Every Man a King: A History of the Long Presidency and Beyond

I am looking forward to the Kingfish Presidency. It is bound to be intriguing. Long is certainly is the ranks of "Greatest Presidents We Never Had" along with Thomas Dewey, Robert Kennedy, and Nelson Rockefeller.

You won't be thinking that after this TL, believe you me.

Wow, two pages already? Hoo-ah!
 
I like you. Very observant. That's almost exactly correct. These are for a Hitler Youth-esque organization, but "Patriot's Handbooks" are incredibly common.

They become even more prevalent then they already were under the George Rockwell administration.

Are you saying the group supports Hitler or that it is reminiscent of the youth groups that he had in Germany?
 
Are you saying the group supports Hitler or that it is reminiscent of the youth groups that he had in Germany?

Huey actually had a very confusing stance about Hitler. He said that "anybody that lets his public policies be mixed up with religious prejudice is a plain fool," but, regardless, ITTL, America is VERY anti-Nazi. However, the Young Patriots (active 1940-1964) are pretty reminiscent of those groups.
 
My policies as governor worked! Share the Wealth worked! And now, my ideas and his will be tossed to the dustbin of history by the thoroughly incompetent Garner, who'll be no better than old Hoover. If only he had lived. But no one could have changed it, I suppose. Now what to do?

I thought share our wealth wasn't a thing until 1934?
 
You won't be thinking that after this TL, believe you me.

Wow, two pages already? Hoo-ah!

I said it would be intriguing. I didn't say it would be good.

I take it that these Young Patriots are basically a liberal/populist version of the Disney Defenders (for those who still remember the President Disney TL).
 
I said it would be intriguing. I didn't say it would be good.

I take it that these Young Patriots are basically a liberal/populist version of the Disney Defenders (for those who still remember the President Disney TL).

Yeah, something like that. I keep meaning to read A World of Laughter, A World of Tears.

I thought share our wealth wasn't a thing until 1934?

You're right. I'll edit the corpus to resolve this. Sorry about that. It's now been revised. Sorry, old man.

i actually borrowed it from the "great" man himself in his book (barring FDR, who was dead, and Hoover, who i thought would have been ASB)

That book is so bizarre, isn't it? He sees himself as God's gift to America. BTW, anyone ever seen Gabriel Over the White House? God knows it's an awful movie, but that's what Huey's presidency will be like.
 
i actually borrowed it from the "great" man himself in his book (barring FDR, who was dead, and Hoover, who i thought would have been ASB)

Never understood why he wanted Hoover myself. Wasn't he widely reviled at this point as well as a critic of the sorts of New Deal policies that Long advocated (albeit in a very different form than FDR), to say nothing of appointing a man who was holding the ball during what was at the time the worst economic crisis in history as Secretary for Commerce?
 
Never understood why he wanted Hoover myself. Wasn't he widely reviled at this point as well as a critic of the sorts of New Deal policies that Long advocated (albeit in a very different form than FDR), to say nothing of appointing a man who was holding the ball during what was at the time the worst economic crisis in history as Secretary for Commerce?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Filler
 
From The Rise and Fall of the Social Populists (1933-1964), Eichiro Azuma, 1996, Pennsylvania Press:

In 1934, even as President Garner rejected the principal of the "New Deal," and the reform movement in general, others, still devoted to the concept, worked to implement it.

In the Congress, the Progressive Party had risen, and while still small, its leaders had gained a number of seats. Beginning with a net zero, its members had gained 10 seats. [1] The Republicans, seen as ineffectual by even their old constituents, lost 14 seats, going down from 117 to 103 [2]. The Democrats gained 5 seats, going from 313 to 318, but their influence still began to slip. [3] Finally, the minute yeomanly federation called the Farmer-Labor party lost a seat, going from 5 to four. [4]

The old Speaker of the House, Henry Rainey, a fine man by all accounts, had died before the election, and thus, his replacement was Joseph Byrns, and the Republican minority leader was Hamilton Fish III, who would later be a presidential candidate. [5] This election was the first time that the president's party gained legislative influence following, and it was also the last pre-Rebirth election to not feature the Social Populist, or Longist, party.

*******

From the "Share Our Wealth" speech given by Senator Huey Long of Louisiana on February 23rd, 1934:

Senator Huey Long [6 said:
I contend, my friends, that we have no difficult problem to solve in America...

It is not the difficulty of the problem which we have; it is the fact that the rich people of this country—and by rich people I mean the super-rich—will not allow us to solve the problems, or rather the one little problem that is afflicting this country, because in order to cure all of our woes it is necessary to scale down the big fortunes, that we may scatter the wealth to be shared by all of the people...

How many of you remember the first thing that the Declaration of Independence said? It said: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that there are certain inalienable rights for the people, and among them are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness;" and it said further, "We hold the view that all men are created equal."

Now, what did they mean by that? Did they mean, my friends, to say that all men are created equal and that that meant that any one man was born to inherit $10,000,000,000 and that another child was to be born to inherit nothing?...

That was not the meaning of the Declaration of Independence when it said that all men are created equal or "That we hold that all men are created equal"...

Is that, my friends, giving them a fair shake of the dice or anything like the inalienable right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, or anything resembling the fact that all people are created equal; when we have today in America thousands and hundreds of thousands and millions of children on the verge of starvation in a land that is overflowing with too much to eat and too much to wear?...

Now let us see if we cannot return this Government to the Declaration of Independence and see if we are going to do anything regarding it. Why should we hesitate or why should we quibble or why should we quarrel with one another to find out what the difficulty is, when we know that the Lord told us what the difficulty is, and Moses wrote it out so a blind man could see it, then Jesus told us all about it, and it was later written in the Book of James, where everyone could read it?...

We have in America today more wealth, more goods, more food, more clothing, more houses than we have ever had. We have everything in abundance here.

We have the farm problem, my friends, because we have too much cotton, because we have too much wheat, and have too much corn, and too much potatoes. We have a home loan problem, because we have too many houses, and yet nobody can buy them and live in them...

Now, let us take America today. We have in America today, ladies and gentlemen, $272,000,000,000 of debt. Two hundred and seventy-two thousand millions of dollars of debts are owed by the various people of this country today. Why, my friends, that cannot be paid. It is not possible for that kind of debt to be paid...

So, we have in America today, my friends, a condition by which about 10 men dominate the means of activity in at least 85 percent of the activities that you own. They either own directly everything or they have got some kind of mortgage on it, with a very small percentage to be excepted. They own the banks, they own the steel mills, they own the railroads, they own the bonds, they own the mortgages, they own the stores, and they have chained the country from one end to the other until there is not any kind of business that a small, independent man could go into today and make a living, and there is not any kind of business that an independent man can go into and make any money to buy an automobile with; and they have finally and gradually and steadily eliminated everybody from the fields in which there is a living to be made, and still they have got little enough sense to think they ought to be able to get more business out of it anyway...

[This] was the view of Socrates and Plato. That was the view of the English statesmen. That was the view of American statesmen. That was the view of American statesmen like Daniel Webster, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, William Jennings Bryan, and Theodore Roosevelt, and even as late as Herbert Hoover, the sadly deceased Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the rudely incompetent John Nance Garner.

All three of these men, Mr. Hoover, Mr. Roosevelt, and Mr. Garner, came out and said there had to be a decentralization of wealth, but neither one of them did anything about it. But, nevertheless, they recognized the principle. The fact that Mr. Hoover never did anything about it is his affair, and I feel sure that Mr. Roosevelt would not have so either, and Mr. Garner certainly seems to not be doing so...

It is necessary to save the government of the country, but is much more necessary to save the people of America. We love this country. We love this Government...

Now, we have organized a society, and we call it "Share Our Wealth Society," a society with the motto "Every Man a King."

Every man a king, so there would be no such thing as a man or woman who did not have the necessities of life, who would not be dependent upon the whims and caprices and ipse dixit of the financial barons for a living. What do we propose by this society? We propose to limit the wealth of big men in the country. There is an average of $15,000 in wealth to every family in America. That is right here today...

We have to limit fortunes. Our present plan is that we will allow no one man to own more that $50,000,000. We think that with that limit we will be able to carry out the balance of the program. It may be necessary that we limit it to less than $50,000,000. It may be necessary, in working out of the plans that no man's fortune would be more than $10,000,000 or $15,000,000. But be that as it may, it will still be more than any one man, or any one man and his children and their children, will be able to spend in their lifetimes; and it is not necessary or reasonable to have wealth piled up beyond that point where we cannot prevent poverty among the masses...

Those are the things we propose to do. "Every Man a King." Every man to eat when there is something to eat; all to wear something when there is something to wear. That makes us all a sovereign...

And we ought to take care of the veterans of the wars in this program. That is a small matter. Suppose it does cost a billion dollars a year—that means that the money will be scattered throughout this country. We ought to pay them a bonus. We can do it. We ought to take care of every single one of the sick and disabled veterans. I do not care whether a man got sick on the battlefield or did not; every man that wore the uniform of this country is entitled to be taken care of, and there is money enough to do it; and we need to spread the wealth of the country, which you did not do in what you call the ARR. [7]

If the ARR has done any good, I can put it all in my eye without having it hurt. All I can see that the ARR has done is to put the little man out of business—the little merchant in his store, the little Italian that is running a fruit stand, or the Greek shoe-shining stand. The ARR is not worth anything, and I said so when they put it through...

Get together in your community tonight or tomorrow and organize one of our Share Our Wealth Societies. If you do not understand it, write me and let me send you the platform; let me give you the proof of it...

I thank you, my friends, for your kind attention, and I hope you will enroll with us, take care of your own work in the work of this Government, and share or help in our Share Our Wealth Societies.


From the October 1934 Universal Newsreel:



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"And in Germany, on August 2nd, Adolph Hitler, the recently-elected fascist leader of the National Socialist party declared himself Fuehrer, or supreme leader, of Germany. President Garner has denounced this action as 'dictatorship, and even worse; this madman will destroy the peace and welfare of Europe that we fought for in the Great War.' Only time will tell if he is right.

hitlerspeaks.jpg


And in the midwest, the great cyclones continue to scrape the topsoil of the crops. These titans are being named 'black blizzards' by those affected. These black blizzards are causing many farmers to flee their homes and move.

491px-Farmer_walking_in_dust_storm_Cimarron_County_Oklahoma2.jpg


Finally (and most recently) the notorious gangster 'Pretty Boy' Floyd was killed ignominiously on October 18th. He, accomplice Adam Richetti, and two female companions, were killed in an automotive accident; their car hit a pole outside of Buffalo, New York, in the midst of a great fog, and it, with them inside, toppled over. [7] This puts an end to his reign of terror."




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Footnotes:
1. IOTL, only 7.
2. IOTL, it went from 117 to 104.
3. IOTL, 313 to 322.
4. IOTL, 5 to 2.
5. The OTL Speaker at this time, Joseph Byrns, was butterflied away from his spot.
6. This speech is OTL, just trimmed for size (as you can see) and edited somewhat.
7. ITTL, Garner's watered-down National Recovery Administration, ARR stands for the American Recovery Referendum, and it does little, at least as Huey sees it.He's not the most unbiased, you know.
8. IOTL, no-one was harmed, but it was foggy, and thus, I'm butterflying this into Floyd's death.
 
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I did some brief research and it seems to me that history has never produced an ideology that matches the views of Huey Long. Perhaps the regime with views most similar to those of Huey Long of OTL was that of Juan Peron in Argentina. Although autocratic in its nature, Peron assumed a populist stance, which differentiated him from the corporatist stances of Fascist leaders like Hitler, Mussolini, and Franco. At the same time, he never identified with the Marxist ideology and maintained a private sector(unlike Socialism). He was known to be a figure that pushed for social justice, nationalized institutions that had previously been dominated by foreign economic interests (especially that of Britain and France), and uplifted labour movements. I wouldn't say that Peronism is a perfect match for "Longism" as Peron's regime maintained close links with the military, never proposed wealth caps, and as far as I know, didn't have its own SA.

My point is that I am quite interested to see an ideology blossom that never had a chance to in OTL (like technocracy). I wonder if "Longism" will spread and mutate into various daughter ideologies like Marxism and Fascism in OTL.
 
I did some brief research and it seems to me that history has never produced an ideology that matches the views of Huey Long. Perhaps the regime with views most similar to those of Huey Long of OTL was that of Juan Peron in Argentina. Although autocratic in its nature, Peron assumed a populist stance, which differentiated him from the corporatist stances of Fascist leaders like Hitler, Mussolini, and Franco. At the same time, he never identified with the Marxist ideology and maintained a private sector(unlike Socialism). He was known to be a figure that pushed for social justice, nationalized institutions that had previously been dominated by foreign economic interests (especially that of Britain and France), and uplifted labour movements. I wouldn't say that Peronism is a perfect match for "Longism" as Peron's regime maintained close links with the military, never proposed wealth caps, and as far as I know, didn't have its own SA.

My point is that I am quite interested to see an ideology blossom that never had a chance to in OTL (like technocracy). I wonder if "Longism" will spread and mutate into various daughter ideologies like Marxism and Fascism in OTL.

I might use some anecdotes about Peron for inspiration and for zest. Unfortunately, while your question about Longist branches is a good one, it's rather spoiler-laden for me to answer fully. Suffice it to say yes, permutations do evolve.
 
Huey Long is a centrist, his ideology use elements from almost all the political views from the 40s, he was a very conservative christian at the same time he held a very populist nature and a socialist economic point of view, if you want a therm to describe this, you should use Longism, because nothing will match this line of tough better than that
 
Please tell me you've at least looked at T. Harry Williams biography of Huey...

Longism is a weird mix of somewhat contrarian elements...

and you really need to know something about college football to write about Huey....he wrote "Fight for LSU" and "Touchdown LSU" both of which are still played today by Tiger Band

That's not even talking about the impact of thousands of men and women who were able to get a college education in the 1930's thanks to Huey Long...
 
Please tell me you've at least looked at T. Harry Williams biography of Huey...

Longism is a weird mix of somewhat contrarian elements...

and you really need to know something about college football to write about Huey....he wrote "Fight for LSU" and "Touchdown LSU" both of which are still played today by Tiger Band

That's not even talking about the impact of thousands of men and women who were able to get a college education in the 1930's thanks to Huey Long...

I plead guilty to not knowing much about college football, but I'll endeavor to learn. If it means anything, I am actually a Saints fan.

You bring up a good point, which is that Long did quite a number of good things for a lot of people. I have not ignored this fact. I'm not going to write him as a crazy dictatorial monster, just as a man, built up of good things and bad things. If I've not communicated this, I apologize. This entire TL is meant to give a nuanced view to the tired old trope of Huey Long, American fascist.

Huey wasn't a fascist. He was a syncretist, for lack of a better word.
 
From Prelude to Power: A History of the Antebellum World, 1919-1936, Stephen Ambrose, 1983, Harvard Press

[The year 1935] was one of great change and upheaval. In Greece, the Hellenic Republic suffered a coup d'état, enacted by Nikolaos Plastiras, who imposed his Venizelist ideals onto the already weakened country. [1] pushed for the ideal of a "Greater Greece," encompassing the old lands of the Eastern Roman Empire, particularly Constantinople, but still firmly democratic. The Greater Greek Republic, as Plastiras' Hellenes would come to be known, would become a strong ally of Longist America during the Kingfish's term of office.

192px-PROKOPIOU-PLASTIRAS-9.jpg

Meanwhile, in Germany, the madman Adolph Hitler began rearming the country in defiance of the Treaty of Versailles. Later, he imposed the disgusting Nuremberg Laws, which were incredibly anti-Semitic.

Back to America. The build-up for the 1936 election was extreme: something like it has not been seen since the Rebirth. Social reform was hot on everyone's mind, not least Huey Long. John Nance Garner's NRR had proven ineffectual. Thus, the Democratic primaries were intense. While Garner received significant support from his party, he was nearly tied with the Kingfish himself, but he was rejected as "too extreme" by the establishment. In a rage, he stormed out of the convention, and a day later, he founded the "Share Our Wealth" Party, which soon became the Social Populist Party. The votes next came to former New York governor Al Smith. Bizarrely enough, the third place votes came to radio comedian and author Will Rogers, who promised to end the "bunk" in politics. [2] (Later, Rogers would support Long's campaign and his reelection, replacing Father Charles Coughlin, who Long broke with in the 1940 election, due to his increasingly unsettling ideologies. Both would be Secretary of Information and Broadcasting, one of the key cabinet positions of the Social Populist regime, Rogers until nearly the end.) Long, now head of his own reformist party, swore to rebuild America into a state of stability and reform.

Meanwhile, the Republicans were in a state of disarray. Their best hope was Senate minority leader, Hamilton Fish III, and his running mate was chosen as Frank Knox. However, they were doomed from the very start. On the absolute other side of the spectrum, the Socialist party had performed a miraculous feat, for they and the Progressive Party had found common ground with the Socialist Laborites, and they had formed the People's General Marxist Party of the United States. They nominated Upton Sinclair, a famed socialist and the governor of California [3], and Norman Thomas, as President and Vice President, respectively.

"They do not merely vote for him, they worship the ground he walks on. He is part of their religion."

— St. Louis Post-Dispatch correspondent on Long's popularity, 1935

Continued from The Rise and Fall of the Social Populists (1933-1964), Eichiro Azuma, 1996, Pennsylvania Press:

The nascent Social Populist party was in disarray. Of course, they would nominate Huey Long as their candidate, and they already had a platform worked up. Long knew that the left-wing vote, fractured as it was, would favor him over Garner and Browder, who many feared. The Farmer-Labor Party, however, had found common cause with the fishermen, and they joined forces, giving the Social Populists their first congressional seats. However, to be Long's running mate was something that many of the fishermen [4] dreamt of. The main nominees were pension advocate Francis Townsend, Gerald L. K. Smith, and William Lemke, both early converts to the party. The chosen son of the Farmer-Laborites, Jacob Coxey, knew he was nothing close to an option, but ran regardless, as a matter of principle. (Father Coughlin noted his ineligibility, due to his Canadian origins.) However, when Robert F. Wagner, a distinguished New York senator shunned by the Garner administration, expressed interest in running with Long, the party agreed that he was the best possible nominee. Thus did the election begin.

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Footnotes:
1. IOTL, this coup failed.
2. Yup, Willy survives this, which is a good enough POD in and of itself. Hmm...
3. He lost IOTL
4. Fishermen is the slang term generally used ITTL for members of the Social Populist party, derived from Huey's nickname.
 
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