AHC - Alternate late-1920s to early-1930s Democrat US Presidents

In a scenario where FDR and Huey Long are butterflied away (or at minimum delayed from becoming Presidential nominees), the challenge is to have a Democratic President from the late-1920s to early-1930s onwards, who unlike OTL FDR in 1933 refuses to recognize the Soviet Union* and also manages to either get the US out of the depression within 2-5 years without a New Deal analogue.

*- It could be the case that a later ATL FDR or similar Democratic Presidency would end up recognizing the Soviets
 
Well, in the first place the Democrats are very unlikely to win the presidency in 1928 no matter who they nominate. As for 1932, there are plenty of Democrats who might have been chosen who would have been more conservative than FDR--Smith, Garner, Baker, Ritchie, etc. But I wouldn't assume they wouldn't recognize the Soviet Union--plenty of conservative businessmen supported recognition in 1933, partly because they wanted more trade with Russia to get the US out of the Depression, and partly to check Japanese expansionism in the Far East. See

The "Great Conspiracy" of 1933: A Study in Short Memories
PAUL F. BOLLER, JR.
Southwest Review
Vol. 39, No. 2 (SPRING 1954), pp. 97-112

https://www.jstor.org/stable/43463960?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

Boller summarized his findings in his Memoirs of an Obscure Professor:

"...Writers like William F. Buckley and newspapers like the Chicago Tribune and the Dallas Morning News charged that recognition planted the seeds of Communist subversion in the United States and they all blamed FDR for it. As the Dallas Morning News put it angrily on November 17, 1953: "Russia was recognized solely because Franklin D. Roosevelt as President insisted upon it."

"It was difficult for me to believe that the question of Soviet recognition was that simple—or that sinister. Late in 1953, therefore, I began spending part of each day in the stacks of SMU's Fondren Library turning the pages of countless magazines and newspapers back in 1933 to see if I could team with some precision just how Soviet recognition came about and what the American people thought about it at the time. The results were surprising, even to me; the majority of newspapers and the bulk of the American business community, I found, favored recognition at the time. They saw the possibility of profitable trade with Russia, for one thing; for another, they thought Russian recognition might serve to check Japanese aggression in China. The Dallas Morning News, I discovered to my delight, had been especially eager for recognition. "Some object to recognition," said the News late in 1933, "on the ground that Russia's system of government is communistic and in general antireligious. Internationally, however, each State in theory has the right to determine its own form of government and sphere of activity. . . . The general opinion in this country is that Russia and the United States should resume normal and diplomatic relations, since they have many common interests, especially in the Far East, and can readily develop trade relations, mutually profitable . . . "

"To the Dallas Morning News, Russia was "Just Another Customer." A News cartoon portrayed a Russian woman waiting before the counter in a grocery store to make her purchases while Uncle Sam, the clerk, tells two protesting women (the American Federation of Labor and the Daughters of the American Revolution): "Listen! 1 ain't goin' to marry the gal!" But my favorite finding was the report of the love feast held in Manhattan's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel on November 24, 1933, to celebrate recognition. It was an elegant party attended by Soviet officials (including Maxim Litvinov, chief Russian negotiator) and by prominent businessmen representing just about every major corporation in the United States. The high point of the evening came when the 2500 guests stood and faced a stage behind which hung a huge American flag beside the Red flag with Soviet hammer and sickle while the organ played "My Country of Thee" and then switched into the "Internationale." I wrote up my findings in an article entitled "The 'Great Conspiracy' of 1933: A Study in Short Memories," which appeared in the Southwest Review in the spring of 1954..." https://books.google.com/books?id=zvuuL-BoDt0C&pg=PT19

Note incidentally that on the recognition issue, FDR "was careful to enlist they support of Al Smith and other prominent Catholic politicians..." https://books.google.com/books?id=9rViPobMmoYC&pg=PA243
 
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While an ATL President Al Smith would have apparently ended Prohibition earlier, would he have been able to delay recognition of the Soviet Union til the late-1930s (albeit prior to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact) and get the US out of the Depression much quicker compared to FDR without any New Deal analogue?
 
While an ATL President Al Smith would have apparently ended Prohibition earlier, would he have been able to delay recognition of the Soviet Union til the late-1930s (albeit prior to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact) and get the US out of the Depression much quicker compared to FDR without any New Deal analogue?

(1) Al Smith had virtually no chance of getting elected in 1928. In 1932 he might have won (in the unlikely event he was nominated) but he could hardly have gotten Prohibition repealed more quickly than it was.

(2) As I already pointed out, Smith supported recognition of the USSR. He was in fact condemned for that by some otherwise friendly Catholic publications: "Under the title, 'A Dent in the Brown Derby,' America sadly remarked that Smith's argument 'seems to rest on a principle entirely foreign to his humane and generous spirit.' Commercial benefit, the editorial continued, does not justify dealing with a government in league with the Third International. A month later, the Jesuit publication exclaimed: 'There are things more precious than trade, and one of them is decency.' The USSR, it contended, stands for everything contrary to the Christian world and values..." Peter G. Filene, Americans and the Soviet experiment, 1917-1933, p. 262.

(3) Without denying the faults of the New Deal, it is hard to see the program of conservative Democrats like Smith having greater success in handling the Depression. Basically, Smith saw a balanced budget as the panacea, and warned that to achieve it, not only would ruthless cuts in federal expenditures be necessary, bur additional revenues would have to be raised through a sales tax:

"In a clear repudiation of Roosevelt's views, Smith lent his support to the sales tax proposal that had recently failed in Congress.20 'It is important in the imposition of new taxes,' he argued, 'that no greater strain be put upon industry or business than is absolutely necessary.' The sales tax, by spreading its burden across all members of society, would not single out business profits or capital investment to bear the brunt of the government's budgetary woes.21" Douglas B. Craig, After Wilson: The Struggle for the Democratic Party 1920-1934, p. 230. (Smith did favor a public works program, but felt that it should be funded by a federal bond issue.)
 
If Al Smith is out of the question in terms of policy despite potentially being able to win in 1932, which other Democrat candidates during that period would have likely fulfilled the challenge of delaying recognition of the Soviet Union, repealing Prohibition earlier and managing to get the US out of depression in around 3 years instead of prolonging it by other 7?
 
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