Andrew Johnson killed in Booth plot.

John Wilkes Booth's plot famously targeted President Lincoln, Vice President Andrew Johnson, and Secretary of State Steward. So my question is, what happens if both Lincoln and Johnson are killed? The next in line according to succession law at the time was one Lafayette Foster. But the succession law also had an odd requirement that, given the death of both the President and the Vice President, an election had to be held within the year. Meaning the death of Andrew Johnson means the election of 1865. How does the precedent setting Foster Presidency affect the end of the civil war? If the law requires an election within the year who are the candidates? I half suspect the Republicans will pick Grant, but I have no idea who the Republicans nominate.
 
I'm pretty sure the 1792 succession act was still in effect, so a special election would occur that fall with the Electoral College voting in December 1865.

If Foster declines to seek a full term, or if he's challenged for the Republican nomination, likely candidates apart from Grant are Thaddeus Stevens (leader of the Radical faction in the House, and chairman of Ways and Means), William Seward (Sec of State), Benjamin Wade (leader of Radicals in the Senate, and later OTL Pres Pro Tem), Schuyler Colfax (Speaker of the House, and Grant's OTL VP), and Edwin Stanton (Sec of War).

I don't know much directly about Foster's politics, but he was defeated for reelection by another Republican IOTL in 1867 and ran for a House seat as a Democrat in 1874, so I suspect he'd have quite a bit of trouble with the Radicals as Acting President, and would be likely to face serious difficulties being nominated as the Republican candidate to run for a full term.
 
I believe that there would be a lot an anger in the immediate aftermath of multiple assisinations.

Maybe there would have been some serious action against the Southern ruling class and real justice for former slaves
 
Two contenders for the Republican nomination would be Seward and Stanton. Stanton is in some peoples minds regarded as being behind the assassination in which case he would also have been hoping to bump off Seward. Seward is more plausible as a candidate being able to bring in support from New York state.

However the republican might have gone for Grant and a Khaki or should we say blue election. The Democrats may well have kept their heads down and the Copperhead label would have been attached to them. By the time of the assassination, Lee had surrendered at Appatomax and Ewell and Liddell had also surrendered and Mosby was parolled under a truce as was Taylor. Johnston was seeking to surrender the Army of Tennessee and this lead to other surrendering. Effectively there were few armies left that hadn't eithered surrendered or were seeking terms apart from Stand Watie so it would have had little effect on the war itself.
 
I see a Seward/Grant ticket. The north goes in a destroys the ruling class in the south, Jef Davis is hung, african american get a rell taste of freedom.

In the long run I see the US buying the Dominican Republic and Alaska, and use then to help free slaves.

But the most important if this happens the old south would be broken forever.
 
I agree about Seward. If he is wounded, but lives, as in OTL, he will be seen as a living matyr for the cause. Although, if Grant declines the nomination, maybe we'll see Seward/Holt, which would be an interesting turn of events ...
 
I see a Seward/Grant ticket. The north goes in a destroys the ruling class in the south, Jef Davis is hung, african american get a rell taste of freedom.

In the long run I see the US buying the Dominican Republic and Alaska, and use then to help free slaves.

But the most important if this happens the old south would be broken forever.

I'm not so sure about this leading to the ultimate victory of the radical republicans and the continuation of reconstruction era policies regarding the rights of former slaves past the end of the occupation of the south. The problem, as another poster here far more knowledgeable than I has pointed out, there's a cultural/contextual problem here. If the south wants to oppress the African American/former slave population, they will find ways to do so, almost no matter what the Federal Government does. Perhaps I'm being pessimistic there. But also, would the reaction to Andrew Johnson's death create such a radical backlash? Sure there would be some increase in reaction to Booth and his plotters, and I suppose there'd be slightly more anger, but unless something else happens like a confederate guerrilla war, which was suggested in the chapter on this idea in the second "What If" book.

So, the two most likely candidates seem to be William Seward and General Grant. Which would be the more likely Republican nominee?
And in terms of the election of 1865, what do the Democrats and their allies do? Renominate General McClellan? Or do they sit it out, making the election of 1865 strictly a contest between Republicans?
 
Grant is a foregone conclusion for the GOP nomination.

The Dems, in this atmosphere, will want to look as impeccably patriotic as they can, so maybe Winfield Hancock. They'll still lose though.

Reconstruction. A lot of details are different, but not much changed in the end. The South felt strongly about black rights (the fewer the better), while most northerners didn't. Hence the outcome.
 
Grant is a foregone conclusion for the GOP nomination.

The Dems, in this atmosphere, will want to look as impeccably patriotic as they can, so maybe Winfield Hancock. They'll still lose though.

Reconstruction. A lot of details are different, but not much changed in the end. The South felt strongly about black rights (the fewer the better), while most northerners didn't. Hence the outcome.

I'm going out on a limb here, but the version of this scenario in the second What If? book postulated a second McClellan nomination. Hancock is another good possibility, though that will have an impact down the line, since there's at least a chance that a loss in 65' would have prevented Hancock from be nominated later on. Just a slight confusion on my part, would the special election result in a permanent restructuring of the Presidential election cycle? That is, say Grant is elected in 1865 and is therefore reelected in 1869 rather than 1868? If that's the case, the 1873 election might prove interesting. President Charles Adams?
 
I'm going out on a limb here, but the version of this scenario in the second What If? book postulated a second McClellan nomination. Hancock is another good possibility, though that will have an impact down the line, since there's at least a chance that a loss in 65' would have prevented Hancock from be nominated later on. Just a slight confusion on my part, would the special election result in a permanent restructuring of the Presidential election cycle? That is, say Grant is elected in 1865 and is therefore reelected in 1869 rather than 1868? If that's the case, the 1873 election might prove interesting. President Charles Adams?

That is so.

The Constitution provides that the POTUS and VP are elected for the term of four years, so the election of 1865 would not be a "special" election for the unexpired term only (doing that would require an Amendment, not just an Act of Congress) but an election for a full term, with subsequent elections being in '69, '73 etc.
 
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