This is outstanding, I've been fascinated by the possibilities of Reconstruction for many years, as the record of my previous posts would show :-)
I'm very interested in Douglass in South Carolina. I'm struggling to assemble a portrait of the modern political system from the hints thus far...
I really think this is silly. The OP doesn't request the end of interpersonal conflicts. The target society is one where people still stab or shoot each other, and still form gangs and Camorra etc it's just one where states achieve the minimum expectation of kindergarten students, "use your...
Nothing in my cursory search suggests that the question was ever meaningfully raised. There still hadn't been a real reversal yet (the Corrupt Bargain was a bit more complex than just second place wins).
I'm a bit odd in that I feel like direct election of senators was a step back. Id prefer to...
Thanks, I wasn't even aware that there had been any discussion of anything similar to direct election pre war.
I'd picked the 1860s because 1) the path was open to amend the constitution, 2) there was an interest in improved representation and perhaps most importantly 3) transcontinental...
There was no way to elect the president directly before the Civil War. Not only would it have been a technical challenge but the absence of the 3/5ths clause would have underrepresented slave states (well, it'd have represented them fairly, which they'd have taken as an outrage snd possibly a...
Im curious what effect the Corwin Amendment has. It actually seemed to be advancing before the secessionists took their balls and went home. Its intention was to put the question of slavery permanently to bed, I can say with good certainty that it wouldn't have done that. So what would permanent...
The Austrians never really changed their constitution after post WWII restoration, the current president has a broad range of powers that are never used.
Norms can be as effective as laws.
I didn't catch exactly how this change would have occurred.
[I've discussed a scenario where MacArthur isn't in command, the UN/US forces are a little more deliberate and dig in across the narrowest portion of the peninsula, so the border ends up being there when the PVA counterattack comes]...
Years ago I had a question about Finlandization. The Soviets were effectively convinced by their treaty that Finland was a "safe" neighbor and they never intervened (militarily). I had wondered if this could happen anywhere else and this thread has reminded me of the Czechoslovak coalition...
Yep, the key 70s court ruling on desegregation was Milliken, which restricted bussing across district boundaries. Despite the ongoing uproar after that point it essentially meant that desegregation was no longer a serious goal in K-12 education.
My AHC would have the goal of getting to...
Trying to take this as seriously as possible. What about an old LHA, despite the straight deck, they're pretty obviously carriers and they're particularly well suited to helicopter and small boat operations which the USCG does tons of.
Small draw back, leaving aside any embarked troops, the...
This might be ASB but I think it might have the greatest effect on Germany of the Great Powers. The various upheavals in France (Bourbon to Orleans to Nap III) are fairly internally driven but does the German Empire happen without the Austrian and French conflicts?
Irish Home Rule in the UK was...
Again, when night riders burn a few USCT veterans out of town the Feds will feel obligated to intervene (assuming this is in the first couple of years after the end of the war, before the occupation became irrelevant).
Enough of that and maybe Lincoln starts considering the possibility of land...
My sense of Lincoln is that while he was deeply principled, his application of those principles shifted with context. (I think his views on race are a good example of this). In the current WI, I imagine he he starts out conciliatory and moves closer (but not all the way) to the Radical position...