The American System: A Henry Clay TL
- Thread starter TheHedgehog
- Start date
ITT the Dems became the fiscal conservative small goverment party, while the Whigs became the big goverment populist party
The Democrats were the fiscal conservative small government party during the 19th century too; that never got them to win Vermont. As long as the Whigs are still the party of moralist WASPs, they shouldn't have trouble winning the Yankiest of Yankee states.
Hah, I'm tempted, but I don't think Congress would let him, but maybe the Interior department builds a new state capital for Alaska named Cameron or something.
Thanks!
Alas, we have another decade or so of Cameron.
Just the electrical grid.
Vermont voted Whig in every election up until 1920, when they flipped to the more conservative Democrats because John Fountain, the Whig nominee, was a western populist who alienated the WASP Vermont elite. While the Democrats were certainly too friendly to the Catholics for many in VT, the Whigs' shift towards heavy spending, heavy taxes, and populist appeals to the urban working class led to the state flipping to a reliable Democratic state.
so he also stops after 12 years instead of pushing to 16? (well, maybe also isn't the right word given the fact FDR died instead of resigning or something)
Great update! Will be interesting to see how the Democrats recover from this, they seem to be in a considerably worse state than the GOP in OTL 1936. Cameron's share of the vote is the second highest of any president in a contested election. Thomas Jefferson just barely beat him out, winning 72.8% of the vote against Charles Pinckney in 1804.
Not quite...
Thanks! The Democrats will take a few election cycles to fully recover, but the rump northern faction of the party remains competitive, and now has total control over the party for the next few years.
IMO this is not feasible if 15% inflation rate you mentioned above happened right within Cameron's presidencies.
OTOH, it is not possible to achieve a 15% inflation rate in a Great Depression-like deflationary environment within one or two presidencies. High inflation would have occurred but it should be decades later IMO.
I believe the cited 15% inflation rate was in a modern context, showing how the Peronist policies of Cameron sort of turned the US into irl Argentina.
Do we have an idea yet of the exchange rate between an OTL USD and a TAS USD?
Reagan could only dream of these numbers haha
Yeah the 15% is TTL's 2023, but there will be a big inflation spike during Cameron's second era.
1 OTL USD is equal to maybe 20 or so TTL USD, about the exchange rate between USD and Mexican pesos.
TTL 1 USD is about 0.27 Argentine pesos, with the British pound being one of the main global currencies TTL.
This seems to indicate that the US is considerably less wealthy than otl, or at least the dollar is a lot weaker. How do the gdps compare tho?
TTL's GDP is probably somewere around 16-18 trillion OTL dollars, so around what the EU's GDP is. Argentina's is around 8-9 trillion
The dollar is indeed weaker and the US is somewhat poorer owing to higher prices from trade barriers and persistently high inflation. It's still considerably better off than OTL Argentina just due to the sheer size and potential of the US economy, even with all of the mismanagement.
103. Such Great Heights
103. Such Great Heights
“Today at noon, American president Montgomery Berryhill resigned from office amid both a steep recession and an embezzlement scandal that has led to the resignation of half of his cabinet in the face of impeachment proceedings. The now-former President had also attempted to declare martial law amid violent unrest in the capital due to a proposed austerity budget that would have slashed social spending to combat a ballooning national debt and reduce a record-high inflation rate of 60%.
In other news, Argentina announced increased troop commitments to combat the Peruvian Los Gusanos [1] drug cartel, which has attempted to take control of lithium mines in northern Chile. Cartel violence has begun spilling over into Argentina more frequently than in past decades, and President Scalia, who was elected on promises to secure the border, has vowed “swift and unflinching” reprisals. Peru, long opposed to Argentine involvement within their borders, condemned the military operation as “illegal under all international conventions,” while Chile welcomed the intervention.”
-From WORLD HEADLINES, BBC, 3rd September, 2003
“The early 20th century was a time of firsts: the first automobile, the first airplane, the first radios and modern electronics. By 1941, aviation in particular had greatly advanced, with transcontinental airlines and airmail emerging. However, transatlantic flights were hampered by the limited range of the aircraft, which were forced to stop for fuel in Newfoundland and Ireland before continuing on to continental Europe or America. A true non-stop flight had never been successfully attempted, let alone a solo one [2]. In 1940, the Pennsylvania Advocate and Le Figaro jointly offered a $60,000 prize for the first pilot to make such a flight between New York and Paris, in either direction. Dozens of pilots across the United States and Europe tried their luck, with the American pilot Steven Vaughn disappearing just east of Newfoundland, and many others turning back due to low fuel or poor weather.
Nathan Sanders was the son of wealthy Arkansan landowners and the descendant of slave traders. From an early age, he was fascinated with flight and purchased a kit aircraft in 1931, teaching himself to fly on his family’s estate. To the disappointment of his parents, who expected him to either take over the plantation or find some college-educated profession, he began working as a commercial pilot for the Internal Air Service, the first transcontinental airline in the United States. However, he aspired to do more and make a name for himself as one of the famous record-breaking pilots of that generation. In 1939, he entered into a competition for a solo non-stop flight from Richmond to Buenos Aires and successfully completed the trip but was narrowly beaten to the prize by another pilot, Evan Ford, who landed in Buenos Aires just half an hour earlier. Still determined, Sanders leapt at the opportunity presented by the transatlantic challenge.
Having quit his job at IAS, Sanders entered the contest with the support of his family and other wealthy Arkansas families who hoped to give their state some good press, and he worked with aviation engineers at Halsey Aircraft to design a twin-engine, single-seat airplane with state-of-the-art fuel efficiency and made of the lightest alloys at the time. Two experimental nine radial engines were used, manufactured by the Tredegar company. They were supplied at cost, mainly because they had not been properly tested on long-range flights, but Sanders was convinced that the design would be the most efficient. He and his team only had time for a single test flight of the airplane, named the Delta Flyer after Sanders’ native Arkansas delta, before he was scheduled to depart with it from Price Field on Long Island.
…
Sanders landed in Paris’s Cavaignac Field almost forty hours after taking off from New York. He had been asked by the Mayor of Paris to circle the Figaro Tower, a recently completed high-rise on the outskirts of Paris [3], but did not as he was exhausted and visibility was poor. As a result, the organizers of the contest thought that he had crashed somewhere and were surprised but relieved when the Delta Flyer landed at the airfield at 12:17am on Monday, August 17th. He was greeted by a crowd of some 100,000 spectators, who carried him on their shoulders from the aircraft to a waiting automobile. The crowd camped outside his hotel room while he slept, and then greeted him as a hero when he emerged that afternoon. He was presented with the Legion d'honneur by French president Chappelle and spent the rest of the day meeting with American, French, and foreign diplomats and civic leaders. He then toured through Prussia and Sweden-Norway before landing in London, where an American cruiser was waiting to ferry him and the Flyer back to the United States.
His flight made him an international celebrity, and he received medals and other honors from over a dozen countries, as well as gifts of wines and a luxury sportscar from wealthy admirers. President Cameron invited him to the Executive Mansion, where he presented the pilot with the Medal of Honor, authorized to be awarded to a civilian by a special act of Congress. After the initial media frenzy died down by the end of the year, Sanders published a memoir, titled In the Clouds, and embarked on a speaking tour across the United States and parts of Latin America. His visit to Buenos Aires in August 1942, at a time when American-Argentine tensions were running high, drew large, adoring crowds and he had a friendly meeting with President Roberto Pinelli. As arguably the most famous American at the time, Sanders quickly attracted the attention of political operatives from both parties. In 1942, he turned down entreaties from both the Whigs and Democrats to run for governor of Arkansas, instead spending his time flying around the country and consulting IAS on opening a transatlantic air route.
Through speaking engagements and airline investments, Sanders was a millionaire several times over within two years. His work opening an airfield in Little Rock earned him the respect of the state’s business community, and efforts to recruit him for elected office intensified. He continued to refuse these offers, but his decision to endorse the Democratic incumbent, Alexander Adams, for Senate in 1944 only increased the pressure, this time from Democrats who saw him as the perfect opponent against Cameron. Privately, Sanders was reluctant to run because he feared that his potential backers would see him as a pawn in their schemes, and he did not want to be reliant on the good will of the Arkansas political establishment. In his time flying and touring the country, he had evolved in some ways from his old south upbringing. While certainly still prejudiced against blacks, including maintaining racially-segregated flights on Southern Airways as its CEO, his experiences in the north soured him on the racial repression practiced by politicians across the south. Still, the begging began to get to him – maybe he did have a future in politics after all?”
-From THE AVIATOR by Cornelius Shriver, published 2019
“As his public works programs reinvigorated the economy, Cameron turned his attention towards a more local matter. The United States capitol building was in a state of disrepair, with an 1850 expansion canceled because of congressional infighting and a proposed reconstruction of the dome scrapped due to the Civil War. By 1940, it was so cramped because of the House’s expansion that congressmen had to cast their votes in blocks, because the chamber could not fit all of them inside at the same time. There had been proposals to expand the capitol during the 1920s, but the fiscal conservatism of the Delaney and Cabell administrations meant that these plans were quietly abandoned. Now, Cameron decided that it was time to rebuild the United States capitol both to accommodate the expanded congress and create a building that was a proper display of American greatness.
Congress, eager for a larger, more spacious home, unanimously passed legislation funding the project and establishing a nationwide contest to select a design. Many proposals were received from renowned architects the world over, such as a design incorporating a high-rise office tower with a glass façade, and one in which the roof of the main chamber was held up by cables suspended from enormous arches. However, the panel of judges appointed by Congress steered the discussion towards the more ornate designs. Modern classicism was all the rage among architects and clients at the time, and the judges were also victims of the craze. Ultimately, they selected the design of Walter Newman, who up until the contest had mostly designed furniture and ceramics. Newman proposed a vast, ornate rotunda in the center for visitors, state functions, and joint sessions of congress, with two domed wings for the House and Senate [4]. He also included plans for murals and statues to decorate the main hallways.
While some judges balked at the cost of the endeavor, Cameron personally intervened to ensure it was selected. He saw the proposed Congressional Palace as the centerpiece for a redevelopment of the National Mall, including a Supreme Court building, new congressional offices, and new buildings for the main cabinet departments. Despite the outcry at the expense of the undertaking, Cameron secured additional funding from Congress to have Newman and other selected architects reconstruct much of central Washington. He described it in his radio addresses as “building a capital befitting the greatness and might of our Republic,” and touted the jobs that would be created during the construction. What went unsaid was that many of the contracts awarded for the construction of the new capitol complex went to friends of Cameron and other important Whig officials. Indeed, the contract for the planned Henry Clay Executive Building was awarded to the brand-new construction firm owned by a cousin and former legal partner of the Architect of the Capitol, himself a longtime Whig donor and campaign advisor.
Many Democrats criticized the redevelopment and, while Cameron ultimately won out and the project went ahead as planned, it was turned into a partisan circus that benefitted, for once, the fiscally minded Democrats. Many Americans saw the project as lavish and unnecessary while many parts of the country were still in dire need of federal investment. Public opinion has come around in recent years as memories of the expenses have faded and the capitol complex has become a popular destination for tourists, both domestic and international.”
-From THE LONG TWENTIETH CENTURY: AMERICA 1940-2003 by Greg Carey, published 2009
[1] “The Worms”
[2] The Great War involved less air combat and sparked less advances in aviation overall, so while the scientific curiosity and public fascination with aerial stunts is still there, the technology takes longer to evolve.
[3] Paris never underwent Haussmanization TTL, so the city center is more medieval while the outskirts are very dense and modern.
[4] Think an even larger version of Mexico’s planned Federal Legislative Palace.
“Today at noon, American president Montgomery Berryhill resigned from office amid both a steep recession and an embezzlement scandal that has led to the resignation of half of his cabinet in the face of impeachment proceedings. The now-former President had also attempted to declare martial law amid violent unrest in the capital due to a proposed austerity budget that would have slashed social spending to combat a ballooning national debt and reduce a record-high inflation rate of 60%.
In other news, Argentina announced increased troop commitments to combat the Peruvian Los Gusanos [1] drug cartel, which has attempted to take control of lithium mines in northern Chile. Cartel violence has begun spilling over into Argentina more frequently than in past decades, and President Scalia, who was elected on promises to secure the border, has vowed “swift and unflinching” reprisals. Peru, long opposed to Argentine involvement within their borders, condemned the military operation as “illegal under all international conventions,” while Chile welcomed the intervention.”
-From WORLD HEADLINES, BBC, 3rd September, 2003
“The early 20th century was a time of firsts: the first automobile, the first airplane, the first radios and modern electronics. By 1941, aviation in particular had greatly advanced, with transcontinental airlines and airmail emerging. However, transatlantic flights were hampered by the limited range of the aircraft, which were forced to stop for fuel in Newfoundland and Ireland before continuing on to continental Europe or America. A true non-stop flight had never been successfully attempted, let alone a solo one [2]. In 1940, the Pennsylvania Advocate and Le Figaro jointly offered a $60,000 prize for the first pilot to make such a flight between New York and Paris, in either direction. Dozens of pilots across the United States and Europe tried their luck, with the American pilot Steven Vaughn disappearing just east of Newfoundland, and many others turning back due to low fuel or poor weather.
Nathan Sanders was the son of wealthy Arkansan landowners and the descendant of slave traders. From an early age, he was fascinated with flight and purchased a kit aircraft in 1931, teaching himself to fly on his family’s estate. To the disappointment of his parents, who expected him to either take over the plantation or find some college-educated profession, he began working as a commercial pilot for the Internal Air Service, the first transcontinental airline in the United States. However, he aspired to do more and make a name for himself as one of the famous record-breaking pilots of that generation. In 1939, he entered into a competition for a solo non-stop flight from Richmond to Buenos Aires and successfully completed the trip but was narrowly beaten to the prize by another pilot, Evan Ford, who landed in Buenos Aires just half an hour earlier. Still determined, Sanders leapt at the opportunity presented by the transatlantic challenge.
Having quit his job at IAS, Sanders entered the contest with the support of his family and other wealthy Arkansas families who hoped to give their state some good press, and he worked with aviation engineers at Halsey Aircraft to design a twin-engine, single-seat airplane with state-of-the-art fuel efficiency and made of the lightest alloys at the time. Two experimental nine radial engines were used, manufactured by the Tredegar company. They were supplied at cost, mainly because they had not been properly tested on long-range flights, but Sanders was convinced that the design would be the most efficient. He and his team only had time for a single test flight of the airplane, named the Delta Flyer after Sanders’ native Arkansas delta, before he was scheduled to depart with it from Price Field on Long Island.
…
Sanders landed in Paris’s Cavaignac Field almost forty hours after taking off from New York. He had been asked by the Mayor of Paris to circle the Figaro Tower, a recently completed high-rise on the outskirts of Paris [3], but did not as he was exhausted and visibility was poor. As a result, the organizers of the contest thought that he had crashed somewhere and were surprised but relieved when the Delta Flyer landed at the airfield at 12:17am on Monday, August 17th. He was greeted by a crowd of some 100,000 spectators, who carried him on their shoulders from the aircraft to a waiting automobile. The crowd camped outside his hotel room while he slept, and then greeted him as a hero when he emerged that afternoon. He was presented with the Legion d'honneur by French president Chappelle and spent the rest of the day meeting with American, French, and foreign diplomats and civic leaders. He then toured through Prussia and Sweden-Norway before landing in London, where an American cruiser was waiting to ferry him and the Flyer back to the United States.
His flight made him an international celebrity, and he received medals and other honors from over a dozen countries, as well as gifts of wines and a luxury sportscar from wealthy admirers. President Cameron invited him to the Executive Mansion, where he presented the pilot with the Medal of Honor, authorized to be awarded to a civilian by a special act of Congress. After the initial media frenzy died down by the end of the year, Sanders published a memoir, titled In the Clouds, and embarked on a speaking tour across the United States and parts of Latin America. His visit to Buenos Aires in August 1942, at a time when American-Argentine tensions were running high, drew large, adoring crowds and he had a friendly meeting with President Roberto Pinelli. As arguably the most famous American at the time, Sanders quickly attracted the attention of political operatives from both parties. In 1942, he turned down entreaties from both the Whigs and Democrats to run for governor of Arkansas, instead spending his time flying around the country and consulting IAS on opening a transatlantic air route.
Through speaking engagements and airline investments, Sanders was a millionaire several times over within two years. His work opening an airfield in Little Rock earned him the respect of the state’s business community, and efforts to recruit him for elected office intensified. He continued to refuse these offers, but his decision to endorse the Democratic incumbent, Alexander Adams, for Senate in 1944 only increased the pressure, this time from Democrats who saw him as the perfect opponent against Cameron. Privately, Sanders was reluctant to run because he feared that his potential backers would see him as a pawn in their schemes, and he did not want to be reliant on the good will of the Arkansas political establishment. In his time flying and touring the country, he had evolved in some ways from his old south upbringing. While certainly still prejudiced against blacks, including maintaining racially-segregated flights on Southern Airways as its CEO, his experiences in the north soured him on the racial repression practiced by politicians across the south. Still, the begging began to get to him – maybe he did have a future in politics after all?”
-From THE AVIATOR by Cornelius Shriver, published 2019
“As his public works programs reinvigorated the economy, Cameron turned his attention towards a more local matter. The United States capitol building was in a state of disrepair, with an 1850 expansion canceled because of congressional infighting and a proposed reconstruction of the dome scrapped due to the Civil War. By 1940, it was so cramped because of the House’s expansion that congressmen had to cast their votes in blocks, because the chamber could not fit all of them inside at the same time. There had been proposals to expand the capitol during the 1920s, but the fiscal conservatism of the Delaney and Cabell administrations meant that these plans were quietly abandoned. Now, Cameron decided that it was time to rebuild the United States capitol both to accommodate the expanded congress and create a building that was a proper display of American greatness.
Congress, eager for a larger, more spacious home, unanimously passed legislation funding the project and establishing a nationwide contest to select a design. Many proposals were received from renowned architects the world over, such as a design incorporating a high-rise office tower with a glass façade, and one in which the roof of the main chamber was held up by cables suspended from enormous arches. However, the panel of judges appointed by Congress steered the discussion towards the more ornate designs. Modern classicism was all the rage among architects and clients at the time, and the judges were also victims of the craze. Ultimately, they selected the design of Walter Newman, who up until the contest had mostly designed furniture and ceramics. Newman proposed a vast, ornate rotunda in the center for visitors, state functions, and joint sessions of congress, with two domed wings for the House and Senate [4]. He also included plans for murals and statues to decorate the main hallways.
While some judges balked at the cost of the endeavor, Cameron personally intervened to ensure it was selected. He saw the proposed Congressional Palace as the centerpiece for a redevelopment of the National Mall, including a Supreme Court building, new congressional offices, and new buildings for the main cabinet departments. Despite the outcry at the expense of the undertaking, Cameron secured additional funding from Congress to have Newman and other selected architects reconstruct much of central Washington. He described it in his radio addresses as “building a capital befitting the greatness and might of our Republic,” and touted the jobs that would be created during the construction. What went unsaid was that many of the contracts awarded for the construction of the new capitol complex went to friends of Cameron and other important Whig officials. Indeed, the contract for the planned Henry Clay Executive Building was awarded to the brand-new construction firm owned by a cousin and former legal partner of the Architect of the Capitol, himself a longtime Whig donor and campaign advisor.
Many Democrats criticized the redevelopment and, while Cameron ultimately won out and the project went ahead as planned, it was turned into a partisan circus that benefitted, for once, the fiscally minded Democrats. Many Americans saw the project as lavish and unnecessary while many parts of the country were still in dire need of federal investment. Public opinion has come around in recent years as memories of the expenses have faded and the capitol complex has become a popular destination for tourists, both domestic and international.”
-From THE LONG TWENTIETH CENTURY: AMERICA 1940-2003 by Greg Carey, published 2009
[1] “The Worms”
[2] The Great War involved less air combat and sparked less advances in aviation overall, so while the scientific curiosity and public fascination with aerial stunts is still there, the technology takes longer to evolve.
[3] Paris never underwent Haussmanization TTL, so the city center is more medieval while the outskirts are very dense and modern.
[4] Think an even larger version of Mexico’s planned Federal Legislative Palace.
i don't recall, is Berryhill the controversial 2024 whig? either way, this reeks of a borderline coup attempt i doubt that Berryhill will get too far before he's arrested. and good luck to whoever ran him in the next race
That's Thaddeus Marshall, Berryhill is a Democrat, first elected in 2000, who presided over a terrible economic and fiscal crisis. The martial law was because there was violent unrest in D.C., not any attempt to seize power, but it made Whigs very angry and they basically forced him to resign.
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