I was thinking of a Populist-Democratic majority coalition government with young charismatic Populist Nebraskan MP William Jennings Bryan, nicknamed "The Great Commoner", as the compromise Prime Minister.In an early draft, it was PM Bryan instead of PM Bland. But Bland felt like a more natural fit for the scenario (a cross of gold may get you a presidential nomination, but I'm not sure it can get you a premiership) and like a road less traveled upon, allowing the scenario a rare bit of uniqueness (I doubt there are very many TLs that do much, if anything, with Richard P. Bland, compared to the well-known Great Commoner). But Bryan will still be important, having given speeches that were crucial in helping Bland beat Palmer in the 1895 leadership contest (a detail I somehow forgot to include) as well as hacing served in the Bland Cabinet (which I won't make a wikibox for, or any other further Cabinets, for that matter. I lost the template for them). He's due to take Bland's mantle when he dies in 1899.
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States in yellow elected a majority or plurality of Republican MPs, states in blue elected a majority or plurality of Democratic MPs, states in green elected a majority or plurality of Populist MPs, states in purple elected an equal amount of Democratic and Republican MPs, and states in light green elected an equal amount of Republican and Populist MPs.
The 1897 United States federal election was held on March 7, 1897. Prime Minister Richard P. Bland sought to savage his silver coalition.
The 1895 election had resulted in a hung parliament, where the subsequent coalition-building had been volatile. Both major parties saw bolters that affected the balance of power, ultimately leading to Richard P. Bland cobbling together, by the barest of margins, a so-called "silver" coalition. However, this coalition was unstable, to put it mildly, and was not able to put together a majority to institute its namesake goal of free silver. After a year of unstable governance, Bland was forced to call new elections, which were set for March 1897. The instability of the Bland ministry deeply strained its popularity, and its insecure control over spending matters threatened the government's very viability, as well as hampering its ability to properly respond to the depression that had destroyed its predecessor's popularity. Its goal of free silver was unpopular outside its Southern and Western agrarian bases, and the promises they had made to their voters in the industrial Midwest had not been kept.
As such, these elections were a devastating defeat for them. The Democrats took 231 seats, an improvement of 7 on their pre-election numbers but 30 seats and 4% below what Palmer had posted in 1895. The Populists were also hurt, losing 36 seats and over half their popular vote. The Silver Republcans all largely rejoined the GOP a month before the election, including leader Henry Teller (who became distrustful of the Democrats and developed a deep hatred of Prime Minister Bland, though he did eventually join the Democrats in 1905), while the National Democrats took 20 seats and 4%, a loss of half the seats that had bolted with Palmer in 1895. The Republicans took a clear majority of 337 seats, allowing William McKinley to become Prime Minister, while the Prohibitionists took 15 seats, 1 more than their 1895 result (though they did about 0.1% worse in the popular vote).
The election solidified the realignment of the previous elections. The Populists began a precipitous decline, while the Democrats lost seats in the North while coming to fully dominate the South. While the Prohibitionists would keep their place in Parliament and maintain MPs well into the 20th century, the National Democrats did not last long either, as Palmer died in 1900. Following his death, the National Democrats would return to the Democratic fold, though this, for them, came too late, as their faction would not dominate the party for decades to come; Bland, who died in 1899, was replace as Democratic leader by William Jennings Bryan, who, though ultimately never prime minister, would shape party politics for decades to come. The Bourbons would not lead the Democrats again until the 1960's.
I think Lincoln throwing Booth out of the theater box is the better option.Presumably he would have except it looks like when he spun and grabbed Booth he accidentally threw him right out of the box and all the way to a hard and fatal landing. Maybe it should be Booth is late and tries his ambush outside where Abe can absolutely monster him.
Hurray! President Udall '76!View attachment 775333
The fall of President John Ashbrook happened slowly at first, then all at once. In the Summer of 1971, the Senate Judiciary Committee began holding hearings regarding a supposed scheme by several State and Defense officials to sell under-the-table weapons to Jose Merino Castro’s fascist regime in Chile. The weapons were supplied by several arms dealers, and the profits from the sales were donated to the Egyptian Islamic Jihadist Order, a terrorist group in Egypt led by Ayman al-Zawahiri that was planning to overthrow the Egyptian government. The operation was run dually to prop up the anti-Communist Chilean dictatorship and destabilize Egypt’s efforts against Israel.
On April 16, 1976, eight American missionaries from the Peoples’ Temple movement, including Peoples’ Temple founder Jim Jones, were arrested while attempting to leave Chile. The charge was a supposed attempt to disseminate Communist propaganda, and President Merino refused to release the missionaries. It took Ashbrook three weeks to negotiate a release, and Jim Jones died a month after returning home due to complications from pneumonia caught in prison. The negative response to Ashbrook’s inability to secure a release drew more attention to the Senate hearings on what became known as the Ayman-Merino Affair or Merinomore (after Spiro Agnew’s Baltimore Scandal). Soon enough, Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld and National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger were directly implicated in the weapons sales.
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Worse yet, upon discovering America’s support of terrorist groups in Egypt, the Arab League declared a two month long oil boycott of the US as retribution, sending the economy into freefall. Several union organizations capitalized on this by striking for fairer wages and hours, worsening the recession and reflecting even worse on Ashbrook. Udall did not waste a moment in attacking the President, drawing a clear connection between his policies and the current recession and painting him as a scandal-ridden hypocrite. In regards to Merinomore, Udall asked in a famous speech, “What did the President know and when did he know it?” Ashbrook had thrived against Church by going on the offensive, but was now forced on the backfoot.
As election day drew nearer, polling showed Udall inching nearer and nearer to his opponent’s numbers, but never quite overtaking him. Unexpectedly high Democratic turnouts broke the camel’s back, letting Udall achieve an extremely narrow victory, becoming the 40th President and forcing Ashbrook out of office much like Ashbrook did to Agnew.
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President John Ashbrook would have a mixed legacy. Although a well-timed chain of events drove him out of the White House, it did not drive his extreme conservatism out of his base of support. The 1976 election would set the stage for the Republican Party's future, and the next two Republican Presidents, Jack Kemp and James Dobson, would solidify it. On the other hand, Udall’s presidency would set a standard of populist progressivism that continued in the Democrats to come, such as Adlai Stevenson III and Ron Reagan, balancing the scales against Ashbrook’s conservatism. In the end, it was doomed to never be, Ashbrook’s America, a country of no left turns.