You know, if this were any other TL, I'd swear you're joking, but looking at the last two presidents...
My body is ready.
No Southern Strategy: The Political Ramifications of an Alternate 1964 Election
- Thread starter Nofix
- Start date
You know, if this were any other TL, I'd swear you're joking, but looking at the last two presidents...
My body is ready.
Update 23: 1984 Presidential Primaries
The first Presidential primary to be finished in 1984 was the Democrats. The main candidates waited to see which states would be up first this year, the Democrats choosing them via sortition like the Republican Party. It was a reform made to to insure no one state would have an advantage of the others year after year. Oklahoma, Kentucky, and West Virginia were up first. The main liberal candidate, who sucked up nearly all of the air in the room, was California Governor Jesse Unruh. His deft handling of the recall the previous year not only kept him in the media spotlight, but also added to his stature as a candidate. He amassed a significant war chest and had traveled to several states where he made contacts and established staffs in each one. Liberal Democratic voters were excited after years of the hawkish, moderate, and/or machine politicians who got nominated again and again.
Very few candidates wanted to go up against Unruh, sensing both his war chest and popularity with the primary voters. Russell Long hoped Lousiana would pop up first and let him get a head start, something he had been gambling his whole campaign on. Instead Lousiana would be one of the last states that year, one of many things which ended the aborted Long '84 run. Other Southern and conservative Democrats ran hoping to stop the western "tax and spend" liberal from jeopardizing their party in the South, now with the National Conservatives waiting to pounce in that region.
Unruh might have been popular with liberals, who mostly young and disaffected voters, but he also scared off fellow Democrats with his close relationship to many lobbyists, and the perennial corruption allegations that continually pop up without ever actually being proven true. The main candidate that moderate and right-wing Democrats crowded around was Florida Governor Claude Kirk.
Kirk had been a Republican for a couple of years in between a lifetime of Democratic Party loyalty, but he proved to be a capable candidate with the backing of much of his fellow Southerners. He swept the Kentucky and West Virginia primaries, but in a minor upset lost Oklahoma to Unruh. Unruh put most of his early campaign into the Sooner State. His focusing more on his economics then the social issues of the day proved that he could win the conservative states, and wasn't restricted in his appeal to just the far-left. His more professional and focused campaign won him that state by focusing on it exclusively , compared to Kirks spread out and beleaguered teams that worked in three seperate states. While Kirk had significantly less money and professional campaigners working for him, he had name recognition and an experienced ground game, allowing him to sweep the second round of states (South Carolina, Missouri, and Kansas) as Unruh picked up a few Western states.
Then came the big killer for Kirk's campaign: Florida. Nobody expected his home state to vote against him, so Kirk dispatched his men to Indiana and Illinois, both of which held significant amounts of delegates and could cement him as the true front runner instead of Unruh. Unruh's team noticed this and waited until the last minute to launch a T.V. and radio blitz, hammering Kirk for his campaigning for Nixon in 1960, his party switching, and his "regressive economic policies". One memorable T.V. ad mockingly said, "I think Kirk's a little confused, the Republican Primary isn't until next week."
The loss of his home state, and Indiana, stopped whatever momentum Kirk had. Unruh planned to coast by the rest of the primaries, saving up money and effort for later in the year with the general election. He planned for one of the most liberal candidacies against two right-wing candidates, President Cohn and whoever the National Conservatives would tap that year. This looked like a good year for a liberal candidate.
Instead a new force to his right emerged, Virginia conservative activist Richard Viguerie. A longtime conservative, he surprised many by entering the Democratic primary instead of the Republican or National Conservative one. He stated he planned to fight the forces of liberalism, secularism, and big government "from inside the beasts belly" and picked up a considerable amount of steam in a short time. No one was quite sure what to make of this. Many of Kirk's campaign staff were defecting to the charismatic preacher and conservative voters were considering him as Kirk failed to make any recoveries in later states.
Many conservative Democrats and Republicans (whose own primary was going very quietly and mostly uncontested) were showing up to Viguerie's rallies, giving the impression he was more then just a joke or a crank candidate. Eventually the Unruh campaign treated him as a real threat, engaging those likely to vote for Viguerie and not taking the remainder of the primary easily. Unruh's original plan to sweep the rest of the primaries, and the South, were scrapped as they put all their effort into big states like Texas and Pennsylvania.
While Viguerie took much of the South, Unruh won most of the country and received the nomination. Viguerie refused to endorse Unruh, attacking him on economic, moral, and ethical grounds and promised to campaign for "the good, moral, and truly conservative candidate this year." His delegates boycotted the Democratic National Convention for good measure, leading to a nomination with a slightly less then full audience.
---
Cohn had no real opposition in 1984. His administration was, if not great, passable to most Republicans. Taxes were cut, regulations were rolled back, the economy was good, no countries had been nuked: things were alright. The main issue most people had was with the President himself, and especially the way he came off to the nation. Cohn kept himself aloof of most of the slander thrown on him, his sexuality, his wife, and came across as both cold and emotionless, compared to his more flamboyant personality in the 50's, 60's, and 70's. But his unwillingness to stoop to his heckler's levels made him appear more Presidential, and less reckless. The media wasn't sure what to make of him. Was he actually running for President or hoping for someone else to take the nomination from him? What are his goals this time around? What happened to the colorful and personality-driven man of the last few decades?
Whatever the case was, he faced little united opposition. Some liberals fielded Governor Evers, who wasn't aware he was even on the ballot in a few states. More conservative Republicans, the one's who hadn't jumped ship to the NCP, touted Alabama Representative Jack Edwards, the sole remaining Republican representative from the Deep South, as their man. He didn't run nor was interested in waging a challenge against the President.
Cohn was unanimously renominated alongside Vice-President Black, easily still the most popular member of his administration. His acceptance speech was short and to the point. Better relations with America's allies, a commitment to economic growth, and consensus politics were the main topics of the speech. In the intervening weeks many newspapers, journalists, and newscasters compared Cohn to a previous Republican nominee from New York: Tom Dewey.
A popular Republican from the Empire State who became his party's nominee, the comparisons between the two men were inescapable for a few months after his nomination. Much like how Dewey went from a burning partisan mudslinger in 1944 to a lifeless political corpse in 1948, people were seeing history repeat with the controversial Roy Cohn becoming completely boring in his plans and delivery.
---
A very unique innovation in the National Conservative Party primary was they had one single day of voting. Nearly a month after the Republicans, and two months after the Democrats, they held their primary nationwide. While party boss Jesse Helms expected to be able to steamroll any and all opposition that year, he hit several snags.
First was Helms' popularity, it barely existed. With his iron-hard grip on the party, he alienated a lot of voters who felt like they had no choice in the direction of the party. Even in the Senate a lot of people chaffed under his rule, especially after numerous blunders. Despite this, Helms was the big man of the party and expected to win easily.
Then came the announcement of Evan Mecham, a controversial and perennial Arizona Republican candidate, that he would run for the Presidency on the National Conservative ticket. This was a dangerous move as Mecham, while considered a crank to many, had a powerful following in western voters (mostly his fellow Mormons and Birchers). Helms also faced a challenge from his native South, when Governor Rockwell announced his challenge for the nomination. Rockwell was initially penned the moderate candidate in a field full of right-wingers, a sentence probably thought impossible a decade ago. He was the moderate candidate until another man announced he was running, William L. Buckley.
The "father of modern conservatism", former nominee for New York Mayor, and now Presidential candidate had made a startling change as far his politics went. Or rather, his politics hadn't changed, merely which landscape he was one. In his native Republican Party, and NYConservative Party, he was still on their right flank. But in the jungle that was the NCP primary he was the only intellectual and realist. He openly attacked the party's obstructionist drift as "dangerous, not only to our goals, but to our country." He attacked his enemies as clowns and demagogues who were doing more to harm conservatism and the desirability of it then any combination of their enemies could.
In the end, the "National" Conservative Party was again broken down by regional lines:
Buckley took the Northeast conservatives, and humiliatingly supplemented Rockwell in the South as the anti-Helms candidate. Mecham emerged in third place as the western candidate, while Boivin and Dornan took their states (Boivin also taking Washington and Hawaii) and some votes from their neighboring states that Mecham won. When it came time to go to the convention, Buckley steadfastly refused to endorse anyone, and a coalition of Helms and the western candidates gave him the nomination. Mecham was made the VP, and both Dornan and Boivin were promised some measure of influence in a Helms administration.
Buckley refused to endorse Helms. Just the opposite, to a crowd of screaming and jeering delegates he announced his continued backing of President Cohn, and departed with his delegates in a symbolic rejection of Helms and the direction the National Conservatives were going. What should have been a easy nomination turned into an embarrassment for the National Conservatives and their nominees.
Very few candidates wanted to go up against Unruh, sensing both his war chest and popularity with the primary voters. Russell Long hoped Lousiana would pop up first and let him get a head start, something he had been gambling his whole campaign on. Instead Lousiana would be one of the last states that year, one of many things which ended the aborted Long '84 run. Other Southern and conservative Democrats ran hoping to stop the western "tax and spend" liberal from jeopardizing their party in the South, now with the National Conservatives waiting to pounce in that region.
Unruh might have been popular with liberals, who mostly young and disaffected voters, but he also scared off fellow Democrats with his close relationship to many lobbyists, and the perennial corruption allegations that continually pop up without ever actually being proven true. The main candidate that moderate and right-wing Democrats crowded around was Florida Governor Claude Kirk.
Kirk had been a Republican for a couple of years in between a lifetime of Democratic Party loyalty, but he proved to be a capable candidate with the backing of much of his fellow Southerners. He swept the Kentucky and West Virginia primaries, but in a minor upset lost Oklahoma to Unruh. Unruh put most of his early campaign into the Sooner State. His focusing more on his economics then the social issues of the day proved that he could win the conservative states, and wasn't restricted in his appeal to just the far-left. His more professional and focused campaign won him that state by focusing on it exclusively , compared to Kirks spread out and beleaguered teams that worked in three seperate states. While Kirk had significantly less money and professional campaigners working for him, he had name recognition and an experienced ground game, allowing him to sweep the second round of states (South Carolina, Missouri, and Kansas) as Unruh picked up a few Western states.
Then came the big killer for Kirk's campaign: Florida. Nobody expected his home state to vote against him, so Kirk dispatched his men to Indiana and Illinois, both of which held significant amounts of delegates and could cement him as the true front runner instead of Unruh. Unruh's team noticed this and waited until the last minute to launch a T.V. and radio blitz, hammering Kirk for his campaigning for Nixon in 1960, his party switching, and his "regressive economic policies". One memorable T.V. ad mockingly said, "I think Kirk's a little confused, the Republican Primary isn't until next week."
The loss of his home state, and Indiana, stopped whatever momentum Kirk had. Unruh planned to coast by the rest of the primaries, saving up money and effort for later in the year with the general election. He planned for one of the most liberal candidacies against two right-wing candidates, President Cohn and whoever the National Conservatives would tap that year. This looked like a good year for a liberal candidate.
Instead a new force to his right emerged, Virginia conservative activist Richard Viguerie. A longtime conservative, he surprised many by entering the Democratic primary instead of the Republican or National Conservative one. He stated he planned to fight the forces of liberalism, secularism, and big government "from inside the beasts belly" and picked up a considerable amount of steam in a short time. No one was quite sure what to make of this. Many of Kirk's campaign staff were defecting to the charismatic preacher and conservative voters were considering him as Kirk failed to make any recoveries in later states.
Many conservative Democrats and Republicans (whose own primary was going very quietly and mostly uncontested) were showing up to Viguerie's rallies, giving the impression he was more then just a joke or a crank candidate. Eventually the Unruh campaign treated him as a real threat, engaging those likely to vote for Viguerie and not taking the remainder of the primary easily. Unruh's original plan to sweep the rest of the primaries, and the South, were scrapped as they put all their effort into big states like Texas and Pennsylvania.
While Viguerie took much of the South, Unruh won most of the country and received the nomination. Viguerie refused to endorse Unruh, attacking him on economic, moral, and ethical grounds and promised to campaign for "the good, moral, and truly conservative candidate this year." His delegates boycotted the Democratic National Convention for good measure, leading to a nomination with a slightly less then full audience.
---
Cohn had no real opposition in 1984. His administration was, if not great, passable to most Republicans. Taxes were cut, regulations were rolled back, the economy was good, no countries had been nuked: things were alright. The main issue most people had was with the President himself, and especially the way he came off to the nation. Cohn kept himself aloof of most of the slander thrown on him, his sexuality, his wife, and came across as both cold and emotionless, compared to his more flamboyant personality in the 50's, 60's, and 70's. But his unwillingness to stoop to his heckler's levels made him appear more Presidential, and less reckless. The media wasn't sure what to make of him. Was he actually running for President or hoping for someone else to take the nomination from him? What are his goals this time around? What happened to the colorful and personality-driven man of the last few decades?
Whatever the case was, he faced little united opposition. Some liberals fielded Governor Evers, who wasn't aware he was even on the ballot in a few states. More conservative Republicans, the one's who hadn't jumped ship to the NCP, touted Alabama Representative Jack Edwards, the sole remaining Republican representative from the Deep South, as their man. He didn't run nor was interested in waging a challenge against the President.
Cohn was unanimously renominated alongside Vice-President Black, easily still the most popular member of his administration. His acceptance speech was short and to the point. Better relations with America's allies, a commitment to economic growth, and consensus politics were the main topics of the speech. In the intervening weeks many newspapers, journalists, and newscasters compared Cohn to a previous Republican nominee from New York: Tom Dewey.
A popular Republican from the Empire State who became his party's nominee, the comparisons between the two men were inescapable for a few months after his nomination. Much like how Dewey went from a burning partisan mudslinger in 1944 to a lifeless political corpse in 1948, people were seeing history repeat with the controversial Roy Cohn becoming completely boring in his plans and delivery.
---
A very unique innovation in the National Conservative Party primary was they had one single day of voting. Nearly a month after the Republicans, and two months after the Democrats, they held their primary nationwide. While party boss Jesse Helms expected to be able to steamroll any and all opposition that year, he hit several snags.
First was Helms' popularity, it barely existed. With his iron-hard grip on the party, he alienated a lot of voters who felt like they had no choice in the direction of the party. Even in the Senate a lot of people chaffed under his rule, especially after numerous blunders. Despite this, Helms was the big man of the party and expected to win easily.
Then came the announcement of Evan Mecham, a controversial and perennial Arizona Republican candidate, that he would run for the Presidency on the National Conservative ticket. This was a dangerous move as Mecham, while considered a crank to many, had a powerful following in western voters (mostly his fellow Mormons and Birchers). Helms also faced a challenge from his native South, when Governor Rockwell announced his challenge for the nomination. Rockwell was initially penned the moderate candidate in a field full of right-wingers, a sentence probably thought impossible a decade ago. He was the moderate candidate until another man announced he was running, William L. Buckley.
The "father of modern conservatism", former nominee for New York Mayor, and now Presidential candidate had made a startling change as far his politics went. Or rather, his politics hadn't changed, merely which landscape he was one. In his native Republican Party, and NYConservative Party, he was still on their right flank. But in the jungle that was the NCP primary he was the only intellectual and realist. He openly attacked the party's obstructionist drift as "dangerous, not only to our goals, but to our country." He attacked his enemies as clowns and demagogues who were doing more to harm conservatism and the desirability of it then any combination of their enemies could.
In the end, the "National" Conservative Party was again broken down by regional lines:
Buckley took the Northeast conservatives, and humiliatingly supplemented Rockwell in the South as the anti-Helms candidate. Mecham emerged in third place as the western candidate, while Boivin and Dornan took their states (Boivin also taking Washington and Hawaii) and some votes from their neighboring states that Mecham won. When it came time to go to the convention, Buckley steadfastly refused to endorse anyone, and a coalition of Helms and the western candidates gave him the nomination. Mecham was made the VP, and both Dornan and Boivin were promised some measure of influence in a Helms administration.
Buckley refused to endorse Helms. Just the opposite, to a crowd of screaming and jeering delegates he announced his continued backing of President Cohn, and departed with his delegates in a symbolic rejection of Helms and the direction the National Conservatives were going. What should have been a easy nomination turned into an embarrassment for the National Conservatives and their nominees.
Roy Cohn, the moderate candidate for a moderate America.
Besides, who could say no to a face like this?
There's got to be a photo of him smiling somewhere. Is he even physically capable of smiling?
I've had the same thought. I have searched high and low, finding only two maybe three, debatable half-smiles. The one real smile doesn't really look like him. (In fact I'm 35% sure it isn't him.)
Seriously is that Cohn? It kind of looks like him, sans the sneer and the dead beat up looking eyes. The eyes only look kind of drowsy in this picture.
Update 23.5: Supreme Court as of 1984
Non-wikibox update today. Got to keep you guys on your toes.
Supreme Court in 1984
CJ: Frank M. Johnson (Humphrey appointee, 1969)
AJ1: William J. Brennan, Jr. (Eisenhower appointee, 1956)
AJ2: Byron R. White (Kennedy appointee, 1962)
AJ3: Thurgood Marshall (Johnson appointee, 1967)
AJ4: Jack B. Brooks (Humphrey appointee, 1971)
AJ5: William J. Guste (Howell appointee, 1975)
AJ6: James L. Buckley (MacBride appointee, 1978)
AJ7: Robert H. Bork (Cohn appointee, 1981)
AJ8: Orrin Hatch (Cohn appointee, 1983)
CJ: Frank M. Johnson (Humphrey appointee, 1969)
AJ1: William J. Brennan, Jr. (Eisenhower appointee, 1956)
AJ2: Byron R. White (Kennedy appointee, 1962)
AJ3: Thurgood Marshall (Johnson appointee, 1967)
AJ4: Jack B. Brooks (Humphrey appointee, 1971)
AJ5: William J. Guste (Howell appointee, 1975)
AJ6: James L. Buckley (MacBride appointee, 1978)
AJ7: Robert H. Bork (Cohn appointee, 1981)
AJ8: Orrin Hatch (Cohn appointee, 1983)
Earlier in response to a question about abortion, you guys replied that bans remained in place, though presumably NY, WA, HI, and AK still had open access abortion in place. It'd be interesting to see a decade on if any other states have eased access or lifted bans, or even put bans back in place. This would be particularly interesting since the issue is not a national inflammatory one, but mainly state-by-state.
Also, if one buys into the theory that Roe v Wade is unintentionally (and tragically if true) responsible for the sudden nationwide drop in crime 19 years later (with NY's drop a couple years earlier), there's even more to this story.
Also, if one buys into the theory that Roe v Wade is unintentionally (and tragically if true) responsible for the sudden nationwide drop in crime 19 years later (with NY's drop a couple years earlier), there's even more to this story.
He's sort of smiling here (this is the best 'smile' of the dozens on getty images of him.) (Though he does have toque on.)
Update 24: 1984 Presidential election
Unruh picked Hugh Carey as his Vice-Presidential nominee, making the ticket unique in that it contained the Governors of the two biggest states. In fact, all three major tickets had one person from either side of the Mississippi River. New Yorker Cohn had the Californian Black, North Carolinian Helms had the Arizona Mecham, and the Californian Unruh had the New Yorker Carey.
Unruh and Carey swung farther to the left then was usual for a national Democratic ticket. Their plan hinged on the right-wing vote being splintered between Cohn and Helms, while centrists/moderates would either stay home or split three ways, and for the left-wing vote to turn out in states like Illinois, the rust belt, and New York. Unruh appealed to the working class in Unruh hoped to rally black voters against his opponents by portraying Helms as an unreconstructed segregationist, and Cohn as an elitist Jew who sneered at the lower classes of New York and the rest of the country. He also trumpeted his own work with Civil Rights and promised a new one would pass Congress "within [his] first term."
Cohn decided to stick to the center, painting Unruh as an out of touch "tax and spend" liberal, while Jesse Helms was tarred as a crypto-Dixiecrat who wistfully called back for the days of Segregation. He played up his anti-communist credentials and his appointment of the first Mormon to the Supreme Court to western voters, his support for business and low taxes in the North, and send his Vice-President to other parts of the nation to "charm them" if possible. In fact, his Vice-President, Shirley Temple Black, appeared on a lot of television programs and used her ability to draw cameras to speak out why the Cohn Presidency deserved a full four years in office. Crime was lower, the economy was doing great, gas prices hadn't risen in nearly a year. Black was the most popular member of the Cohn administration since her appointment.
Helms, meanwhile, fought hard and dirty. He publicly accused Cohn of being a "immoral pervert" who entered into a loveless marriage for pure political gain. He also attacked Unruh for his divorce to Virginia June Lemon as proof he couldn't be trusted with the moral leader of the United States. He proudly and unironically referred to himself as "the forward-looking, honest, and clean candidate." On the lower levels of campaigning, where national television didn't follow him, he called Cohn a traitorous Jew and Unruh a money stealing, vote stuffing communist.
The weak link of the Helms campaign, however, was his Vice-Presidential pick: Evan Mecham. He was chosen as Vice-President to balance out the ticket (he was a Westerner Mormon against Helms' Southern Baptist background, and received a high amount of votes in the primary). Mecham was popular with Birchers, older voters, and Mormons, but mostly in the western states that received little attention by the national campaigns. When he did appear on the T.V. it was because of some gaffe he said, like calling the state of New York "a den of faggotry." Helms hated his Vice-Presidential pick, later insulting him as "the dumbest, most malformed idiot I could have chosen."
The Presidential debates made a return, as well as the first appearance of a Vice-Presidential debate.
First came the Vice-Presidential debates, held in San Diego, California on September 12th. It lasted one hour and thirty minutes, essentially a half-hour for each of Black, Carey, and Mecham. Vice-President Black made the best impression of the night, being very restrained and natural compared to the two men she was debating. Carey came off as tired and sleepy (he later blamed it on the weather and his own exasperation from campaigning so much), while Mecham came off as rambling, incoherent, and contradictory (especially as Governor Carey attacked him for his 'den of faggotry" comment). Black defended the Administration's successes, especially on the how it handled the political climate after the Manson attacks.
The Presidential debates, exactly two weeks later in the same area, had a much more interesting debate. At the start of the debate, about twenty minutes in, Unruh and Helms almost got into altercation after the California Governor referred to Helms as "the hypocrite [sic], Jew-baiting, everything-hating candidate who has more in common with John Calhoun then Jesus Christ." Helms threatened he'd press charges if he didn't apologies right then and there, and Unruh responded "you can't sue a man for the truth." The moderator threatened to kick them both out if they didn't behave, to which they did.
The rest of the debate went rather well, for Roy Cohn at least. He answered all of his questions without sounding lifeless or snarling mad. He even got in a good reply to someone who asked if America could elect someone as ugly as him ("I'd rather have Eisenhower's looks and brains then have Kennedy's") Helms and Unruh both couldn't help but taking another dig at each other, and ended up being seen as either petty or immature idiots to most voters who saw the debates.
Despite the hope of the media, there was no "October Surprise" like in previous elections. The campaigns ran hard and fast, trying to take every last voter they could in the last few weeks. Polling was all over the place. Some showed President Cohn winning a majority, some showed Unruh winning a majority or plurality, even one predicted Helms could win most of the states from Florida to Idaho. Many discussed the possibility of a deadlocked electoral college, including who the House would pick as President, who the Senate would pick as Vice-President if Helms and Mecham came in second. There was even the fear Cohn or Unruh could win an electoral majority and lose the popular vote.
Finally, November 6th came.
Cohn, to the surprise of many, won a majority of the electoral vote and a hefty plurality, almost 10% ahead of Unruh. Despite years of liberal hatred, and the occasional rumor about his sexuality, many Americans accepted Cohn as a good man who deserved another term in office. The majority of his votes came in the Northeast, in the electoral vote-rich states stretching from Illinois to New York. Cohn also performed surprisingly well with black voters, taking nearly a third of the vote in states like Illinois and Pennsylvania.
Unruh under-performed heavily. It was expected that he and Cohn would tie at around the 40% range, give or take a couple of points, while Helms would be a distant third to both. Instead he came just barely above a third of the vote. Plethora of liberals who were initially excited about him slowly started to become disenchanted as he transformed from "the great liberal hope" into just another machine politician. Moderates were alienated from his embrace of national healthcare, abortion rights, and cutting military spending. Conservatives Democrats just jumped ship or voted a split ticket.
Helms managed to eke out close wins in Alabama and Louisiana against Unruh and the more popular state Democrats. Helms also managed to win over 40% in his home state, South Carolina, and Mississippi. The sole state the NCP won a majority in was Idaho at 52%. Helms and Mecham were popular with religious right-wing Christians (of differing denominations) who disliked the Jewish Cohn and the "immoral" Unruh, who did little to challenge the impression he was a politician who loves women, money, and booze. Helms played up his Southern Baptism for all it was worth, and did pretty well among heavily rural Christian voters.
Despite a powerful third party running that year, voter turnout was much lower then before. Liberals were skeptical about Unruh. In spite of never being convicted of any kind of crime, many thought he was either corrupt or tolerated corruption as Governor. Far-right and disenchanted conservative voters didn't like Cohn's centrist run, obviously aiming toward being elected with the help of liberals, and thus they flocked to Helms/Mecham or skipped the Presidential election.
Even thought they won multiple states in multiple regions of the US, and despite having a pretty solid Congressional block, they were already facing two major dilemmas: ideological and leadership choices. The New York Conservative Party, in a sense the original one, saw the National Conservatives as just Southern Democrats and the odd Westerner. A large majority of their Senators were Southerners, over half of their Representatives were from the south, and most of their members had recently defected from the Democrats or more rarely the Republicans. The leading group of the NYConservatives didn't quite like their methodology of attacking both Democrats and Republicans, and refusing to work with thek to achieve conservative goals. That more then anything cemented their differences.
The divide was so pronounced between the two Conservative Parties, that the New York Conservative Party endorsed President Cohn, and in fact managed to get the National Conservatives to have to run on another party name in New York for being too similar to theirs. The National Conservatives ran in New York under the National Party banner, cementing a final break between the two.
Unruh and Carey swung farther to the left then was usual for a national Democratic ticket. Their plan hinged on the right-wing vote being splintered between Cohn and Helms, while centrists/moderates would either stay home or split three ways, and for the left-wing vote to turn out in states like Illinois, the rust belt, and New York. Unruh appealed to the working class in Unruh hoped to rally black voters against his opponents by portraying Helms as an unreconstructed segregationist, and Cohn as an elitist Jew who sneered at the lower classes of New York and the rest of the country. He also trumpeted his own work with Civil Rights and promised a new one would pass Congress "within [his] first term."
Cohn decided to stick to the center, painting Unruh as an out of touch "tax and spend" liberal, while Jesse Helms was tarred as a crypto-Dixiecrat who wistfully called back for the days of Segregation. He played up his anti-communist credentials and his appointment of the first Mormon to the Supreme Court to western voters, his support for business and low taxes in the North, and send his Vice-President to other parts of the nation to "charm them" if possible. In fact, his Vice-President, Shirley Temple Black, appeared on a lot of television programs and used her ability to draw cameras to speak out why the Cohn Presidency deserved a full four years in office. Crime was lower, the economy was doing great, gas prices hadn't risen in nearly a year. Black was the most popular member of the Cohn administration since her appointment.
Helms, meanwhile, fought hard and dirty. He publicly accused Cohn of being a "immoral pervert" who entered into a loveless marriage for pure political gain. He also attacked Unruh for his divorce to Virginia June Lemon as proof he couldn't be trusted with the moral leader of the United States. He proudly and unironically referred to himself as "the forward-looking, honest, and clean candidate." On the lower levels of campaigning, where national television didn't follow him, he called Cohn a traitorous Jew and Unruh a money stealing, vote stuffing communist.
The weak link of the Helms campaign, however, was his Vice-Presidential pick: Evan Mecham. He was chosen as Vice-President to balance out the ticket (he was a Westerner Mormon against Helms' Southern Baptist background, and received a high amount of votes in the primary). Mecham was popular with Birchers, older voters, and Mormons, but mostly in the western states that received little attention by the national campaigns. When he did appear on the T.V. it was because of some gaffe he said, like calling the state of New York "a den of faggotry." Helms hated his Vice-Presidential pick, later insulting him as "the dumbest, most malformed idiot I could have chosen."
The Presidential debates made a return, as well as the first appearance of a Vice-Presidential debate.
First came the Vice-Presidential debates, held in San Diego, California on September 12th. It lasted one hour and thirty minutes, essentially a half-hour for each of Black, Carey, and Mecham. Vice-President Black made the best impression of the night, being very restrained and natural compared to the two men she was debating. Carey came off as tired and sleepy (he later blamed it on the weather and his own exasperation from campaigning so much), while Mecham came off as rambling, incoherent, and contradictory (especially as Governor Carey attacked him for his 'den of faggotry" comment). Black defended the Administration's successes, especially on the how it handled the political climate after the Manson attacks.
The Presidential debates, exactly two weeks later in the same area, had a much more interesting debate. At the start of the debate, about twenty minutes in, Unruh and Helms almost got into altercation after the California Governor referred to Helms as "the hypocrite [sic], Jew-baiting, everything-hating candidate who has more in common with John Calhoun then Jesus Christ." Helms threatened he'd press charges if he didn't apologies right then and there, and Unruh responded "you can't sue a man for the truth." The moderator threatened to kick them both out if they didn't behave, to which they did.
The rest of the debate went rather well, for Roy Cohn at least. He answered all of his questions without sounding lifeless or snarling mad. He even got in a good reply to someone who asked if America could elect someone as ugly as him ("I'd rather have Eisenhower's looks and brains then have Kennedy's") Helms and Unruh both couldn't help but taking another dig at each other, and ended up being seen as either petty or immature idiots to most voters who saw the debates.
Despite the hope of the media, there was no "October Surprise" like in previous elections. The campaigns ran hard and fast, trying to take every last voter they could in the last few weeks. Polling was all over the place. Some showed President Cohn winning a majority, some showed Unruh winning a majority or plurality, even one predicted Helms could win most of the states from Florida to Idaho. Many discussed the possibility of a deadlocked electoral college, including who the House would pick as President, who the Senate would pick as Vice-President if Helms and Mecham came in second. There was even the fear Cohn or Unruh could win an electoral majority and lose the popular vote.
Finally, November 6th came.
Cohn, to the surprise of many, won a majority of the electoral vote and a hefty plurality, almost 10% ahead of Unruh. Despite years of liberal hatred, and the occasional rumor about his sexuality, many Americans accepted Cohn as a good man who deserved another term in office. The majority of his votes came in the Northeast, in the electoral vote-rich states stretching from Illinois to New York. Cohn also performed surprisingly well with black voters, taking nearly a third of the vote in states like Illinois and Pennsylvania.
Unruh under-performed heavily. It was expected that he and Cohn would tie at around the 40% range, give or take a couple of points, while Helms would be a distant third to both. Instead he came just barely above a third of the vote. Plethora of liberals who were initially excited about him slowly started to become disenchanted as he transformed from "the great liberal hope" into just another machine politician. Moderates were alienated from his embrace of national healthcare, abortion rights, and cutting military spending. Conservatives Democrats just jumped ship or voted a split ticket.
Helms managed to eke out close wins in Alabama and Louisiana against Unruh and the more popular state Democrats. Helms also managed to win over 40% in his home state, South Carolina, and Mississippi. The sole state the NCP won a majority in was Idaho at 52%. Helms and Mecham were popular with religious right-wing Christians (of differing denominations) who disliked the Jewish Cohn and the "immoral" Unruh, who did little to challenge the impression he was a politician who loves women, money, and booze. Helms played up his Southern Baptism for all it was worth, and did pretty well among heavily rural Christian voters.
Despite a powerful third party running that year, voter turnout was much lower then before. Liberals were skeptical about Unruh. In spite of never being convicted of any kind of crime, many thought he was either corrupt or tolerated corruption as Governor. Far-right and disenchanted conservative voters didn't like Cohn's centrist run, obviously aiming toward being elected with the help of liberals, and thus they flocked to Helms/Mecham or skipped the Presidential election.
Even thought they won multiple states in multiple regions of the US, and despite having a pretty solid Congressional block, they were already facing two major dilemmas: ideological and leadership choices. The New York Conservative Party, in a sense the original one, saw the National Conservatives as just Southern Democrats and the odd Westerner. A large majority of their Senators were Southerners, over half of their Representatives were from the south, and most of their members had recently defected from the Democrats or more rarely the Republicans. The leading group of the NYConservatives didn't quite like their methodology of attacking both Democrats and Republicans, and refusing to work with thek to achieve conservative goals. That more then anything cemented their differences.
The divide was so pronounced between the two Conservative Parties, that the New York Conservative Party endorsed President Cohn, and in fact managed to get the National Conservatives to have to run on another party name in New York for being too similar to theirs. The National Conservatives ran in New York under the National Party banner, cementing a final break between the two.
True, but it's Evan Mecham, though. And the ticket was infighting a lot.
Would they go for the California liberal or the homojew New Yorker running to the center?
Mecham was very popular with Mormons, Birchers, and old people. Plus they don't need a majority, just a plurality.
The infighting was mostly Helms bashing him after they lost.
Prepare yourselves, for four more years...of President Cohn *Scare Chord*
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The down ballot elections will be posted tomorrow.
Here I though Unruh had a chance, but I knew he was fucked once he stooped to Jesse Helms' level in the debates and Roy "I Look Like I Have Literal Skeletons In My Closet" Cohn came across as reasonable in comparison.
Well, at least we know Cohn is leaving by 1989 (since he finished pretty much all of MacBride's second term), although I'm frightened to think just who you two will come up with to replace him.
Also, Cohn's picture in the infobox tho.
Well, at least we know Cohn is leaving by 1989 (since he finished pretty much all of MacBride's second term), although I'm frightened to think just who you two will come up with to replace him.
Also, Cohn's picture in the infobox tho.
Orville_third
Banned
I do think Meacham might have attacked Black based on her past- though that would likely have backfired big time.
And Cohn might have picked something up...
And Cohn might have picked something up...
It seems to be a running gag of people thinking they can beat Cohn but utterly failing.
"Cohn for Senator? This'll be ea-" "Nope"
"Cohn for Vice-President ? This'll be a cin-" "Nope"
"Cohn for President? Third times the cha-" "Not this time it isnt."
I concluded there are no good Cohn pictures. He must have been cursed by fairies or something to be so ugly.
That's what you get for massively underestimating your opponents.
Black is the most popular member of Cohn's administration, attacking her would play bad with most Americans and fail to file up any significant base they could appeal to. Really, who could attack Shirley Temple and get away with it?
She's so popular she's even being talked up for the nominee in 1988.
Great Timeline.
I'm surprised that Cohn won another term but so far his performance seems to warrant another.
Since the GOP still relies on the Northeast, I'd assume the Rockefeller Republicans/Eastern Establishment are still relevant here. Who replaced Rockefeller as the National Leader of them though? As most of them were dying off OTL, it will be interesting to see the younger generation of Rockefeller type Republican politicians ITTL.
I'm surprised that Cohn won another term but so far his performance seems to warrant another.
Since the GOP still relies on the Northeast, I'd assume the Rockefeller Republicans/Eastern Establishment are still relevant here. Who replaced Rockefeller as the National Leader of them though? As most of them were dying off OTL, it will be interesting to see the younger generation of Rockefeller type Republican politicians ITTL.