Is an end to the war in Europe (or imminent end) by Nov '44 enough to have Dewey beat FDR?

[raharris1973]

Is an end to the war in Europe (or imminent end) by Nov '44 enough to have Dewey beat FDR?

I am making a parallel here to how the end of the war in Europe seemed to be enough to make Churchill, and the Conservatives, "dispensable" to British voters, and how they replaced him with Labour and Attlee. British voters did so even though the Pacific war was not over and looked set to continue possibly another two years.

A large part of the legitimacy of Roosevelt's extra terms was the contingencies of wartime, and his margin of '44 was his lowest, and '40 had been lower than '36.

How to end the European War early shouldn't be too hard, especially with some pre-1944 PoDs. Causes could include D-Day going off in May, favorable PoDs on the Soviet front, D-Day going off (successfully) in 1943 [I give this as an example, I *don't* care to debate it now], the Battle of the Atlantic going better, the US getting into the war months earlier over Atlantic clashes, etc.

What if *both* the European and Japanese wars were ended, or imminently ending by November 1944? Would *that* greatly increase the odds of Dewey defeating FDR? Perhaps more than VE-Day alone, because of the extra centrality of the Pacific War to the US?

Getting the Pacific War to end that early is indeed a harder a lift, but is still plausible using the PoDs I suggested above, plus more aggressive ones like an earlier atomic bomb, or a combination of more prepared USA, UK, or USSR putting pressure on Japan on all fronts, and so on.

Your thought?

 

[sillygoose]

Go.. d question. I think yes based on polls I saw a while back that showed people wanted to ride out the war with a president who was winning it. There were a lot of concerns about his health and general policies, but thought because the war was going well under his direction that the public would support him until it was over, much like Churchill's situation actually. Now that isn't a guarantee Dewey would win, but he'd have a good shot at it even against a victorious president. Especially if the OTL strike wave of 1945-46 happens earlier here.

Strike wave of 1945–1946 - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

That pissed off a lot of people at the time and resulted in the Taft-Hawley bill that took away a lot of labor rights.

 

[ShieldWife]

Dewey believed that Roosevelt knew about the Pearl Harbor attack before it happened, in large part because the US broke Japan’s Purple code back in 1939. Dewey didn’t bring this up because the USA was still at war with Japan and revealing information would have caused the Japanese to change their codes and would hurt the war effort.

If the war was over, in Europe and the Pacific, we’ll before November of 1944, then Dewey could have safely brought this up and the idea that Roosevelt knew about Pearl Harbor might have gained traction. That would certainly have lead to fierce debate and maybe it could have brought down Roosevelt, especially with wartime pressure removed.

Alternatively, maybe Roosevelt could have ridden the wave of victory celebrations.

I personally think that Dewey could have handled post-war issues in a much better way than Roosevelt or Truman and could possible have prevented Stalin from getting half of Europe or Mao from getting China. Imagine what a different world that could have created.

 

[raharris1973]

The changes to the timeline are going to have to be very, very drastic, to get the war over, both

in Europe and the Pacific, well before November of 1944,

Those types of changes in the timing of the conduct of the war themselves could see the final Soviet and Western positions in Europe and Asia fall about where they did historically, or quite a bit more favorably for the west, or more favorably for the Soviets, so there are many variables.

 

[Chiron]

Is an end to the war in Europe (or imminent end) by Nov '44 enough to have Dewey beat FDR?

Your thought?

No, FDR had a hard lock on the Electoral College and ground game to get out the vote. The Republican Party back then did not have a ground game and relied on the telephone at a time when only a quarter of the population had regular access to a phone. They also didn't have the support of the labor movements who blamed them for the Great Recession.

Britain's case is entirely different from the US where Churchill ran a coalition government that involved a lot of horse trading, some of it quite literal. Labor built a ground game, made sure Churchill's supporters were on the frontlines without being obvious about it, and cut a few deals to win the election.

 

[WolfBear]

Personally, I suspect that both wars would need to be over by Election Day in order for Dewey to actually have a realistic shot in November 1944. Americans generally don't like changing horses in the middle of a stream: 1864, 1916 (sort-of), 1940 (sort-of), 1944, 1964, and 2004 all come to mind here.