AHC: GOP New England, Democratic South, but...
- Thread starter Aaaaasima
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Not possible. Even if Republicans continued down the right-wing populist path and Democrats towards a classically liberal platform that wouldn't even come close to the result you're looking for. There's a reason New England only goes Republican in TLs when the GOP has become fiscally conservative, social liberal/inclusive and the opposite with the Democrats, because it sets up a coalition that can win the states they can't OTL, and leaving those ideologies the same wouldn't change jack.
Yeah, New England won't put up for the Democrats' or OTL Republicans' social conservatism. Not possible.
New England has a history of social conservatism tho. It is where the Puritans is from and a ton of blue laws are still in effect. So maybe a different brand of religious right is needed.
Instead of Baptist and Born Agains leading the religious right what if it's Catholics , Episcopalians, Methodist and Orthodox Jew's leading the group?
Instead of Baptist and Born Agains leading the religious right what if it's Catholics , Episcopalians, Methodist and Orthodox Jew's leading the group?
That would be a non-starter, assuming the ATL Religious Right is focused on the same issues as the real-world Religious Right. Liberal New Englanders don't object to Baptists and born-agains per se, they object to the positions that those groups take on sociopolitical issues. Banning abortion and outlawing homosexuality are not going to be any more palatable positions coming from Episcopalians than from Baptists.
And FWIW, while the Purtians get a non-entirely-unjustified bad rap, their long-term heritage has been a little more nuanced. The Congregationalists are the direct descendants of the Purtians, and in many places, they morphed into Unitarians, probably the most liberal denomination today. And the Copngregationalists still going by that name have a strong progressive contingent: Jeremiah Wright, Obama's controversial liberal minister, was a member of the United Church Of Christ, a Congregationalist-derived denomination. The United Church Of Canada, the most liberal of the mainstream denominations in that country, also had a strong Congregationalist wing.
I know this but with a Pod earlier then the 70's lets say the 30's you could end up with a more social conservative New England. Especially if social issues like Drinking, Drugs and Censorship is talked about more then Abortion tho to be honest there is lots Pro Lifer's in New England still today.
Something to that. It was, after all, socially-conscious Unitarians who made "Banned in Boston" a household phrase.
Maybe if, as you suggest, liberals somehow remain focussed on regulatory approaches to social malaise(eg. Prohibition, censorship), you could end up with strong movements in New England around that. Catherine MacKinnon would be the 20th Century shorthand for such an approach(though she's technically not from New England).
Gotta go to work. I'll try to add more later.
yeah something along those lines combined with The Billy Graham faction of "Liberal" southern Christians win the war with the religious right for the south and bible belt.
^ I think for it to work on the New England front, you'd need Canadian-style Red Toryism to be more of a thing in the US. And by Red Tory, I don't mean the 21st Century definition, ie. a slash-and-burn fiscal conservative who marches in the Pride Parade once a year. The opposite, in fact: a noblesse-oblige spouting fiscal dove who takes a paternalistic(sometimes bordering on bigoted) line on social issues. The anti-abortion, anti-gay George Grant being the archetypal example.
But that tendency doesn't even really exist in Canada anymore(whereas fiscal hawks at Pride are a dime a dozen), and I'm not sure how you'd make it a major thing in the US. I think you need a pre-1900 POD.
And I also don't know how you'd get the Billy Graham types to win out against the Pat Robertson crowd down in Dixie. I would assume that the reason the Robertsons won in OTL is that they were saying something their audience had a pre-existing willingness to listen to.
But that tendency doesn't even really exist in Canada anymore(whereas fiscal hawks at Pride are a dime a dozen), and I'm not sure how you'd make it a major thing in the US. I think you need a pre-1900 POD.
And I also don't know how you'd get the Billy Graham types to win out against the Pat Robertson crowd down in Dixie. I would assume that the reason the Robertsons won in OTL is that they were saying something their audience had a pre-existing willingness to listen to.
The American River Ganges
By Thomas Nast. An example of liberal(more or less) anti-immigration sentiment in the later 19th Century.
Maybe if you could somehow get Catholic immigrants to the US to be a lot less assimilate-able than they were OTL, like they're going around burning down protestant churches and beating up suffragettes, that provokes a nativist reaction from New England liberalism(not too far fetched, given the affinity between some liberals and eugenics). So liberalism becomes the default ideology for anyone who wants to roll back immigration, which in the early 20C means the Republican Party. This gives you a xenophobic, flag-waving GOP based in the northeast, though I'm not sure you could add other animosities to their agenda without undermining the reasons that they dislike immigration in the first place. Such a grouping would be unlikely to become anti-feminist, for example, unless I suppose they think that feminism is lowering the WASP birth rate and upping the percentage of wild-eyed Irishmen and swarthy Italians among the population.
By Thomas Nast. An example of liberal(more or less) anti-immigration sentiment in the later 19th Century.
Maybe if you could somehow get Catholic immigrants to the US to be a lot less assimilate-able than they were OTL, like they're going around burning down protestant churches and beating up suffragettes, that provokes a nativist reaction from New England liberalism(not too far fetched, given the affinity between some liberals and eugenics). So liberalism becomes the default ideology for anyone who wants to roll back immigration, which in the early 20C means the Republican Party. This gives you a xenophobic, flag-waving GOP based in the northeast, though I'm not sure you could add other animosities to their agenda without undermining the reasons that they dislike immigration in the first place. Such a grouping would be unlikely to become anti-feminist, for example, unless I suppose they think that feminism is lowering the WASP birth rate and upping the percentage of wild-eyed Irishmen and swarthy Italians among the population.
Maybe it's because I live in the working class "rural" part of CT but I know many Republicans who fit that definition also they love there guns. But my House District is one of the tightest in New England. That's why I kinda don't see New England being conservative to far fetched.
as for the south Democrats won it as late of 96. So maybe more sex and money scandals with the 70's and 80's Televangelist crowd including a scandal with Pat Robertson himself. Something with him using the money giving to the 700 club and CBN not for the company but too pay off blackmailers?
I know what you're saying. British Columbia in Canada has this reputation for being the most liberal place going("the Left Coast", "British California"), based largely on the image of Vancouver, the only part of the province that most Canadians elsewhere pay any attention to. But you meet people from just a few hours inland, and they can be some of the most racist rednecks you'd ever have the misfortune to meet. (Not all of them, of course, but the ones who are really belie the province's image as a progressive bastion.)
And next door, in my home province, Emily Murphy might serve as a template for the kind of liberal nativism I'm envisioning for New England here. Pioneering feminist and social reformer, but with views on race, drugs, and crime that make Breitbart look like a world-beat fanzine.
I think there were people of this particular ideological overlap in the American feminist and suffragette movements, but I'm a bit rusty on the names.
I think there were people of this particular ideological overlap in the American feminist and suffragette movements, but I'm a bit rusty on the names.
Impossible without drastically changing the demographics of the regions. Namely, by creating a black majority Deep South.
that's not that hard to do look at the demographics of Mississippi up until post WWII
yeah I'm sure they were around.
Just thinking a few minor changes and you can get this it would be kinda strange.
Which would probably be difficult to achieve without avoiding the Great Migration, which could probably best be avoided by a stronger Reconstruction (probably including 40 acres and a mule) creating lasting civil rights protections for blacks. Doing so would probably require a stronger Radical Republican faction however, and that as well as strengthening the black-and-tan faction by creating a lasting black political presence would probably ideologically change the Republican Party and the Democratic Party so that the ideologies of the parties are not identical to the ones of OTL parties in 2017.