Martin Luther King Jr. Runs for President 1964

[Lahbas]

This was an earlier idea for a timeline I was going to write, but eventually shelved it due to not having the research materials available, nor did I know enough on King himself.

Basically, in protest of the Kennedy Administrations ambigouis stance on Civil Rights, King declares and independent run for the Presidency, in order to put the Civil Rights movement in better view of the public. He also hoped that by getting the support of a large segement of the African-American population, which was typically a solid Democratic bloc, he could force the goverment to act before the election.

Kennedy would do nothing, as he is still assasinated in Dallas Texas, making Lyndon Johnson President. LBJ, though in favor of Civil Rights, is torn between the election and doing wat he considered right. If he passed the legislation, then it was likely he would lose the South, but be ensured King's support. At the same time, however, Henry Cabot Lodge (who had entered the primaries and was the frontrunner) could very well threaten him in the North, where he would need the South as a electoral safety.

Meetings between the President and King would prove fruitless, LBJ asking that King be patient for reform after the election, while MLK believed he would go back on his word, once the pressure was off.

At famous rally in Washington D.C., after having given his "I Have A Dream Speech", he annouced that Adam Clayton Powell Jr. would be his running mate in the upcoming election.

At the Democratic Convention, because of the turmoil caused by MLK's "Freedom" run, he forgets to push back RFK's speech away from the VP nomination. Despite having previously picked Hubert Humphrey, Robert Kennedy wins the Democratic Nomination for that spot. At the Republican Convention, Henry Cabot Lodge prevails, and would chose Michigan Governor George Romney as his Vice President.

How would the election turn out?

Lyndon Baines Johnson (D-TX)/Robert Francis Kennedy (D-NY)
Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. (R-MA)/George Wilcken Romney (R-MI)
Martin Luther King Jr. (F-AL)/Adam Clayton Powell Jr. (F-NY)

[Lahbas]

MLK's canidacy would result in massive African-American turnout, resulting in the Deep South becoming a battleground for the first time on over eighty years. Lyndon Johnson would still win, due to large sympathy vote following the Kennedy Assasination. However, because Henry Cabot Lodge does not alienate the moderates like Goldwater, and King running as an Independent. Therefore, the election is still close, but Lyndon Johnson still wins the election. Claims of voter fraud across the Deep South, and in some other parts of the country.

Democratic: Lyndon Baines Johnson (D-TX)/Robert Francis Kennedy (D-NY)     46%  /  291 Electoral
Republican: Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. (R-MA)/George Wilcken Romney (R-MI)       40%  /  230 Electoral
Freedom: Martin Luther King Jr. (F-AL)/Adam Clayton Powell Jr. (F-NY)             13%  /  17 Electoral

Despite bad feelings between the two immediately following the election, Martin Luther King Jr. would become a major (if not controversial) advisor to LBJ during his second term in office, and authored most of the Civil Rights legislation that he introduced to Congress. King would later enter politics as the first African-American senator from Alabama as a Republican, though he would later change to the Democratic Party in 1975. He would run for President again in the 1976 Democratic Primaries, and win the nomination, but lose to Howard Baker. He would continue serving as Senator until 1983, when he would die of a massive heart attack at his home in Washington.

[President Mitt]

I severely doubt King would win any electoral votes.

[Хahar 🤔]

Nigras didn't vote in the South in 1964.

[President Mitt]

MLK's canidacy would result in massive African-American turnout, resulting in the Deep South becoming a battleground for the first time on over eighty years. Lyndon Johnson would still win, due to large sympathy vote following the Kennedy Assasination. However, because Henry Cabot Lodge does not alienate the moderates like Goldwater, and King running as an Independent. Therefore, the election is still close, but Lyndon Johnson still wins the election. Claims of voter fraud across the Deep South, and in some other parts of the country.

Democratic: Lyndon Baines Johnson (D-TX)/Robert Francis Kennedy (D-NY)     46%  /  291 Electoral
Republican: Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. (R-MA)/George Wilcken Romney (R-MI)       40%  /  230 Electoral
Freedom: Martin Luther King Jr. (F-AL)/Adam Clayton Powell Jr. (F-NY)             13%  /  17 Electoral

Despite bad feelings between the two immediately following the election, Martin Luther King Jr. would become a major (if not controversial) advisor to LBJ during his second term in office, and authored most of the Civil Rights legislation that he introduced to Congress. King would later enter politics as the first African-American senator from Alabama as a Republican, though he would later change to the Democratic Party in 1975. He would run for President again in the 1976 Democratic Primaries, and win the nomination, but lose to Howard Baker. He would continue serving as Senator until 1983, when he would die of a massive heart attack at his home in Washington.

So was LBJ's first act as President to kill off 1/2 of Alabama Whites?

[RI]

That map looks a lot like the 1984 Democratic primary map.

[Lahbas]

MLK makes sure to organize a large amount of support, especially in the Deep South. Most laws that had prevented them from voting before had been overturned before the election, such as the poll tax, grandfather clause, and literacy tests. However, you are right in that Louisiana and Mississippi would remain with Lyndon Johnson.

Again, the race's throughout the South are so close only because of MLK's canidacy, with Mississippi and Louisiana having the highest percentage of African-Americans. Again, voter fraud would have kept thos states within LBJ's column.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Lahbas, you're confusing the effects of several different things, not all of which had happened by 1964.  Except for the poll tax eliminated by the XXIVth Amendment in January 1964, none of the impediments to black voting had been removed.  That would happen with the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965.  Indeed, the continuing disenfranchisement of blacks that happened in the South in the 1964 elections despite the abolition of the poll tax provided the impetus for the Voting Rights Act.  The main effect of the XXIVth Amendment was to add poor whites to the voting rolls in 1964.  There's no way MLK gets a share of the vote larger than LBJ's in the Southern states against Goldwater in the actual 1964 election.

[Lahbas]

My mistake. I knew there were reforms passed in '64, but I didn't know it was those exact reforms.

That is, of course, you mean the protection of a person's right to vote. If that is the case, that is negated by the sheer amount of Blacks that are expected to vote. President Johnson, in order to win fairly, and to prevent protests against the election results themselves, would try and get the state goverments from avoiding overt methods of preventing African Americans from voting.

This would include literacy tests, as orginizations such as the NAACP would investigate why so few, if any, African Americans were allowed to vote. As such, the main method that is used is simply not counting the ballots cast by African Americans, which is not nearly as efficent, but not nearly as visible.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Johnson and the NAACP did do what you suggested in 1964, but it was insufficient to allow blacks to participate in the process in a meaningful fashion in the South.  Even after the VRA was passed, rates of African-American voting remained considerably lower than that of white Americans.