1997-1999: Ron Harvey/David A. Luther (Independent)
def. 1996: Mitch O’Rourke/Louis Long (Democratic), Michael Landon/John Campbell (Republican)
Ron Harvey had no intention of winning the 1996 presidential election. Maybe at one point when the young and charismatic tech magnet of the Silicon Rockies chose to run, he wanted to sit where Curtis Johnson sat. But the man who brought computers into the American home felt a different purpose to running: to deadlock the electoral college and extract policy concessions and the promise to be made Secretary of State from the candidate of his choice. The "great gaping void", as Harvey put it, left by Johnson's administration in the wake of Canada's tailspin and collapse and the subsequent recession was one that left many desperate for change. Californian Senator, the 'family first' conservative Michael Landon, provided a safe pair of hands to grip the wheel. Harvey, the Boy from Boise, offered a leap in the dark. Preforming well in polling and at the debates, Harvey's campaign pledged "absolute economic security" for and tariffs to protect the farmers and labourers of the mid-west and rust belt, to "bring the money spent frivolously overseas and on trinkets back to the American's who needed it most", to "break the obscene concentration of wealth in this country", and to deliver a balanced budget, as well as promising to spend more on an education and healthcare system that "works for everyone" and to "drain the swamp" in D.C. Harvey was painfully aware that he couldn't win, but maintained a public image of a man confident he was bound for the White House.
And then he won.
The exact reason for Harvey's upset victory came from the collapse of Michael Landon's campaign. Vice President O'Rourke was never going to win; the malaise around him and the administration was too strong, and his performance at debates was too weak. Landon was the frontrunner; Landon was the man who was expected to win office, and who Harvey was preparing for his negotiations with, even if Landon was polling strong enough in enough states the win the whole thing by himself. However, the October Surprise hit: Michael Landon's wife, the future Governess of Oregon Katherine Baker, wanted a divorce, citing Landon's affair with an unnamed Congressman. Landon's campaign hit a knot in the track, and derailed in a spectacular fashion; the Republicans of the Senate, many of whom were aware of the affair, abandoned him, not wanting to "associate with a sodomite". This was despite many within the leadership having been aware of the affair. As the media circus enveloped Landon, noting his hypocrisy in taking a 'family first' position that derided same-sex relationships, Harvey saw several big-name endorsements swing his way, most notably former President Harrison MacDonnell, who declared Harvey "the living embodiment of the American dream".
Sweeping the pacific states, the mountains, mid-west, the rust belt, and Vermont and Maine, much to his own surprise, Harvey won a decisive victory. He'd be no Secretary of State; he would instead be President. It was not a position he wished to be in, and indeed when Landon's October Surprise hit, he had been rather hoping that O'Rourke would somehow be able to pull a victory out of the bag. Rather he found himself stood, reciting the oath of office before Supreme Justice Peterson on a cold day in January. Unlike his predecessor, Harvey didn't allow the unexpectedness of his successor to be visible. Dignified, confident, and speaking clearly to the nation, at first Harvey, the first man since Washington to not represent any party, and the first ever to not come from politics or the military, was a breath of fresh air. Filling his administration with technocrats, such as his Secretary of State Patricia Clarke, and military men such as Justice Secretary John Stein- the latter a suggestion by Vice President Luther, himself formally SMMC- Harvey referred to his government as one that was a "Cabinet of All-Talents", in which figures were chosen because of what Harvey viewed as their technical skill, rather than their political leanings. This was a mistake, and rifts were quick to form between the Military, the 'Technocrats', and the token political appointments that Harvey would be forced to make in order to satisfy the Democratic controlled congress. These rifts would ultimately tear the administration apart.
Harvey was ultimately reliant on Executive Orders. Although he was able to get bipartisan support for cuts in Government spending- just- and some more liberal social policy, he was forced to resort to the E.O. in order to implement tariffs and to pursue economically nationalist interventions. Although publicly a centrist, Harvey leaned more towards the Republicans in terms of economics, and with this he fought a blue Congress. The Democratic Speaker Aaron Udall of Utah's 2nd would not give the President an inch. In his mind the President didn't have a party; therefore, in this state of cohabitation, the President, unable to fall back on the Democrats or Republicans, would have to become a vessel for Congress. The Speaker had a revolution in mind; the President would fight this tooth and nail. Coming from the tech world, Harvey was used to getting what he wanted, and what he wanted was the obedience of congress to pass the legislation he felt he had the right to pass. And faced with men like Udall, his hostility was vitriolic; on one noted occasion, Harvey threw a personal computer into the walls of the oval office when Udall announced he planned to kill Harvey's immigration reform. The dent remains, and is called the "Harvey Hole'. Although Harvey would reluctantly accept many of the laws that would find themselves sat on the resolution desk, the President refused to accept the tail wagging him. This was where
United We Stand entered the picture.
The 1998 midterms were shrouded in a great deal of uncertainty. Although generally speaking it was understood that the President's Party would take a hit during the midterms, especially if one was as unproductive with their first two years as Harvey had been, there was no President's Party to speak of. The Democrats struck hard as the primary opposition against Harvey, and did well in the polls, while the Republicans found themselves unwilling to tie to the President and offer themselves to his desire to "fight a midterm against Congress". Their indecision would be their downfall. Secretary Clarke wanted to ensure that if the Republicans wouldn't bite, then the President would.
United We Stand was founded in December of 1997, Clarke nominally Chairwoman of the group, resigning from the administration to contest the open Oregon Senate seat (her successor as SoS would be SoJ Stein). Officially a centrist political party, in reality it was taking whoever would join, from the far-left ecologists who would storm the San Francisco Mayorship, to the hard-right Nationalists who found the Republicans too tame, and everyone in between. This desperate band would pick up defections in the House and Senate; many more Bipartisan members of the Republican Party would cross the aisle, knowing of their impending defeat, and figuring it was worth a chance. The results for UWS were impressive for a Party coming from a standing start, although many gains came from local compacts with Republicans, and where they competed, they only split the vote in favour of the Democrats. In the Senate, four seats were picked up with John Hein’s in Washington, Patricia Clarke in Oregon, Zach Woloch in North Dakota, and Ralph Brooks Idaho (although Senator Brooks would join the Libertarian Party upon his swearing in). In the House, the Democrats came two short of breaking their record. The Republicans fell third in the popular vote, edged out by a few points by UWS; however, UWS' vote was spread evenly out, and except for a few dozen pick-ups, made up less than half of the 'opposition' grouping in the HoR. Although this was still a major feat, as they became the largest third party since the Unionists in 1860.
Harvey didn't last long after the mid-terms. Initially, there was some speculation that the Democrats would impeach him at the first chance. Instead Harvey vomited blood while attending a private function with the Prime Minister Santoro of Italy. He had advanced stomach cancer; the chance to save him could be found with target chemotherapy, but it would be an expensive treatment, and one that might kill the President rather than save him. Harvey pushed on; he didn't have it in him to quit. He would fight this just as he fought regulations on his tech in Idaho, and how he had fought his way to the Presidency. But his Cabinet had other ideas and, following Harvey's collapse following a particularly stressful bought of chemotherapy in March, the Cabinet and other appropriate officials reluctantly enacted Section 4 of the Twenty Fifth Amendment. David Luther became Acting President. At the urging of his family, Harvey resigned. He wouldn't make it to Spring.
1999-1999: David A. Luther/vacant (Independent)
1999-2001: David A. Luther/John Stein (Independent/America First)
The Presidency of David A. Luther was a short one, and another shock to the system of the United States. With Harvey's resignation in January, Luther entered office to a nation that had, in the last two terms, experienced five Presidents, and quickly looked upon the office with despair. Luther had come from the military, and fancied himself something of a latter-day George Washington. Where Johnson looked upon the White House with despair, the first Nebraskan to hold the office looked at it with anticipation; after all, it may be a gilded cage, but it was one that had far more power that people were willing to admit. Upon his inauguration, many comparisons were made between Luther and George Washington, although Luther himself privately disliked these in good faith. More astute commentators compared him to Grant as a way of commenting on the rumour that Luther entered the Marine’s as a way of avoiding jail time for a DUI. It was quickly noted that the President Luther hung a portrait of in the Oval Office was of James K. Polk. This was no mere reference to Luther’s hometown, but rather a symbol of what was to come. Luther was an expansionist. Of the things accomplished in his two years in office, Luther would be principally remembered for overseeing the expansion of the Union to include the states of Puerto Rico and New Columbia, and for championing the formation of the Pacific Commonwealth ahead of their own entry into the Union in 2007.
This is not to say new states and stars were the only thing of note the come from Luther’s brief administration. US expansionism went further than their pre-existing territories. The rifts between the military and the technocrats that had formed under Harvey had become great gaping gashes in the Government; upon Harvey’s death, in what became known as the “Night of Front Knives”, Luther removed every single technocrat he could, barring Secretary of Energy Prof. Anthony Parker, replacing them with military men. His own Vice President was the former Secretary of State John Stein. With the dominance of the military in the executive branch, it was hard for many, both in the US and beyond it, to not look at what was happening as military coup, taking advantage of the chaos left by the last turbulent 8 years. Protestors in their hundreds of thousands found their way into Washington in the ‘March for Democracy’. Luther was defensive, and tried to calm the protests, noting that, just because his Cabinet was full of military men with deep ties to the energy and arms industry, and just because he was pursuing a large-scale neoliberal deregulatory programme with free-market Democrats in Congress, he was not running a Junta.
As the new millennium approached, this became a little harder to defend. The Canadian Government in Toronto was losing the struggle to control of
Pays d'en-haut. French recognition of the largest of the Quebecoise fragment-states,
Saint-Laurent, which itself was struggling to seize control northern New Brunswick, caused concern for Luther’s Administration, who viewed Harvey’s inaction towards the region as a blight on American policy towards their neighbours. In January of 2000, Luther met with Canadian Premier Andrew Dipper. Dipper urged the United States to intervene; to shift its military power into putting down
Pays d’en-haut. Luther was hesitant; memories of Vietnam still burned bright in his mind, and although a fight in Nipissing could restore a semblance of normality to the continent, he knew that he wouldn’t be able to pass it through Congress. However, Luther was confident that a quick campaign, one of shock and awe, could kick the rotten structure in and bring the whole thing tumbling down. Appearing before the nation in a fireside discussion, Luther explained the situation in terse simple terms, announcing a short intervention that would “put an end to the issues facing our cousins to the north”. John Stein was more straightforward: “We’re going to rock the earth”.
Within twenty-five minutes, the USAAF scrambled bombers returned home. The fires burning in Nipissing could be seen from space. Canadian and American troops moved north and east into the region. Congress went ballistic; Democrats spoke of impeachment. The Republican Party officially came down hard against intervention, but the base itself was fragmented; United We Stand was more consistent. Luther avoided impeachment, despite fiery rhetoric. Many Americans approved of the intervention, and, thinking of what happened to Andrew Johnson, Udall quashed talk of removing a sitting President during an election year. In any case, Luther ensured the next election would be fought and won on the question of Foreign Policy.
Luther did not contest. After an unhappy year, he had no stomach for further electoral politics, letting his Vice President, John Stein, run on the America First platform. Instead Luther formed a Think Tank devoted to bringing new states in the Union; by 2018, it had accomplished this when five new stars joined the other 53.