Carter-King: The Second American Revolution

[Hnau]

I’m wondering if this scenario has ever been explored. It’s rather utopian. I’d appreciate if anyone would like to brainstorm with me or even make this into a timeline. I’ll consider anything that comes out of this thread as a collaborative effort.

The world this is for has already seen major differences, such as a larger Warsaw Pact, no split between Russia and China, and an active enduring Space Race which sees nuclear rockets flown by both sides in the 1970s, followed by lunar bases and expeditions to Mars. This timeline has a soul of science fiction.

One happy butterfly is that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is never assassinated. He continues to rise in popularity through his March for the Poor and eventually as a member of the House of Representatives. Jimmy Carter then chooses him as his running mate in the presidential election of the bicentennial. As the first NATO lunar base begins operations in 1979, no matter what happens its likely the Democrats stay popular and Carter-King will win a second term. What would it be like though if the Carter administration focuses these eight years on lasting political reform and anti-poverty measures? King would probably be very pleased if a citizen’s guaranteed income or negative income tax was successfully instituted, along with a type of Medicare-For-All. The ERA would be on the table as well. Of course, King would try to win a presidential term of his own in 1984, but fail... the country would probably still be too racist at that point, and reeling from rapid social changes. Republicans will do what Republicans do at that point, with Reagan or without him, but it’s possible the reforms and new welfare state sticks.

 

[glenn67]

If MLK is elected to Congress from Georgia, Jimmy Carter cannot pick him as his running mate. The US Constitution forbids the Electoral College from voting for the Presidential and Vice Presidential candidate if they reside in the same state.

 

[Hnau]

If MLK is elected to Congress from Georgia, Jimmy Carter cannot pick him as his running mate. The US Constitution forbids the Electoral College from voting for the Presidential and Vice Presidential candidate if they reside in the same state.

Hmm, good point. Maybe he runs for Congress in Chicago? Would that be so crazy?

 

[SandroPertini98]

Glenn67 is right. You have to change his state or change the presidential nominee. This could be a good way to make it: Carter had surely many qualities (a strong international position on human rights and a pretty good diplomatic team, among others) but he was a moderate/conservative pro-deregulation Democrat. He didn't want to approve the Tip O'Neill's economic stimulus to revitalize economy in 1979. I see hard to make him to support the socio-economic measures of King's March for the Poors. But there is a easy solution: Morris Udall was the major Carter's competitor to become the "anti-establishment" candidate in 1976 Democratic primaries. He was liberal and charismatic but lost some key states to Carter due the black opposition (Udall was a Mormon and Carter accused him to be a sort of crypto-racist because in 1976 the Mormon Church still barred blacks to become priests). But what if King supports Udall?
Udall wins the primary with a large margin and choose King as running mate in exchange. Then Udall-King ticket wins general election.
In 1984 the Republican choice will be probably between Bush, Dole and maybe John Anderson.

 

[Hnau]

How do you think Mo Udall would differ on domestic issues from Carter? I do like the idea.

I imagined that MLK by this point would be enough of a national figure, and charismatic as hell, that he’d be able to bridge the divide between Jimmy Carter’s austerity politics and Ted Kennedy’s more liberal wing. Talks over healthcare and welfare reform only broke down in 1978 in our world. Perhaps King wins enough in the early 1970s on anti-poverty measures that it makes the leap easier. A citizen’s guaranteed income designed as a negative income tax could also be seen by Carter as an act of budget balancing if it dismantled enough of the Great Society programs.

This is also a world where President Kennedy is never assassinated (but becomes very sickly into his second term), and sends money and weapons into Vietnam rather than drafted soldiers. Space programs still demand high costs, but the budget is easier to balance without those huge military expenditures. There’s also no Three Mile Island accident or Iranian revolution in 1979, but there is a Kurdish war for independence. As such it might be easier for Carter to “lighten up” so to speak.

If Udall is the better pick, perhaps an interesting butterfly in this world would be the Mormon Church desegregates in the 1960s.

 

[President Benedict Arnold]

Not sure what you’re hoping to get out of a discussion mainly about the late ‘70s with a PoD in ‘63. Maybe MLK surviving would be a more managable PoD.

Also, Udall was a liberal and a Mormon through and through. It’d matter very little to him or his political positioning no matter when the LDS Church desegregates.

 

[Hnau]

Sure, but then Carter would have less of a reason to attack Udall during the primary, and King would have been more amenable to joining the ticket.

It makes things a lot cleaner, more easily-analyzed if I just picked a POD in 1968, wouldn't it? Ha, but I prefer alternate history to be a bit more messy, a smorgasbord of interesting thought experiments, so that the universe we glimpse is altogether unique and different. I do hope I'm a good representative for the right-brained folks who may like to read and ponder.

 

[Hnau]

I've been researching the welfare proposals that were coming out of the Democratic Party in the 1970s. The most probable design would be much like OTL, in which President Carter was initially supportive of a negative income tax which would give up to $4,000 a year (~$15,000 in 2018 dollars) to a family of four making less than $20,000, and would essentially scrap other assistance programs. It would cost a few more billion dollars to get going, but it would be much more effective, and Carter has the political capital to sign the bill into law with Vice President King's help. Unfortunately, it would have work requirements, and by the next Republican administration (perhaps still Reagan's), it may have drug testing provisions as well. I'd like to think in this world Nixon didn't step up the War on Drugs as much, though. The anti-war movement would be much more muted after all. I'd like to think that cannabis and low-harm psychedelics like LSD are never assigned Schedule 1 status of criminalization... I know that's expecting a lot from Nixon if he's still president, but this is a timeline that leans utopian. There would be a federal job guarantee which would spend as much time providing for paid training, job search assistance, and subsidies for employers, as the government would only be required to bring employment up to 3% of the working population (regarded as "full employment"). Applicants who receive public sector jobs would be a skilled minority. There would also be universal child care, and as mentioned before, national health insurance as originally envisioned by Senator Ted Kennedy.

The US economy in the 1980s, with cheaper energy, less debt, and a stronger safety net, would likely take off. It's leaner design would make it competitive with more robust yet wasteful European welfare states. I imagine some other countries may try to replicate the American model, for example Japan if it's high growth rates stall out as in our timeline. By the 1990s, it would be possible for a young Californian to celebrate his admission into NASA's astronaut training program by sharing legal cannabis joints the same day that his wife returns from the hospital with their first child and no bill.

 

[DTF955Baseballfan]

What was the best childrens' hospital in the '60s?

Have one of King's children severely injured weeks before his assassination. King goes to be with him/her and the plot is revealed; we can get King some rest and improve his heart, too. King was a native of Georgia but it's possible he could so take to the people of that area that after a few years he decides to stay near the child and rest himself and be ready to run for the House in '70 or '72.

Stories I've heard from nearby Akron Childrens and Cleve3land's Rainbow Babies and Childrens inspired this thought as a solution for you.

 

[Bomster]

Glenn67 is right. You have to change his state or change the presidential nominee. This could be a good way to make it: Carter had surely many qualities (a strong international position on human rights and a pretty good diplomatic team, among others) but he was a moderate/conservative pro-deregulation Democrat. He didn't want to approve the Tip O'Neill's economic stimulus to revitalize economy in 1979. I see hard to make him to support the socio-economic measures of King's March for the Poors. But there is a easy solution: Morris Udall was the major Carter's competitor to become the "anti-establishment" candidate in 1976 Democratic primaries. He was liberal and charismatic but lost some key states to Carter due the black opposition (Udall was a Mormon and Carter accused him to be a sort of crypto-racist because in 1976 the Mormon Church still barred blacks to become priests). But what if King supports Udall?
Udall wins the primary with a large margin and choose King as running mate in exchange. Then Udall-King ticket wins general election.
In 1984 the Republican choice will be probably between Bush, Dole and maybe John Anderson.

Robert F. Kennedy/Martin Luther King Jr!

Kennedy*King’76

 

[Anarch King of Dipsodes]

Forget about questions of residency. First you have to explain why King would abandon his national role, where he focused exclusively on civil rights and some related issues, for a localized role which involves him in everything Congress touches. Also he loses the freedom to move around the country, and moves from being a very senior figure in the civil rights movement to being a junior Representative.

It also means he has to become a partisan (presumably a Democrat), which costs him moral authority and ties him to a lot of dubious figures.

Then one has to explain how he gets the office. Despite his posthumous prestige as a martyr, in life he was not the Maximum Leader of black America who could just parachute in wherever he wanted. This abrupt detour into political office would annoy the career politicians he'd be cutting in front of.

Also, when would this happen? It's not likely that King would be tabbed for VP after one or two terms in the House. For him to be a plausible VP candidate by 1976, he'd have to start in the 1960s.

It would be more likely for King to be taken directly onto a national ticket without any previous political office. (It has happened: VP nominees Charles Dawes, Frank Knox, Henry Wallace, and Sargent Shriver were all first-time candidates.)