WI: Abraham Lincoln Lives Through Second Term

He doesn't fall out with Congress half as badly as Johnson did. He almost certainly signs the Freedmans Bureau and Civil Rights Acts, and probably supports a 14th Amendment of some kind - though he's likely to oppose Section 3 as an infringement on his pardoning power. He will also favour the enfranchisement of at least some Blacks, in particular those who have served in the Union Army. Even Johnson suggested a limited enfranchisement, but was too "States Rights" minded to insist. Lincoln would probably make it an order.

Longer term, I'm afraid, probably not a lot changes. Sooner or later the ex-Rebs will control the South, and probably won't be much nicer to Blacks than OTL; and, as OTL, most northerners won't care enough to do much about it. But there may be less bloodshed along the way.
 
I think some of it will depend on whether he survives an assassination attempt, or whether there is simply no attempt made.
 

Hecatee

Donor
He won't be remembered as the great man we know because the fights he'll have to do in the postwar era and the mistakes he will do (as he is wont to do) will diminish his fame, a lot of the blame which goes today on his successors who let to the current absurd race obsession in the US (and to the troubles associated) will fall on him. Yet his presence will also be a big factor in discussions after the end of his term, so he may help steer the US toward a better path.
 
Might he seek a third term, or will he stand staunchly by the "tradition"?

If the Civil War was still going on, I'd be inclined to think so, but the immediate crisis has passed. The last thing he ought to do if he wants to discredit Southern accusations of him being a tyrant is to try to put himself 'above' Washington of all people during peacetime.
 

Saphroneth

Banned
He won't be remembered as the great man we know because the fights he'll have to do in the postwar era and the mistakes he will do (as he is wont to do) will diminish his fame
There's also a tendency for assassinated controversial presidents to quickly become lionized. OTL Lincoln was incredibly hated, and I've seen some arguments that a lot of the -R vote in the 1864 election - especially among soldiers - was driven not by a comparison of Lincoln v McClellan but by the general understanding that a President McClellan could be assassinated and put his deeply unpopular DNC-mandated VP in the White House!
(Even with McClellan's campaign a self-contradiction, as he repudiated the central 'Peace' plank of his own party's platform, the election was really quite close.)


When he became a martyr that changed all but overnight.
 
There's also a tendency for assassinated controversial presidents to quickly become lionized. OTL Lincoln was incredibly hated, and I've seen some arguments that a lot of the -R vote in the 1864 election - especially among soldiers - was driven not by a comparison of Lincoln v McClellan but by the general understanding that a President McClellan could be assassinated and put his deeply unpopular DNC-mandated VP in the White House!
(Even with McClellan's campaign a self-contradiction, as he repudiated the central 'Peace' plank of his own party's platform, the election was really quite close.)


When he became a martyr that changed all but overnight.
I wouldn't call the election close- 55% to 45%; 400,000 vote difference out of a total of 4 million votes cast (with a roughly 73% turnout). The electoral vote was a HUGE landslide- McClellan got 3 states with a total of 21 electoral votes. Lincoln had a mandate.

Lincoln could have lost NY, CT, and PA; all states he won with less than 4% of the vote; and still have easily won the electoral college.
 

Saphroneth

Banned
I wouldn't call the election close- 55% to 45%; 400,000 vote difference out of a total of 4 million votes cast (with a roughly 73% turnout).
Well, that's kind of my point. 55% is about what he got in the North as an unknown in 1860, and his opponents were badly divided with their official platform mid-war being "let's give up".

The electoral vote was a HUGE landslide- McClellan got 3 states with a total of 21 electoral votes. Lincoln had a mandate.
That's largely due to the peculiarities of Republican support, though, in that several states were won by very small margins.
Make no mistake, I'm not arguing Lincoln didn't have a mandate - I'm arguing that the small scale of his victory in popular vote terms even during a period of national victory and against a "Peace" faction is evidence that people just weren't all that hot on the man personally. (The Republican campaign was to a large extent a "fear" campaign, aided by at least a few dodgy dealings.)

This is supplemented by other evidence from the time, from cartoons to the general sense of Republican party insiders, that it was pretty much "Lincoln as least bad option".
 
Well, that's kind of my point. 55% is about what he got in the North as an unknown in 1860, and his opponents were badly divided with their official platform mid-war being "let's give up".


That's largely due to the peculiarities of Republican support, though, in that several states were won by very small margins.
Make no mistake, I'm not arguing Lincoln didn't have a mandate - I'm arguing that the small scale of his victory in popular vote terms even during a period of national victory and against a "Peace" faction is evidence that people just weren't all that hot on the man personally. (The Republican campaign was to a large extent a "fear" campaign, aided by at least a few dodgy dealings.)

This is supplemented by other evidence from the time, from cartoons to the general sense of Republican party insiders, that it was pretty much "Lincoln as least bad option".
I'm sorry, but I don't see the slim margins except from NY, CT, and PA; and even then he wins handily even if he loses those states.
 

Saphroneth

Banned
I'm sorry, but I don't see the slim margins except from NY, CT, and PA; and even then he wins handily even if he loses those states.
I know, but the "landslide" argument electorally is not based on strong margins in those states but on rather slim ones. 147/86 isn't nearly as much of a "landslide".


Again, I'm not somehow trying to say that Lincoln didn't "really" win the election - he manifestly did. I'm arguing that this was despite the personal unpopularity of Lincoln rather than because of his personal popularity, and indeed the Wade-Davis manifesto was basically an attempt to kill his political career from within his own party.

(Of course, it didn't help that he was accused - rightly or not - of earning the nomination via the "spoils" system.)
 
I know, but the "landslide" argument electorally is not based on strong margins in those states but on rather slim ones. 147/86 isn't nearly as much of a "landslide".


Again, I'm not somehow trying to say that Lincoln didn't "really" win the election - he manifestly did. I'm arguing that this was despite the personal unpopularity of Lincoln rather than because of his personal popularity, and indeed the Wade-Davis manifesto was basically an attempt to kill his political career from within his own party.

(Of course, it didn't help that he was accused - rightly or not - of earning the nomination via the "spoils" system.)
Of course he earned it through the spoils system. The concept of primaries wouldn't be for another 100 years.
 

Saphroneth

Banned
Of course he earned it through the spoils system. The concept of primaries wouldn't be for another 100 years.
No, I'm not sure you understand what I mean. I mean he was viewed at the time as having done it improperly - that is, by packing the convention with supporters who were not representative of the state parties. (At the time the state parties chose who their delegates would support - his use of spoils was seen as an undemocratic end run around this process, which played into the meme he was a bit of a tyrant.)
 
If the Civil War was still going on, I'd be inclined to think so, but the immediate crisis has passed. The last thing he ought to do if he wants to discredit Southern accusations of him being a tyrant is to try to put himself 'above' Washington of all people during peacetime.

Also the Republicans were mostly former Whigs, who traditionally were doubtful even about second terms, let alone third ones. And they have a perfectly ok candidate in Grant.
 

Greenville

Banned
I don't agree with the idea that Lincoln would've been impeached over suspending the Constitution and closing newspapers or a similar fate to Johnson.

The Constitutional amendments are still proposed by Radical Republicans in Congress which Lincoln approves. The fifteenth amendments has better wording. The Civil Rights Act of 1866 probably still is struck down by the Supreme Court.

Reconstruction foes the same. Grant succeeds Lincoln as president in 1869.
 
I don't agree with the idea that Lincoln would've been impeached over suspending the Constitution and closing newspapers or a similar fate to Johnson.

Agreed Anything like that is ASB.

The Constitutional amendments are still proposed by Radical Republicans in Congress which Lincoln approves. The fifteenth amendments has better wording.

It was already worded about as well as it could be and still get ratified. Re the 14th see my earlier remark abt Section 3.

The Civil Rights Act of 1866 probably still is struck down by the Supreme Court.

Reconstruction foes the same. Grant succeeds Lincoln as president in 1869.

Agreed.
 
He doesn't fall out with Congress half as badly as Johnson did. He almost certainly signs the Freedmans Bureau and Civil Rights Acts, and probably supports a 14th Amendment of some kind - though he's likely to oppose Section 3 as an infringement on his pardoning power. He will also favour the enfranchisement of at least some Blacks, in particular those who have served in the Union Army. Even Johnson suggested a limited enfranchisement, but was too "States Rights" minded to insist. Lincoln would probably make it an order.

Longer term, I'm afraid, probably not a lot changes. Sooner or later the ex-Rebs will control the South, and probably won't be much nicer to Blacks than OTL; and, as OTL, most northerners won't care enough to do much about it. But there may be less bloodshed along the way.

Well this is depressing. I remember always believing that Lincoln would have enforced Reconstruction and prevent the CSA from being popular today.

Oh well. Is there any way to actually have made Reconstruction work in a plausible way?
 
Well this is depressing. I remember always believing that Lincoln would have enforced Reconstruction and prevent the CSA from being popular today.

Oh well. Is there any way to actually have made Reconstruction work in a plausible way?

Not really. At the end of the day the North didn't really care much what happened to the Blacks, and the (white) South cared a great deal about keeping them in their place. So the outcome was predictable. At best, a bit more effort by the Republicans after 1896 might have prevented the blatant disfranchisements of the early 20C, and held things about where they were in 1880, but that's probably about it.

One very long shot. If Lincoln is willing and able to push through an amendment abolishing the electoral college, the Southern Black vote becomes much more crucial for the GOP. Even with it, they won the popular vote only once (1880) between 1876 and 1892, and then only by a razor-thin margin. Indeed, bar the exceptional cases of 1864 and 1872, I'm not sure (David T please tell me if I'm wrong) whether they ever got a majority of the white vote before about 1900. With a direct popular election, the Southern Black vote would be essential to them, so they'd have tried much harder to maintain it. But of course, for this very reason such a change would be a terrific gamble for them, and so a very doubtful starter. I have a hazy recollection that Senator Charles Sumner advocated it in the 1860s, but I'm unsure how much (if any) support he got.
 
I know, but the "landslide" argument electorally is not based on strong margins in those states but on rather slim ones. 147/86 isn't nearly as much of a "landslide".


Again, I'm not somehow trying to say that Lincoln didn't "really" win the election - he manifestly did. I'm arguing that this was despite the personal unpopularity of Lincoln rather than because of his personal popularity, and indeed the Wade-Davis manifesto was basically an attempt to kill his political career from within his own party.

(Of course, it didn't help that he was accused - rightly or not - of earning the nomination via the "spoils" system.)


Considering there were no polls in those days we can rely only on the result of the elections. Sure there were people who hated him, it goes with the job. There were people who hated Ike, LBJ, Nixon (Even before Watergate) and Reagan and all won by landslides. His popularity was probably more or less shown in the election result.
 
I think some of it will depend on whether he survives an assassination attempt, or whether there is simply no attempt made.

Considering John Wilkes Booth's fanaticisim, unless disease or an accident kills him first, I'd expect Booth to try to kill Lincoln.
 
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