How Long Could The GOP Victory Streak Have Lasted Without The Great Depression?

[Zyobot]

With Woodrow Wilson's popularity sinking in the aftermath of World War One abroad and backlash against the Progressive movement at home, 1920s America was ripe for change. Campaigning on a theme of "return to normalcy" from his front porch in Ohio, GOP candidate Warren G. Harding crushed his Democratic opposition in a landslide and ushered in an period of Prohibition, prosperity, and pro-business policy that brought about a straight decade of Republican domination.

Unfortunately, this wasn't to last, as the bubble blown up over the GOP's tenure finally burst in October 1929. Left with an economy in free-fall and troubled by outcry from his response to the Bonus Army in the middle of an election year, the one-term presidency served by Herbert Hoover gave way to a Democratic snap-back speared by Franklin D. Roosevelt. With FDR's ascendance into office and the New Deal Coalition now dominant for over thirty years after the fact, the series of Republican drubbings that preceded his rise were brought to a definitive end.

However, if the Great Depression or some analogous disaster like it were miraculously avoided on the GOP's watch, then how long could their victory streak have lasted? For one, I assume that voter fatigue combined with the statistical probability that some Republican incumbent messes up at some point means that it won't last forever. And that their replacement will probably be a Democrat, given how entrenched the two-party system is in American politics. Otherwise, I'm not sure what else to predict, though some hypothetical electoral maps depicting the results of 1932 and subsequent elections would be appreciated (YAPMS may be of considerable use here).

Thank you in advance,

Zyobot

[american2006]

Dec 17, 2020 22:55:45 GMT Zyobot said:

With Woodrow Wilson's popularity sinking in the aftermath of World War One abroad and backlash against the Progressive movement at home, 1920s America was ripe for change. Campaigning on a theme of "return to normalcy" from his front porch in Ohio, GOP candidate Warren G. Harding crushed his Democratic opposition in a landslide and ushered in an period of Prohibition, prosperity, and pro-business policy that brought about a straight decade of Republican domination.

Unfortunately, this wasn't to last, as the bubble blown up over the GOP's tenure finally burst in October 1929. Left with an economy in free-fall and troubled by outcry from his response to the Bonus Army in the middle of an election year, the one-term presidency served by Herbert Hoover gave way to a Democratic snap-back speared by Franklin D. Roosevelt. With FDR's ascendance into office and the New Deal Coalition now dominant for over thirty years after the fact, the series of Republican drubbings that preceded his rise were brought to a definitive end.

However, if the Great Depression or some analogous disaster like it were miraculously avoided on the GOP's watch, then how long could their victory streak have lasted? For one, I assume that voter fatigue combined with the statistical probability that some Republican incumbent messes up at some point means that it won't last forever. And that their replacement will probably be a Democrat, given how entrenched the two-party system is in American politics. Otherwise, I'm not sure what else to predict, though some hypothetical electoral maps depicting the results of 1932 and subsequent elections would be appreciated (YAPMS may be of considerable use here).

Thank you in advance,

Zyobot

Well, excluding Cleveland and Wilson, it has been going 80 years. It may just never stop. Likelist though is after World War Two, especially if it is devastating.

[stevep]

Dec 17, 2020 22:55:45 GMT Zyobot said:

With Woodrow Wilson's popularity sinking in the aftermath of World War One abroad and backlash against the Progressive movement at home, 1920s America was ripe for change. Campaigning on a theme of "return to normalcy" from his front porch in Ohio, GOP candidate Warren G. Harding crushed his Democratic opposition in a landslide and ushered in an period of Prohibition, prosperity, and pro-business policy that brought about a straight decade of Republican domination.

Unfortunately, this wasn't to last, as the bubble blown up over the GOP's tenure finally burst in October 1929. Left with an economy in free-fall and troubled by outcry from his response to the Bonus Army in the middle of an election year, the one-term presidency served by Herbert Hoover gave way to a Democratic snap-back speared by Franklin D. Roosevelt. With FDR's ascendance into office and the New Deal Coalition now dominant for over thirty years after the fact, the series of Republican drubbings that preceded his rise were brought to a definitive end.

However, if the Great Depression or some analogous disaster like it were miraculously avoided on the GOP's watch, then how long could their victory streak have lasted? For one, I assume that voter fatigue combined with the statistical probability that some Republican incumbent messes up at some point means that it won't last forever. And that their replacement will probably be a Democrat, given how entrenched the two-party system is in American politics. Otherwise, I'm not sure what else to predict, though some hypothetical electoral maps depicting the results of 1932 and subsequent elections would be appreciated (YAPMS may be of considerable use here).

Thank you in advance,

Zyobot

  Zyobot,

  To avoid the Great Depression you would really need a different ending to WWI or at least possibly the peace treaty.  If the US agreed to the British proposal to cancel all allied war debts, possibly with also a major reduction in reparations from Germany, then the world economy isn't so tied to the US one.  As such you might still get a nasty shock for about 1929 in the US but if it doesn't drag the rest of the world down with it then there's a chance for the US to recover without needing massive government intervention.  In that case the Republicans might well recover and stay in power at least a term or two more.  Voter fatigue and the decay that accompanies too long in power for any party will have an effect sooner or later and there will be a chance.

  The other option is that the depression still occurs but the Republicans throw up a Roosevelt, either Teddy or FDR type, who realises that government needs to intervene to help the many people driven to the edge by the recession and to end the death dive generated by the existing idea of cutting your way out of a depression!!  Again that could give them another term or three.

  Steve