| October 29 |  |
Editor says, in this thread the left-wing Al Smith becomes President in 1928.
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In 1928, on this day the United States stock market crashed, ushering in the worldwide economic collapse known as the Great Depression.
Cometh the hour, cometh the manThere had been a scare on October 24th, but the events of the 29th were catastrophic. Yet only twelve days before, America's foremost economist, Yale Professor Irving Fisher had commented that "Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau".
During March 1929, the new president Al Smith took the drastic step of closing all the banks temporarily. Stocks had by then lost 80% of their value since " Red Friday"1, the day when capitalism ended in the United States, and the American Dream of Socialism began.
Historians speculate that without Red Friday, Smith would have been easily beaten by Herbert Hoover who had served as Commerce Secretary throughout the Coolidge Administration. Yet the "October Surprise" could only have one benefactor. Because in his political career, Smith traded on his working-class beginnings, identified himself with immigrants, and campaigned as a man of the people.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© Paul Baldwin, "The 365 most important events of the twentieth century"Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Wikipedia Labels: Al Smith, Depression, America, Stock Market Crash, Recession. Editor says, please note we have taken at least one liberty with this post because we have moved the stock market crash forward by a year with no explanation. Ho-hum. 
Also, 1) instead of Black Friday we have Red Friday as it launched the socialist revolution in America you see.
~ Now this makes for a very interesting impact on WWII, not to mention the post war period. It'd be interesting to see how a socialist USA deals with the communist USSR...
~ White Friday?
~ I don't see a stock market cfrash thata close to the election as being enough to tip the vote to Smith. A lot of the opposition to him was based on his being Catholic (as would be true even 32 years slater with John F. Kennedy), and it would have taken some time for the economic crash on Wall Street to have had consequences on Main Street grave enough to overcome this prejudice, if indeed that could have happened.
~ And oh, yes, a "socialist" USA? Al Smith was no socialist. Indeed, he became a bitter opponent, from the right, of FDR's New Deal., which he denounced as socialist. Merely campaigning as a "man of the people" is a long way from socialism.
~ The question here is if we are looking at Social Democracy(tm) or a Stalinist Train Wreck complete with Totalitarianism.
~ I concur with Griffin, this could go either way. I'd imagine civil war sparking up somewhere.
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