The End of Freedom: The Cost of the Great Depression.

Awesome! Glad to see you joined over here, though the readers are tougher to impress over here, though it's also easier to get comments.
 

DISSIDENT

Banned
Has echoes of the Turtledove story "Joe Steele" and Murray even kind of looks like Josef Stalin, but your TL is more plausible than Stalin immigrating and becoming president during the Depression.
 
Awesome! Glad to see you joined over here, though the readers are tougher to impress over here, though it's also easier to get comments.

Yeah I noticed that.
I guess I should consider it a good thing (keeps me on my toes with details).
That's what I didn't like about Atlas: sometimes you could be writing shit and nobody will tell you because they're too nice.

GPORTER wouldn't last five minutes over here.
 
Yeah I noticed that.
I guess I should consider it a good thing (keeps me on my toes with details).
That's what I didn't like about Atlas: sometimes you could be writing shit and nobody will tell you because they're too nice.

GPORTER wouldn't last five minutes over here.

Oh yeah, Gporter would be torn to shreds, if his type of writing would even somehow fit in over here. Most of the time, he'll just do an election night timeline, and heck, election night will take up the majority of pages in some of his shorter (and longer) things.
 
OMecha

Interesting. I know there have been a few TLs with America going seriously off the rails during the depression but never seen this character before. Distinctly nasty from his Wiki description but has the dangerous ability to 'get things done' when people are desperate.

How is he getting a lot of those measures through Congress and past the Supreme Court? I know FDR had a lot of problems with those and think it would be even worse for Murray - both because of his openly anti corporatist stance and because he has alienated a lot of the house democrats. Can't see him being able to call up the guard to basically breach the constitution.

One other thing with a dictatorial/autocratic system in the US is that with the very long borders and moderate climate in many areas escaping should be a lot easier than in the USSR. Hence once people see the way things are going you could see a flight of many to Canada and Mexico. Which Murray might not object to as long as their gone. If he has expansionist designs things could get very bad. Not to mention how this interacts with events in Europe and Asia.

Anyway, welcome to the board.

Steve
 
OMecha

Interesting. I know there have been a few TLs with America going seriously off the rails during the depression but never seen this character before. Distinctly nasty from his Wiki description but has the dangerous ability to 'get things done' when people are desperate.

How is he getting a lot of those measures through Congress and past the Supreme Court? I know FDR had a lot of problems with those and think it would be even worse for Murray - both because of his openly anti corporatist stance and because he has alienated a lot of the house democrats. Can't see him being able to call up the guard to basically breach the constitution.

One other thing with a dictatorial/autocratic system in the US is that with the very long borders and moderate climate in many areas escaping should be a lot easier than in the USSR. Hence once people see the way things are going you could see a flight of many to Canada and Mexico. Which Murray might not object to as long as their gone. If he has expansionist designs things could get very bad. Not to mention how this interacts with events in Europe and Asia.

Anyway, welcome to the board.

Steve

Interesting.
I think I ought to make a new entry in relation to Congress.
As for emigration, very interesting. I never thought of that (seriously).
 

J.D.Ward

Donor
What is this building, and when was it built?

TowersOutside.jpg

Meeting hall where the National Council for Depression Relief took place.

As a matter of interest, what is this building, and when was it built in OTL?
The architecture looks noticeably more recent than 1931.
 
My only quibble so far is that it would be more plausible for Garner not to give at the convention, FDR to pick Alfalfa Bill, and for Zangara to shoot FDR. Bill can easily use the shock of the assassination to further his agenda.
Certainly one of the more original TLs on this site. Subscribed. :cool:
 
As a matter of interest, what is this building, and when was it built in OTL?
The architecture looks noticeably more recent than 1931.

It probably wasn't. But it's the closest building I could find to the meeting place description.

Sorry for the lack of updates for right now. I'm kind of busy (looking for a job mostly).
 
My only quibble so far is that it would be more plausible for Garner not to give at the convention, FDR to pick Alfalfa Bill, and for Zangara to shoot FDR. Bill can easily use the shock of the assassination to further his agenda.
Certainly one of the more original TLs on this site. Subscribed. :cool:

I assumed that this is how it was going to happen. Probably would have been more reasonable if it did.
 
Damn. I like this. I just had a look at the OTL 1932 election of wikipedia and noticed how similar the results seemed to have been.

This is just wow.
 
Just realized I forgot this little nugget of info:

During the general campaign Alfred Smith would shock the American public by endorsing President Herbert Hoover (who he ran against in 1928) over Oklahoma Governor William H. Murray who he argued would be “the death of everything this nation has come to represent.”

MU014A.jpg

I don't know much about Smith, but wouldn't it make more sense as far as he's concerned, to run as an independent than support Hoover? Like you say, he ran against him 4 years previously and he could run on an "I told you so" message, while at the same time campaigning against Murray.
Of course this might split the democratic voat (which would defeat the whole point of the TL), though given how wildly unpopular Hoover was, it wouldn't necesarily.
Just wondering what Smith's reason was for not running himself really.
Aside from that though, I'm enjoying this TL a great deal and I'm looking forward to Murray's second term, which I sense will be much more dystopic than his first.
 
My only quibble so far is that it would be more plausible for Garner not to give at the convention, FDR to pick Alfalfa Bill, and for Zangara to shoot FDR. Bill can easily use the shock of the assassination to further his agenda.
Certainly one of the more original TLs on this site. Subscribed. :cool:

Not to give FDR too much credit here but I always assumed he would've been uncomfortable with a Vice President Alfalfa Bill. Sure, FDR kept quiet about anti-lynching laws during his presidency but I doubt he would've been able to stomach having a man as racist as Murray as the Vice President. I know it's the 1930's and all but there's just something about FDR that tells me he would've been opposed to Murray.
 
Not to give FDR too much credit here but I always assumed he would've been uncomfortable with a Vice President Alfalfa Bill. Sure, FDR kept quiet about anti-lynching laws during his presidency but I doubt he would've been able to stomach having a man as racist as Murray as the Vice President. I know it's the 1930's and all but there's just something about FDR that tells me he would've been opposed to Murray.
That's true, but I also don't think Alfalfa Bill can beat FDR for the nomination.
Perhaps FDR loses in 1928, and Albert Ritchie or whoever the nominee is picks Bill as his running mate?
 
That's true, but I also don't think Alfalfa Bill can beat FDR for the nomination.
Perhaps FDR loses in 1928, and Albert Ritchie or whoever the nominee is picks Bill as his running mate?

Okay, major rewrite. (disregard messages)
Taking this TL in a WHOLE different direction than the Atlas edition.
 
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