Get Off the Track! (1884 United States presidential election)

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

When the results of the 1880 election were read out in Congress in advance of the twenty-fourth presidential inauguration, Abraham Lincoln had prevailed over James Baird Weaver by a majority of some four hundred thousand votes, becoming the first president from a right-of-center party to be reelected since Washington himself. His second administration was nearly cut short on July 2, 1881, when a disappointed office seeker-turned-assassin fired a pistol shot into the president's abdomen at a Washington train station. Lincoln, stubbornly refusing treatment, made a miraculous recovery and would carry the bullet for the rest of his life. (The former president would die eighteen months after leaving office at the age of 77 when the bullet was dislodged in a carriage accident, killing its intended victim a half-decade after being fired from the assassin's gun.)

Experiencing a surge of popularity from surviving the attempt on his life just as Congress was preparing to reconvene in the fall of 1881, Lincoln's hold over his party was further strengthened by the outcome of the last Congressional elections, which had seen nearly two dozen Southern Nationals go down to defeat at the hands of Republican Labor challengers, while divisions between moderate Laborists, Georgists, and socialists allowed Northern Liberals to gain seats across the Atlantic and the upper Midwest. With this more favorable Congress, Lincoln was able to secure Congressional support for a federal anti-lynching bill in 1882. Lincoln likewise succeeded in persuading Congress to enact federal anti-trust legislation and a revised silver purchase act, reestablishing a bimetallist monetary policy.

In spite of these legislative achievements, Lincolns' second term witnessed rising tensions between immigrant and native-born workers, between the state and organized labor, and between opposing factions of the labor movement. Labor riots in New York, Chicago, and San Francisco in the summer of 1883 left dozens dead and ultimately had to be suppressed by a combination of police and state militia; meanwhile, Lincoln was forced to mobilize federal troops to prevent the armed overthrow of the biracial city government of Danville, Virginia by leaders of the National Conservative party and the "White Supremacy Convention."

Liberal National: Seventy-five years old and visibly aged by his time in office, Lincoln with relief invoked the tradition established by Washington and Jefferson to decline a third term in 1884, using his influence within the party to secure the nomination for his friend and ally, Secretary of State John A. Logan of Illinois. To satisfy the Southern Nationals, Mississippi Governor James L. Alcorn was nominated for vice president. The Liberal National platform praises the achievements of Lincoln's eight years in office and proposes program of One-Nation conservatism based around protectionism, civil rights, bimetallism, and capitalism augmented by judicious regulation. They support the expansion of American influence in the Pacific and Central America as the United States assumes its place as one of the leading world powers, and opposes the direct election of senators.

Republican Labor: After eight years in opposition, Republican Labor stand precariously poised on the edge of a precipice, their position as the largest party on the left endangered by the rise of Georgist and Marxist parties over the course of the last decade. Their candidate is Illinois Governor Alson Streeter, who has been nominated on a platform of free silver, protectionism, anti-monopolism, agrarianism, and the direct election of senators. He has criticized the federal Silver Purchase Act for introducing only a limited quantity of silver coinage and calls for the free circulation of silver at a ratio of 30:1 with gold. His response to the 1883 Chicago labor riots has been heavily criticized by the press, Streeter having first refused to call in the militia to suppress the riots, and afterwards blaming anarchists and socialists for inciting the violence.

United Labor: An enthusiastic outpouring at the United Labor convention greeted the arrival of their hearty champion, Henry George, who for the third time in twelve years presents himself to the nation as a candidate for president. Fresh from defeat in the 1882 New York gubernatorial election, George has embarked on a tour of the country to promote his signature issue—the single tax. Anti-monopolist, anti-rent, anti-protectionist, and anti-socialist, George's strongest support comes from immigrant laborers and especially Irish Catholics who fueled his successful mayoral campaign in 1878.

Republican: The Republicans have nominated former Illinois Governor John M. Palmer on a platform of free trade, opposition to bimetallism, and anti-imperialism. The party has found some favor among Southern Nationals put off by Lincoln's embrace of bimetallism and vigorous action on civil rights, though Palmer himself supported the extension of voting rights to black men as a member of the Illinois constitutional convention in the 1840s.

Equal Rights: Having sat out the previous presidential election, the National Equal Rights party have nominated attorney and suffragist Belva Ann Lockwood on a platform of universal suffrage. Drawing support from a diverse coalition of voters favoring women's enfranchisement, Lockwood is expected to poll best in the few Western states where women already have the vote.

Social Democratic: Beginning in 1876, the rapid growth of the socialist movement in America had given rise to a number of small parties calling themselves variously "Socialist," "Social Democratic," and "Socialist Labor." In the aftermath of the 1883 labor riots, the loose association of socialist parties united to organize the Social Democracy of America under the national leadership of Dutch-American radical Philip Van Patten. At their second-ever national convention, held at Chicago in the spring of 1883, the party's delegates nominated New York machinist and labor organizer J. Edward Hall and anarchist editor Albert Parsons. Their platform calls for an eight-hour day, collective ownership of the means of production, and explicitly disavows Georgism.

Prohibition: The national convention nominated John St. John of Kansas on a platform of temperance, universal suffrage, equal rights, direct election of senators, and abolition of the death penalty.

Two days.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Social Democrats for Hall!

[Elcaspar]

Social Democrats for Hall!

[PPT Spiral]

George 'til the end

[Diabolical Materialism]

Toxic Streeter Bros harrassed me on the telegraph so I'm voting for Hall.

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

The oldest of my great-great-grandparents, who is a generation older than the others for reasons that are too long to state, joins my great-great-great-grandparents in the ranks of the old enough to vote. I suppose the poor peasant constituency is still in the Republican Labor camp, so here's a vote for Alson Streeter.

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

1884 United States presidential election, first round

Mr. James Edward Hall (Social Democratic, New York) / Mr. Albert Richard Parsons (Social Democratic, Illinois) 27.6% popular votes
Secretary of State John Alexander Logan (Liberal National, Illinois) / former Governor James Lusk Alcorn (Liberal National, Mississippi) 24.1% popular votes
Former Mayor Henry George (United Labor, New York) / State Senator John Sherwin Crosby (United Labor, New York) 17.2% popular votes
Mrs. Belva Ann Lockwood (Equal Rights, District of Columbia) / Mrs. Marietta Stow (Equal Rights, California) 13.8% popular votes
Governor Alson Jenness Streeter (Republican Labor, Illinois) / Representative Absolom Madden West (Republican Labor, Mississippi) 13.8% popular votes
Former Governor John McAuley Palmer (Republican, Illinois) / former Representative Abram Stevens Hewitt (Republican, New York) 3.4% popular votes
Former State Senator John Pierce St. John (Prohibition, Kansas) / former State Senator William Daniel (Prohibition, Maryland) 0.0% popular votes

By the end of Lincoln's second term, the nationalist project which had its origins in the wild dream of Alexander Hamilton had at last come into its own as a mature, coherent vision for the nation's future. Industry, science, and imperialism had transformed the face of the North American continent, as the flag of the United States advanced all the way to the Pacific coast. Though Republicans from Jefferson to Jackson to Seward had sometimes succeeded in influencing the course of progress, they had been unable to defeat it altogether, and this manifested in a collapse in the Republican vote. Between 1872 and 1884 Jeffersonians went from a clear majority of the electorate and the dominant force in Congress to a dwindling and deeply divided minority whose solutions seemed to the great majority of workers out-of-touch with the economic and political reality in the country. As the industrial working class increased in share of the overall population, demand for a fresh solution to the capitalist problem grew among the constituencies traditionally catered by the left that was answered by a new party: the Social Democrats. Drawing support primarily from industrial workers in the upper Midwest, recent immigrants from Germany and Eastern Europe, and middle class intellectuals in New England, the party succeeded in topping the first round of the 1884 presidential election. Their plurality, however, was slim, and the lack of adequate organization in the South and West allowed the Liberal Nationals to keep control of much of the map. Fewer than one third of the voters backed the SDA's presidential candidate on the first round, as Georgeists and laborists remained skeptical heading into the runoff.