#WhatIf Lincoln didn't replace Hannibal Hamlin as his Vice President in 1864? Thus Hamlin becomes President in 1865 rather than Andrew Johnson. #alternatehistory (1)
https://twitter.com/alt_historian/status/1473667007639924740
1865 - Hannibal Hamlin is sworn in as the 17th President of the United States. Having narrowly kept his job as VP after Lincoln shelved plans for a unity ticket in 1864 in order to appease Radical Republicans, Hamlin takes a more aggressive approach to Reconstruction. (2)
Hamlin's first term sees Special Field Orders No. 15 (which granted 400k acres of land to 18,000 former enslaved families) is never rescinded, former Confederates are immediately barred from ever holding office again, and many Confederate leaders are imprisoned for treason. (3)
Hamlin also aggressively supports the Freedmen's Bureau which cements the legacy of Field Order 15, and gives former slaves the means to build intergenerational wealth. Sherman is given carte blanche to deal with Neo-Confederate groups like the KKK and the White League. (4)
By 1868 the only southern states to be readmitted to the Union have been largely purged of Confederate officials and drafted constitutions with universal male suffrage. Hamlin is re-nominated over the objections of more conservative Republicans. (5) 
Hamlin's second term sees the KKK all but wiped out in the South, however the White Leagues remain a persistent problem as they adopt more clandestine strategies to infiltrate the Republican party itself and re-establish the antebellum social order. (6)
Hamlin elects not to seek another term in 1872, due in large part to efforts to draft Secretary of War Ulysses S. Grant for the Presidency. Grant is hotly opposed by conservative Republicans who walk out of the convention and join with former Dems to launch the Liberal Party. (7)
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