Yeah you definitely won’t have as much of an isolationist/pacifist camp with the GAW since it’s so much closer to home. It’s the Socialists whom that question will divide - the Libs and Dems will be pretty united even if there’s differences in exactly how to best prosecute the conflictGood 'ol Hiram Johnson. Nice to know his career is still going well, despite most pointedly NOT being anyone's running mate in this ATL 1912.
Which reminds me; with LaFollette, Johnson, Lodge and others in the Liberal camp, I wonder how this is going to impact the eventual peace treaty at the end of the GAW. Although all were isolationists, I can't imagine any of them being opposed to the war effort (after all, the CSA started it), but it IS going to make for an interesting effort to hammer a peace out after the war is over. Not sure what the different camps will be when it comes times for that, but I suspect it's going to be an interesting ... discussion
Cinco de Mayo
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It will be interesting to see the split in the Socialists. Obviously, the divide in OTL during WWI fatally weakened the party in the United States (and the question over whether or not to support the Russian Revolutionary government just further fractured it). There will certainly be a good group of Socialists who are pacifist my creed and will oppose the war on moral grounds; but my gut tells me the split won't be nearly as bad as in OTL. First of all, the Confederates are the clear aggressors. Secondly, the CSA as a nation of slave holders is going to get very little sympathy from the majority of Socialists - who may actually see the war as a good chance to liberate the slaves (and poor downtrodden workers, as well) and also remake the economy of a nation as vile as the Confederacy into something more humane and enlightened.
I have this image of Socialist carpetbaggers after the war is done, going south to radicalize the freedmen and the workers. I doubt these efforts will come to much in the end, but it would be interesting to see play out.
Didn't realize that these elections were the olympics with gold silver and bronze.
But yeah, this feels like an election who's main central issue was just the fact that Hearst is trying to run for a 3rd term and break a *huge* precedent. Democrats weren't necessarily spent after those 8 years office and could have easily won 12 had Hearst just stepped aside and let someone else take the mantle. Nice play on his being a counterpart on Teddy but in a different fashion.
God bless that poor lone socialist. He's been holding the fort for so long, that I will be sadden when he either dies or is voted out.
Its Richard Pettigrew of Dakota; he's fine.
In OTL he lived to 1926 and it seems as if his seat is pretty safe. I think he'll be in there until he decides to retire; assuming he avoids his indictment from OTL, though I'm assuming he will as the political situation around the war is very different than WWI in OTL. I'm more concerned he's going to get lonely!
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Always been interested in Charles Evans Hughes as President. I know in OTL he served as Secretary of state for Warren Harding and later on was a member of the US Supreme Court where he blocked several of Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal legislation which put the two at odds. Personally I think Hughes would have been MUCH better than Woodrow Wilson especially in the lead up to the First World War. As interesting and fascinating a President Hearst has been I'm ready to see what President Charles Evans Hughes will bring to the White House. Great election chapter"...unlike the other elections where he had himself been on the ballot - 1898, 1904 and 1908 - Hearst had the political winds coming at him, rather than filling his sails. Part of it was that he had, for nearly a decade and a half, been one of if not the most dominant personality in American politics and culture rather than the insurgent powering the people against a collapsing conservative dynasty; whatever else he was, he was certainly the establishment. Another piece was that unlike his runs against the reactionary Fairbanks or the anonymous Pennypacker, his opponent was uncooperative in playing into his hands. Hearst had warned a number of Democrats for years not to underestimate Charles Hughes and despite his personal distaste for the "moralizing lecturer," respecting the capabilities of an opponent had always been a family trait. Hughes' governorship had been moderate and on the campaign trail he took a cautious approach, giving typically one to two speeches per day, declining to make firm policy commitments other than expanding and reworking federal schools funding after all the population growth of the last two decades, and in a nod to his middle-class base opposing a proposal to mandate closed shops for labor unions as the next frontier of the Labor Relations Act. While Hearst and a number of Democrats attacked him as evasive, Hughes continued his above-the-fray campaign, confidently portraying himself as undriven by personal ideologies or animus towards any faction and open to all ideas that came before him, often tailoring his message to a conservative or progressive audience depending on who he was speaking to, aiming his campaign straight for the middle of the electorate rather than chasing the most die-hard Old Guard Liberals to the right (Hughes could be quite confident that the most hardened conservatives had the choice of either a third term of Hearst or him, and thus focused on aiming for the soft middle that had powered two elections for Hearst but were skeptical of a third). Hughes also was an active participant on the trail compared to Pennypacker before him and eagerly went to places many Liberals had refused to go before, not just geographically (Hughes campaigned with California Governor Hiram Johnson in San Diego and Los Angeles) [1] but also culturally, speaking at union halls, beer gardens and farm associations, often receiving a skeptical but respectful audience that was impressed he bothered to show up at all.
Of course, the biggest issue for Hearst was his decision to seek a third term. Historians have debated endlessly to what extent Hearst cost himself, and his party, the White House in 1912, and the conclusion often arrives at him being the primary cause. Liberal newspapers were aggressively against him and neutral media had shifted from support to staunch opposition; while the language of partisan editorials compared him to an aspiring dictator, more measured opinions cast his choice to not step aside for a cycle or two and anoint a chosen successor as a self-inflicted wound. The public largely agreed with this stance, as Democrats from around the country alerted Hearst that he had cost himself a tremendous deal of popularity, shifting a huge bloc of swing voters to Hughes and peeling off a handful of leftist radicals in the West who had stayed inside the tent the last two runs to the Socialists (who, ironically, were running Eugene Debs yet again.) Many of his surrogates were unenthusiastic, like Senator Bryan, and the passionate followings in county parties and local civic organizations that had driven two victories were decidedly missing. Compared to 1904 and 1908, when the President had received receptions around the country comparable to modern-day music stars, it seemed the only people who were genuinely excited about the possibility of a third term were Hearst and his inner circle.
Hearst nevertheless did his best to salvage the campaign in its closing months. Hughes' talent as an orator was unsharpened (nothing approximating the 'Axis of Liberty' speech for which he is famed was on offing on the 1912 campaign trail) and Hearst was one of the most talented speakers of the age. He criss-crossed the Midwest by train and automobile, holding six to seven events per day where he shook hundreds of hands and delivered the same twenty-five minute stump speech by memory. Millie came into her own as a speaker, dazzling crowds and rebuilding the President's support with middle-class women. His surrogates aggressively countered the message that Hughes was "all you like about the Hearst era without the man at the center who you don't" by portraying him as a kindly facade on the same politics as men like Senator Cabot Lodge and implied that the whole of the Fair Deal would be repealed. Hearst's campaign, which had limped out of the convention with a split party, re-consolidated Democratic support in the closing weeks, its only apparent mistake an awkward response to a streetcar strike that shut down much of Chicago mere days before voters headed to the polls.
As election night loomed, Hearst was exhausted and spent, choosing to hold his last few events in New York before retreating to his home on Central Park East with Millie, the boys and a handful of close advisers to hunch over telephones and telegraphs. Key was optimistic of a win, while men like Haffen and Fitzgerald warned Hearst that it was likelier than not that he was looking at a close loss for all his efforts to salvage a sure defeat. All that was left was the verdict of the American voter..." [2]
- Citizen Hearst
[1] This one's for you history nerds
[2] I was going to do a little more on the 1912 election but I find writing campaign trail content tedious. Hopefully this update captured the general thrust of things
I think the war in North America is going to be less “oh the humanity, what a pointless war” and not just because of Slavery. The US is in the same position as the Kaiserreich: We very clearly benefit and become top dog of the continent in victory, able to exercise influence across the continent and beyond. Victory brings everything, defeat brings recriminations, very dark recriminations.
Partisan Democrats ITTL...
I guess the real question is...why even bother if you are a Democrat in this United States?
You did exactly what the spirit of the times called for, and what do you have to show for it? Not a damn thing. The most popular and successful Democratic since Andrew Jackson lost roughly 20% of the popular vote in four years to a guy who was commited to saying nothing except how he would cripple labor unions.
You have lost six of the last nine Presidential elections. You are going to spend at least four years out of power, meanwhile the Liberals and an incredibly pliant media will spend the entire time winning a war and slandering you in the process. As we just saw, the public will buy those attacks hook, line, and sinker, because America is a Liberal country with temporary interregnums that don't last and don't cause lasting change.
If you are a Democrat, what's the play here? You were conservative in 1880 and 1892 - and lost. You were more progressive in 1896 and 1900 - and lost again in huge part because you weren't progressive enough and lost key votes in Iowa to an explicitly progressive third party playing spoiler in 1900. So you said "screw it" and embraced mainstream progressivism full boar. You nominated an honest-to-God actual progressive reformer, the governor of a huge state who enacted a clearly progressive agenda, and he won, and you got tons of stuff done. Then he won again, huge, and more progressive stuff done.
Then he ran again, on the record of the eight years of broad centrist-based progressivism. He was the same guy who delivered all those aforementioned progressive wins, the same guy who was the first Democrat to win two terms since Jackson, who matches the spirit of the times better than anyone who came before...and even he loses, to a reactionary who went out of his way to say nothing at all - and got away with it, because arbitrary term limits matter more than actual policy to the people you are trying to help.
And that doesn't mention the asskicking in the House, and Hughes getting to appoint Edmunds's replacement as Chief Justice. We're back to the bad old days, where men at home in the Gilded Age roll back labor protections and make America only work for rich WASPs while everyone else gets left behind.
When the Democrats tack to the right, they lose. When they play for the center, they lose. When they embrace progressiveism and the left, they lose. The only constant in an era of massive change is that Democrats will lose.
So I ask again...if you are a Democrat in this timeline, why even bother at this point?
I guess the real question is...why even bother if you are a Democrat in this United States?
You did exactly what the spirit of the times called for, and what do you have to show for it? Not a damn thing. The most popular and successful Democratic since Andrew Jackson lost roughly 20% of the popular vote in four years to a guy who was commited to saying nothing except how he would cripple labor unions.
You have lost six of the last nine Presidential elections. You are going to spend at least four years out of power, meanwhile the Liberals and an incredibly pliant media will spend the entire time winning a war and slandering you in the process. As we just saw, the public will buy those attacks hook, line, and sinker, because America is a Liberal country with temporary interregnums that don't last and don't cause lasting change.
If you are a Democrat, what's the play here? You were conservative in 1880 and 1892 - and lost. You were more progressive in 1896 and 1900 - and lost again in huge part because you weren't progressive enough and lost key votes in Iowa to an explicitly progressive third party playing spoiler in 1900. So you said "screw it" and embraced mainstream progressivism full boar. You nominated an honest-to-God actual progressive reformer, the governor of a huge state who enacted a clearly progressive agenda, and he won, and you got tons of stuff done. Then he won again, huge, and more progressive stuff done.
Then he ran again, on the record of the eight years of broad centrist-based progressivism. He was the same guy who delivered all those aforementioned progressive wins, the same guy who was the first Democrat to win two terms since Jackson, who matches the spirit of the times better than anyone who came before...and even he loses, to a reactionary who went out of his way to say nothing at all - and got away with it, because arbitrary term limits matter more than actual policy to the people you are trying to help.
And that doesn't mention the asskicking in the House, and Hughes getting to appoint Edmunds's replacement as Chief Justice. We're back to the bad old days, where men at home in the Gilded Age roll back labor protections and make America only work for rich WASPs while everyone else gets left behind.
When the Democrats tack to the right, they lose. When they play for the center, they lose. When they embrace progressiveism and the left, they lose. The only constant in an era of massive change is that Democrats will lose.
So I ask again...if you are a Democrat in this timeline, why even bother at this point?
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Couldn’t you say something similar of Democrats IOTL? They were mostly boxed out of national power but still never disappeared thanks to regional/urban interest groups. Post failed Reconstruction, they spent the Gilded and Progressive Era as the minor party nationally, but existed as a de facto One-Party authoritarian state in the south. In ITTL I’m not sure exactly what power base sustains Democrats during their times in the wilderness. Are city machines enough? The plains doesn’t have many people to play the same role but the Senate malappropriation is sufficient to keep them relevant?
It is actually worse here than OTL. From 1880 to 1920 Democrats won three presidential races here vs the four of OTL.
It seems like it is only city machines and the Plains. They got rocked everywhere else in the House races per the update.
Ethnic vote is another huge part; this is a Democratic Party which has managed to seize much of the Protestant German and Scandinavian vote in addition to just the Catholics. Especially since we seem to be having increase immigration than what we even saw in OTL (more Poles, more Norwegians, more German-Russians, etc). They also, even before absorbing the Populists were making in-roads into Labor and farms. It's actually a pretty robust voting bloc and though it's only now reaching maturity, it seems to have been the general thrust of the Dems during the 1880s and, especially, the 1890s.
The Democrats are implied to finally lose their monopoly on power in the CSA after the next election, too. In the end, having the parts of the country that strongly vote for your party secede wasn't a good strategy... whodathunk.
Couldn't have gotten that much of the German/Scandinavian vote when Hughes won Wisconsin. The Democrats did win MN and Dakota though, so it wasn't a total sweep of Scandinavia West. Plus we don't exactly have precinct level voting results (and I am NOT asking for any lol, that would be batshit crazy to provide that here).
Exactly, this. The Democrats losing a huge part of their base hasn't helped - luckily for them, the GOP largely imploded within a decade after the end of the Civil War as new issues arose; the Dems being able to get two terms during the 1870s was likely a godsend as it gave them a chance to build up patronage and draw in new voters who otherwise might have gone Republican. But the fact of the matter is, that they had lost a huge wing of their party during the Civil War. And so, using what base they had left - Urban machines, ethnic voters and some rural farmers - they leaned harder into that and began to grow from there. All in all considering, they've done really well and have now built up a mature and robust constintuency; so much so that they can have a President try to break the old two-term tradition and only narrowly lose, and still hold their advantage in the Senate. I suspect that them not getting left holding the bag when the war is done is also going to play majorly into their advantage as well.
Wisconsin seems to be as dominated by the LaFollette progressive machine as OTL, and I suspect LaFollette threw his backing to Hughes - and LaFollette even in OTL was well known for having a near-Democratic level obsession and skill with working ethnic voters into a coalition (and he was particularly known for being close to the Scandinavian community; he had spoken Norwegian since he was a child). So, Wisconsin going to Hughes (who is probably getting support from Stalwarts AND Progressive Liberals) isn't too much of a shock. Wisconsin is certainly less Democratic than it's OTL counterpart - even having had several Democratic Senators and, once suspects, governors during the previous decades - but I think the Liberals being surprisingly unified for once there would play to Hughes' advantage.
This isn't wrong analysis but my general point is that Democrats haven't actually done that well. From 1880 to 1920 Democrats have the Presidency for all of 12 of 40 years. That's really bad. I disagree as well with your assertion that they lost "narrowly" in 1912. Hearst lost by five full percentage points and 95 points in the EV. That doesn't feel narrow to me - that's a comfortable, go-to-bed-early win in my book. But that's admittedly a semantics issue - reasonable people can disagree here.
And back to the third term thing. That may explain Hearst losing (although I point again to 1940 OTL, where FDR in very similarly circumstances dropped roughly 15 points as opposed to the roughly 20 points Hearst dropped here) but that third term doesn't explain the beatdown in the House. This is still the era of split ballots after all.
Liberals have, as they always have, cracked the code. And now with "neutral" media cheerleading for them it is going to be even harder for Democrats to claw back.
Democrats just lose, no matter what they do.
Thank you! Kern or Marshall could definitely have won, yeah. Though the big fat prize of New York’s electoral votes would have been tough (there’s a reason why every President but one from 1905 through 1949 will be a New Yorker!)
Hughes in 1916 was a very different animal than Hughes in 1936 (time and politics had def passed the man by quite a bit by the point he was appointed to SCOTUS) but he’d definitely have been a big upgrade over Wilson or Harding, that’s for sure. We’ll have a few other “could have beens” like Foraker, Hearst and Hughes in the White House moving forward whose names will be familiar.
Indeed. Much more of an ideological component to the war than WW1
Al Smith and Thomas Dewey...come on down! You're the next contestants on The POTUS Is Right!
Although will be incredibly hard to overcome Smith's Catholicism. If you think the media hates Democrats now imagine if (gasp!) a PAPIST were to run for President!
One for two right!
Well, Smith is helped here by a larger Catholic population plus not having a ferociously anti-Catholic South to deal with, and coming off of a very successful/popular 1921-29 PresiDem (I may as well spoil Smith even if I keep his predecessor secret for now) rather than running straight into the Hoover buzzsaw like IOTL.
But still yeah his Catholicism would be the Kennedy controversy of 1960 on steroids even in a victory
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