President Tilden

The Vulture

Banned
I'd have thought this would be an AH favorite, given how close the 1876 election was.

Anyways, the 1876 election was one of the closest in US history. Suppose Louisiana goes Democratic and tips the balance. What would happen if we get President Samuel Tilden, rather than Hayes?
 

maverick

Banned
I'd like to think that he'd deal with the Great Railroad Strike of 1877 differently than Hayes, but I don't know how insidious was the anti-labor thinking during the Gilded Age, so I cant' be sure if Tilden wouldn't have crush them anyways.

Internationally, there's the chance that he is called as an arbiter for the Argentine-Paraguay post-War of the Triple Alliance border negotiations and grants the Gran Chaco to Argentina! :D:p
 
Re: maverick's post, a tiny border-hamlet called Presidente Tilden, Argentina as opposed to Presidente Hayes, Paraguay. :D

As for America, I would think he would handle the Railway Strike, too, but I can't say how.

Interestingly enough, the Republicans don't have to make that compromise in favor of Redeemer governments in the South, nor do they have to promise to support a Southern transcontinental railroad; either has interesting social or political effects.
 
Didn't Tilden's health essentially break down after 1877? If so that's probably going to have an impact on his Presidency.
 

maverick

Banned
If Tilden's health is that bad, there's two possibilities:

A. He's forced to retire or he dies in office, meaning that Hendricks becomes President in 1877 or 1878; Hendricks wouldn't seek reelection in 1880;

B. Tilden is forced to delegate on Hendricks, but he serves his term and does not seek reelection in 1880;


Either way, we can speculate about a Democratic administration between 1877 and 1881.
 
The aftereffects will be interesting to say the least. It would work to make the face of the democratic party northern, urban, and Bourbon much earlier. Somehow I'd like to think he wouldn't end Reconstruction, especially in the same manner in which Hayes did though. However politically, I fear such an act would be inevitable. At the very least he should prove to be less corrupt than what Hayes was in OTL.
 
Oh, man, I didn't even think about Reconstruction or the Klan.


Well, by 1877 it was moribund anyway, with Radicals hanging on by their fingernails in SC and LA, but everything else Redeemed.

Theoretically, since a Democratic President had withdrawn the troops, a Republican one might consider sending them back, but even if he did the effect would probably be minimal. "Redemption", once achieved in any state, was never reversed, and northern voters were bored stiff with the issue.
 
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