WI Union Victory at the Crater

Maybe temporally but he'll ease up when the situation cools down.

The second thing is that Reconstruction couldn't get much milder short of allowing the South to return Blacks to chattel slavery. Virtually nobody was executed or had all of their property seized. There were no taxes levied on Southerners that didn't have to be paid by Northerners as well. How much more mild can you get?
 
The second thing is that Reconstruction couldn't get much milder short of allowing the South to return Blacks to chattel slavery. Virtually nobody was executed or had all of their property seized. There were no taxes levied on Southerners that didn't have to be paid by Northerners as well. How much more mild can you get?

I think it's the other things regarding it that made it so harsh.
 
On Reconstruction

I'm not sure if Reconstruction could ever really be as successful as the radical republicans ideology would want Lincoln or no Lincoln. Unless you can change certain aspect of the Southern culture at that time Reconstruction seems doomed forever. If Federal troops were able to occupy the South for some generations then perhaps the society would have become more welcome to the vote of blacks and republicans. However this would be electorally impossible as seen OTL the troops are going to eventually have to leave due to politicking.

Once the Federal soldiers leave any state government that is not directly racist is going to fall pretty fast. After that happens the votes of blacks and poor whites that could threaten the ruling coalition will gradually be disenfranchised by poll taxes, literacy tests, and property requirements.

This may just be me being cynical about building a non-racist (or atleast only semi-racist) society out of one that formerly treat ~1/3 of its population as property.

Once again though with Lincoln at the helm the South would get by with a lot lot less crap then they did in OTL.
 
I think it's the other things regarding it that made it so harsh.

If those "other things" are things like black suffrage and expansion of civil rights, then I've got to disagree with you. It is true that in 1863, Lincoln butted heads with Congress on the question of Reconstruction, with the President's proposal being fairly mild (10% solution, guiding incoming states to provide vote for literate blacks and Union vets, etc). However, by early 1865, they were working through their differences, with a compromise plan going forward, wherein those states which had begun Reconstruction would be readmitted, while those yet to begin would do so along the lines of the Wade-Davis Proposal; in addition, I see Lincoln and the Radicals playing a sort of "good cop, bad cop" routine with the Southern states in getting them to, at minimum, offer enlarged expansion along Lincoln's proposed lines. And nothing like what Andrew Johnson countenanced OTL (black codes imitating slavery, etc) would pass by a surviving Lincoln.

So why did I think an earlier war could mean a milder Reconstruction? Well, remember that Lincoln's views during all this were evolving, bringing him closer to the Radicals with each passing year -- at the start of his presidency, Lincoln had no intention of touching the institution of slavery where it already existed, and by the days before his death, he was not only waging a war of liberation and pushing an amendment abolishing slavery in the nation, but was openly talking about the need for at least partial expansion of the franchise to the formerly enslaved, and was open to even more in certain cases. End the war before the election, though, and now this evolution might be curbed in late 64/early 65, which will have effects in the months following the war however you look at it.

But that's just a thought I had in reading a previous post; could be I'm completely overcorrecting, and that Lincoln's political evolution would not be imperiled by an earlier peace, especially if it was so visibly won by USCT Troops. So I think I'm back to my original position here.
 
Well yes, but that applies to Lincoln avoiding assassination in general; if, say, the butterfly net doesn't catch this event (though I'm wide open to arguments that say it would, so long as its not just "butterflies"...

Actually, this is an important point to be considered. Booth's attitudes and motivations may be just about the same. But the timing is going to be very different.

Suppose the attack succeeds; Petersburg falls the same day (30 July). Richmond falls a few days later as the remnants of Lee's army flee westward. This is an enormous morale hit to Confederates everywhere. OTL, the CSA lasted only 55 days after the fall of Petersburg; ITTL, it will be longer, because all the other Union victories of 1864-1865 haven't happened yet. Sherman is about to take Atlanta, and Farragut is about to close Mobile. 55 days ITTL is late September. It's 100 days or so to the election; another month to the electoral vote.

Do Lee and Johnston surrender before November? If so, the discussion of Reconstruction moves forward several months to become an election issue. It seems likely that in the wake of the USCT contribution at the Crater, there will be more talk than OTL of land distribution to blacks and black suffrage.

That could set Booth off as it did OTL; and he might assassinate Lincoln before the election; or very likely before the end of Lincoln's first term.

That means Hannibal Hamlin will be President for the beginning of Reconstruction!

If Lincoln is killed before the election, or before the electors vote... Would the Republicans have Johnson succeed to the Presidential nomination and election? If they don't then they have to pick a replacement for Lincoln; if they do then for Johnson. Who?
 
If Lincoln is killed before the election, or before the electors vote... Would the Republicans have Johnson succeed to the Presidential nomination and election? If they don't then they have to pick a replacement for Lincoln; if they do then for Johnson. Who?

This is a very interesting question in itself, because if Congress, ballot makers, or "faithless" electors deny the already nominated Johnson the vote, then however it's done will set a precedent that (alone) will potentially have massive impacts on the Constitution as practiced for centuries to come.
 
This is a very interesting question in itself, because if Congress, ballot makers, or "faithless" electors deny the already nominated Johnson the vote, then however it's done will set a precedent that (alone) will potentially have massive impacts on the Constitution as practiced for centuries to come.

They wouldn't be denying Johnson votes for the office he was nominated for: Vice President. Nothing in the Constitution says that a candidate for Vice President succeeds a missing candidate for President.

It's a very awkward situation, and I don't think any good-faith answer would denounced. However, the more I think about it, I conclude that after the election, Johnson would be considered the successor. Before the election... maybe not.
 
It's a very awkward situation, and I don't think any good-faith answer would denounced. However, the more I think about it, I conclude that after the election, Johnson would be considered the successor. Before the election... maybe not.

Considering that Johnson was there as ideological and geographic balance to Lincoln I doubt very much that he would succeed Lincoln as the new candidate in the event Lincoln is killed before the election. There are too many people, and egos, in the GOP that would block any such move in a heartbeat. Seward, with his State Department service and established abolitionist and unionist credentials, seems likely as one option to me.

Regardless whoever gets the nod (and please Gods let it be someone other than Johnson) couldn't lose if they got caught with a dead woman and a live altar boy coming on the heels of the Great Emancipator, the man who saved the union, and was cruelly cut down by some Confederate diehard in the immediate wake of his final victory.
 
OK, so an earlier Lincoln assassination would actually mean a more radical/effective Reconstruction (at least the first few years); since an earlier assassination is more likely than one happening around the same time or later than OTL, and Lincoln surviving is the other option, I think we can safely say that Reconstruction gets off to a better start TTL.
 
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