactic would make it almost impossible for Watson to form a viable alliance with the CSA's racial minorities.

(Also while discussing the Brandeis article, Craigo had Watson as a Radical candidate. If we go with the assumption though that the Radicals were the party of the Confederate's minorities and the Liberals were the party of the Confederate's poor whites, then Watson would need to be a Liberal rather than a Radical.)

Should I switch Vardaman and Williams then? It seems to make sense.

I think that would work.

I fixed it and made Coolidge a two-non-consecutive term governor.

The one other change I would recommend is making Coolidge Governor of Massachusetts in the 1927-1929 period. (The novels strongly imply he was the current Governor of Massachusetts when he ran for President in 1928.) Otherwise looks good.

 

[Tiro]

Hey guys. I need some more ideas for the Confederate election of 1897.

Ask and ye shall receive - quite possibly more than you expect, but hopefully nothing less than what you Need!


Now I thoroughly agree with President Mahan that the key to understanding the '87 Election is that it was almost certainly the biggest Upset at the Polls in Confederate History until the Election of President Hampton in 1921 (an event that I tend to see as the beginning of a comeback for the most Conservative species of Whigs*); The Whigs were dead in the water after the disastrous Gist Administration, the Radicals and the Liberals scented fresh blood in the Water then gleefully withdrew the feelers they had extended to their rivals for the status of Confederate Opposition, each Party thinking that they might now digest the rewards of this Feeding Frenzy in solitary splendour (without being obliged to share).

In the process the Radicals and Liberals basically savaged themselves competing for the floating voters seeking to signal their disenchantment with The Whigs (as well as all those rats that had deserted The Whip ship and were therefore looking for other options), splitting the Opposition Vote and leaving a stretch of clear water just sufficient for James Hogg to plot a safe course through to the Presidential Mansion.

*Quite conservative to start with and downright reactionary when that Capital 'C' crops up.


Zoidberg, I really like the idea that the Liberals and Radicals (at least certain elements thereof) would have been searching for common ground even before the Election of 1903; I would suggest that they might have been attempting to bridge the ideological divide between "Hillbilly progressives" and isolationist Agrarians as early as the Haitian debacle (one suspects that efforts would have been doubled after President Gist picked up the ball set rolling along the shores of Hispaniola - when a Whig comeback seemed more probable, but before States Gist proceeded to drop that ball right over the Isthmus of Darien), but it seems quite likely that each of these Parties was have preferred to win the CS Presidency without being obliged to go to the effort of compromise.

Having failed to reach an accommodation it seems likely they would waste far too much energy and time on each other, allowing the Whigs to recover themselves somewhat (sufficient to consolidate their core voters, at least). My guess is that this would be coupled with a shrewd bit of rebranding by President Hogg and his backers, who would doubtless be content to throw only President Gist and his immediate circle of supporters to the Wolves so long as they could hold on to enough of the Whig Grandees for some semblance of Party Unity to be maintained - they would almost certainly couple this with a line of rhetoric emphasising Hogg's Western roots, an appeal to Business (neither Radicals or Liberals seem likely to appeal to Monopoly Men) and the general sense of a new broom sweeping clean.

Basically Gist is dismissed as a strange aberration in the History of the Whig Party and now the REAL Whigs are back in charge, so get ready for a return to the Good Old Days (only with a whole lot less trouble on the Mason-Dixon line and a slightly smaller silver spoon for the Planters to dig into the trough); for some reason "Let's all live high on the Hogg" occurs to me as a possible slogan, for some reason. Doubtless the Whigs made a good deal of capital on what appears to have been Hogg's fairly gregarious nature and I believe that President Mahan suggested at one point that "Big Jim" would advocate for a Veteran's Pension Bill (which doubtless made an even better selling point for the "New Old Whigs").


Zoidberg, might I please see the Electoral Map by Turquoise Blue to which you allude? (I'd like to give it a thorough look-over before I say anything further on the possible course of this Election - I don't always agree with their conclusions, but TB Maps are well worth the attention).


Now when it comes to the precise ideology of the Radicals and the Liberals I remain a little vague for the simple reason that History rather than Politics is my primary speciality - and it is always harder to explain what a Party believes in than to relate what it has done - but I do tend to believe that the Radical Liberals WOULD seek to retain the broadest possible spectrum of members after the merger between the Liberal & Radical Parties, which means that the Rad-Libs would probably tolerate the more outspoken sort of Racist until the Party decides that sort of thinking is more detrimental than helpful.

That being said I suspect that prior to the Red Rebellion naked bigotry (as opposed to Institutionalised Racism) doesn't really help much at the Polls, since the Coloured population has failed to turn Tiger after manumission and the average Confederate has slightly less reason to resent a Black population clearly under the White Man's Thumb (as opposed to a population of Freedmen with thirty acres, a mule and an occupying Army to buck them up); if one of the more consistent elements of the Radical Liberal ideology is "We should do more with the United States" then outspoken Racists are even more likely to be a liability instead of an asset.

One theme that I would like to suggest is the general suppression of the Populist tendency in the Confederate States between President Gist and President Wilson; basically neither Party really wants to Rock the Boat when life if pretty good for the average Confederate (and even better for the common run of Confederate Politician), so those looking to impose truly Radical Change (as opposed to side-step it, thereby creating the impression of Progress) would likely be sent to wander in the Political Wilderness ... until the Great War opens up entirely new prospects so rich that the wild men come howling back out of the wastelands (with the Freedom Party and the Redemption League particular beneficiaries of this previously suppressed, but apparently irrepressible tendency).


I hope that my remarks above do not contain to much strained metaphor for their meaning to be transparent - if they do then in a nutshell I believe that the Whig Triumph was so unexpected as to be near-stupefying, that "Big Jim" Hogg played a key role in the success of his Party, that Radicals & Liberals shot each other in the foot but STILL took far more votes than the Whigs (at least when their counts were combined) and that it might be interesting to hint at a certain amount of shenanigans on the part of the Whigs (if only as an insinuation whispered by Opponents seeking to remove blame for their own failings from themselves).

Oh and I definitely believe that the future Radical-Liberals FINALLY became serious about their merger following this Election, though the complications following the Birth of this new Party proved sufficient to impact their chances of success in Future Elections.

I'll leave things there before I ramble any further away from Perfect Clarity.

 

[Zoidberg12]

That makes sense. From this point on the Whigs start running more economically liberal candidates like Hogg, Clark, and Wilson which is presumably in reaction to the Liberal Party cutting into their vote among the less well off voters.

This is a good consensus.

Hmmm. What you are saying makes a lot of sense, but I'm still reluctant to overwrite a previously written article unless we have an overwhelming reason to do so. Maybe the story of the 1897 election is that it was the election that the Radicals and Liberals should have won but threw away because they weren't able to work together. (And their disgust over losing this election is what led to the subsequent merger.) Craigo's Brandeis article list Thomas Watson as a candidate that year, and its certainly easy to envision Watson trying to court rural white voters by playing up his white supremacy but such a tactic would make it almost impossible for Watson to form a viable alliance with the CSA's racial minorities.

(Also while discussing the Brandeis article, Craigo had Watson as a Radical candidate. If we go with the assumption though that the Radicals were the party of the Confederate's minorities and the Liberals were the party of the Confederate's poor whites, then Watson would need to be a Liberal rather than a Radical.)

I very much like these ideas. Based on this and some ideas from Tiro, I've decided that the Radicals and Liberals, learning from their joint loss of the 1897 election and the victory that they could very well have had in said election, decide to merge into the Radical-Liberal Party sometime before 1903.

I think that would work.

Okay. I just fixed the list.

The one other change I would recommend is making Coolidge Governor of Massachusetts in the 1927-1929 period. (The novels strongly imply he was the current Governor of Massachusetts when he ran for President in 1928.) Otherwise looks good.

I also just fixed this list, making Coolidge an ex-governor when he ran for president in 1932.

 

[Zoidberg12]

Tiro, I just want to say that, once again, I really like your ideas for the election of 1897. I'll most definitely use them in my forthcoming article for said election (it should be up and finished in a few days if all goes well and no homework intervenes).

I just want to add some of my own thoughts. As I've said before, I've decided that the Radicals and Liberals, learning from their joint loss of the 1897 election and the victory that they very well could have had in said election, decide to merge into the Radical-Liberal Party sometime before 1903. Thinking about it, it makes more sense that the Radicals and Liberals, as two separate parties, would do very well in the 1897 election but would still lose. Then the two parties, thinking that they could have won the Grey House in '97 if only they were one party, decided to merge before 1903. There were those in both the Radical and Liberal parties who wanted to merge before 1897 in an effort to capitalize on Gist's overwhelming unpopularity to try and seize the Grey House. However, these efforts were hampered by, as you've said, a number of differences between the two parties. The missed potential of 1897 was the one wake-up call that eventually lead to those of the two parties burying the hatchet and merging into one party. In spite of this, the Rad-Libs, running under a ticket of Thomas E. Watson and James K. Vardaman, still lose the 1903 election. Like you said, the monumentum that a united Rad-Lib party could have had in 1897 is no longer there.

Zoidberg, might I please see the Electoral Map by Turquoise Blue to which you allude? (I'd like to give it a thorough look-over before I say anything further on the possible course of this Election - I don't always agree with their conclusions, but TB Maps are well worth the attention).

I have a copy of it saved on my laptop. It shows the Rad-Libs winning Louisiana, Florida, Arkansas, Mississippi, Cuba, Sonora and Chihuahua. The Whigs win everything else. Now since its been decided that the Radicals and Liberals were still separate parties in 1897, this needs to be amended. I can see the Radicals, running once again under the Russell-Cameron ticket, winning the same states that they did in 1891, Louisiana, Florida, Sonora and Chihuahua, as well as Cuba, winning thirty-four electoral votes. The Liberals, running under a ticket of Benjamin Tillman and Charles Macune, do much better in this election, what with the anger towards the Gist administration. They win two states, Arkansas and Mississippi, winning sixteen electoral votes. As I've said before, I imagine many of the voters in Arkansas and Mississippi, particularly the farmers and rural voters, were probably fed up with the planter class elites sitting in their ivory towers in far-off Richmond and not really caring about them and their interests.

One question I have is as follows; when do the political parties in the CSA finally start having national conventions like the political parties up in the USA? When does the system of state conventions end?

 

[Zoidberg12]

List of Governors of Alabama

17. John Gill Shorter (Democratic) (1861-1865)
18. Thomas H. Watts (Independent) (1865-1867)
19. Lewis E. Parsons (Independent) (1867-1869)
20. Robert M. Patton (Independent) (1869-1871)
21. Robert B. Lindsay (Independent) (1871-1875)
22. George S. Houston (Independent) (1875-1879)
23. Edward A. O'Neal (Independent) (1879-1883)
24. Rufus W. Cobb (Independent) (1883-1887)
25. Thomas Seay (Whig) (1887-1889)
26. Thomas G. Jones (Whig) (1889-1893)
27. William C. Oates (Whig) (1893-1897)
28. Joseph F. Johnston (Whig) (1897-1901)
29. William D. Jelks (Whig) (1901-1905)
30. William J. Samford (Whig) (1905-1909)
31. William D. Jelks (Whig) (1909-1913)
32. B. B. Comer (Whig) (1913-1917)
33. Emmet O'Neal (Whig) (1917-1921)
34. Charles Henderson (Whig) (1921-1925)
35. Thomas Kilby (Whig) (1925-1929)
36. William W. Brandon (Whig) (1929-1933)
37. Benjamin M. Miller (Whig) (1933-1935)
38. Bibb Graves (Freedom) (1935-1942) †
39. Chauncey Sparks (Freedom) (1942-1944)
-. Dwight D. Ironhewer (Military) (1944- )*

† = Died in Office
* = As head of the Delta Military District

 

[President Mahan]

Someone needs to be a Biography of Thomas E. Watson. I think his biography would really encapsulate the history of the Pre-Great War opposition to the Whigs.

 

[bguy]

Zoidberg, I really like the idea that the Liberals and Radicals (at least certain elements thereof) would have been searching for common ground even before the Election of 1903; I would suggest that they might have been attempting to bridge the ideological divide between "Hillbilly progressives" and isolationist Agrarians as early as the Haitian debacle (one suspects that efforts would have been doubled after President Gist picked up the ball set rolling along the shores of Hispaniola - when a Whig comeback seemed more probable, but before States Gist proceeded to drop that ball right over the Isthmus of Darien), but it seems quite likely that each of these Parties was have preferred to win the CS Presidency without being obliged to go to the effort of compromise.

Makes sense. OTL Tillman was an anti-imperialist and Vardaman and Watson were ferocious opponents of the Preparedness Movement and U.S. entry into World War 1, so they would absolutely hate President Gist's expansionist foreign policy and calls for a military build-up and that would give them good reason to make common cause with the Radicals.

Now when it comes to the precise ideology of the Radicals and the Liberals I remain a little vague for the simple reason that History rather than Politics is my primary speciality - and it is always harder to explain what a Party believes in than to relate what it has done - but I do tend to believe that the Radical Liberals WOULD seek to retain the broadest possible spectrum of members after the merger between the Liberal & Radical Parties, which means that the Rad-Libs would probably tolerate the more outspoken sort of Racist until the Party decides that sort of thinking is more detrimental than helpful.

Agreed. My own working theory for the rise and fall of Radical Liberals is that the Tillman-Watson-Vardaman agrarian populist wing of the party was probably dominant until the First Great War when Watson and Vardaman's opposition to the war badly discredited them with the Confederate public. That in turn led to the Radical Liberals deciding they needed to run a hawk in 1915 to cleanse the party of the appearance of being defeatist and pacifistic and that is why (along with trying to strengthen the party in the Spanish speaking states) the Rad-Libs went with Doroteo Arango (the party's most visible hawkish figure) in 1915. Of course nominating a Mexican-Confederate infuriated the white supremacists within the party. (And would lead to the white supremacists largely abandoning the Rad Libs to join up with the revanchist parties by 1921.)

That being said I suspect that prior to the Red Rebellion naked bigotry (as opposed to Institutionalised Racism) doesn't really help much at the Polls, since the Coloured population has failed to turn Tiger after manumission and the average Confederate has slightly less reason to resent a Black population clearly under the White Man's Thumb (as opposed to a population of Freedmen with thirty acres, a mule and an occupying Army to buck them up); if one of the more consistent elements of the Radical Liberal ideology is "We should do more with the United States" then outspoken Racists are even more likely to be a liability instead of an asset.

I don't know. I could see enforcement of Black Codes being a big issue in the CSA. In particular I could imagine the Whigs wanting to be able to employ African-Confederates in the factories (since they could pay them less than white workers) while the populists within the Rad Libs would want African-Confederates to be forbidden from working in factories (so as to preserve those jobs for white workers.)

I just want to add some of my own thoughts. As I've said before, I've decided that the Radicals and Liberals, learning from their joint loss of the 1897 election and the victory that they very well could have had in said election, decide to merge into the Radical-Liberal Party sometime before 1903.

FWIW, Craigo's Brandeis article had the merger occur in 1900, so that fits in perfectly with your plans.

In spite of this, the Rad-Libs, running under a ticket of Thomas E. Watson and James K. Vardaman, still lose the 1903 election. Like you said, the monumentum that a united Rad-Lib party could have had in 1897 is no longer there.

Since your list of Mississippi Governors has Vardaman becoming Governor of Mississippi in 1903 that might be a little early for him to run for Vice President.

As an alternate possibility for the bottom of the Rad-Lib ticket in 1903 what about John Parker of Louisiana.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_M._Parker

OTL he was a conservationist, anti-monopolist and ran as the Progressive Party candidate for Governor of Louisiana in 1912. so he would give the Rad-Lib ticket some geographic and ideological balance (giving the ticket both a rural populist and an urban progressive.)

 

[MatthewFirth]

Anything we have for football stuff?