AHC: Strongest possible KKK

McAdoo had the support of the Klan in 1924 (primarily because he was strongly pro-Prohibition and because his two main opponents, Al Smith and Oscar Underwood were so unacceptable to the Klan) but was no Klansman. In 1911, he had chaired a national citizen's committee demanding the abrogation of the US-Russia passport treaty on the ground of Russia's limitations on travel rights for American Jews. (IIRC, that was actually what brought him to Wilson's attention.) In 1924 his backers included Catholics like James Riordan and Jews like Bernard Baruch. (Also, as commissioner of the nation's railroads during World War I McAdoo had issued an order dictating that blacks and women working for the railroads should get the same pay as white men for equal work. Admittedly, he may have done this at the behest of the railroad unions, who thought that if the railroads had to pay blacks equally, they just wouldn't hire them. But whatever the motives of McAdoo's equal pay order, it was welcomed by African Americans at the time.) Moreover, McAdoo was not only a supporter of the New Deal domestically but a strong supporter of FDR's foreign policy (which the Klan, or what remained of it, hated) in 1939-41: "In correspondence with Cordell Hull, McAdoo praised the Roosevelt policy of “armed neutrality” that was put into force in 1939, and was even more effusive about the “destroyers for bases” plan that was prominent in 1940.907 In fact, McAdoo suggested that the United States should request bases at Singapore and Hong Kong as well, since the security offered by our Pearl Harbor facility was so questionable!" https://media.proquest.com/media/pq...p/NPDF?_s=IngIylYiVKWGPwRw8wtTG8i8LR4=(Indeed, his fears about Pearl Harbor were quite prescient--he expressed his concerns to FDR as early as 1938!--though they were based partly on the standard Californian doubts about the loyalty of the largely Asian population of Hawaii.)

No doubt McAdoo shared many of the racial prejudices of the South where he was born and (with regard to Asians) of the California where he eventually lived. But he was not a Klansman, and even if he had somehow been elected in 1924--IMO the chances of any Democrat winning that year were negligible--the Klan would still be in decline by the mid-1920's. (After all, in OTL the Klan was perfectly satisfied with the election of Coolidge. And while it is true that the Democratic platform of 1924 did not denounce the Klan by name, neither did the Republicans.')
 
Not havinfg a Stephenson scandal would not IMO have saved the Klan.

The Klan had reached its peak and was starting to decline even before the Stephenson scandal hit in 1925. Already in 1924 it suffered such setbacks as the defeat of governor Walter Pierce in Oregon and the victory of "Ma" Ferguson over Klansman Felix D. Robertson for governor of Texas.

The Stephenson affair was not the only cause of the Klan's decline. Another important factor was internal dissension, both at the national level (the dispute between William Joseph Simmons and his successor as Imperial Wizard, Hiram Evans) and locally. (It is remarkable how in city after city, even before Stephenson was convicted, large numbers of the Klansmen--in some cities virtually all of them--seceded and formed new organizations like the Minute Men of America in Denver, the Independent Protestant Knights of America in Niagara, New York, etc. See Kenneth Jackson, *The Ku Klux Klan in the City, 1915-1930,* https://books.google.com/books?id=xkgwSauBgTwC&pg=PA254 ) Another point is that electoral success became harder as the Klan's opponents united, and electoral frustration in turn led to decline in membership. (It also led non-Klan politicians who had associated themselves with the Klan to back away from it, so that joining the Klan would no longer bring patronage benefits.) Also, the Klan's issues became less compelling: Reds seemed less scary than in the early 1920s, immigration had already been restricted, Prohibition proved unenforceable, and the Catholic Church obviously was not going away. Finally, the sheer *novelty* of the group wore off--I think this factor is often underestimated. The 1920's was an era of short-lived crazes, and in some respects the Klan was one of them, though obviously more sinister than most. Even Al Smith's presidential candidacy in 1928 could not really revive it.
 
The Klan's not going to win through the Democrats in the 1920s; outside of the South they were too anti-Prohibition and dependent on immigrants.

Have D.C. Stephenson not get brought down by scandal and keep growing more powerful, first in Indiana, then nationwide. With his greater influence, he prevents any scandals from coming out around Governor Edward Jackson. Then have Hoover not run in 1928, and Jackson wins the Republican nomination.
 
FDR was much worse than most presidents in that regard, though. I know Lincoln did stuff, but he wasn't as much of a racist as FDR was, and he opened up a lot of land for settlement, which FDR wouldn't have done. Wilson was also fascistic.

FDR wasn't very racist for the time period, Blacks leaders visited the White House on occasion. That was very controversial at the time, particularly down south. Opening land for settlement was a done deal after the ACW. The ONLY reason it wasn't done before is that the Southern States didn't want more Free States which they figured the Western States would be. That wasn't a consideration after the ACW and Southerners had no problem opening up the west after it.
 
Lincoln flat out said if he could preserve the Union without freeing a single slave, he would do so. FDR issued Executive Orders to make sure blacks had access to government jobs.
 
He also said he was as much in favor as any man of whites having the superior place in society? More table-setting?

No, that was probably genuine. Lincoln was racist by modern standards but not by his era's. By his era's standards he was liberal but not radical on the issue. However basically saying that Whites should have superior jobs and certain rights the Blacks don't does not mean you want Blacks to be out and out slaves. Racism, like most things, is not all or nothing it is a matter of degree to a large extent. However degrees MATTER.
 
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1920s Klan has the potential to get even more politically powerful if it can keep its internal corruption problems more under control. That's what hurt its image in the eyes of the public at the time. The 1920s Klan can best be understood as a WASP identity politics group. It was a very different animal from the 1860s-70s Klan or the 1960s Klan.

This is a oft misunderstood point in the 1915-1923 Klan revival. Alcohol, 'social degenercy', Cahtholicism or any non Protestant religion, and other "races" like Slavs & Scandinavians were all regarded as enemies of the natural position of the Anglo Saxon Protestants. When the Klan was restarted 1915 the "Negro" problem had been handled informally & legallly for decades.

After Klan membership peaked and declined the broader racial & religious doctrines were altered & the hatred slowly 1925 - 1950 redirected at African Americans.
 
WI the Klan flip their attitude towards alcohol?

During Prohibition they turn a profit selling moonshine to thirsty Northerners. "Moonshining" becomes a patriotic duty for many hillbillies. Mind you, plantation owners shift to growing tobacco, psycho-active hemp and corn. Much of that corn is fermented and distilled to create alcohol. They use those profits to fund Klan projects.

The ultimate Klan-wank would involve the Klan adopting Taliban attitudes towards booze: "not for consumption by the faithful, but we will cheerfully sell bath tub gin to decadent Catholics, liberals, New Englanders, immigrants, non-whites, etc."

Ps. I just read Clive Cussler's novel "Bootlegger."
 
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