The Gathering Storm Clouds
William Gibbs McAdoo, 31st President of the United States of America
An Election of Fear and Loathing
The American elections of 1928 were to prove amongst the most contentious in recent times and, while not completely redefining, were to set a new paradigm which would come to dominate the following decade. As with previous years, one of the defining political conflicts of the 1920 centred on the clashes between the Interventionist and Isolationist wings of American politics, with the former having been dominant early in the decade under President Wood and the latter having come to power with President McAdoo. Key to this conflict were the surging conflicts around the world which put American interests and foreign investments increasingly at risk, from Central America and Mexico to Siberia and China. The failures of the McAdoo presidency in the eyes of most commentators were almost entirely of an international nature, with the president able to point to a booming economy, the implementation of moral codes of conduct on entertainment, a successful campaign against bootlegging and a resolution of the western farmers' economic woes through the signing of the 1925 Anglo-American Trade Deal as proof of his successes.
As a result, the focus of the campaign against McAdoo came to centre primarily on international issues while McAdoo and his supporters repeatedly dismissed such efforts as attempts to distract from the President's impressive domestic record. Even as the Siberian Campaign began and the Fruit Companies found themselves increasingly invested in a bloody and expensive struggle with the Sandinistas, McAdoo continued to trumpet his successes, questioning why America was even involved in all of these far flung places and turning the matter on its head by demanding that his opponents justify their wasteful interventionist policies. McAdoo's position within the Democratic Party grew ever more stable as a result, even as calls for him to break with the nativists in the party grew louder amongst progressive Democrats.
In fact, it was this divide over the Democratic Party's nativist tendencies which would rapidly grow to dominate the clashes within the party as the elections neared, with progressive heavyweights like Joseph Taylor Robinson, Al Smith and Henry A. Wallace all undertaking considerable efforts to push back against the nativists. Perhaps the most influential result of this effort on the part of the progressive democrats was to be the selection of Huey Long as keynote speaker at the Democratic Convention and a general strengthening of progressive sentiments in important segments of the party in the leadup to the convention. The nativists were far from willing to let this lie, and in the months leading up to the convention they would significantly improve their own positions with men like Theodore Bilbo, Walter F. George and James T. Heflin condemning the progressives as un-American, un-Democratic and fundamentally un-Christian, a dig particularly aimed at the Catholic Al Smith and other Irish-Americans in the party.
While still limited mostly to party insiders, the clash within the Democratic Party was becoming increasingly clear to the public even as their rivals in the Progressive and Republican Parties were consolidating their positions in the lead-up to the coming election. The Republicans, while dealing with the growth of nativists within the party themselves in the form of Indiana Klan-aligned politicians, were far more united than the Democrats. However, the question of who exactly would rise to become their nominee remained in question as the two great figures of the party, Charles Curtis and Frank Lowden, both hoped to be nominated in what they believed to be their best chance at unseating the Democratic Party. The situation in the Progressive Party was more disarrayed, a result of their undisputed leader, Robert M. La Follette, having died in 1925 just as the influx of Republican Progressives entered the party alongside a smaller number of democrats. The result was a free-for-all between the countless factions of the party which left everyone dissatisfied and, far more critically, left the electorate confused as to what exactly it would mean to vote Progressive (1).
The first of the party conventions to kick off was the Republican Convention, held in Kansas City from the 15th till the 18th of June 1928, and was dominated by the figures of Charles Curtis and Frank Lowden. The four day convention would see a good deal of back and forth, as the two party leaders both held considerable support, but ultimate it would be Frank Lowden who emerged victorious. Key to the decision to back Lowden had been the sudden entry of Edward Jackson of Illinois into the debate, who reacted with horror at the prospect of a Curtis candidacy, viewing the Native American-descended senator with ill-disguised disgust. While Lowden was happy to see his primary rival sunk by white supremacists, the sudden rise of a known member of the Indiana Klan to prominence within the part was to cause considerable unease amongst Republican supporters. The result was that while Edward Jackson and his Klan backers put in a great deal of effort, and more than a little graft, to try and secure the vice presidency for Jackson, it would be the cold, silent Calvin Coolidge who secured the nomination in a powerful rebuke of Jackson and his compatriots.
The Democratic Convention, which kicked off on the 26th of June, was to prove one for the ages, leaving behind a completely changed political party. With the news that Lowden had been selected by the Republicans and the continued public recrimination caused by the Indiana Klan's involvement in the Republican Convention, the Democrats felt confident in victory, and as such went into the convention with an air of inevitability. Not only was McAdoo a certain lock, but his Vice President Pat Harrison had proven himself a surprisingly active campaigner in the south, ginning up support for McAdoo, and was widely liked by large segments of the party. The one fly in the ointment was the progressive wing of the party who refused to go quietly into the night.
As with so many other major events in America in the decade to follow, it all began with Huey Long. The maverick governor of Louisiana was already well on his way to clinching a second term as governor and had, during the floods of the previous year, emerged as a wildly controversial national figure in the progressive camp of the Democratic Party. While derided as authoritarian, verging on dictatorial, in his rule of the state, he was widely praised for his industrial, infrastructural and educational reforms - but was viewed with fear and worry by his nativist neighbors in the south for his desegregationist and populist ways. His selection as keynote speaker had been met with considerable opposition and if not for a massive investment of political capital by the progressives would likely have never happened. It was to prove a fateful occurrence. Taking the stage after the initial festivities, Long began to speak. He was eloquent, bombastic and more than a little foulmouthed, and if his speech were to be summarised into one sentence it was this: "The Ku Klux Klan is a Cancer upon America and must be eradicated root and stem!"
Understandably, Long's speech was met with more than a little outrage as Klan-affiliated party figures cried out in rage, seeking to shout down the young governor. Blistering rants and ravings erupted, all of which were bellowed down by the famously loud-mouthed governor, even as the progressives arose with cheers and the rat-tat-tat of claps. Finally, after more than fifteen minutes of speaking, Long came to an end with a plea, no, a demand, that McAdoo condemn the Klan and free the party of their toxic influence. When McAdoo took the stage later that evening, he did not mention the Ku Klux Klan a single time. The following day, Huey Long and the progressive delegates walked out of the convention hall and the Democratic Party (2).
While McAdoo and Harrison were endorsed by the Democratic Party, the damage had already been done. The walkout of the progressive wing of the Democratic Party would not only see Joseph Taylor Robinson, Al Smith and Henry A. Wallace leave the party, but also the prominent West Virginian John W. Davis, the young and popular Georgian Richard Russell Jr and Huey Long himself depart for the open embrace of the Progressive Party. Not only did this mean the consolidation of the Democrats under the nativist and isolationist wing of the Democratic Party, it resulted in the fundamental reshaping of the Progressive Party, who the progressive Democrats joined.
The Progressive Party had always been seen as something of an outgrowth of the Republican Party, with its basis in the Roosevelt machine and the later addition of Farmer-Labour and Social Democratic forces from the Great Lakes region. However, the addition of the Democratic Progressives were to bring several important new constituencies - most prominently Catholic Americans, Louisianians and sections of the poor and working classes of the south of both light and dark skin. The arrival of Long and the Democratic Progressives was also to prove vital for the reconsolidating of the Progressive Party, resulting in the nomination of the former Republican Hiram Johnson of California and the selection of Huey Long, despite the misgivings of some in the party, as Vice Presidential candidate (3).
The chaos and vitriol which began with the party conventions only escalated as the presidential campaigns came under way. In Louisiana and surrounding states Huey Long campaigned openly and often against the Ku Klux Klan alongside various other prominent former Democrats in a bid to undermine Democratic power and Klan backing in the south, even as Hiram Johnson took the lead in securing support from the Progressive heartland in the north and north-west, as well as in his home state of California. Al Smith and other prominent Irishmen took up the progressive cause as well, campaigning widely in the Irish bastions of Massachusetts and New York, while efforts at mustering the Italian vote proved less important and successful.
At the same time, the McAdoo campaign's supporters turned their vitriol against the Progressives, drumming up anti-Catholic sentiments and claiming that Huey Long was planning to abolish segregation, miscegenation laws and the poll tax in order to strengthen the Progressive in the south and allow the Blacks to run rampant. While his supporters engaged in race baiting and ever more forceful attacks on his enemies, McAdoo himself primarily ran an overtly clean campaign focusing primarily on his administration's successes and promising a strengthening of the government efforts against bootleggers and Wets alike.
By comparison, the Republican campaign of Frank Lowden seemed lost in the early stages of the campaign, focusing their efforts primarily on foreign affairs, reduced government spending and intervention, but compared to the titanic clash between the Democrats and Progressives they were largely sidelined by the political fireworks between Democrats and Progressives. It was under these conditions that a Klansman, of uncertain affiliation, attempted to assassinate Governor Long in early September of 1928. The scandal which erupted over the attempted assassination of a vice presidential candidate putatively undertaken by a paramilitary force allied with either or both of their rival parties was to have immense consequences not only for the Klan and the course of the elections, but also for American politics for decades to come.
The first to act was D.C. Stephenson, who on learning of the attempted assassination issued a public condemnation of the Old Klan and publicly made the distinction between the Indiana and Old Klan clear to the public. Not to be outdone, Hiram Evans was swift to claim that the assassin had been personally dispatched by Stephenson and that his subsequent efforts were just an attempt at smearing the Old Klan with the Indiana Klan's own radicalism. The destruction of the assassin's body by the enraged mob would leave it impossible to determine either way, and all police efforts to ascertain the assassin's identity would prove for naught. Hardly one to let such an opportunity go unexploited, Long refused to make any distinction between the two Klans and held both equally responsible, pointing to them as a great cancer which was eating away at the heart of American freedom and democracy by drawing in both major parties and infusing the politics of America with violence.
Already roiled by the attempt on Long's life, McAdoo would find his position further weakened with the advent of the Siberian Campaign, which proved right all of the Republican's talking points of how McAdoo had neglected foreign affairs, and the increasingly troubled economic straits of the Fruit Companies involved in the Central American Banana Wars. Nevertheless, McAdoo continued to make his case on domestic prosperity and successful support for the cause of prohibition, strengthening the latter case by ordering the arrest of the Gustin Gang in Boston in late-October, thereby at once demonstrating the links between the Irish Catholics, the Wets and Bootlegging operations, in the process tarring all three groups with one broad brush.
While Lowden was able to strengthen his position in the polls by continuing to attack McAdoo on foreign affairs, he was hampered by a largely inactive vice presidential candidate, vote splitting with the Progressives and factional strife with Curtis supporters, who found Lowden's support from the Indiana Klan loathsome, particularly in light of events in the months leading up to the election. This connection to the Klan had come into focus during October, as the Indiana Klan's efforts to expand into Ohio, in order to influence the election there, had run into a radical faction of the Old Klan.
The Ohio section of the Old Klan was dominated by a paramilitary faction known as the Black Guard and led by William Shepard and Virgil "Bert" Effinger. The intrusion of Republican-supporting Indianans, intruding onto Ohio Klan territory, would result in violent reprisals already beginning in August, but steadily escalating until these clashes hit their climax in the Indianapolis Southside Massacre, where a heavily armed parade by Indiana Klansmen marched through the predominantly minority neighborhood in a show of force and intimdation, only to be attacked with grenades, Thompson Machineguns and pistols by Ohio Klansmen in dressed in black robes. The resultant struggle would leave 16 Indiana Klansmen dead and another 28 wounded while the attackers took an unknown number of losses, having taken their dead and wounded with them when they escaped. The resultant firestorm of public outrage would ultimately fall primarily on the Indiana Klan, and the Republicans by extension, as a result of which Klansmen were arrested on the scene (4).
On election day, the 6th of November 1928, proceedings came under way across the United States under a cloud of fear and tension, poll projections varied wildly and all contenders seemed to have a path to victory, and there were some who even questioned what would happen if no party was able to secure the 266 electoral votes that it would require to emerge victorious. However, when the results were finally published it would see a return of the McAdoo government. The chaos and violence which had engulfed the nation had seen voters stream towards safety and security, finding it in the clear domestic successes of the current administration. While the situation in Russia was worsening and states south of the border were acting out, such issues had little direct impact on the majority of Americans.
Even still, the opposition to McAdoo had found itself divided between Republicans and Progressives in many states, with the result being that the Democrats were able to win out in several key states. Ultimately, those who lost out the most would be the Republicans, who saw their already rapidly shrinking support west of the Mississippi reduced to a few states in the Southwest, Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and Nevada, while California turned towards the progressives. In fact, the Progressives were able to counter the Democratic surge resulting from the passage of McAdoo's Farmers' Assistance bill, and even extended their grip further south to include Kansas and Colorado, while Huey Long was able to wield his indomitable political machine to turn Louisiana to the Progressives, the sole southern state to break with the Southern Democratic powers in the election.
The Republicans were successful in turning Indiana in their favour, but saw their midwestern bulwark collapse in the face of vote splitting with the Progressives and a surge in support for the Democrats in Delaware, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, shocking the Republican establishment to its core. In fact, while the Democrats were actually able to secure more electoral votes in the 1928 elections than in those of 1924, improving from 274 to 281, the Republicans saw a calamitous fall into third place as the Progressives secured 133 electors to the Republican 117. At the same time, the Progressives extended their seats in the senate to 25, with the Republicans reduced to 36 while the Democrats fell to 39 seats, ensuring that McAdoo would need to work with the other parties if he wanted to pass any significant legislation. At the same time, the Democrats saw their gains from the mid-term elections of 1926 consolidated with a firm majority of 224 seats, while the Progressives secured 91, the Republicans fell to 118 with minority parties securing 7 seats (5).
Footnotes:
(1) It is worth noting that while the attacks on McAdoo on foreign policy are warranted, prior to the convention the situation abroad isn't actually all that bad. The Agreement of Omtepe has recently been signed and has the Sandinistas on the run, and the Siberian Campaign is only just nearing its starting date. McAdoo goes into the convention with a string of domestic policy successes, a major trade agreement with the British and an increasingly clear direction for the party, namely nativism, a strong government and isolationism. Now we know that things aren't going to stay rosy for long, but it should be clear that in the summer of 1928 McAdoo is widely viewed as a shoe in for the election.
(2) I may have had a tiny bit too much fun there, but here we are. The Democratic Party was split firmly between progressive and conservative/nativist factions IOTL as well and the 1920s were a period of considerable intra-party conflict which hampered them immensely. Now IOTL it was the conservative/nativist wing of the party which ended up getting the worst of it, with the KKK, Catholicism and the rise of progressive voices like FDR, Al Smith and the like all causing a shift in progressive favour. In this case the situation is quite different. Under McAdoo, the nativists have emerged as one of the strongest factions in the party while the progressives have been steadily marginalised. Thus, where IOTL it was the segregationists and nativists threatening walkouts, here it is the Progressives who decide to abandon ship. The existence of the Progressive Party had already siphoned some of the progressive Democratic support, but the refusal of McAdoo to do anything about the Klan and the general feeling that the party has been taken over by nativists, ultimately drive them to follow Huey Long out of the party.
(3) Our man Huey Long is nothing if not ambitious and with the notoriety gained at the Democratic Convention, he is able to secure a VP nomination for himself. As the most famous anti-Klan crusader in the country, he becomes an obvious choice for a party which seeks to paint both the Republicans and Democrats as being in bed with the Klan (There are some pretty salacious satirical drawings emphasising these links which become famous during the 1928 elections). The result is a significant boost to the Progressive Party, which goes into the coming elections looking less like a third wheel and more like a true contender. Just to reiterate the contenders: The Democrats have McAdoo/Harrison, the Republicans have Lowden/Coolidge and the Progressives have Johnson/Long.
(4) Just a reminder that the attempted assassination of Huey Long mentioned here is the same attempt as that mentioned in Update Twenty-Seven, Explosive Americana. While the escalation in violence seen during 1928 might seem shocking, the entire decade has been marked by a growing trend towards violence between groups and factions in the United States. From the Anarchist bombings, Red Scare and race riots to an active long-lasting guerrilla war in West Virginia, violent clashes between protesters and military men during the Chicago parades, growing Klan authority, we have been following a trend of radicalisation and increasing use of violence for political means throughout the timeline. Now granted, the actions of the Black Guard and Klansmen in general are not directly controlled or directed by the Democratic or Republican party, but it doesn't look good for either party. At the same time you have Huey Long and the Progressives as a whole railing against the Klan and the parties they support.
(5) I know that some might be surprised by the Democratic surge, but honestly - in times of crisis people tend to flock to trusted leaders and McAdoo has, at least so far, done a pretty good job domestically, which is what is valued highest at the time outside of elite New York and Washington circles. The Republicans really limp their way out of this while the Progressives surge onto the stage as a full-on major party. While the 1924 elections come to be seen as the Progressive Party's coming out party, 1928 is seen as the moment in which they emerged as a direct competitor to the Republicans and Democrats. Perhaps the most consequential development, however, is the further growth of the Progressive Party in the Senate, which has resulted in a situation in which the government cannot pass legislation without support from one of the other parties.
1928 Elections:
Senate: Dem - 39, Rep - 36, Prog - 25, Other - 0
House: Dem - 224, Rep - 118, Prog - 91, Other - 7
Dust Storm in Texas
The Storm Before The Storm
More than anything else, the second term of President McAdoo would be characterised by political gridlock as the ugly wounds of the 1928 election continued to fester. The rise of the Progressive Party, which was fervently hostile to both the other parties, exposed a fundamental weakness of the American political system when no party was able to secure a majority. While the Democrats had had to deal with this in the 1924-28 period, they had largely been able to pass their policies by working with factions in the other parties to pass legislation, only needing to peel a maximum of five senators from any one party to pass legislation. However, with only 39 senators they now needed to peel away between half and a third of their rivals' senators if they wanted anything passed. While this might have been possible in more congenial circumstances, it would prove next to impossible in an era of partisanship.
Despite this situation, McAdoo had initially been hopeful and sought to entice the Progressives into supporting his efforts with a further farm relief bill and increased financing for the census, both of which were met with curt refusal by Hiram Johnson and William Borah, who took the lead for the Progressives in the Senate. The collapse of the Siberian Whites in early 1929 would send shockwaves through the Republican Party, whose backers had invested heavily in the region and had just seen many millions of dollars go up in flames in a couple months, and turned what had initially been a dislike of the Democratic government into a fervent hatred.
With Congress hopelessly deadlocked in the Senate, and as a result the legislative branch frozen fast, McAdoo turned to Presidential Executive Orders to ensure the passage of policy beginning in 1930, most prominently tasking the AILE to turn its focus on the links between the Irish-American criminal underground and the Irish independence movement, a move which would prove critical to weakening the ties between the Presidency and the AILE, as its director August Vollmer outright refused the order, viewing it as an infringement upon his agency's hard won independence from external interference. The issue would steadily escalate over the course of 1930 before being brought to the Supreme Court for judgement - where the independence of the AILE from the Presidency was entrenched.
Even so, the AILE would still increasingly turn its attentions towards the Irish criminal organisations, although the increasingly covert activities of the White Hand would see the focus primarily turn towards the Great Lakes region. During this time, Vollmer yet again demonstrated his increasing opposition to McAdoo through the creation of the Anti-Klan Taskforce, which began to investigate the involvement of the various Ku Klux Klan factions on a federal scale, and placed growing attention to the problem of armed and violent paramilitary movements around the United States.
Hamstrung in Congress and increasingly at odds with the Supreme Court, which proved a determined challenger to McAdoo's efforts at extending the power of the Executive Order, the position of the national Democratic Party and McAdoo himself experienced a steady decline in support, a fact which was first demonstrated in the Mid-term elections of 1930 which saw the Democrats fall to 183 seats, the Progressives grow to 121 and the Republicans to 129 seats in the House, while two Democratic Senate seats fell to the Progressives (6).
Despite the political situation, the American Economy continued to boom throughout the second McAdoo Administration, factories blooming, powerplants burning and new businesses sprouting up by the day. Exceedingly lenient loan schemes, at least partly financed by a guarantee on the part of the government to underwrite the finances of smaller banks, which resulted in an explosion in the number of small, often rural, banks and a resulting development of new leasing and rental arrangements, allowed countless ordinary Americans to live a life of immense comfort when compared to the pre-Great War era. Having gotten a taste of a new quality of life, many would take out further loans with which to further improve their lives, an arrangement which was often structured around a lower rate of interest in the first couple years before it increased dramatically.
While there were plenty of Americans who were able to improve their lives, finding an ever growing number of jobs in a vast and expanding number of industries, without these loans a sufficient part of the populace would fall into a growing spiral of debt which gradually began to slow economic progress. Additionally, while the American farmers had found an outlet for their agricultural goods in the trade agreement with the British, this would simply result in even more money being put into expanding capacity - massively extending an already over-supplied sector of the economy and drawing calls for further government support in the form of a Farmers' Assistance Bill.
The expansion of American agriculture could not have come at a worse time, for beginning in the summer of 1930 the favorable climatic conditions of the 1920s gave way to an unusually dry era which would in time lead to drought stalking the heart of America. From Texas in the south to the Northern Prairies, some of the best farmland in the world suddenly fell under the dry spell to end all dry spells - showing no sign of ending any time soon. While most farmers made it through 1930 and 31 mostly intact, the following years would see the situation grow increasingly dire as water sources shrank, the earth dried out, the crops died and the livestock with it. Going into the 1932 elections the situation was becoming so dire that the ongoing drought was producing large dust storms across large parts of the continent and forcing people from their land.
The economy would experience further hardships as the McAdoo government's neglect and mismanagement of foreign affairs grew ever clearer and impactful, with the collapse of the Fruit Companies at first causing shortages in tropical fruit, although this could be alleviated by primarily Colombian and Venezuelan fruit plantations, and unemployment, which was further exacerbated in the slowly expanding ripples of economic calamity as the impact of losing the immense investments in White Siberia played havoc with the high finances of the New York elite. Gradually, these consequences and subsequent international crises would make themselves known as increasingly desperate elite financiers looked for any and every possible source of income to alleviate their financial straits, with due process and diligence largely set aside in the struggle for profitable investment and capital growth (7).
Just because the elections came to an end, did not mean that the conflict both between factions of the Klan and the wider struggle against anti-Klan forces under Huey Long came to an end. In Ohio, the growing debt of blood between the Black Guard and Indiana Klan would see an escalating cycle of violence following the Indianapolis Southside Massacre which would shock the region to its core. While D.C. Stephenson and Hiram Evans both sought to tamp down on the violence, equally aware of the damage it was doing to the Klan as a whole, they proved largely unsuccessful in their efforts. At the heart of the matter lay the relatively weak central authority of the Old Klan, which largely allowed chapters to run themselves in order to achieve a national presence, and the resultant opposition of Ohio Klan figures to interference from the National leadership.
Such clashes had already lead to the Indiana Klan's breach with the Old Klan, and while the Ohioans remained staunchly Democratic in affiliation, they soon began to ape their Indiana neighbours by moving in an increasingly independent direction. Noted for their fanaticism, propensity for violence and the distinct black Klan robes worn by their elite Black Guard, the Ohio Klan soon began to garner national attention. As bombings, shootings and stabbings occurred with frightening regularity along the border between Indiana and Ohio between the two factions, the need for new recruits would see the Black Guard turn to particularly unsavoury methods, kidnapping people off the street and bringing them to rural training camps for indoctrination and training, with a graduation ceremony, and resultant freedom, requiring the murder of a minority person. With public outcry over the violence growing across the Midwest and anti-Klan sentiment entrenching itself in the communities hit by the intra-Klan strife in the new decade, August Vollmer spied an opportunity to further distinguish the AILE as an independent law enforcement institution through the dispatch of more than 200 agents to Indiana and Ohio, who began a wide-ranging investigation to identify and bring to justice the perpetrators of the countless crimes being committed in the region (8).
Not to be left out, Huey Long would take a break from his near-constant anti-Klan campaigning in the South, primarily in Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri and Mississippi, to do a tour of the Midwest. Undertaken in early-1932, at the height of the intra-Klan violence, Long would speak before massive crowds on the terror and destructiveness brought upon their communities by the Klan, citing the names of those killed in the individual communities in an impressive display of memory while openly daring the Klan to take another shot at him. It wasn't long before someone took him up on the offer, with unsuccessful assassination attempts occurring at rallies in Fort Wayne, Muncie, Dayton and Columbus before Huey Long was convinced to end his tour. Nevertheless, despite the violence that these rallies engendered, they would be seen widely as a roaring success and a demonstrable blow to the power and authority of the Klan in the Midwest. More and more, the sentiment seemed to be that the Klan was playing a critical role in the degeneration of American society into violence and chaos.
While Long made Klan membership an imprisonable offense in Louisiana in early 1930, only months before securing a seat as Senator for Louisiana in the 1930 Midterm elections, and campaigned nationally to secure similar legislation was passed elsewhere, the Klan found its position in both the Republican and Democratic Parties increasingly in question. While Hiram Evans was able to maintain his position as powerbroker in the Democratic Party, the same could not be said for D.C. Stephenson and the Indiana Klan, whose publicly known members would find themselves ejected from the party under the direction of a resurgent Charles Curtis in 1931, his animosity towards the Klan had been stoked beyond measure by the Klan's interference in the 1928 Republican Convention (9).
While Huey Long had been able to develop a national profile, soon becoming one of the most recognisable men in America, he had come to find that his hold on Louisiana itself was shakier than originally believed. The issue, more than any other, stemmed from the personage of Long's Lieutenant Governor Paul Narcisse Cyr, a man appointed to appease the Old Regulars who he had pushed from power in 1924. Cyr, who had developed the frightful habit of declaring himself in charge of state affairs the moment Long left the state, gradually eroded what little relationship he had with Long after his appointment in 1928. This collapsing relationship was further escalated by a series of events in 1930, as Long was elected to the senate but refused to leave his seat of power in Louisiana to Cyr. The clashes between Cyr and Long rapidly worsened as Long continually delayed resigning as governor. Throughout the spring and summer of 1931, Cyr threatened to take the oath of office as governor but did not do so.
In October 1931, Cyr filed suit in a bid to oust Long as governor and declared himself governor, having a justice of the peace in Shreveport give him the oath of office in the Caddo Parish courthouse. Cyr next departed for Baton Rouge where he threatened to take over the governor's mansion. In response, Long ordered the National Guard to mobilise and had troops surrounded the state capitol with strict orders not to admit Cyr, replacing the guardsmen with state police a few days later. For a time, the city turned into an armed camp, with both Long and Cyr packing pistols. However, without police power, Cyr soon realized that he was beaten and returned to his home of Jeanerette while Long, who had dubbed Cyr the "tooth puller from Jeanerette" in reference to his background as a dentist, flatly deposed his former Lieutenant governor - even ordering Cyr removed from the state payroll, resulting in the forfeit of all pensions and wages. When Cyr began to protest that he remained Lieutenant Governor, Long was swift to claim that the rightful Lieutenant Governor was not Cyr at all, but rather that his close ally Oscar K. Allen had taken up the post already and was now the legitimate successor to Long - a fact which would be confirmed in a closely managed special election in late 1931 which saw Oscar appointed to succeed Long.
Affairs in Louisiana now organised, Allen being so closely tied to Long as to be viewed as little more than a stooge, Long was able to turn his complete attentions to the Midwest and the national sphere as a whole, taking up his senate seat full-time in DC after having spent more than a year shuttling between Louisiana and the Capital. It was during this time that Long set out on his Midwestern tour and, perhaps most significantly, made contact with the ascendant Catholic radio star Father Charles Edward Coughlin, who would prove critical to boosting Long's contacts in the wider Catholic, particularly Irish-American Catholic, circles. As fierce a denouncer of the Ku Klux Klan as Long himself, Coughlin had emerged initially in 1926 in response to cross burnings on the grounds of his church and the rise of the Klan in his home town of Detroit, where they menaced his Irish-American congregants. In the lead-up to the 1928 elections, he had shifted his focus from religious topics to politics, and rapidly saw a growth in his following, vocally supporting the Progressives as the only force standing up to the Klan in America. He would soon extend his messages into anti-Capitalist topics and by the early 1930s had grown his support to number in the hundreds of thousands. The meeting between Long and Coughlin would soon see the development of a close partnership as the two began to discuss their views on the politics of the day and the role of the Progressive Party in a future America (10).
Footnotes:
(6) As is stated in the update, the American political system really isn't equipped to handle three major parties - especially if they cannot figure out how to work together. With Huey Long and the Progressives as a whole in an openly declared war with the Klan, and the Republicans horrified at McAdoo's total failure to deal with foreign affairs. The President is unable to gin up the support he needs for the legislative branch of government to function. When this is coupled with a Supreme Court staffed primarily by judges put in place by progressive governments or Republican conservative judges, it becomes hard for him to accomplish much of anything. Finally, unlike in the modern day where the American President can use Executive Orders on an incredibly wide array of issues, at this time executive orders have not seen broad use outside of wartime and are rarely active policy initiatives. This was one of the major changes which occurred under FDR, and McAdoo just doesn't have the same level of support as FDR had.
1930 Midterm Elections:
Senate: Dem - 37, Rep - 36, Prog - 27, Other - 0
House: Dem - 183, Rep - 129, Prog - 121, Other - 7
(7) While the economic situation is quite different from OTL we still see many of the developments which occurred in the American economy IOTL, such as reckless consumer spending. One thing to note is that this is further worsened by the government's promise of underwriting banks' finances, which occurs as part of the McAdoo government's efforts to boost economic growth even further to shore up their faltering support. At the same time we see the beginnings of the drought which will lead to the Dust Bowl of the mid-1930s and the growing economic disruption which results. While the economy is still booming going into 1932, it has definitely begun to weaken, as more and more warning signs begin to emerge of a pending economic recession. Finally, we have the desperate elite financiers investing their money in increasingly harebrained schemes - particularly the countless small banks popping up all over the country prove targets of this financing, which in turn results in further unsustainable consumer and small-holder debt.
(8) The situation with the Klan is deteriorating quickly, but Ohio and Indiana are really hotspots for the strife, and the effects are being felt in the societies that they claim to protect. The part about abducting people off the street in order to recruit them is actually an OTL practice of the Black Guard, who were later rebranded as the Black Legion, and were probably amongst the most extreme of the various Klan affiliates at the time. Also note that by bombings, I am mostly referring to people throwing grenades or sticks of dynamite through a window or the like, not massive car bombs or anything of that scale. It is mostly just skirmishing between feuding factions after the Southside Massacre draws attention to the conflict. It is worth noting that the AILE agents dedicated to the anti-Klan Taskforce in Ohio and Indiana are amongst the largest in the agency's history.
(9) Is Huey Long being exceedingly lucky here, in surviving this mad caper across the Midwest and campaigning elsewhere? Yes, definitely. But, when you consider the amount of attempts made on various prominent political figures both at the time and since IOTL, it should remain plausible. Huey Long is overtly reckless with his own safety, as he was on occasion IOTL, but in fact maintains a highly trained and disciplined bodyguard who are able to deal with most threats and wears various protective gear to reduce the danger where possible. That said, the thing to take away from this part is that the support for the Klan is crumbling as their promises prove hollow and they begin to directly harm the communities they claim to protect.
(10) Huey Long's struggle with Cyr is almost entirely OTL and gives a better idea of his disregard for norms and willingness to use state resources in his personal feuds. It is worth noting here that the Coughlin-Long relationship forms earlier than IOTL and that Coughlin takes a significantly less anti-socialist outlook ITTL. He is far more concerned with the rise of the far-right than with the left, viewing the Red Scare and subsequent demonisation of communists and socialists as an effort on the part of the far-right's efforts to distract from their own misdeeds. He is by no means a socialist or communist, but he isn't overtly hostile as he was IOTL, which is what makes it possible for him to align with the Progressives. He does take an anti-Semitic tone, but it isn't anything people really make a note of with him ITTL. In general anti-Semitism just isn't as much of a hot button topic as it proved to be IOTL during this era, it is present and widespread but not something notable - much as it was prior to the Great War.
End Note:
I know that I have been in the weeds for a lot of people during these latest updates, but this should be a topic which plenty of people have sufficient knowledge to get into the nuances. The American political and economic systems are beginning to crack under the pressure as partisan politics rise to the fore and the issue of the Klan rises to dominate the national consciousness.
I really hope that people enjoyed this update and that we can get a good discussion going on these developments.
Seriously, you have a lot of great speculation in here which aligns with a lot of my own thoughts on how events might proceed and some of the key dynamics to bear in mind as I was working on the subsequent period. We will be getting a deeper look into the Jiaxing Communists and Asian Communism in general next Sunday, but I can say that the Jiaxing Communists are going to be rural in focus for the most part. We are going to see considerable shifts in the political dynamics of the Soviet Republic as we move forward with Trotsky the main impetus of these changes.
