General Mung Beans
Banned
If Lincoln didn't replace Hamlin with Johnson for the VP slot in 1864 and Lincoln was still assassinated what would Hamlin's presidency be like?
Basically He would be a [Northern] Congressional Puppet.
Except Whe don't know his views of what to do with the Free Slaves
He would revoke Lincoln's pronouncements that the Rebellion was over in Various States.
He would not declare It over in Texas like Johnson did.
There would be Harsher Military Government in the Southern States after Congress [illegally, without quorum] dissolves the State Governments for not ratifying the 14th Amendment.
He would Support the Radical Re-Constructionists , as they imposed the unratified 14th amendment, on the US.
The Civil Rights Bills may have more enforcement provisions.
Basically it makes uber KKK and a second civil war in a generation or so
In OTL the Souther governments were allowed to reform under an all white voting system and they showed a scary amount of sympathy for the recent treason and very little for former slaves.
Now had events been different and it had become clear that the North was going to insist on Civil rigths I suspect that the defeated and shocked South would not have resisted so much in the summer of 1865.
Of course for Hamlin to have ensured a successful reconstruction himself he would either have had to change the game in the early years, possible or been relected more often than FDR, not so much
Actually, I think it could destroy the KKK (Grant did it militarily) and maintain the gains made in Reconstruction, which isn't as bad as some apologists will tell you. Reconstruction failed because the North lost interest, not because it was inherently flawed; the Radicals weren't evil demons like some will have you believe.