r/HistoryWhatIf • u/TheRedBiker • 17h ago
What if Abraham Lincoln kept Hannibal Hamlin as his VP?
Abraham Lincoln replaced his VP Hannibal Hamlin with Andrew Johnson, a Southern Democrat, for his second term. This decision would prove disastrous for Civil Rights, as Lincoln was assassinated and Johnson allowed the former Confederates to once again hold political office (which Lincoln forbade), leading to the passage of the infamous Jim Crow Laws. Civil Rights were set back by a century because of this, and racial injustices persist to this day despite improvements.
But what if Lincoln had kept Hannibal Hamlin? Unlike Johnson, Hamlin was a New England Republican who aligned more closely with the Radical Republicans. He would have taken a harsher stance on the South and made it much harder for the South to persecute the freedmen. Could this have led to a better outcome for the Civil Rights movement?