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Lilac - Presidents of these United States: 1788-1865
Presidents of these United States: 1788-1865
1788-1795: George Washington (Nonpartisan-VA)
1788: Richard Montgomery (Nonpartisan-NY)
1795-1802: John Adams (Convention-MA)
1794: Thomas Jefferson (Federalist-VA)
1802-1807: William Christian (Federalist-VA)†
1801: John Marshall (Convention-VA)
1807-1809: John Thomas (Federalist-MA)
1809-1816: Samuel Dexter (Convention-MA)
1808: Abraham B. Venable (Federalist-VA)
1816-1823: Samuel Dana (Convention-MA)
1815: Aaron Burr (Federalist-NY)
1823-1830: Samuel Davis (Convention-MA)
1822: Aaron Burr (Independent-NY)
1830-1837: David Brydie Mitchell (Breton-GA)
1829: Richard H. Dana, Sr. (Convention-MA), Duncan McArthur (Convention-OH), Humphrey Marshall (Convention-KY), François Quirouet (Breton-QC)
1837-1840: Richard Elliott Parker (Breton-VA)†
1836: Solomon Southwick (Compact-NY), Joseph Lawrence (Convention-PA)
1840-1851: James Harper (Compact-NY)
1843: Edmund Burke (Breton-NH)
1851-1858: Charles Stewart Todd (Breton-KY)
1850: Samuel F. B. Morse (Compact-CT)
1858-1865: Charles Pettit McIlvaine (Compact-NJ)
1857: John T. Mason, Jr. (Breton-MD)
1865-: John Jay II (Breton-NY)
1864: Sydenham Moore (Gradualist-AL), Thomas Fluornoy (S. Compact-VA), Godlove S. Orth (N. Compact-IN)
This is all just a bit of a list to collect my thoughts (and give a little information), on what exactly happened in my vignette (which I recommend you read first). Constitutional butterflies included.
In 1775, Gen. Richard Montgomery seizes Ft. St. Jean several weeks faster with better artillery placement, captures Guy Carleton in a subsequent battle, and is able to seize a still almost-undefended Quebec City.
Let's cycle through the next few years of the Revolutionary War rather quickly - Britain ultimately makes retaking Quebec a lower priority; Burgoyne launches a campaign to retake Boston instead (and runs into an alternate form of Saratoga at the Battle of Barre) - Washington and Montgomery battle inconclusively with the British throughout Pennsylvania for several years; the southern campaign comes close to success but not quite, and ultimately with the aid of the French navy, Washington gets the forces in New York City to surrender in mid 1780, ending the war. Quebec is one of the 14 colonies to be set free.
The first years of the new nation are chaotic - no more so than in Quebec, where the franchise is extremely limited, there is pushback against the central government over those western land claims, and of course the whole 'emissaries of papist tyranny' thing. The few Quebec delegates eventually walk out, which the convention tries to ignore - Quebec Anti-Federalist forces easily defeat ratification.
So Quebec exists in a weird half-way house as the United States take the first steps towards democracy.
First there's the decisive clash between 'Washingtonians' and Montgomerists' - indeed who the first president was going to be was a matter of contention for quite some time, with two national heroes so equally placed. Montgomery and the Schuylers end up losing out narrowly - his foreign birth can't have helped, and the south has all those extra EVs from slaves. The Montgomery-Washington split ends up filtered down to future generations as a vaguely non-partisan, non-sectional clash over spoils, even if Adams and Jefferson do have drastically different foreign policy ideas.
The Federalists however end up on the worse side of it - charismatic Virginian William Christian dies in office and per the rules of succession, Senate President John Thomas - in his eighties! - takes office. Thomas isn't up to doing much of anything, which is why Quebec (still only loosely associated), which still resents him for being an occupying general, ends up entering into an alliance with Constitutionalist France in 1808.
It's the last mistake they'll ever make - the Conventioneers are outraged and Samuel Dexter stokes up an anti-Catholic, anti-French panic which both wins the election and gives them a pretext to invade Quebec later that year. Britain has no wish to stop Dexter, and Narbonne-Lara is busy enough on the home front that he can't possibly send troops - Quebec capitulates, and pro-American forces form a provisional government and petition for admission as a state later that year. With a little tinkering to limit the rights of the priesthood, Dexter accepts - and off of the successful war and the booming economy, the Massachusetts Dynasty lasts for another 14 years after him. All the while the Federalists sink into irrelevance, curtailed to their base in Virginia and Georgia - even charismatic former Senator Aaron Burr can't stem their losses although he heads up the party twice.
Come 1829 however and everything goes to shit - the Convention caucus can't decide on a candidate (for good reason; people are sick and tired of presidents from New England), and everything splits to hell - with the long forgotten Federalists squeaking through in a radical new form. Nicknamed the 'Bretons' after Club Breton from the French Crisis [the faction that IOTL later became known as the Jacobins] - they believe in expanding suffrage, settling west, and ramping up immigration. And the southern ones tend to believe in slavery. The two Bretons - Mitchell and Quirouet - combine their electors to narrowly win; a victory for what is anecdotally termed the St. Lawrence-Savannah Axis.
The bitter Convention Party can't really handle competition - they stumble and fumble as Montreal swells with both immigrants and commerce; and Quebec successfully has the rights of both the priesthood and those with titles respected by the federal government.
General Parker of Virginia is elected in 1836 over the bitter and dispirited Convention Party - and over the Compact. Sometimes known as 'The Protestant Compact', more technically named after the 'Compact among the States' theory of the Constitution - for as Solomon Southwick puts it, 'the Romish can have no abhorrent rights which the other states of the union are forced to respect'. Mob violence, the bitterness of New Yorkers that are seeing their Great Lakes trade all but dry up, and free soil sentiment are a potent mix.
And when President Parker dies in 1840 - Senator Harper is catapulted to White House almost by chance. And the fact that the Compact caucus selected him as their leader - he's at the forefront of propaganda when it comes to 'publicizing' the many offenses of licentious priests and nuns in the hotspot of supposed sin that is Montreal. And when cholera strikes the city in late 1840, Harper is secretly pleased.
And the next year, with majorities in both houses of Congress, he makes a decision - the Compact can do more. Surprising to anyone who thought they were legitimately about small-government (and unsurprising to anyone who knows how power works) - Harper makes a decision. The Catholic church and it's offshoots are 'undemocratic' and 'antithetical to the spirit of the Consitution' and on top of that, concealing any multitude of licentiousness and sin. So he sends in the Army to keep peace. If a lot of Catholic farmers are unnecessarily beaten up, forced out of their homes - that's one thing. And if soldiers end up digging a lot of holes in the forest at night - that's another thing. Not one that the administration papers especially want to comment on. Or one that Harper talks about as he's narrowly elected to a full term. And when he offers a bipartisan bone to the Bretons in the form of war with Mexico - they focus on that instead.
If anything, Charles Todd goes down in history as the 'Gradual Emancipator' - California and Oregon are a bit too unruly to try and force slavery on them, and amidst the widespread slavery debates - well, he recalls soldiers from Quebec very quietly. Can't afford to piss moderate Compacters off.
And if Charles McIlvaine's remembered for anything, it's for being the last president of the Compact Party before it goes down in flames in the debate over the pace of emancipation. And for being very interested in what the historians are writing.
1788-1795: George Washington (Nonpartisan-VA)
1788: Richard Montgomery (Nonpartisan-NY)
1795-1802: John Adams (Convention-MA)
1794: Thomas Jefferson (Federalist-VA)
1802-1807: William Christian (Federalist-VA)†
1801: John Marshall (Convention-VA)
1807-1809: John Thomas (Federalist-MA)
1809-1816: Samuel Dexter (Convention-MA)
1808: Abraham B. Venable (Federalist-VA)
1816-1823: Samuel Dana (Convention-MA)
1815: Aaron Burr (Federalist-NY)
1823-1830: Samuel Davis (Convention-MA)
1822: Aaron Burr (Independent-NY)
1830-1837: David Brydie Mitchell (Breton-GA)
1829: Richard H. Dana, Sr. (Convention-MA), Duncan McArthur (Convention-OH), Humphrey Marshall (Convention-KY), François Quirouet (Breton-QC)
1837-1840: Richard Elliott Parker (Breton-VA)†
1836: Solomon Southwick (Compact-NY), Joseph Lawrence (Convention-PA)
1840-1851: James Harper (Compact-NY)
1843: Edmund Burke (Breton-NH)
1851-1858: Charles Stewart Todd (Breton-KY)
1850: Samuel F. B. Morse (Compact-CT)
1858-1865: Charles Pettit McIlvaine (Compact-NJ)
1857: John T. Mason, Jr. (Breton-MD)
1865-: John Jay II (Breton-NY)
1864: Sydenham Moore (Gradualist-AL), Thomas Fluornoy (S. Compact-VA), Godlove S. Orth (N. Compact-IN)
This is all just a bit of a list to collect my thoughts (and give a little information), on what exactly happened in my vignette (which I recommend you read first). Constitutional butterflies included.
In 1775, Gen. Richard Montgomery seizes Ft. St. Jean several weeks faster with better artillery placement, captures Guy Carleton in a subsequent battle, and is able to seize a still almost-undefended Quebec City.
Let's cycle through the next few years of the Revolutionary War rather quickly - Britain ultimately makes retaking Quebec a lower priority; Burgoyne launches a campaign to retake Boston instead (and runs into an alternate form of Saratoga at the Battle of Barre) - Washington and Montgomery battle inconclusively with the British throughout Pennsylvania for several years; the southern campaign comes close to success but not quite, and ultimately with the aid of the French navy, Washington gets the forces in New York City to surrender in mid 1780, ending the war. Quebec is one of the 14 colonies to be set free.
The first years of the new nation are chaotic - no more so than in Quebec, where the franchise is extremely limited, there is pushback against the central government over those western land claims, and of course the whole 'emissaries of papist tyranny' thing. The few Quebec delegates eventually walk out, which the convention tries to ignore - Quebec Anti-Federalist forces easily defeat ratification.
So Quebec exists in a weird half-way house as the United States take the first steps towards democracy.
First there's the decisive clash between 'Washingtonians' and Montgomerists' - indeed who the first president was going to be was a matter of contention for quite some time, with two national heroes so equally placed. Montgomery and the Schuylers end up losing out narrowly - his foreign birth can't have helped, and the south has all those extra EVs from slaves. The Montgomery-Washington split ends up filtered down to future generations as a vaguely non-partisan, non-sectional clash over spoils, even if Adams and Jefferson do have drastically different foreign policy ideas.
The Federalists however end up on the worse side of it - charismatic Virginian William Christian dies in office and per the rules of succession, Senate President John Thomas - in his eighties! - takes office. Thomas isn't up to doing much of anything, which is why Quebec (still only loosely associated), which still resents him for being an occupying general, ends up entering into an alliance with Constitutionalist France in 1808.
It's the last mistake they'll ever make - the Conventioneers are outraged and Samuel Dexter stokes up an anti-Catholic, anti-French panic which both wins the election and gives them a pretext to invade Quebec later that year. Britain has no wish to stop Dexter, and Narbonne-Lara is busy enough on the home front that he can't possibly send troops - Quebec capitulates, and pro-American forces form a provisional government and petition for admission as a state later that year. With a little tinkering to limit the rights of the priesthood, Dexter accepts - and off of the successful war and the booming economy, the Massachusetts Dynasty lasts for another 14 years after him. All the while the Federalists sink into irrelevance, curtailed to their base in Virginia and Georgia - even charismatic former Senator Aaron Burr can't stem their losses although he heads up the party twice.
Come 1829 however and everything goes to shit - the Convention caucus can't decide on a candidate (for good reason; people are sick and tired of presidents from New England), and everything splits to hell - with the long forgotten Federalists squeaking through in a radical new form. Nicknamed the 'Bretons' after Club Breton from the French Crisis [the faction that IOTL later became known as the Jacobins] - they believe in expanding suffrage, settling west, and ramping up immigration. And the southern ones tend to believe in slavery. The two Bretons - Mitchell and Quirouet - combine their electors to narrowly win; a victory for what is anecdotally termed the St. Lawrence-Savannah Axis.
The bitter Convention Party can't really handle competition - they stumble and fumble as Montreal swells with both immigrants and commerce; and Quebec successfully has the rights of both the priesthood and those with titles respected by the federal government.
General Parker of Virginia is elected in 1836 over the bitter and dispirited Convention Party - and over the Compact. Sometimes known as 'The Protestant Compact', more technically named after the 'Compact among the States' theory of the Constitution - for as Solomon Southwick puts it, 'the Romish can have no abhorrent rights which the other states of the union are forced to respect'. Mob violence, the bitterness of New Yorkers that are seeing their Great Lakes trade all but dry up, and free soil sentiment are a potent mix.
And when President Parker dies in 1840 - Senator Harper is catapulted to White House almost by chance. And the fact that the Compact caucus selected him as their leader - he's at the forefront of propaganda when it comes to 'publicizing' the many offenses of licentious priests and nuns in the hotspot of supposed sin that is Montreal. And when cholera strikes the city in late 1840, Harper is secretly pleased.
And the next year, with majorities in both houses of Congress, he makes a decision - the Compact can do more. Surprising to anyone who thought they were legitimately about small-government (and unsurprising to anyone who knows how power works) - Harper makes a decision. The Catholic church and it's offshoots are 'undemocratic' and 'antithetical to the spirit of the Consitution' and on top of that, concealing any multitude of licentiousness and sin. So he sends in the Army to keep peace. If a lot of Catholic farmers are unnecessarily beaten up, forced out of their homes - that's one thing. And if soldiers end up digging a lot of holes in the forest at night - that's another thing. Not one that the administration papers especially want to comment on. Or one that Harper talks about as he's narrowly elected to a full term. And when he offers a bipartisan bone to the Bretons in the form of war with Mexico - they focus on that instead.
If anything, Charles Todd goes down in history as the 'Gradual Emancipator' - California and Oregon are a bit too unruly to try and force slavery on them, and amidst the widespread slavery debates - well, he recalls soldiers from Quebec very quietly. Can't afford to piss moderate Compacters off.
And if Charles McIlvaine's remembered for anything, it's for being the last president of the Compact Party before it goes down in flames in the debate over the pace of emancipation. And for being very interested in what the historians are writing.
- Zaffre
- Word Count: 1.3k