"In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of." Confucius
/////
Admiral Horthy, Head of a Navy whose might was only rivaled by Bolivia's
In November 1919, amongst the chaos of the collapse of the centuries old Hapsburg monarchy, Emperor Charles I of Austria-Hungary, signed a document "removing himself from public affairs", which was carefully crafted to avoid being an abdication. Soon afterwords Austria-Hungary had ceased to exist. Austria had transferred into a semi-stable, semi-democratic state. Hungary however was different.
After briefly flirting with Communism and getting dragged into a disastrous war with Romania Hungary ended up becoming a Kingdom again. However no one wanted Charles returning and so a regency was installed under the last Austro-Hungarian Admiral, Miklós Horthy in 1920. This excited Charles because a Kingdom meant he got a crown to wear and Horthy was a monarchist. In addition the (very weak) Hungarian parliament was dominated by monarchist parties, never mind that one of the major ones wanted a different dynasty. Charles thought the time was right to regain the throne of Hungary. So he showed up unannounced in Horthy's house on March 21st 1921 and demanded he be reinstated as King so that he could make Hungary great again. Horthy was torn, on one hand he did support the monarchy on the other hand stood the Little Entente. The Little Entente was a recently formed military alliance between Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and Romania which had been formed with two purposes 1) Keep the Hapsburgs off the thrones of Europe and 2) Keep Hungary from getting too powerful. Concerns over the Little Entente forced Horthy to tell Charles that the time was not right and send the would be king on his way. But Charles was not done yet. Collecting his supporters in Switzerland he returned to Hungary, in the city of Sopron, declared himself "King of Austria and King of Bohemia" and began organizing Legitimists for a March on Budapest. Despite the Great Powers condemning him and the Little Entente threatening an invasion Charles pressed on. He marched at a snail's pace, with full royal pomp, giving Horthy some time to regroup. Still Charles was at the gates of Budapest by the 21st of October. The next[1] day the first shots of the Hungarian Civil War were fired as the Legitimists fired on Budapest and began to attack the Regentists (a term for Horthy's supporters, even if many of the defenders were Budapest Republicans). The defense was weak and soon Horthy's government was retreating beyond the Danube. Charles's march into Budapest was too much for the Little Entente and on October 23rd Czechoslovakia mobilized, followed by Romania and Yugoslavia.
At the Battle of the Galga River on October 26th Horthy's forces stopped the overstretched royalists. That turned out to be all it needed, as by early November Little Entente forces poured into Hungary. The Czechoslovak Army was eager to put down the self-proclaimed "King of Bohemia", or at least the Czech part was. For the 3rd time in then 5 years The Romanian Army entered Hungary. The Yugoslavian contingent was smaller but still applied pressure from the south. By November 10 Czechoslovakia was in Budapest and the Romanians were on the Tisza. Charles fled to Switzerland in hiding and ended up being exiled to some Atlantic speck of land.
In Hungary Horthy was thankful to the Little Entente for helping him, but soon found they had other plans. Despite weak protests from a couple great powers the Little Entente felt that leaving a throne for anyone was too big an opportunity for the Hapsburgs. Instead they had Social Democrat Károly Peyer established as head of the Republic of Hungary. So much for the Regency.
Horthy ended up forming his own political party, the Party of National Unity (NEP), which would go on to dominate national politics post-1922 with Horthy as Prime Minister and later President. However Hungary remained isolated with the ever watchful Little Entente hovering over them.
/////
Pershing's shmexy official portrait.
After the election Pershing met with President Wilson in the White House. While many knew by this point that Wilson was somewhat ill Pershing was still shocked by how pale and thin Wilson was, as well as how confused the President seemed. After Wilson was half carried off to bed Secretary Lansing entered the room and explained the situation to the President-Elect. After hearing about Lansing's shadow presidency Pershing wrote that "to be so close to the light so many times, yet never to touch it. I cannot imagine the feeling Mr. Lansing had." Pershing had never despised his opponent and now came to respect him greatly. In his final months in the White House Pershing would commission a portrait of Lansing and have it hung near one of Andrew Jackson.
As Pershing prepared for the inauguration he began to draft his cabinet. Pershing had no political experience and only selected a few of the positioned personally, party bosses selected the rest, a sure way to prevent poor decision making[2].
President: John Pershing
Vice President: Calvin Coolidge
Secretary of State: Charles Evans Hughes
Secretary of the Treasury: Andrew Mellon
Secretary of War: Leonard Wood
Attorney General: Thomas Sterling
Postmaster General: Will Hays
Secretary of the Navy: Edwin Denby
Secretary of the Interior: Lawrence Phipps
Secretary of Agriculture: Charles Scott
Secretary of Commerce: Ovington Wellar
Secretary of Labor: James Davis
With huge Republican landslides in both the house and the Senate his appointments sped through.
Secretary of State Hughes soon negotiated treaties with the losing powers of the Great War that did not include references to any League of Nations concept. Pershing was no isolationist, and while American diplomats in Geneva refused to actually attend meetings, the Pershing Administration kept a close eye on the League's inner workings.
Pershing, obviously a fan of the military, was quick to shit down any talk of navel disarmament, though he could not stop the slow decay of the army from its wartime glory.
The first major piece of legislation to reach Pershing's desk was the one he cared most strongly for. The Sedition Act of 1921 tasked the Attorney General with "preserving American liberty". It allowed the Postal Service to cease any sort of delivery for a publication advocating political revolution. Such publications could be banned if their advocations could be proved to be causing someone to do anything against the nation. The same went for speeches, any speech with an "easily discernible negative result" could result in imprisonment. Insulting a solider could get you fined, because those soldiers were protecting your freedom goddamn it! The United States Flag also became defended by law. Oh, and Hail Columbia was now to be played at official events.
The "War Clauses" of the Sedition Act covered the laws when the nation was at war, amazing right? Anyway they were pretty much the same except now even advocating anything anti-American was punishable. Crime punishment was hiked during the war if the crime hurt the war effort, and transferred treason charges to the War Department during the war.
The Sedition Act sped through Congress with enormous public support and was signed by President Pershing mid-July. Now what was the President to do?
Not much actually, aside from being all ceremonial and such Pershing remained a largely empty suit President. His cabinet largely drove the country on autopilot, persecuting prohibition, stopping crime. Despite Paranoia still remaining high the failure of anything to materialize left little to do. Secretary of the Treasury Mellon tried to slash taxes by huge margins, but Pershing's pet projects, which we will learn about, as well as people in congress realizing that their money came from government revenue kept them only large margins[3].
The post-war depression lingered on, the rich boomed and boomed but the poorer Americans felt the dragging economy stay put. The lack of energy or openness in the Pershing White House failed to excite people. Pershing mostly stated in Washington our toured the country doing official events, becoming the first to visit Alaska for example.
There were of course exceptions to Pershing doing nothing, such as when he invaded West Virginia.
/////
You Decide: Proletariat exploiting manchildren or Vitreous defenders of the American way?
Of all the major unions only the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) with their charismatic leader John L. Lewis remained relatively unscathed, one miners had received assurances from Wilson that he would assist them in negotiating a better position after the war, a promise that was never fulfilled. But this meant that unlike most other major unions UMWA still retained the trust of its members. But with Pershing in charge Lewis knew that nothing would really change unless he acted.
The impetus came in southern West Virginia, where coal workers were trying to unionize against a powerful company presence. And this is West Virginia, so that's a lot of coal miners. So as it became apparent Pershing was going to sit back, UMWA men began to swarm into West Virginia. And they found themselves in a war zone.
Company men, often private detectives like Felts, had often acted to evict miner's families and arrest troublemakers. But when they came to the tiny town of Matewan they found the local government was quite sympathetic to the miners and got into a shootout with would-be union members who had been deputized, the Felts men were killed and the town Mayor was severely wounded. Police Chief Sid Hatfield, who was the real McCoy when it came to supporting unionization, emerged as a hero to the West Virginia. The "Matewan Massacre" became a rallying point for unions, while miners across the border areas near Kentucky began to arm themselves. As UWMA began to take an interest in southern West Virginia open violence began to spread. With charismatic leaders like Sid Hatfield the miners began what amounted to guerrilla warfare in the mountains when martial law was declared, heavily favoring the extremely violent "defenders of law and order". In early 1921 Hatfield was acquitted of the murder of the detectives, boosting his popularity even further. By now the "Coal War" has spread northwards and violence was rapidly increasing. In early August 1921 Hatfeild barely escaped an attempt on his life[4] and the miners came pouring out of the mountains to defend him and the cause. A last ditch visit to Charleston failed to do anything and soon angry miners were organizing in Kanawha County, eager to go south into the chaotic Logan and Mingo counties and unionize the mines, no matter what the owners or workers there thought. Time was running short, many workers began to feel the pressures of not really having a job and were signing back on.
Sid Hatfeild and another union leader, Bill Blizzard, organized the miners, commandeered a rail car, and began to head south. Meanwhile the anti-union forces in Logan County organized and set up a defense at Blair Mountain. The stage was set for the final battle.
The first skirmish occurred on August 15, and by the 20th the full force of the miners had attacked Blair Mountain. The defenders, composed of county police, deputized citizens and West Virginia State Guardsmen, had less men but also held the higher ground and better weapons. They decided to flaunt their technological superiority by hireling private planes to drop homemade bombs on the attacking miners. The attack ground on for nearly a week deadlocked. By this point Pershing was organizing the United States Army for action to quell the violence. The timetable became rushed when on August 30th the miners broke the defensive lines on Blair Mountain and began pouring into Logan and Mingo counties. Over 60 miners were killed along with 23 of the anti-union activists.
Apparently believing that causing another outburst of anti-labor hysteria=victory, UMW President John L. Lewis issued a statement that "regretted" to violence caused by "reactionary elements in West Virginia." He nonetheless recognized the hastily set up unions in Mingo and Logan counties and said that any action to break them would likely provoke a nationwide coal strike. This announcement only served to rule up further fears and bring up the Red Scare again.
Pershing took personal command of the army for the "West Virginia Pacification", the first sitting President to lead troops since James Madison, though his command was actually mostly to scratch his itchy feet, most of the actual commanding was done by lower level army men. Indeed Pershing was (quietly) criticized by some for mostly puttering around Charleston.
When the Army arrived in Logan and Mingo counties on September 11 they didn't find much organized resistance. Only a small last stand in Logan proper occurred. Mostly it was reduced to potshots and petty attacks. It turned out that Bill Blizzard had decided to cut his losses and ordered the "army" to disband. There were retributions of course, many miners hid their weapons just in case, but the peace fell rather quickly. Even the trials went quickly, not every Union sympathizer was in the Army and some found their ways onto juries, weird huh? Lewis's promised national coal strike occurred, but once again public opinion turned against the strike, and with no fight in West Virginia to rally around it collapsed by mid-November. The "Coal Insurrection" as it came to be called, legitimized the need for harsh laws in the eyes of most Americans and helped Pershing's popularity.
What happened to Sid Hatfield? No one really knows. Some say he fled into the hills, some day he died in a last stand near a creek in Mingo County. Some idiots say he ascended to heaven in a hail of bullets, the even more moronic say he moved to Russia and started a Cult around Lenin.
There was a arthurian-esque legend about his rifle. Legend says that he his his rifle so that only a true blue collared West Virginian can find it, and that they would lead the miners to justice.
This legend came to a screeching halt in 1974 when a honeymooning couple from France found it in a stream.
/////
Help Wanted: Better Maps
During the Great War the United States military had realized that it was woefully behind but the industrial capacity of the nation had enabled it to quickly advance. So that was that.
However it quickly also realized that trains were not enough to mobilize the American military and industry. The age of the automobile was rising, but American roads were sub par. While convoys could cross the nation it was bumpy and painstaking work. A new Bureau of Public Roads was formed to address the issue. Oddly the BPR was placed under the Department of Agriculture, maybe because Agriculture had something to do with animals, which made paths which were kind of roads? I have no idea. Any way the BPR asked the army to show routes "of principle importance to national security" to them, which the army did. The BPR then refined the proposal and produced a map of the proposed "National Security Highway System", which they submitted to the Department of War. Always one to be heavily interested in military matters Pershing quickly became fond of the proposal[5], and became a major advocate for its construction. His experiences in Mexico showed him the importance of logistics in military action. They also showed him how easy it was to attack a civil war stricken country, but pick the lessons that apply the most I guess.
Congress was less exited about the enterprise, such a move cost Uncle Sam money and they were in the middle of slashing taxes across the board. But Pershing through his weight behind it, and fears of an uprising made them eager to have maneuverability. Still they cut off most of the plan down to bare lines on each coast, interconnected industrial roads in the east. Connecting the east to the west was a long line near the Mexican border, carefully chosen incase Mexico got a death wish.
Construction was of course tied up in Bureaucracy, and by the end of 1924 very little had been completed. Still the Highway Proposal would be quite influential in the years to come.
It's one of those things that only happens in 1 universe out of the infinite possibilities of the multiverse. I mean an American general from a global war is a major proponent of an interstate system of large roads? How unlikely is that?
/////
Jazz became popular during the 20's, giving its artists the right to vote was not
To the average American the 20's saw a widening gap between them and the rich. The rich got richer while they had to slowly claw their way out of the post-war depression. The constant warnings of communists continued after the Coal Insurrection and the Red victory in the Russian civil war remained, but for the average American the idea wore thin. They were struggling to advance, new technology was becoming available but to get it and "be prosperous" they had to go deep into debt[6]. The promised purity that was to emerge from Prohibition turned out to be pure greed by bootleggers.
This dissatisfaction showed in the midterms when the democrats gained several seats in both houses, however their defeat in 1920 was do great and the gerrymandering by the GOP was so great, that they still were far behind in overall seat count.
Not much else happened for the rest of Pershing's term, the overall economy slow staggered upwards, while the stock market spiraled upwards. Several times Pershing spoke in favor of action in favor of African Americans, several times it came to nothing more then a few extra lynchings by the increasingly powerful KKK. A sense of lethargy seemed to sweep Washington. There was a feeling across the nation that America should be doing something, but that it wasn't.
_____
1: IOTL it collapsed here.
2: An odd combo of OTL, Pershing's ideals for AG and SecWar and republicans with "experience in the field"
3: Slightly smaller then OTL.
4: Unlike IOTL.
5: IOTL he presented the proposal, nicknamed the "Pershing Map" to Congress.
6: Similar to OTL, but we had a more optimistic view, calling it "credit".
/////
Admiral Horthy, Head of a Navy whose might was only rivaled by Bolivia's
In November 1919, amongst the chaos of the collapse of the centuries old Hapsburg monarchy, Emperor Charles I of Austria-Hungary, signed a document "removing himself from public affairs", which was carefully crafted to avoid being an abdication. Soon afterwords Austria-Hungary had ceased to exist. Austria had transferred into a semi-stable, semi-democratic state. Hungary however was different.
After briefly flirting with Communism and getting dragged into a disastrous war with Romania Hungary ended up becoming a Kingdom again. However no one wanted Charles returning and so a regency was installed under the last Austro-Hungarian Admiral, Miklós Horthy in 1920. This excited Charles because a Kingdom meant he got a crown to wear and Horthy was a monarchist. In addition the (very weak) Hungarian parliament was dominated by monarchist parties, never mind that one of the major ones wanted a different dynasty. Charles thought the time was right to regain the throne of Hungary. So he showed up unannounced in Horthy's house on March 21st 1921 and demanded he be reinstated as King so that he could make Hungary great again. Horthy was torn, on one hand he did support the monarchy on the other hand stood the Little Entente. The Little Entente was a recently formed military alliance between Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and Romania which had been formed with two purposes 1) Keep the Hapsburgs off the thrones of Europe and 2) Keep Hungary from getting too powerful. Concerns over the Little Entente forced Horthy to tell Charles that the time was not right and send the would be king on his way. But Charles was not done yet. Collecting his supporters in Switzerland he returned to Hungary, in the city of Sopron, declared himself "King of Austria and King of Bohemia" and began organizing Legitimists for a March on Budapest. Despite the Great Powers condemning him and the Little Entente threatening an invasion Charles pressed on. He marched at a snail's pace, with full royal pomp, giving Horthy some time to regroup. Still Charles was at the gates of Budapest by the 21st of October. The next[1] day the first shots of the Hungarian Civil War were fired as the Legitimists fired on Budapest and began to attack the Regentists (a term for Horthy's supporters, even if many of the defenders were Budapest Republicans). The defense was weak and soon Horthy's government was retreating beyond the Danube. Charles's march into Budapest was too much for the Little Entente and on October 23rd Czechoslovakia mobilized, followed by Romania and Yugoslavia.
At the Battle of the Galga River on October 26th Horthy's forces stopped the overstretched royalists. That turned out to be all it needed, as by early November Little Entente forces poured into Hungary. The Czechoslovak Army was eager to put down the self-proclaimed "King of Bohemia", or at least the Czech part was. For the 3rd time in then 5 years The Romanian Army entered Hungary. The Yugoslavian contingent was smaller but still applied pressure from the south. By November 10 Czechoslovakia was in Budapest and the Romanians were on the Tisza. Charles fled to Switzerland in hiding and ended up being exiled to some Atlantic speck of land.
In Hungary Horthy was thankful to the Little Entente for helping him, but soon found they had other plans. Despite weak protests from a couple great powers the Little Entente felt that leaving a throne for anyone was too big an opportunity for the Hapsburgs. Instead they had Social Democrat Károly Peyer established as head of the Republic of Hungary. So much for the Regency.
Horthy ended up forming his own political party, the Party of National Unity (NEP), which would go on to dominate national politics post-1922 with Horthy as Prime Minister and later President. However Hungary remained isolated with the ever watchful Little Entente hovering over them.
/////
Pershing's shmexy official portrait.
After the election Pershing met with President Wilson in the White House. While many knew by this point that Wilson was somewhat ill Pershing was still shocked by how pale and thin Wilson was, as well as how confused the President seemed. After Wilson was half carried off to bed Secretary Lansing entered the room and explained the situation to the President-Elect. After hearing about Lansing's shadow presidency Pershing wrote that "to be so close to the light so many times, yet never to touch it. I cannot imagine the feeling Mr. Lansing had." Pershing had never despised his opponent and now came to respect him greatly. In his final months in the White House Pershing would commission a portrait of Lansing and have it hung near one of Andrew Jackson.
As Pershing prepared for the inauguration he began to draft his cabinet. Pershing had no political experience and only selected a few of the positioned personally, party bosses selected the rest, a sure way to prevent poor decision making[2].
President: John Pershing
Vice President: Calvin Coolidge
Secretary of State: Charles Evans Hughes
Secretary of the Treasury: Andrew Mellon
Secretary of War: Leonard Wood
Attorney General: Thomas Sterling
Postmaster General: Will Hays
Secretary of the Navy: Edwin Denby
Secretary of the Interior: Lawrence Phipps
Secretary of Agriculture: Charles Scott
Secretary of Commerce: Ovington Wellar
Secretary of Labor: James Davis
With huge Republican landslides in both the house and the Senate his appointments sped through.
Secretary of State Hughes soon negotiated treaties with the losing powers of the Great War that did not include references to any League of Nations concept. Pershing was no isolationist, and while American diplomats in Geneva refused to actually attend meetings, the Pershing Administration kept a close eye on the League's inner workings.
Pershing, obviously a fan of the military, was quick to shit down any talk of navel disarmament, though he could not stop the slow decay of the army from its wartime glory.
The first major piece of legislation to reach Pershing's desk was the one he cared most strongly for. The Sedition Act of 1921 tasked the Attorney General with "preserving American liberty". It allowed the Postal Service to cease any sort of delivery for a publication advocating political revolution. Such publications could be banned if their advocations could be proved to be causing someone to do anything against the nation. The same went for speeches, any speech with an "easily discernible negative result" could result in imprisonment. Insulting a solider could get you fined, because those soldiers were protecting your freedom goddamn it! The United States Flag also became defended by law. Oh, and Hail Columbia was now to be played at official events.
The "War Clauses" of the Sedition Act covered the laws when the nation was at war, amazing right? Anyway they were pretty much the same except now even advocating anything anti-American was punishable. Crime punishment was hiked during the war if the crime hurt the war effort, and transferred treason charges to the War Department during the war.
The Sedition Act sped through Congress with enormous public support and was signed by President Pershing mid-July. Now what was the President to do?
Not much actually, aside from being all ceremonial and such Pershing remained a largely empty suit President. His cabinet largely drove the country on autopilot, persecuting prohibition, stopping crime. Despite Paranoia still remaining high the failure of anything to materialize left little to do. Secretary of the Treasury Mellon tried to slash taxes by huge margins, but Pershing's pet projects, which we will learn about, as well as people in congress realizing that their money came from government revenue kept them only large margins[3].
The post-war depression lingered on, the rich boomed and boomed but the poorer Americans felt the dragging economy stay put. The lack of energy or openness in the Pershing White House failed to excite people. Pershing mostly stated in Washington our toured the country doing official events, becoming the first to visit Alaska for example.
There were of course exceptions to Pershing doing nothing, such as when he invaded West Virginia.
/////
You Decide: Proletariat exploiting manchildren or Vitreous defenders of the American way?
Of all the major unions only the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) with their charismatic leader John L. Lewis remained relatively unscathed, one miners had received assurances from Wilson that he would assist them in negotiating a better position after the war, a promise that was never fulfilled. But this meant that unlike most other major unions UMWA still retained the trust of its members. But with Pershing in charge Lewis knew that nothing would really change unless he acted.
The impetus came in southern West Virginia, where coal workers were trying to unionize against a powerful company presence. And this is West Virginia, so that's a lot of coal miners. So as it became apparent Pershing was going to sit back, UMWA men began to swarm into West Virginia. And they found themselves in a war zone.
Company men, often private detectives like Felts, had often acted to evict miner's families and arrest troublemakers. But when they came to the tiny town of Matewan they found the local government was quite sympathetic to the miners and got into a shootout with would-be union members who had been deputized, the Felts men were killed and the town Mayor was severely wounded. Police Chief Sid Hatfield, who was the real McCoy when it came to supporting unionization, emerged as a hero to the West Virginia. The "Matewan Massacre" became a rallying point for unions, while miners across the border areas near Kentucky began to arm themselves. As UWMA began to take an interest in southern West Virginia open violence began to spread. With charismatic leaders like Sid Hatfield the miners began what amounted to guerrilla warfare in the mountains when martial law was declared, heavily favoring the extremely violent "defenders of law and order". In early 1921 Hatfield was acquitted of the murder of the detectives, boosting his popularity even further. By now the "Coal War" has spread northwards and violence was rapidly increasing. In early August 1921 Hatfeild barely escaped an attempt on his life[4] and the miners came pouring out of the mountains to defend him and the cause. A last ditch visit to Charleston failed to do anything and soon angry miners were organizing in Kanawha County, eager to go south into the chaotic Logan and Mingo counties and unionize the mines, no matter what the owners or workers there thought. Time was running short, many workers began to feel the pressures of not really having a job and were signing back on.
Sid Hatfeild and another union leader, Bill Blizzard, organized the miners, commandeered a rail car, and began to head south. Meanwhile the anti-union forces in Logan County organized and set up a defense at Blair Mountain. The stage was set for the final battle.
The first skirmish occurred on August 15, and by the 20th the full force of the miners had attacked Blair Mountain. The defenders, composed of county police, deputized citizens and West Virginia State Guardsmen, had less men but also held the higher ground and better weapons. They decided to flaunt their technological superiority by hireling private planes to drop homemade bombs on the attacking miners. The attack ground on for nearly a week deadlocked. By this point Pershing was organizing the United States Army for action to quell the violence. The timetable became rushed when on August 30th the miners broke the defensive lines on Blair Mountain and began pouring into Logan and Mingo counties. Over 60 miners were killed along with 23 of the anti-union activists.
Apparently believing that causing another outburst of anti-labor hysteria=victory, UMW President John L. Lewis issued a statement that "regretted" to violence caused by "reactionary elements in West Virginia." He nonetheless recognized the hastily set up unions in Mingo and Logan counties and said that any action to break them would likely provoke a nationwide coal strike. This announcement only served to rule up further fears and bring up the Red Scare again.
Pershing took personal command of the army for the "West Virginia Pacification", the first sitting President to lead troops since James Madison, though his command was actually mostly to scratch his itchy feet, most of the actual commanding was done by lower level army men. Indeed Pershing was (quietly) criticized by some for mostly puttering around Charleston.
When the Army arrived in Logan and Mingo counties on September 11 they didn't find much organized resistance. Only a small last stand in Logan proper occurred. Mostly it was reduced to potshots and petty attacks. It turned out that Bill Blizzard had decided to cut his losses and ordered the "army" to disband. There were retributions of course, many miners hid their weapons just in case, but the peace fell rather quickly. Even the trials went quickly, not every Union sympathizer was in the Army and some found their ways onto juries, weird huh? Lewis's promised national coal strike occurred, but once again public opinion turned against the strike, and with no fight in West Virginia to rally around it collapsed by mid-November. The "Coal Insurrection" as it came to be called, legitimized the need for harsh laws in the eyes of most Americans and helped Pershing's popularity.
What happened to Sid Hatfield? No one really knows. Some say he fled into the hills, some day he died in a last stand near a creek in Mingo County. Some idiots say he ascended to heaven in a hail of bullets, the even more moronic say he moved to Russia and started a Cult around Lenin.
There was a arthurian-esque legend about his rifle. Legend says that he his his rifle so that only a true blue collared West Virginian can find it, and that they would lead the miners to justice.
This legend came to a screeching halt in 1974 when a honeymooning couple from France found it in a stream.
/////
Help Wanted: Better Maps
During the Great War the United States military had realized that it was woefully behind but the industrial capacity of the nation had enabled it to quickly advance. So that was that.
However it quickly also realized that trains were not enough to mobilize the American military and industry. The age of the automobile was rising, but American roads were sub par. While convoys could cross the nation it was bumpy and painstaking work. A new Bureau of Public Roads was formed to address the issue. Oddly the BPR was placed under the Department of Agriculture, maybe because Agriculture had something to do with animals, which made paths which were kind of roads? I have no idea. Any way the BPR asked the army to show routes "of principle importance to national security" to them, which the army did. The BPR then refined the proposal and produced a map of the proposed "National Security Highway System", which they submitted to the Department of War. Always one to be heavily interested in military matters Pershing quickly became fond of the proposal[5], and became a major advocate for its construction. His experiences in Mexico showed him the importance of logistics in military action. They also showed him how easy it was to attack a civil war stricken country, but pick the lessons that apply the most I guess.
Congress was less exited about the enterprise, such a move cost Uncle Sam money and they were in the middle of slashing taxes across the board. But Pershing through his weight behind it, and fears of an uprising made them eager to have maneuverability. Still they cut off most of the plan down to bare lines on each coast, interconnected industrial roads in the east. Connecting the east to the west was a long line near the Mexican border, carefully chosen incase Mexico got a death wish.
Construction was of course tied up in Bureaucracy, and by the end of 1924 very little had been completed. Still the Highway Proposal would be quite influential in the years to come.
It's one of those things that only happens in 1 universe out of the infinite possibilities of the multiverse. I mean an American general from a global war is a major proponent of an interstate system of large roads? How unlikely is that?
/////
Jazz became popular during the 20's, giving its artists the right to vote was not
To the average American the 20's saw a widening gap between them and the rich. The rich got richer while they had to slowly claw their way out of the post-war depression. The constant warnings of communists continued after the Coal Insurrection and the Red victory in the Russian civil war remained, but for the average American the idea wore thin. They were struggling to advance, new technology was becoming available but to get it and "be prosperous" they had to go deep into debt[6]. The promised purity that was to emerge from Prohibition turned out to be pure greed by bootleggers.
This dissatisfaction showed in the midterms when the democrats gained several seats in both houses, however their defeat in 1920 was do great and the gerrymandering by the GOP was so great, that they still were far behind in overall seat count.
Not much else happened for the rest of Pershing's term, the overall economy slow staggered upwards, while the stock market spiraled upwards. Several times Pershing spoke in favor of action in favor of African Americans, several times it came to nothing more then a few extra lynchings by the increasingly powerful KKK. A sense of lethargy seemed to sweep Washington. There was a feeling across the nation that America should be doing something, but that it wasn't.
_____
1: IOTL it collapsed here.
2: An odd combo of OTL, Pershing's ideals for AG and SecWar and republicans with "experience in the field"
3: Slightly smaller then OTL.
4: Unlike IOTL.
5: IOTL he presented the proposal, nicknamed the "Pershing Map" to Congress.
6: Similar to OTL, but we had a more optimistic view, calling it "credit".