AHC Eugene Debs Potus

Craigo

Early US intervention in WWI --> increased militarization and unionization ---> war ends, government turns troops on strikers --> radicalized working class elects Debs in 1920 when the GOP and Dems nominate a pair of conservative candidates.

Very rough draft, but filling the blanks shouldn't be too hard. You just need a poor economy and radicalized citizenry, and wars are good for that.
 

Craigo

Alternatively, there's a Gilded age TL in the before 1900 form that seems to use the 1877 strikes as its POD, which is a good place to start earlier. Or what if the AFL had turned to industrial unionism? An early Gompers death could lead to more "leftist" unionism and a stronger socialist political party.
 

Japhy

Banned
Easiest way to do it is to have not become a Socialist. The options for that are that

-The Supreme Court rules in his favor during In re Debs.
-The Federal Courts that threw him him prison in the first place acquit him
-While in Prison for the Pullman Strike he never starts reading Socialist Literature.

Before he was a convert to the ideology he considered himself a Populist Democrat. As long as men like William Jennings Bryan take over the Party in 1896, and hold onto it after as per OTL (With the exception of handing it over to the Bourbons in 1904) Debs has a decent chance if we get him into some sort of Political Office, like a Congressional Seat, of being an option for 1908 or 1912. He might make really good VP material, and then well its easy enough to do.
 

Wendell

Japhy said:
Easiest way to do it is to have not become a Socialist. The options for that are that

-The Supreme Court rules in his favor during In re Debs.
-The Federal Courts that threw him him prison in the first place acquit him
-While in Prison for the Pullman Strike he never starts reading Socialist Literature.

Before he was a convert to the ideology he considered himself a Populist Democrat. As long as men like William Jennings Bryan take over the Party in 1896, and hold onto it after as per OTL (With the exception of handing it over to the Bourbons in 1904) Debs has a decent chance if we get him into some sort of Political Office, like a Congressional Seat, of being an option for 1908 or 1912. He might make really good VP material, and then well its easy enough to do.
Click to expand...

I quite like this idea for a timeline.
 

Craigo

In re Debs was a unanimous decision, if I remember correctly. That's a hard POD. If Debs is never imprisoned, that's a different story.
 
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