A man's thoughts and dreams
1905-1917:
Theodore Roosevelt (Progressive)
1904 (with Joseph Carey) def. Mark Hanna (Republican), Alton B. Parker (Democratic)
1908 (with Hiram Johnson) def. William H. Taft (Republican), William J. Bryan (Democratic)
1912 (with Hiram Johnson) def. Philander C. Knox (Republican), Champ Clark (Democratic)
1917-1921:
William J. Bryan (Democratic / 'Peace' Progressive / Socialist - Peace Coupon)
1916 (with Hiram Johnson) def. Theodore Roosevelt ('War' Progressive), Charles E. Hughes (Republican)
1921-1929:
Franklin Roosevelt (Democratic)
1920 (with Champ Clark) def. Theodore Roosevelt (Republican), William J. Bryan (Progressive / Popular Democratic / Socialist - Peace Coupon)
1924 (with A. Mitchell Palmer) def. William C. Sproul (Republican), Robert LaFollete (Farmer-Labor / Socialist / Regional Labor Parties - United Front), William J. Bryan (Christian Labor)
1929-1933:
Andrew Mellon (Republican)
1928 (with Frank Lowden) def. Al Smith (Democratic), Norman Thomas (Socialist / Farmer-Labor / Regional Labor Parties - United Front)
1933-19
45:
H.P. Lovecraft (Socialist / Farmer-Labor / EPIC - United Front)
1932 (with Upton Sinclair) def. Newton D. Baker (Democratic), Andrew Mellon (Republican), A. Philip Randolph ('Civil Rights' Socialist)
“I never ask a man what his business is, for it never interests me. What I ask him about are his thoughts and dreams."
- President Howard P. Lovecraft
Mark Hanna lives and successfully primaries Roosevelt in 1904, only for the Bull Moose to split and form his own party eight years early and win the Presidential election. Untethered by tradition, he wins two more and takes the US into WW1 in 1915, only to lose in 1916 as the pro-war parties (Republican and 'War' Progressive) fail to reach an accord like the anti-war ones. Bryan, however, faces an internal coup by his own Secretary of the Navy despite his efforts to bring the war to an end (which he does in 1919), beginning eight years of conservative Democratic rule. Meanwhile, participation in the Peace Coupon allows the Socialists a national platform, and they are helped by their long-term alliance with Hiram Johnson's refusal to fold back into the GOP with the rest of the Progressives, and by the Bryanite Popular Democrats' refusal to support Roosevelt. With a United Front of leftist parties eventually rising to a clear third place in 1928 (despite the setback of Bryan's quixotic attempt to forge a distributist socially conservative party in the Western states at the end of his life), the Democrats lose enough urban voters in 1928 to let in a hardline Republican government. That same year, the Progressives and Popular Democrats from a new Farmer-Labor party, though this is soon dwarfed by the growing urban socialists after they absorb the CPUSA. as the Socialists grow in prominence, the journalist and horror writer Howard Lovecraft becomes increasingly prominent in the party, urged on by his ambitious wife. Lovecraft wins a seat in the 1930 house elections, and when the 1932 convention comes round, though inexperienced, Lovecraft is recognised as an enthusiastic activist with, unusually for the Socialists, a rural background, and wins the Popular Front nomination as a compromise between Thomas and LaFollete. Mellon is saddled with recovering the economy after an alternate crash, but his laissez-faire approach leads to a further collapse. When the 1932 election comes round, the economic chaos has discredited both parties, and despite a split in the Socialists over Lovecraft's somewhat outdated racial views, the United Front wins out. The new age of a democratic socialist America is dawning, but it remains to be seen if all shall share in its benefits.
(I've done President Lovecraft before, but seeing
@bionic_man do a list on it, and having read recently about Lovecraft's eventual conversion to socialism, I decided to have another stab at it)