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Editor says, what if America had voted Strom Thurmond for President in 1948? And fifty-five years later his illegitimate black daughter spoke up for African-Americans? Please note that the views and opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the Editor's. Content has been extensively repurposed from Wikipedia and CNN.
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In 2002, on this day at Capital Hill the Washington elite paid tribute to Strom Thurmond on occasion of the former US President's hundredth birthday.
Dark warning of a problem avoided"I want to say this about my state: When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We're proud of it. And because the rest of the country followed our lead, we didn't suffer all those problems over all these years, either". Trent Lott said at the party. " The Senate Minority Leader was of course making reference to "those problems" articulated with chilling clarity in a 1948 campaign speech in which Thurmond had said "I wanna tell you, ladies and gentlemen, that there's not enough troops in the army to force the Southern people to break down segregation and admit the n-expletive race into our theaters, into our swimming pools, into our homes, and into our churches". 
Thurmond was not alone in voicing the concerns of white supremacists. Because events in South Africa were moving very much in the same direction with the implementation of apartheid following the National Party's victory at the 1948 election. And on a subsequent state visit to Washington, Prime Minister Daniel Malan would find in Thurmond an American politican with a markedly similiar outlook on segregation. Both politicans viewed history through the prism of the 1915 movie Birth of a Nation Click 
to watch the trailer of Birth of a Nation with events since reconstruction threatening the status quo, secured only by the activities of loyalists such as the Klan.
The party included an unexpected guest named Essie Mae Washington-Williams and it would be fair to say that some discordant views were expressed. Whilst Thurmond might not welcome the so-called n-expletive race in white people's theaters, swimming pools, homes and churches it would appear that he did not exclude them from the bedroom. Because 78-year old Washington-Williams publicly revealed that she was Thurmond's daughter, born to a black maid, Carrie "Tunch" Butler (pictured) when Butler was 16 and Thurmond was 22. At the time of Washington-Williams's conception, Carrie was only 15 years old, leading many to believe that she was a victim of statutory rape by Thurmond in the least. 
After Thurmond's death in 2003 the whole truth would emerge. Thurmond only agreed to meet Washington-Williams when she was 16. He helped pay her way through college and later paid her sums of money in cash or, through a nephew, checks. Though Thurmond never publicly acknowledged Washington-Williams when he was alive, he continued to support her financially. These payments extended well into her adult life. Washington-Williams has stated that she had not previously revealed she was Thurmond's daughter during his lifetime because it "wasn't to the advantage of either one of us" The Thurmond family publicly acknowledged her parentage. Many close friends and staff members had long suspected this to have been the case, stating that Thurmond had always taken a great amount of interest in Washington-Williams and that she was granted a degree of access to the former President more appropriate to a family member than to a member of the public.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© Today in Alternate History, 2004-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Beasts Source: Wikipedia Labels: Strom Thurmond, Segregration, Apartheid, Reconstruction, America. Editor says, on December 10, 2002 Incoming Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott issued a written apology over his comment that the United States would have avoided "all these problems" if then-segregationist Strom Thurmond had been elected president in 1948. "A poor choice of words conveyed to some the impression that I embraced the discarded policies of the past," Lott said. "Nothing could be further from the truth, and I apologize to anyone who was offended by my statement."Lott, R-Mississippi, made the comment Thursday on Capitol Hill during a 100th birthday celebration for Thurmond, who was retiring the next month after nearly 48 years in the Senate (Source - CNN).
~ You know if Thurmond was a serious runner for President, the media would have been licking their lips for such a love child story, tracked her down ruthlessly, & the scandal would have been much bigger than Lewinski's oral skills ever were. And if he had been elected, through some miracle, expect him to be the first US President to be successfully impeached...
~ By the 1940s, the writing was on the wall for segregation, one way or another. It had lasted as long as it had mostly because most Americans outside the South weren't really aware of it---but during the World Wars, a lot of Northerns saw Dixie up close, and were often shocked at what they saw. Things like the Scottsboro Boys' case, not to mention the very bad taste Hitler's shenanigans had left in people's mouths, did their bit to bring the end closer.
~ Oh, I don't know about that, David; look at how Kennedy got the kid glove treatment, despite his sleazy private life and numerous medical problems. Granted, JFK was a member of the Northeastern establishment, but I don't think there was any hint of this story coming out during Thurmond's time.
~ Well that's true Zach, but then again the media is controlled by liberals, so no wonder they left JFK alone ;)
A right-winger llike Thurmond, on the other hand, would have been the media's wet dream come true... lol
~ The attitude on race mixing as so blatantly supported by Thurmond would make this kid a bigger problem than Kennedy's fornication ever would have been.
~ If Strom thurmond had ben elected in '48 and as a result "all those problems" had not occurred, how would his admirers even have known about them? I suggest the following: "And because the rest of the country followed our lead, America remnains today a white man's country in which the colored races know their place and keep to it, and as a result Americans of all races live in happy harmony in the freest nation in history."
Such hypocrisy would have been well in keeping with the racial attitudes of the Old South, for which words like "freedom," "eqaul" and "citizen" applied only to whites. (And not necessarily to all of them, either; non-Christians, and even Catholics, were undersstood to occupy a lesser place in society. JFK wouold never have been elected president in such a USA).
A bigger issue would be how Thurmond could have gotten elected in the first place. In "our" 1948, he didn't come anywhere close.
© Today in Alternate History, 2013-. All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
