DBWI: No Death of the Democrats

Woodrow Wilson killed the Democratic Party.

It certainly didn't help that the Democrats looked like complete and utter fools when the public found out before the 1920 that Wilson's Wife had been running the country[1]

The 1918 election saw the Democrats lose 22 House Seats, but at least they could claim a Senate pickup in Massachusetts.
The 1920 election[2] saw the utter destruction of the Democratic Party outside of the south and the Republicans managing to take a number of seats in the south. Republicans gained 94 House Seats, making the House 304 to 100. The Socialists even managed to take a seat from the Democrats [3].

Deep Southern Democrats broke off and formed the Conservative Party.

The 1922 elections didn't do much help. The Conservatives swept the south - past democratic officeholders having rebranded themselves - and outside the south principally minor parties like Farmer-Labour, Socialist, Socialist-Labour, Nonpartisan League won seats that significantly dampened the number that the Democrats ultimately picked up.

When La Follette consolidated the minor parties into his Progressive Party, that was pretty much it. In 1924 Coolidge swept the nation and the Democrats came fourth behind the Conservatives and Progressives. This three-party system in which there's only one big-tent national party and two regional opposition parties has been what's governed the US since then.


So what if the Democrats hadn't imploded?





OOC:

[1] The first POD

[2] Here is a list of seats that stayed Democrat OTL but go Republican in 1920 here. All were single-digit margins of victory except for those with an asterisk(*) which were below 12 point.

Alabama 7 Alabama 10
Arkansas 3
Colorado 4*
Illinois 4 Illinois 5 Illinois 8
Kentucky 2* Kentucky 3 Kentucky 4 Kentucky 8 Kentucky 9
Maryland 1 Maryland 4
Massachusetts 10
Missouri 2 Missouri 11
New Jersey 12
New York 2 New York 11 New York 18 New York 22 New York 42
North Carolina 5 North Carolina 7 North Carolina 8 North Carolina 9 North Carolina 10
Oklahoma 5 Oklahoma 7
Tennessee 7*
Virginia 7

This makes the Kentucky and Tennessee delegations mostly Republican and NC break-even. Put that together with Missouri, Maryland, Delaware, West Virginia, and Oklahoma and that's 8 Southern or Southern-ish Congressional delegations out of 17.

[3] OTL. Meyer London in New York's 12th.
 
This three-party system in which there's only one big-tent national party and two regional opposition parties has been what's governed the US since then.
Well, it esssentially makes America a one-party state as Progressives and Conservatives hate each other more than they hate the Republicans and the Republicans often respond to either party gaining popularity by adopting their more moderate ideas and pushing in their ideological direction.
 
Well, it esssentially makes America a one-party state as Progressives and Conservatives hate each other more than they hate the Republicans and the Republicans often respond to either party gaining popularity by adopting their more moderate ideas and pushing in their ideological direction.

Eh, most political scientists think of it more as four-party. The GOP's reasonably divided between the Social Liberals and the Proper Liberals.

I think the Progressive v Conservative divide is true, but a lot of it is theater by respective leaders. Conservatives have no qualms bringing up some economic issues like anti-trust, farm subsidies, financial regulation, etc. Rural Progressives work with Conservatives on guns against the GOP. Labor-Union Progressives and Conservatives enjoy screwing with the conservatives on environmental and climate issues. Foreign Policy is an issue with no clear partisan divides.



Maybe if the GOP didn't consistently win Presidential elections there'd be a stronger presidency, as there wouldn't be the knee-jerk opposition to anything the President does. Granted, Harding and Coolidge sort of set the mold for the modern presidency by laying low and not doing much. Their abandoning Wilson's innovation of presenting the State of the Union to Congress and returning to just sending a written letter is still found in every civics textbook, for example.
 
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