No Mao 1949 -- American Butterflies

bguy

Donor
A few things here:

1) In 1947, Congress was Republican, and the country was reeling from the Strikes of 1946, so pro-labor legislation was, at this point in time, very unpopular; if a member of Congress voted against this piece of legislation in anyway, he'd be paying a political price -- therefore, just because a Senator voted for TH in 1947 doesn't mean they'll be opposed to modifying it after 1949

Alrighty just looking at Democrats on this issue...
20 Democrat Senators voted to override Truman's veto, 22 voted to sustain it
106 Democrats in the House voted to override with only 71 voting to sustain

How do you get past these numbers? Most of these members are going to still be in Congress throughout the rest of Truman's presidency and whoever follows him. You might get one or two to change their mind but the vast majority of them will oppose repeal or modification of 14b. Nothing is going to happen in this timeline to suddenly make unions more popular or to make conservative Democrats from conservative states decide to throw away their own careers over this issue.

2) Taft Hartley is much bigger than Section 14b, which allows for Right to Work Laws; it outlaws Closed Shops, Sympathy Strikes, and other things -- this is important -- that played a direct role in the Strikes of 1946

But Section 14b is one of the most important components of the law. Especially for the south which does not want unions and has a vested interest in defending the concept of state autonomy.


3) The unions are a big part of the Democratic Party, especially at this time. What they want, ideally, is a repeal of Taft Hartley, but minus exigent circumstances (which the Red Scare provided OTL) they will expect some action on it. So it will be in a number of legislators interest to offer them something

Unions expected repeal OTL in 1965 as well. They did not get it, because even after a landslide presidential election victory with a supermajority in the Senate, the votes were not there. LBJ was able to enact Medicare, the Voting Rights Act, and federal aid to education, but he failed to get repeal of 14b. That is how difficult this is going to be.

Look at it this way, if I am a Southern Democrat at this time, what possible reason do I have to vote for repeal or modification of 14b? There is no national popular outcry for it (the only people that actually want it are the unions), and if I vote for it the business community in my state will declare war on me. The unions don't have any leverage over me and can't offer me anything. Nor will I really care if opposing repeal of 14b creates difficulties for my northern counterparts. I work just as well with northern Republicans as northern Democrats, maybe even better. (I've basically been allied with them since 1938 anyway.) I have absolutely nothing to gain from supporting this bill and a lot to lose by supporting it.

Do you think it was a coincidence that Lyndon Johnson voted to override the Truman veto? If you were a southern Democrat whose name wasn't Claude Pepper supporting unions was a career killer at this time.

4) In 1948 alone, 9 Senate seats went Democrat, and their loses in 1950 OTL are largely due to events not ITTL
5) The practice of regularly filibustering pieces of legislation was not yet common practice (civil rights being a noticeable exception), so modifiers only need 50 votes, plus VP Kefauver

Alrighty lets be generous and say all 9 of those new Senators will support repeal. 25 + 9 gets you to 34. You are still 14 seats short even without the fillibuster.

The Democrats might do somewhat better in the 1950 elections, but they will probably still lose seats (sluggish economy plus the usual mid-term election factor.)

But lets be generous and say that going against all the normal mid-term election trends, the Democrats do exceptionally well and win all 1950 Senate races that OTL the Republican candidate did not win by at least 5%. That means the Democrats end up gaining... 3 seats. Now lets also assume those 3 new Democrat senators will also march lock step on repeal of 14b, and we now have 37 votes. Still 11 seats short.

Do the same thing for all races the Republican candidate did not win by at least 10% and the Democrats get 6 seats. Assume all 6 of the new senators will vote for 14b repeal, and you have 40 votes. Still 8 short.

So lets just go all out and say the Democrats win every Republican senate seat that is up in 1950, (even the Vermont seat that Aiken won by over 50 points), and you get the Democrats gaining 13 seats. Again assume that all of the new Democrat senators will support repeal of 14b, and you now have 47 votes. Still a vote short.

Is it clear yet how impossible this is. Even without the fillibuster and with the ASBs going full blast to make it happen you still can't get there. Repeal or modification of Section 14b is just not going to happen during a Truman presidency.

6) It's "Truman or Lucas" -- remember, the thread agreed Scott Lucas doesn't lose in 1950 TTL, and remains an ideal candidate for President

My mistake. Although Lucas is far from an ideal candidate. He was a pretty poor majority leader who tried to make everyone happy and ended up having both the left and right wings of the Democrats angry at him. He also wasn't all that healthy (heart attack in 1950.) OTL he went on to live to 1968, but in this timeline I could easily see him dying in office. If he can even get elected at all that is. Taft would probably run pretty competitively against Lucas who doesn't seem to be that much of a campaigner (OTL he lost his senate race by 8% despite being the Senate Majority Leader.)
 
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bguy said:
You might get one or two to change their mind but the vast majority of them will oppose repeal or modification of 14b. Nothing is going to happen in this timeline to suddenly make unions more popular or to make conservative Democrats from conservative states decide to throw away their own careers over this issue.

The thing that changes is the public panic over the Strikes of 1946 calms down, and there's no panic that comes to fill the void.

But maybe that gets to why we reach such different conclusions on this -- I see it as a law that was enacted in response to very exigent circumstances, survived intact afterword in the midst of a second Red Panic, then became the new normal as a number of states passed Right to Work laws and got used to them, eventually (certainly by 1965) becoming politically impossible to even alter.

FWIG, your view of the law seems to be as something that came about because of its support by key constituencies -- the timing of the law or how it came about being less important than the interests that defend it. Is this a fair assessment?

He did end up trying to won but quit (like Johnson) when he lost a primary.

Good point, actually
 
Just to give a little more context to this TL, I've got a couple of other threads on this, one on China itself, another on Nixon.

In the latter, I thought if Nixon loses his 1950 Senate bid, his best next step is the Governor's race in 1954. I've also been thinking having Henry Cabot Lodge Jr defeat Kennedy's 52 challenge ITTL as well...

EDIT ADD: I also just thought of something -- in a different Cold War (no NSC 68, etc) would the US have reacted differently to, say, Bastista's 1952 coup in Cuba?
 
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Just to give a little more context to this TL, I've got a couple of other threads on this, one on China itself, another on Nixon.

In the latter, I thought if Nixon loses his 1950 Senate bid, his best next step is the Governor's race in 1954. I've also been thinking having Henry Cabot Lodge Jr defeat Kennedy's 52 challenge ITTL as well...

EDIT ADD: I also just thought of something -- in a different Cold War (no NSC 68, etc) would the US have reacted differently to, say, Bastista's 1952 coup in Cuba?
Ehhh, I wouldn't underestimate the Kennedys ever. If you really want, you could kill off Jack in WWII I suppose.

I think Batista would remain as OTL, the US would just see it as business as usual (he had had a coup before too during FDR's time). Unless you had President Henry Wallace...
 
Ehhh, I wouldn't underestimate the Kennedys ever. If you really want, you could kill off Jack in WWII I suppose.

I think it's pretty plausible -- considering, AIUI, Lodge lost the election by 3% after neglecting his own race to campaign hard for Eisenhower.\

I think Batista would remain as OTL, the US would just see it as business as usual (he had had a coup before too during FDR's time).

Good point...

Unless you had President Henry Wallace...

Not ITTL
 
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