“(Truman) won his party's nomination at the 1948 Democratic National Convention only after defeating attempts to drop him from the ticket. The convention's civil rights plank caused a walk-out by several Southern delegates, who launched a third-party "Dixiecrat" ticket led by South Carolina Governor Strom Thurmond. The Dixiecrats hoped to win enough electoral votes to force a contingent election in the House”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_United_States_presidential_election
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Because the rich and the powerful HATED the idea that the electorate should have any say in American politics.
After all, this is a democracy run by plutocrats!! Didn’t Truman get the memo? Who the fuck did he think he was?
“The New Deal had greatly strengthened labor unions and they formed a major base of support for Truman's Democratic Party. The Republicans, working with big business, made it their highest priority to weaken those unions.”
Plutocrats will be plutocrats.
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“When Truman dropped to 32 percent in the polls, Democratic Arkansas Senator William Fulbright suggested that Truman resign; the president said he did not care what Senator "Halfbright" said.”
That sounds vaguely familiar, right Sen Bennet?
“As he readied for the 1948 election, Truman made clear his identity as a Democrat in the New Deal tradition, advocating for national health insurance, and repeal of the Taft–Hartley Act.”
Unions are good.
The plutocrats hated this.
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“He broke with the New Deal by initiating an aggressive civil rights program which he termed a moral priority. His economic and social vision constituted a broad legislative agenda that came to be called the ‘Fair Deal.’”
And now we get to part of the meat and potatoes: racism. You may think racism was bad under Obama, but it was NOTHING like it was in the 1940s. So bad, I can’t read more than a minute before it triggers me. History is full of this shit.
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So WHITE America went apeshit. Fuck Truman and FDR for getting things done, screw working with the Allies to stop Hitler, fuck the winning (for a later time) of WW II, how DARE the fuck say ALL AMERICANS are equal?!?! (The bastard was WOKE!)
Screw him, tell him to resign, to step aside, go woke, go broke, man. He can’t make competent decisions, we need to nominate someone ELSE at the convention!!!
Does ANY of this sound familiar? No?
Onwards through history…
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“The Solid South rejected civil rights as those states still enforced segregation.”
Because the South is STILL FIGHTING THE GODDAMN CIVIL WAR! They are losers will not accept the loss (see Jan 6th).
“ In the spring of 1948, Truman's public approval rating stood at 36 percent, and the president was nearly universally regarded as incapable of winning the general election.”
Sound familiar?
Then you will LOVE the next post by Truman
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“Republicans approve of the American farmer, but they are willing to help him go broke. They stand four-square for the American home—but not for housing. They are strong for labor—but they are stronger for restricting labor's rights. They favor minimum wage—the smaller the minimum wage the better. They endorse educational opportunity for all—but they won't spend money for teachers or for schools.”
Today’s problems are over THREE-QUARTERS of a century old!
Guess who is responsible?
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“They think modern medical care and hospitals are fine—for people who can afford them ... They think American standard of living is a fine thing—so long as it doesn't spread to all the people. And they admire the Government of the United States so much that they would like to buy it.”
That is the big difference between Democrats and Republicans. It didn’t happen yesterday, it didn’t happen in 2016.
It happened when Biden was in First Grade.
This is the reality of history.
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“Within two weeks of the 1948 convention Truman issued Executive Order 9981, ending racial discrimination in the Armed Services, and Executive Order 9980 to end discrimination in federal agencies.”
The plutocrats were INCENSED! Strom Thurmond, a racist Dixiecrat, split the party as did Wallace.
Defeat of the Democratic Party seemed inevitable.
There was only one problem with this scenario.
The plutocrats never asked the American people what THEY wanted. Whether THEY were incensed.
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As today’s press would describe it, the Truman Campaign was in full meltdown. No state was taken for granted. His whistle-stops were a hit with We The People. One million New Yorkers turned out for a ticker-tape parade.
But the press ignored them. “Dewey will win” was the resounding beat, “Truman will lose to the Dewey Machine” they extolled. Roper, Gallup and Crossley stopped polling — what was the point? The election as far as they were concerned was a formality.
Truman has lost.
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But, again, they forgot the most important part of the equation — and polls don’t decide elections. Newspapers don’t decide elections.
We the People decide elections.
And that’s where we get the iconic moment of Harry S Truman holding a newspaper that KNEW he would be defeated. President Truman had the last laugh.
The press lost its attempt to decide who would be President.
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We can overcome the horrors of the past by assuring our future remains bright, by electing candidates who are not perfect, but vaguely point to the right direction.
There will be missteps, fuckups, and corrections. We are all human. But as long as we are headed in the correct direction, we should excuse the bus driver for the inevitable side trip.
The press does not define us. Rebellious politicians do not define us. We the People define who and what we want to become.
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Epilogue
History doesn’t tell us what will happen for everything, but it is a good guide. Will Biden win despite defections? That’s undecided.
Every generation, mine included, believes their problems are NOW problems, that our parents or grandparents never had to deal with this.
A change in Presidents means a change in direction. The question is, is it a where you want to go?
Okay, time to go play Final Fantasy. Hope you enjoyed this!
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Postscript to the Epilogue (you didn’t know you could do that, did you?)
The source is from Wikipedia, which after they have pounded and milled it, you are left with… dry facts. But history is far more interesting when it is actually a narrative, especially if you can point to a modern analog.
I try to make history interesting because “just the facts” is dull. It is tedious. It is painful. And it’s not how the people at the time felt. To them it was the “now”.
Let’s make for a better now
@feloneouscat Thank you for the history! I think I read about this year's ago, but it's good to get a reminder.
@feloneouscat There’s my man. He saved his best political jabs at the convention in Philadelphia and at the end on the campaign trail.
I’d love to see him start his acceptance speech paraphrasing HST and say
“Kamala Harris and I are going to win this election and make the Republicans like it!”
@feloneouscat I appreciate your whole thread.
An off-topic-yet-historical aside: the design of the mic in the pic is a lot older than I thought. I thought they started making it in the 50s, but a quick search tells me that it goes all the way back to 1939!
I use a current-gen version of that same design, so I thought that was interesting. 🙂
Yeah, that caught my eye as well. I didn’t know they were that old!
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But as anyone who reads horror will tell you, the defeat of the monster does not mean the monster will not rise again.
Seventy six years later, the world is witnessing the same thing all over again. An attempt by the plutocrats to subvert American Democracy.
Every American election is the most important election ever.
Republicans STRIVE to return us to the days BEFORE Roosevelt. To the days when the color of your skin or your sexual organs defined your destiny.