Brainstorming/PC: Ways to strengthen American socialism?

Currently planning a timeline that chronicles the rise of socialism as a major political force in American politics. Understandably for this to not be ASB it is necessary to strengthen the socialist movement in the US. I have a few ideas on how to do this and would like some feedback, as well as any other suggestions people might have.

The Populist Party dissolves some time between 1900-1904 rather than 1908. Whilst this doesn't have much of an initial effect, it does mean that a lot of their supporters and activists switch over to the newly formed Socialist Party, giving them a bit of a boost in their early elections.

Bill Heywood chosen as Deb's running mate in 1908. Heywood was initially considered as the presidential candidate due to the national attention he recieved after being acquitted for the murder of Frank Steunenberg, but was rejected because it was feared he would have been to divisive, with Debs considered the only candidate able to hold the Party together. If the Party decided to take the risk of nominating him as Deb's running mate, might that give them a bit of a boost in the 1908 election?

Earlier US entry into WW1. This was a major factor in Jello's timeline Reds, where the US joins from the very beginning. I'm not that well informed about that period of history, however, so I'm looking for suggestions on how to get the US involved earlier.

Hubert Harrison lives longer. IOTL he died of appendicitis in 1927, which shouldn't be too hard to have him survive. As a result he's able to serve as a major African-American figure in the socialist movement, and is instrumental in building support for socialism within the black community.

The CPPA agrees to form an independent political party. IOTL during the second conference in 1922 delegated from the Farmer-Labor Party called for establishing a new political party. The motion was defeated by 12 votes (52 to 64) with the Socialist Party supporting the motion. If the motion passes (albeit by a tiny margin) it would serve to lay the foundations of a broad-church left-wing party that serves as an American equivalent to the UK Labour Party.

A large section of the US film industry relocated from California to Florida. IOTL studio executive Joseph Schneck warned that, in the face of militant unionism and the genuine prospect of Upton Sinclair being elected Governor of California the film industry would likely relocate from Hollywood to Florida. Assuming that they follow through on this threat, much of the remaining film-making infrastructure in Hollywood falls under the control cooperatives and strong unions sympathetic to socialism and other progressive politics. As a result America ends up with two major film centres, with Hollywood serving as a major source of left-wing support, as well as taking the sting out of anti-Communist blacklists by providing work to blacklisted actors.

Derailing the Second Red Scare. Due to a whole host of reasons I'm planning to have the Second Red Scare fizzle out and be much less effective than IOTL. Would this be a significant boost to US socialism in general?

What do you all think so far, and does anyone have any possible suggestions?
 
Haywood was pretty anti-parliamentarian in part because of the syndicalism of the organisation he belonged to and in part because a lot of organisers and members of the IWW and a lot of workers in general were not able to vote due to the way registration was restricted particularly to those who worked across state lines and for migrant workers in general. I think one of the more important moments that prevented socialism from becoming a real force was the Palmer raids and the prevention of the socialists such as Samuel Orr and the like being barred from serving on the New York State Assembly, both of which occurred around the same time, but there were other strikes and attempts by socialists to enter elections that were suppressed by the state that could be similar turning points.
 
Haywood was pretty anti-parliamentarian in part because of the syndicalism of the organisation he belonged to and in part because a lot of organisers and members of the IWW and a lot of workers in general were not able to vote due to the way registration was restricted particularly to those who worked across state lines and for migrant workers in general. I think one of the more important moments that prevented socialism from becoming a real force was the Palmer raids and the prevention of the socialists such as Samuel Orr and the like being barred from serving on the New York State Assembly, both of which occurred around the same time, but there were other strikes and attempts by socialists to enter elections that were suppressed by the state that could be similar turning points.

Stopping the Red Scare's the best way to do it.
Two anti-Communist frenzies effectively discredited the socialist left in 20th century America.
 
Derailing the Second Red Scare. Due to a whole host of reasons I'm planning to have the Second Red Scare fizzle out and be much less effective than IOTL. Would this be a significant boost to US socialism in general?

What do you all think so far, and does anyone have any possible suggestions?

What tou need is to derail the First Red Scare, not the Second. The USA had the most vigrant, fastest growing and militant socialist movement, all the way up to the First World War, and was only decisively broken by the Red Scare, the mass deportation of radicals, and the tightening of voting and citizenship requirements that broke the left, and ultimately led to its long term co-opting.

If you weaken the First Scare enough for a socialist party to continue to grow, it could create a successful third party by the Great Depression.
 
Have Bryan win in 1896. Bryan was a representative of the farmers and his policies would have been in their favour. At the same time, there would be a Republican counter-reaction against the "religious radical" and would have led to the party moving to the right. Bryan would do nothing to help American workers, while progressivism is strangled in its crib. In reaction, socialism would be strengthened.
 
Undermining the First Red Scare?

So how would I go about weakening the First Red Scare?

One idea I'm flirting with is having the US fight on the side of the Central Powers in WW1. I think this would help give the October Revolution a better reputation in the US for two reasons. Firstly, it would take a major enemy combatant out of the war. Secondly, with the US at war with Russia a lot of American war propaganda is going to depict Russia as the epitome of tyranny and autocracy (which it sort of was), therefore meaning that anyone who overthrows it is at least going to be given props for brining down the Tsar. Whilst this might take some of the sting out, I doubt it would be enough though. There are also the massive butterflies a CP aligned US would throw up.

Any other suggestions?
 
... and strong unions sympathetic to socialism and other progressive politics.
This period in the US certainly isn't my forte but were the unions automatically sympathetic to socialism? IIRC during the 1920s and '30s whilst they certainly worked to improve their members pay and conditions a large number of them also seem to of had no compunctions about throwing other groups, be they made up of other races or groups, under the bus to achieve their ends.
 
Shameless Plug!

Some answers, but also a shameless plug for the timeline in my sig that features a growing US socialist movement allied to Bryan-era populists.

This period in the US certainly isn't my forte but were the unions automatically sympathetic to socialism? IIRC during the 1920s and '30s whilst they certainly worked to improve their members pay and conditions a large number of them also seem to of had no compunctions about throwing other groups, be they made up of other races or groups, under the bus to achieve their ends.

This is key - I think you need to avoid the re-election of Samuel Gompers to AFL. The easiest way to do this is to have John McBride make not such a cack-handed effort of working with other unions in 1895, keeping him in place longer. McBride favoured working with Bryan-era populists whereas Gompers was a moderate who steered the AFL away from any profound socialist outlook during his leadership into the 1920s. This would prevent them making a working peace with the economic status quo.

Earlier US entry into WW1. This was a major factor in Jello's timeline Reds, where the US joins from the very beginning. I'm not that well informed about that period of history, however, so I'm looking for suggestions on how to get the US involved earlier.

Or maybe keep the US out altogether? What if the socialists throw themselves behind the peace movement and manage to tip the balance (I'm not an expert on the US road to WWI so can't say exactly how I'm afraid)? Then they would be able to point at the carnage and suffering in Europe and say "Look, we kept you out of that. We kept your sons alive!" Considering how the international tide turned to peace after 1918 its likely that this success would enhance the standing of the socialist movement. It would also not alienate German-Americans from the cause but also, for your timeline's purposes, probably still result in a CP victory and the economic downturn of the post-war period that would help socialism grow.


A large section of the US film industry relocated from California to Florida. IOTL studio executive Joseph Schneck warned that, in the face of militant unionism and the genuine prospect of Upton Sinclair being elected Governor of California the film industry would likely relocate from Hollywood to Florida. Assuming that they follow through on this threat, much of the remaining film-making infrastructure in Hollywood falls under the control cooperatives and strong unions sympathetic to socialism and other progressive politics. As a result America ends up with two major film centres, with Hollywood serving as a major source of left-wing support, as well as taking the sting out of anti-Communist blacklists by providing work to blacklisted actors.

This I didn't know - would you be mortally offended if I used this idea in my timeline? Feel free to say no!
 
Some answers, but also a shameless plug for the timeline in my sig that features a growing US socialist movement allied to Bryan-era populists.

I absolutely love your Paris Commune TL, and it, along with Reds, was part of the inspiration for the idea of having a socialist America TL.

This is key - I think you need to avoid the re-election of Samuel Gompers to AFL. The easiest way to do this is to have John McBride make not such a cack-handed effort of working with other unions in 1895, keeping him in place longer. McBride favoured working with Bryan-era populists whereas Gompers was a moderate who steered the AFL away from any profound socialist outlook during his leadership into the 1920s. This would prevent them making a working peace with the economic status quo.

I'm trying to keep the PoDs post 1900 if possible, so I won't be able to prevent his re-election. That said, he was almost arrested in 1911 for publishing an illegal boycott list, but the conviction was overturned by the Supreme Court. Although the decision was unanimous, it might be plausible to prevent the Supreme Court from hearing the case. With Gompers in jail, could that open the AFL's leadership to a more radical figures, and if so who would be a good choice?

Or maybe keep the US out altogether? What if the socialists throw themselves behind the peace movement and manage to tip the balance (I'm not an expert on the US road to WWI so can't say exactly how I'm afraid)? Then they would be able to point at the carnage and suffering in Europe and say "Look, we kept you out of that. We kept your sons alive!" Considering how the international tide turned to peace after 1918 its likely that this success would enhance the standing of the socialist movement. It would also not alienate German-Americans from the cause but also, for your timeline's purposes, probably still result in a CP victory and the economic downturn of the post-war period that would help socialism grow.

I'm not sure how effective that would be. Firstly, at least according to a friend of mine who studied History and university, the idea that the carnage of WW1 brought about a great awakening in pacifism and anti-war sentiment was actually a narrative that liberal pacifists created several decades after the fact. Contrary to popular perceptions, apparently hawkish attitudes and jingoism were still fairly prominent in the aftermath of WW1. Secondly, I think that getting bogged down in an unpopular war would probably have a bigger impact on the national psyche (just look at Vietnam and Iraq) than the socialists claiming that they kept the country out of a potential war, especially if they have to share the credit with right-wing isolationists. Furthermore, I would like to try and keep the general shape of interwar geopolitics, at least in Europe, largely as IOTL, so having the CP win would put a bit of a crimp in that.

This I didn't know - would you be mortally offended if I used this idea in my timeline? Feel free to say no!

Certainly, by all means. If you want to make this alt-Hollywood (which is basically what conservatives think OTL Hollywood is; a foetid den of liberals, socialists and degenerates) even more interesting, there's an apocryphal story that a young Ronald Reagan tried to join the Communist Party during the great depression because he heard that they were offering support to unemployed actors, but was rejected because the party official in charge of the applications didn't think he had the commitment to be a political activist (or thought he lacked the intelligence according to some versions of the story). Whilst I think it is just an urban legend, it bears remembering that the young Ronald Reagan was a left-leaning Democrat, was heavily opposed to racial discrimination and was twice elected President of the Screen Actors Guild. I'm sure you can find something fun to do with this information.
 

cpip

Gone Fishin'
If you want to make this alt-Hollywood (which is basically what conservatives think OTL Hollywood is; a foetid den of liberals, socialists and degenerates) even more interesting, there's an apocryphal story that a young Ronald Reagan tried to join the Communist Party during the great depression because he heard that they were offering support to unemployed actors, but was rejected because the party official in charge of the applications didn't think he had the commitment to be a political activist (or thought he lacked the intelligence according to some versions of the story). Whilst I think it is just an urban legend, it bears remembering that the young Ronald Reagan was a left-leaning Democrat, was heavily opposed to racial discrimination and was twice elected President of the Screen Actors Guild. I'm sure you can find something fun to do with this information.

Dang, now I want to use this in something.
 
Here's another idea that I've been working on. When I was studying for my MA in International Political Economy (bragie-bragie boastie-boastie) I came across an article by Mark Blyth who was offering a social constructivist account of how different ideas among elites about crises and have different effects on how actors view the causes and solutions to crises beyond a crude materialist reductionism based on material interests. To illustrate this he uses the First New Deal (the period between 1933-1935) and the National Recovery Administration to show how the various crisis-defining ideas in contemporary economic thought shaped policy during those early years. Now regardless of where you might stand on the theory side (I'm probably more of a structuralist than he is) it does offer some interesting background information and potential areas where an aspiring alternate historian might have some fun.

Long story short, during this time there were three competing and contradictory crisis-defining ideas that shaped how elites perceived the Great Depression and their proposed solutions.

The first set of ideas, ‘‘sound finance’’ (or the bankers credo) sought to explain the Depression as a result of the failure of the government to adhere to the principles of fiscal orthodoxy. The second set of ideas ‘‘diagnosing the depression’’ were based around antimonopoly doctrines that had their roots in Brandesian thinking. These ideas held that the Depression was the result of monopolistic practices, particularly those of large corporations and trusts. Therefore, if cartelized industrial structures had ‘‘choked’’ the economy, then antitrust laws were the tonic for recovery (Hawley 1980).

Finally, working at counterpoint to both sound finance and antimonopoly arguments was the ‘‘administered prices’’ thesis, which maintained that monopoly was the problem, but only in so far as monopoly had not gone far enough. Rather than ‘‘bust’’ trusts as the antimonopolists advocated, administered-prices theorists argued that state intervention was needed to promote further cartelization. This would allow large firms to fix prices at a socially optimal output (Berle and Means 1933).
The First New Deal centred on the "administered prices" thesis, and attempted to persuade American businesses that these measures where in their interests. Unfortunately for them, the American business was ideologically segmented:

The three main business groups—the American Chamber of Commerce (ACC), which represented small and medium sized firms, the smaller and more polyglot National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), and the Business Advisory Council (BAC), which was dominated by a subset of America’s largest firms—each displayed different attitudes toward the NRA.
And as a result the government was unable to implement this vision of the New Deal due to disagreement with industry leaders, in particular over labour rights and "sound finance" concerns over public works spending. This led to the discrediting of the "administered prices" thesis, whilst the other schools were unable to offer any tangible alternatives, which in turn led to the rise of the proto-Keynesian and more labour focused policies of the later New Deal, at least according to Blyth.

Now what I think would be a good way to strengthen the appeal of socialism during the New Deal would be to have the administered prices approach be much more successful, at least initially, by having the NRA and the Democrats be more willing to compromise with business leaders on issues surrounding labour and public spending. For example, if the labour movement is already a bit more militant and socialist oriented then the Democrats would be less likely to strengthen then, perhaps focusing their patronage on more moderate unions and allowing smaller businesses exemptions on their labour rights standards. As a result the early New Deal leads to fewer benefits for working people and develops in a more corporatist direction. With the Democrats having fewer public confrontations with business leaders it becomes easier for socialists to portray the Democrats as a party thoroughly in the pocket of big business, whilst also being able to tap into America's rich anti-Trust populist tradition. As a result in the 1936 election the far-left will likely gain a significant credibility boost, and whilst this will likely lead to the Democrats swinging more heavily towards a pro-labour position in order to take the wind out of their sails it will probably be too little to late in terms of public perceptions.
 
Christianity and socialism blend well philosophically if not politically in OTL. Maybe some innovative young firebrand blends them together.
 
Christianity and socialism blend well philosophically if not politically in OTL. Maybe some innovative young firebrand blends them together.

Don't have to look far. There were plenty of American Socialists who were motivated by Christianity. Eugene Debs, and Francis and Edward Bellamy would arguably count, but most notably would be Norman Thomas, a Presbyterian Minister and six-time Presidential candidate for the Socialist Party. There are also Martin Luther King Jr. and Cornell West, although they come in a bit later than what I had in mind.

Indeed, one of the things I plan to explore is the development of a uniquely American form of socialism, with Christian socialism being a major tendency within it.
 
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