WHAT HATH A WARM OVERCOAT WROUGHT?
An Alternate History Timeline
By Robert Perkins
Part One: 1860-1885
1861-1898--Indian Wars in the West. From 1861 to 1898, the U.S.A., the F.S.A., Deseret, or all three, will be at war almost constantly with some group of Native Americans in the West. In the end, the natives will be almost exterminated in most places, with the pitiful survivors confined to reservations.
March 1861--In Washington, D.C., Robert Augustus Toombs is sworn in as the fourteenth President of the United States of America. At New York, Levi Boone is sworn in as the fourth President of the Federated States of America.
May 1861--The U.S.A.’s transcontinental telegraph line is completed.
1861-1869--The administration of President Levi Boone of the Federated States of America. Boone’s administration starts off well, as several pieces of banking reform legislation are passed in his first year of office which go a long way toward correcting the conditions which lead to the Great Panic. Boone, like his counterpart in the U.S.A., Robert Toombs, will also sponsor public works projects as a way of absorbing much of the unemployed labor in the country and injecting cash into the industrial sector as a means of “jump-starting” the business sector. These policies will have an effect, and the Great Panic will end in the F.S.A. by 1863. This will be enough to get Boone re-elected for a second term in 1864.
However, in the end, Boone’s administration will be remembered, not for ending the Great Panic, but for it’s anti-immigration laws and policies. Toward the end of Boone’s first administration, draconian new anti-immigration laws are finally passed by the Congress of the F.S.A. Small quotas are set up for each European country. The combined quota for all Catholic countries in Europe is set at a level less than that of England alone. All immigration from anyplace other than Europe is banned. Immigrant entry stations are set up at all major ports (the one at New York on Ellis Island), these stations staffed by confirmed Republican Party members who have absolute authority to deny entry to any immigrant they deem “undesirable.” In some places, these officials commit atrocious abuses of their authority, demanding bribes or worse from immigrant applicants…some particularly unscrupulous officials will demand sexual services from female applicants…in exchange for being allowed into the country. Other immigrants are subjected to beatings during “entry interviews” by these officials. When news of these abuses finally becomes public in President Boone’s second term, it will create a huge scandal.
Domestically, Know Nothing gangs will terrorize immigrants many F.S.A. cities, rioting and looting immigrant-owned businesses, burning Catholic churches, and administering beatings to any immigrants they find alone on the streets at night. In response, immigrant communities will form their own vigilance committees which exact retribution against these gangs for their attacks on immigrants. This will, of course, be used by the Boone Administration to justify even more severe restrictions on immigration, as well as draconian laws…couched as “necessary law enforcement measures”… restricting the freedom of immigrants within the F.S.A. itself.
As a result of these policies, the level of immigration falls dramatically during Boone’s second term of office. This will quickly begin to impact business expansion in the F.S.A. Industrialists in the F.S.A. had depended on a steady supply of immigrant labor, willing to work long hours in horrible conditions for extremely low pay, to keep their factories running and competitive with British manufacturing (which abuses it’s labor force even more than do the industrialists in the F.S.A.). Now they no longer have access to this labor force, and native Americans are simply not willing to work in the horrible conditions of the factories for the ridiculously low wages being offered. Industrialists are faced with a stark choice: either pay higher wages and hire native Americans…which will make their goods even more uncompetitive with British goods…or shut down. Allies of the industrialists in Congress try to provide a quick fix by raising tariffs again to the highest rates which will ever be seen in history, effectively shutting out British imports and severely impacting imports from other countries as well. But Britain and other countries respond by raising their own tariffs, sparking an international trade war. By the end of Boone’s term, the country is back in the throes of economic recession as a result.
1861-1865--The administration of President Robert Toombs of the United States of America. President Toombs will be significant in U.S. history as the first President to publicly advocate loosening restrictions on the Castizo/Mestizo population of Mexico as a means to take the steam out of the ongoing rebellions in many areas of Mexico. He is not successful in getting such legislation passed, but his advocacy of this course of action starts a public debate on the issue which will, eventually, bear fruit.
Concerned by the increasing toll being taken on American troops in Mexico by fighting with Mexican insurgents, Toombs will also be the first President to make serious attempts to negotiate with the leaders of the various Mexican rebel factions and the Mexican “government in exile” for which most of the rebels are, at least officially, fighting. These negotiations, although they will not be successful during his term, will eventually lead, within the next two decades, to an agreement which re-establishes an independent, although much abridged, Mexico.
Toombs will also be remembered for his strong espousal of internal improvements and public works projects as a means of combating the effects of the Great Panic. During the first two years of his administration especially, several major bills for public works projects in the States and Territories will be passed. Although these measures will be, in some measure, successful (most historians place the official end of the depression caused by the Great Panic in 1863...although, in many areas, the effects continued for some time after that…and credit the infusion of cash into the economy resulting from Toombs‘ public works projects with a major share of the credit for this), they will, along with Toombs’ advocacy of greater rights for Mexicans, doom his Presidency. Since Mexican migrants flocking north to work on these projects are often seen as the beneficiaries of these policies, the Democrats will seek to whip up white fears of Mexican migration as a campaign tactic in the 1864 election, leading them to victory.
July 1864 onward--In the United States of Central America, the administration of William Walker works on improving the economic conditions and stability of the new nation. Walker, in order to get badly needed foreign capital, grants a charter for a combined U.S., F.S., British and French consortium to build a canal through Nicaragua, for the purpose of linking the Caribbean Sea with the Pacific Ocean. Work on the canal begins in 1866, and will take nearly three decades to complete. When it is complete, the United States of Central America demands, and receives, the right to levy small tolls on all shipping traffic passing through the canal in exchange for the pledge that the traffic of all nations will be allowed to use the canal without interference. This proves a boon to the economy of the nation. With revenues gained from the canal, as well as the loans and grants given to the nation by the canal consortium, Walker (who will die, still in office, in 1890) and his successors will build much-needed infrastructure and industry in the Central American republic, which will enable it to compete for trade in world markets. By the end of the century, the U.S.C.A. will be a moderately strong regional power with a strong economy, a moderately sized but well trained and equipped army, and a small, but well-equipped and very professional, navy which operates primarily in the Caribbean.
November 1864--National Elections in the U.S.A. and the F.S.A. In the U.S.A., President Toombs is renominated by the Whig Party, while the Democrats nominate Robert M. T. Hunter of Virginia. The nomination of Hunter marks a revolt within the Democratic Party by the powerful planter class against the pro-internal- improvements and pro-industrialization wing of the party (epitomized by former Democratic Presidents Benton and Davis). Democratic candidate Hunter, the candidate of this privileged elite, wants to lower the tariff to pre-1841 levels and use the revenue being derived from the Mexican Bullion Act to offset the reduction in tariffs.
However, the Democrats recognize that the tariff issue is not “sexy” enough to woo the majority of voters, and as the main focus of their campaign, they try a new strategy, playing on increasing fears of Mexican migration into the cities of the United States. The Whigs, seeking to promote industrialization and development, have generally supported the encouragement of migration by Mexicans northward and the use of cheap Mexican labor by the developing industries of the U.S. As a result of these policies, the number of Mexicans living in U.S. cities is rapidly increasing and they are becoming a significant minority in many areas, which is alarming many whites. The Democrats portray the Whigs as a party which “values dirty Greasers over good White Men.”
President Toombs and the Whig Party find it difficult to counter this Democratic strategy, and their arguments, unfortunately, do not successfully convey to the common voter the value of using the revenue created by the Mexican Bullion Act as specified in the Bullion Act…to fund internal improvements projects in the States and the Territories so as to spur economic development. Even though President Toombs is endorsed in the election by the popular former President Jefferson Davis…a Democrat who often found himself at odds with the planter aristocrats within his own party during his own term as President because of his support of the Mexican Bullion Act and of internal improvements in general…he loses the election by a significant margin.
In the F.S.A., the American Republican Party renominates President Boone. The Democratic Party nominates Horatio Seymour of New York, while the Whigs, in an attempt to co-opt the anti-immigration vote from President Boone, nominate Henry B. Anthony of Rhode Island. The key issue of the election is the immigration issue, with Democratic candidate Seymour arguing for relaxing restrictions on immigration, while both Boone and Anthony argue against it. In what will prove to be a historic decision, in order to avoid splitting their own vote and thus handing the election to the Democrats, the Whigs and the American Republicans hold a joint convention in September 1864, following their own party conventions which were held the previous month. In a backroom deal, it is agreed to combine the two tickets, with Boone running for President and Anthony for Vice President (the Vice Presidential candidates selected by the respective parties at their own conventions are forced by their party leaderships to withdraw from the election). The ticket of Boone and Anthony proceeds to defeat Horatio Seymour in the general election. Thus begins the process which will lead, within two years, to the formal merging of the American Republican and Whig parties in the F.S.A.
December 1864--Thomas Nast, a moderately successful political cartoonist for the F.S.A.’s largest newspaper, LESLIE’S ILLUSTRATED WEEKLY (HARPER‘S WEEKLY, the paper where in OTL Nast did his most significant work, was never founded in the ATL), takes ship with his family and moves to Australia. Although Nast, in OTL, was both anti-Irish and anti-Catholic, and thus would seem a natural ally of the American Republican Party, he is a German immigrant and in the ATL, along with other German immigrants, has been harassed by Know Nothing toughs and generally made to feel like a second-class citizen by the Boone Administration. During the recent election, Nast campaigned against Boone through a series of vicious editorial cartoons. He received threats to his life from some of Boone’s cronies as a result, which played a major part in his decision to leave the country. He will never return to the F.S.A. The departure of Nast will have impacts both cultural and political.
Culturally, the departure of Nast will drastically affect how Christmas is celebrated in the Federated States and, indeed, the world. This is because, at the time of his departure, Nast has not completed his series of Christmas drawings featuring Santa Claus, and many aspects of the Santa Claus legend which we take for granted in OTL…Santa’s costume and appearance as we know it in OTL, the idea of Santa having a workshop staffed by elves who make toys, the idea of Santa living at the North Pole, the idea that Santa gives gifts only to “good” children and denies them to “naughty” ones, and the custom of writing letters to Santa…never come into being in the ATL. The custom of kissing under mistletoe also never catches on in America (although the custom was known in Europe prior to Nast's engravings, it was through his engravings in America that the custom caught on there in OTL). Santa Claus ends up looking very different, and customs for celebrating Christmas end up being very different.
Politically, the departure of Nast will be one of several factors which will enable a New York politician of Irish ancestry…one William Magear Tweed…to have a very different political career in the ATL. More on this elsewhere.
March 1865--In a ceremony held at Washington, D.C., Robert M. T. Hunter is sworn in as the fifteenth President of the United States. At New York, Levi Boone is sworn in for a second term as President of the Federated States.
May 1865--Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton form the National Woman Suffrage Association. The primary goal of the organization is to achieve voting rights for women by means of a Congressional amendment to the Constitution of the F.S.A.
1865-1873--The administration of President Robert M. T. Hunter of the United States of America. Hunter will sponsor attempts in Congress to pass legislation restricting the ability of business owners in the U.S. to employ Mexican migrant workers. These attempts, however, will not be successful. Hunter also fails to repeal the various internal improvements laws which had been passed by earlier administrations, but he and his allies in Congress do prevent any new ones from being passed. Hunter’s major legislative victory, however, is the passage of an amendment to the Mexican Bullion Act, which allows funds from Mexican Bullion taxes to be used for purposes other than internal improvements. This allows the planter party in Congress to successfully lobby for a reduction in the tariff to pre-1848 levels. Hunter’s policies will have deleterious effects on the economic development of the United States in the upcoming years, and by the end of his second term, the United States will, once again, be in the throes of a severe recession.
President Hunter also continues the negotiations with the Mexican rebels and their “government in exile” which had begun under President Toombs. Like Toombs, however, Hunter will not successfully complete these negotiations during his term of office. Last but not least, under Hunter’s term of office, serious fighting will break out between U.S. forces and the Apache in the Southwest.
May 1866--At a joint convention held in Chicago, Illinois, the American Republican and Whig Parties agree to formally merge. The new organization will call itself, simply, the Republican Party. As a condition of the merge, the leadership of the former Whig Party guarantees full support for the anti-immigrant agenda of the American Republicans. This will lead to a defection of many former Whigs from the ranks of the new party, strengthening the Democrats. Nevertheless, the new Republican Party will be the dominant party of the F.S.A. for most of the remainder of the 19th century.
November 1866--Lucy Stone, Henry Blackwell, and others form the Woman’s Suffrage Association of the Federated States. This group focuses exclusively on gaining voting rights for women through amendments to individual state constitutions.
December 1866--Since in the ATL, French Emperor Napoleon III’s Mexican adventure has never taken place, Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian Josef von Habsburg, younger brother of Emperor Franz Josef of Austria, has never been offered the throne of Mexico. Instead, after being removed as Viceroy of Lombardy and Venetia in 1859, Maximilian went into quiet seclusion at his personal estate, Miramar Castle, near Trieste, and took a trip to Brazil to study the flora of the Amazonian rain forests.
Maximilian returned from Brazil with his botanical specimens in early 1861, and remained in retirement thereafter at Miramar. To counter his boredom, he asked for, and was given, permission to re-enter the navy, being given command of the important naval base at Trieste. He served with Admiral Tegetthoff at the Battle of Lissa during the Italian sideshow to the 1866 Seven Weeks War with Prussia, distinguishing himself by his bravery under fire.
However, the Italian portion of that war was the only bright spot in what otherwise was a disaster for Austria. In the aftermath that conflict, therefore, the Habsburg monarchy in the Austrian Empire has been thrown into crisis. The reign of Emperor Franz Josef has been a long series of setbacks and disasters for the Empire, and various ethnic nationalities within the Empire…most notably the Hungarians…are pressing for greater political power within the Empire, or, if that cannot be had, independence from it. In the midst of this crisis, the powerful mother of Emperor Franz Josef, Empress Sophie, persuades (“brow-beats” might be a better word for it) Franz Josef, in the interests of the dynasty, to step down and abdicate his throne. After much resistance, Franz Josef complies, abdicating not only for himself but for his eight year old son, Crown Prince Rudolf, in favor of Archduke Maximilian, who is crowned as Emperor of Austria on Christmas Day, 1866.
December 1866-April 1901--The reign of Emperor Maximilian of Austria. The new Emperor Maximilian is still forced to conclude a compromise with the Hungarians, but he also includes other powerful ethnic nationalities, such as the Czechs, Slovaks, Poles, Croats, and Romanians, in the agreement, in essence replacing the empire with a federal state. The Hungarians protest over the inclusion of the other ethnic nationalities in the agreement, thus elevating these groups to a level of political equality with the Magyars…especially the Croats and the Romanians, who they have traditionally ruled and view as subordinate to Hungary. The Hungarians threaten to secede from the empire, but Maximilian is able to rally the remaining peoples of the empire behind him, and it becomes clear to the hotheaded Magyars that they will not win a war of secession against the remainder of the empire. So, in the end, the Magyars grudgingly accept the agreement forged by Maximilian in May 1867.
Maximilian also institutes a new liberal constitution, which guarantees the rights of the various ethnic minorities in the empire, and establishes a constitutional monarchy with limited powers for the sovereign as the form of government for the empire. A key provision of the document is that the constitution cannot be suspended or amended except by agreement between the Emperor and both houses of the Diet. Each of the important ethnic minorities is granted representation in the bi-cameral Diet, which has a lower house wherein the various groups are represented according to population, and an upper house where each of the various groups is represented equally. As a result of this and other political and social reforms instituted during his reign, popular support for the Hapsburg dynasty is greatly increased, and the empire makes a strong recovery from the woes it suffered during the reign of Franz Josef.
Last but not least, Maximilian also institutes various reforms in the Austrian military which greatly increase it’s combat potential. This will have important consequences in a few years.
May 1868--The F.S.A.’s first transcontinental railroad is completed. The line links Council Bluffs, Iowa with San Francisco, California, the line running through the Republic of Deseret (passing through the capital at Salt Lake City).
July 1868--U.S. troops corner and decisively defeat the rebel Juan Cortina in Nuevo Leon Territory, killing Cortina in the process.
August 1868--James Gibbons named by Pope Pius IX as Vicar Apostolic of North Carolina.
September 1868--Oregon is admitted into the Federated States of America as that nation’s 17th State.
November 1868--National Elections in the U.S.A. and the F.S.A.
In the U.S.A., the Democratic Party renominates President Hunter, while the Whigs nominate Zebulon Baird Vance of North Carolina. As Whig candidate Vance is on record as supporting the use of Mexican labor in industry, the Democrats once again run their “Greaser-loving Whigs” campaign. Vance proves an able opponent, however. Noting the fact of the increasing gulf between the interests of the planters and the interests of just about everybody else in the U.S.A., Vance takes the bold step of actively campaigning against the “fat, greedy plantation aristocrats” and presenting himself and the Whig Party as the champions of the interests of the common man. However, in the end, the fear-mongering of the Democrats wins out, and President Hunter is re-elected by the narrowest of margins. This victory, however, will prove to be the last hurrah of the old planter aristocracy and it’s influence over politics in the U.S.A.
In the F.S.A., President Boone declines to run for a third term, throwing the field open to new candidates. The Republican Party nominates Vice President Henry B. Anthony of Rhode Island as it’s candidate for President. The Democrats nominate William Magear Tweed, a New York politician of Irish ancestry who has championed the cause of immigrants. Anti-immigrant feeling is still strong in the F.S.A., and despite the recession and the scandals relating to abuses committed as a result of the Boone Administration’s immigration policies, the election is a close one. But in the end, anger at the renewed recession and disgust at the anti-immigrant excesses of the Know Nothings combine to give the Democrats a victory, and William M. Tweed is elected President of the Federated States of America.
January 1869--The U.S.A.’s first transcontinental railroad is completed.
March 1869--At Washington, D.C., Robert M. T. Hunter is sworn in for a second term as President of the United States of America. At New York, William Magear Tweed is sworn in as the fifth President of the Federated States of America.
1869-1877--The administration of President William Magear Tweed of the Federated States of America. The Presidency of William Magear Tweed will leave a mixed legacy which historians will ponder to this day. Tweed’s administration will be marked by a rollback of the worst of the Know Nothing immigration laws passed during the Boone Administration. Important currency reform legislation will also be passed, which will greatly reduce the volatility of the F.S.A.‘s economy. Other important events during his administration will include the admission of California as a State, and a protracted series of Indian Wars in the West.
However, the legacy his administration will most be remembered for is rampant corruption. Tweed will sponsor lavish spending on internal improvements projects, most of which will be riddled with graft and corruption at a cost of millions of dollars to the taxpayers. As a result of shady dealings primarily by his political appointees, his second term will be marred by several major corruption scandals. In the biggest of these, two members of Tweed’s cabinet , his Secretary of the Treasury and Secretary of War (who also happened to be the President and Vice President of a railroad company which was receiving government subsidies and were guilty of embezzling those funds), will be imprisoned. The extent of Tweed‘s own involvement in this feeding frenzy of greed and corruption may never be known, but the lavish personal expenditures he will make during his term…palatial homes in New York City, Long Island, and Albany, New York; a large yacht; a private train car; and others…will be more than enough to convince a majority of the voters that “where there is smoke, there is fire.“ And indeed, there will be enough “smoke” from Tweed’s financial dealings that Tweed will be brought before impeachment proceedings in early 1876. However, he will narrowly avoid conviction in the Senate, and will serve out the remainder of his term, albeit in disgrace.
1870-1872--The War of the Three Powers. In 1868, the Spanish succession crisis breaks out on schedule, resulting in war between Prussia and France in July 1870. However, unlike in OTL, France will not fight alone in this conflict. Austrian Emperor Maximilian is something of a Francophile, and very concerned about the threat the power of Prussia poses to Austria. Shortly after taking the throne, he began cultivating improved relations with Emperor Napoleon III of France, and the two Emperors signed a secret treaty of alliance against Prussia in late 1868. When the war breaks out, therefore, Emperor Maximilian honors his treaty with Napoleon and declares war on Prussia. He is also able to persuade the south German states to refuse Prussian demands that they join the war on France, and instead, these declare war on Prussia as well. As in OTL, Italy, hoping to make territorial gains at Austria’s expense, declares war on Austria.
The Prussian war machine is very formidable, and despite the array of power lined up against it, still manages to more than hold it’s own in the struggle. However, the support of Austria, Bavaria, and the other south German states is enough to enable Napoleon III’s forces to escape total defeat at Prussian hands, and the war drags on well into 1872. Finally, the weight of the powers aligned against it begins to tell, and the Prussians are thrown back out of France and the allies invade Prussia itself. King Wilhelm of Prussia dismisses his Chancellor and architect of the war, Otto von Bismarck, and sues for peace in September 1872. The British government offers to mediate, and the Treaty of London, ending the war, is signed in January 1873. By terms of the Treaty, Prussia is allowed to formally annex the remaining states of the North German Confederation. The south German States form their own confederation, headed by Austria, known as the Sud-Deutsche Bund. Prussia is forced to pay heavy indemnities to France and Austria. France is allowed to annex Luxembourg, but takes no territory from Prussia itself. Italy gets to keep Rome…which it seized during the war…but Austria retains control of Venetia.
March 1870--California is admitted into the Federated States of America as that nation’s 18th State.
April 1870--The new transcontinental railroad is proving a boon to Anglo settlement in Mexico, especially Sonora Territory, whose citizen population has grown to the point by April 1870 that the U.S. Congress admits Sonora territory to the Union, the first of the Mexican Territories to achieve Statehood status.
July 1871--The 1870 Census reveals that California Territory has finally met the minimum population requirements for admission into the Federated States, and the F.S. Congress passes legislation creating the new State of California.
1872--James Gibbons becomes Bishop of Richmond, Virginia. Upon moving to this industrial center, Gibbons becomes aware of the plight of Mexican Catholic factory workers, who face many forms of discrimination. Over time, he will begin to work, quietly and behind the scenes, on their behalf.
March 1872--Susan B. Anthony submits to the Federated States Congress for consideration a draft Constitutional Amendment granting Women’s Suffrage. The Congress takes no immediate action.
November 1872--National Elections in the U.S.A. and the F.S.A. In the U.S.A., President Hunter decides not to run for re-election. The Democrats nominate Clement C. Claiborne of Alabama, while the Whigs nominate Henry Watkins Allen of Louisiana. The Democrats once again trot out the “Greaser-loving Whigs” mantra which served them well in the past two campaigns, and the common wisdom is that Claiborne will easily win election. The campaign of Whig candidate Allen, however, strikes a cord with an increasing segment among lower and middle-class whites who have suffered under Hunter’s economic policies and also increasingly found themselves frozen out of the slaveholding planter aristocracy by increasing slave prices, and who have thus begun to question why they should blindly support the political and economic agendas of the planters above their own interests. And so, in a landmark political upset, Henry Watkins Allen wins the election by a large majority.
In the F.S.A., the Democrats renominate President Tweed, while the Republicans nominate John Sherman of Ohio. The popular President Tweed will easily win re-election to a second term.
1873--Grasshopper plagues devastate western farms in both the F.S.A. and the U.S.A.
March 1873--In a ceremony at Washington, D.C., Henry Watkins Allen is sworn in as the sixteenth President of the United States of America. At New York, William Magear Tweed is sworn in for a second term as President of the Federated States of America.
1873-1881--The administration of President Henry Watkins Allen of the United States of America. Allen’s term will once again see the passage of internal improvements legislation by Congress, and, while the amendment to the Mexican Bullion Act which was passed under Hunter’s Administration will not be repealed, Allen will successfully lobby for in increase in the tariff for the purpose of fostering industrial growth in the U.S. Allen’s policies will prove to be just the stimulus the U.S. economy needs, and he will be remembered as the President who ended the “Planter Recession,” as the economic downturn caused by the policies of President Robert M. T. Hunter and his plantation aristocrat supporters in Congress has come to be called in the United States. He will also go down in history as a peacemaker, after successfully negotiating a treaty which ends the ongoing insurrection in Mexico, in the process re-establishing an independent Mexican state.
May 1874--Bishop James Gibbons starts an educational program to teach English to Mexican workers and their families in the Richmond area.
1875--The National Women Suffrage Association and the Women Suffrage Association of the Federated States merge to form the National Woman Suffrage Association of the Federated States (NWSAFS). As the movement's mainstream organization, NWSAFS wages state-by-state campaigns to obtain voting rights for women.
June 1875--California del Norte and Nuevo Leon are admitted by the U.S. Congress into the Union as States.
November 1876--National Elections in the U.S.A. and the F.S.A. In the U.S.A., President Henry Watkins Allen is renominated by the Whig Party, while the Democrats nominate Robert Lowry of Mississippi. Lowry is a rich planter and another candidate of the powerful plantation aristocracy which controls the Democratic Party, and does not run an effective campaign. Allen easily wins election to a second term.
In the F.S.A., disgraced President William Magear Tweed declines to run for re-election. Instead, the Democrats nominate Grover Cleveland of New Jersey, while the Republicans nominate J. Neely Johnson of Indiana (in OTL, Johnson had gone west during the California Gold Rush, where he won election as Governor of California in 1856 on the American Party/Know Nothing ticket. In the ATL, he never left Indiana and became involved with the American Republican Party there, eventually rising to Governor of Indiana by 1860 and later serving in the Senate as a Republican. He also does not experience the decline in health which killed him in 1872 at the age of 47 in OTL, and so is still alive to run for President in 1876). Promising an “honest and trustworthy administration,” with a “kinder and gentler, but still firm” policy on immigration, Johnson takes advantage of general public disgust with the corruption of the Democrats to win a landslide victory.
March 1877--In a ceremony at Washington, D.C., Henry Watkins Allen is sworn in for a second term as President of the United States. At New York, J. Neely Johnson is sworn in as the sixth President of the Federated States of America.
1877-1880--The administration of President J. Neely Johnson of the Federated States of America. Johnson proves to be somewhat of a genial non-entity, and although he promised somewhat tougher, but still “kinder and gentler” immigration laws, none are passed during his administration. He will die in office before the end of his first term.
January 2, 1877--Death of Emperor Napoleon III of France (in OTL he died in 1873, largely as a result of ill health and a broken heart caused by his defeat in the Franco Prussian War. A Napoleon III rejuvenated by victory in the war with Prussia lives a few years longer). He is succeeded by his son, who reigns as Emperor Napoleon IV. Napoleon IV will continue the liberalizing trends began by his father in the latter years of his reign, and will prove to be a popular and successful ruler.
August 1877--Death of President Brigham Young of the Republic of Deseret. Young is succeeded in office by Vice President John Taylor, who will serve out the remainder of Young’s current four year term, which ends in 1879 (the next Deseret general elections are to be held in November 1878).
October 1877--James Gibbons become Archbishop of Baltimore. He will use the authority given him by his new post to expand the education program for Mexican workers, which he founded in Richmond, Virginia while serving as Bishop there, to all the cities whose Catholic churches are under his leadership.
November 1878--In General Elections held in the Republic of Deseret, John Taylor is elected as President (the first time he has been elected on his own account as President). Taylor will continue to serve until his own death in 1887.
April 1879--The Treaty of Mexico City is signed, whereby the U.S. agrees to withdraw, over a five year period, from all the Mexican Territories except California del Norte, New Mexico, Nuevo Leon, Coahuila, Chihuahua, Sonora, and Baja California. The United States agrees to the re-establishment of an independent Mexico, in exchange for economic concessions (specifically the right to continue to exploit Mexico’s gold and silver mines) by the new Mexican government. The Mexicans agree to grant legal protection to the lives and property of Anglos who have made their homes in Mexico, in exchange for an agreement to relax legal restrictions on Mexicans living in the United States (in practice, neither side will live up to that portion of the agreement with any great enthusiasm, and many Anglos who have made their homes in Mexico will return to the U.S. over the succeeding years. Since the Mexicans already living in the U.S. are pretty much used to living with restricted rights, however, few of them choose to return to Mexico).
1880-1881--The Nez Perce War. When the government of the F.S.A. demands that the Nez Perce Indians of the Wallowa Valley, in Oregon, remove to a reservation, a band led by Chief Joseph defies the order and flees to Canada. F.S. Army units are sent to pursue, and are defeated by Chief Joseph in several battles. In one of the rare Native American victories of the long, sad period of the Indian Wars, Joseph and his band elude their pursuers and escape to Canada.
May 1880--California is the first State of the F.S.A. to grant women the right to vote.
June 1880--President J. Neely Johnson of the F.S.A. dies in office (his health problems which killed him in OTL having been delayed, but not stopped, finally catch up to him). He is succeeded by his Vice President, John Sherman of Ohio, who becomes the seventh President of the Federated States of America.
June 1880-March 1881--The administration of President John Sherman of the Federated States of America. President Sherman will, like his predecessor, have an unremarkable, and short, administration.
July 1880, Paris, France: Emperor Napoleon IV is married to Princess Beatrice, youngest daughter of Queen Victoria of Great Britain. The union of these two royal houses will also cement an alliance between France and Britain which will have great impacts on future history.
November 1880--National Elections in the U.S.A. and the C.S.A. In the U.S.A., President Henry Watkins Allen declines to run for a third term. In his stead, the Whig Party nominates John Joseph Martin of North Carolina, while the Democrats nominate James Black Groome of Maryland. The nomination of Groome represents a revolt by the pro-internal-improvements and pro-industrialization wing of the Democratic Party, which has been suppressed by the power of the plantation aristocrats since the election of 1864. There is not much to choose from between the two candidates, and in a narrow election, Groome wins. His victory will effectively seal the fate of the plantation aristocracy as the controlling political force in the U.S.A. With both political parties in the control of those opposed to the aristocrats and their agenda, the aristocrats find themselves out in the cold and helplessly watch as the full agenda of their opponents is enacted into law over the next few years.
In the F.S.A., the Republicans nominate President Sherman, and the Democrats nominate Thomas Reed Cobb of Indiana. In a narrow election, Cobb defeats Sherman to win the Presidency.
December 1880--Emperor Maximilian of Austria has remained childless (apparently either he or the Empress Charlotte was infertile…given that Charlotte is reputed to have, in OTL after Maximilian’s death, had an affair which produced a son, it was probably Maximilian), and is under increasing pressure to name an heir. He has become very fond of his nephew, the former Crown Prince Rudolf (son of Franz Josef), and has been grooming him as his heir. Rudolf has been an ardent supporter of Maximilian’s liberalization of the Empire, and Maximilian sees him as someone who will carry on his legacy after his death. Therefore in December 1880, he formally anoints the 22-year old Rudolf as the new Crown Prince and heir apparent of the Austrian Empire.
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Copyright 2009 by Robert P. Perkins.
All rights reserved. Last updated on 2/25/2009.