President of the United States

Seal Of The President Of The Unites States Of America

The president of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The role of the Executive Branch, of which the president is the head, is to enforce the national laws as stated in the Constitution or made by Congress. The office of president was established upon the ratification of the United States Constitution in 1788 and the first president, George Washington, took office in 1789.

The president serves as the chief executive and leader of the executive branch of the federal government. Article Two of the Constitution establishes the president as the commander-in-chief of the armed forces and enumerates powers specifically granted to the president, including the power to sign into law bills passed by both houses of Congress, to create a Cabinet of advisers, to grant pardons or reprieves, and, with the "advice and consent" of the Senate, to make treaties and appoint federal officers, ambassadors, and federal judges (including Justices of the Supreme Court). Article Two also defines a presidential term at four years.

In OTL, since 1951, presidents have been limited to two terms by the Twenty-second Amendment. There have been 46 presidencies, but only 45 individuals have held the office; Grover Cleveland served two non-consecutive terms.

This article lists the known presidents found in a fictional work after the Point of Divergence in alternate history, or sitting presidents found in works of science fiction. Presidents who served before the POD of a given alternate history that are mentioned in passing do not need to be listed here - even if they are still alive during the story but do nothing during it. Stories set in the history of OTL may reference past presidents, the sitting president, or future presidents: unless the work is one of speculative fiction, those presidents do not belong here.

Republican Democratic Socialist

"The Breaking of Nations"[]

Donald Trump attained the presidency with the aid of Vladimir Putin of Russia.^[1] At Putin's direction, Trump laid the foundation for increased right-wing authoritarianism in the United States, which in turn lead to the eventual dismemberment of the country.^[2]. Trump didn't live to see the break-down; he died in the second COVID-19 outbreak in 2024,^[3] and his successor, Mike Pence, who also owed his office to Putin, attempted to thwart the creation of the new country of Pacifica from the states of the west coast. It wasn't until Putin formally recognized Pacifica that Pence backed down.^[4]

№	President		Term	Party	Vice President
45	Donald Trump		2017-2024	Republican	Mike Pence (Ascended to the Presidency)
46	Mike Pence		2024-2033, 2033-20??*	Republican	Lindsey Graham

Literary Comment[]

"The Breaking of Nations" ends in 2031. In "The Purloined Republic", James Morrow's contribution to And the Last Trump Shall Sound, we learn that Pence worked around the Twenty-second Amendment by running as vice president on the bottom of the ticket with Devin Nunes in 2032. Shortly after being sworn in as the 47th president of the United States, Nunes resigned, and Pence became the 48th president. As Turtledove did not participate in writing Morrow's work, this wiki will not incorporate further information from that story.

"Election Day"[]

In 2016, the Democrats were able to keep the presidency when Senator John F. Kennedy Jr. defeated Republican Donald Trump in a close race.^[5]

№	President	Term	Party	Vice President
43	George W. Bush	2001-2009	Republican	Dick Cheney
44	Barack Obama	2009-2017	Democratic	Joe Biden
45	John F. Kennedy Jr.	President-elect at story's end	Democratic	Michael Bennet

The Guns of the South[]

With the Second American Revolution ending in a Confederate victory in 1864, Democratic challenger Horatio Seymour defeated incumbent U.S. president Abraham Lincoln in a highly contested election.

№	President		Term	Party	Vice President
16	Abraham Lincoln		1861-1865	Republican	Hannibal Hamlin
17	Horatio Seymour		1865- Incumbent at novel's end, 1868	Democratic	Clement Vallandigham

Joe Steele[]

In 1932, California Congressman Joe Steele won the presidency, and established a dictatorship during the course of his unprecedented five terms. He died in March 1953, about six weeks into his sixth term, and was succeeded by Vice President John Nance Garner. However, through the machinations of former Steele loyalists, Garner was impeached, convicted, and removed from office. As a series of circumstances had removed all legal successors to the presidency, J. Edgar Hoover, the head of the Government Bureau of Investigation, seized emergency executive powers, and moved into the Oval Office. He maintained the title of "Director", rather than adopting the office of President.

№	President	Term	Party	Vice President
31	Herbert Hoover	1929-1933	Republican	Charles Curtis (presumed)
32	Joseph V. Steele	1933-1953	Democrat	John Nance Garner (Ascended to the presidency)
33	John Nance Garner	March-April(?), 1953	Democrat	Office vacant

Directorate[]

№	Director		Term	Party
1	J. Edgar Hoover		1953- incumbent at novel's end	N/a

Literary comment[]

The original "Joe Steele" story has a different ending. After Steele's death, a three-way conflict among President Garner, the Hammer, and J. Edgar Hoover claims the lives of both the Hammer and Garner, and Hoover takes over. It is not revealed what title he uses. This is in contrast to the novel's "legalistic" process of bloodlessly removing Garner from office and Hoover establishing himself as the "Director", but the end result is essentially the same.

"Must and Shall"[]

President Abraham Lincoln was killed by a Confederate sharpshooter at Fort Stevens in 1864, during the Great Rebellion. Vice President Hannibal Hamlin ascended to the presidency, and began a policy of retribution against the rebelling Southern states. Hamlin's successors continued this policy.

№	President	Term	Party	Vice President
16	Abraham Lincoln	1861-1864	Republican	Hannibal Hamlin (Ascended to the presidency)
17	Hannibal Hamlin	1864-1869(?)	Republican	Vacant to 1865
18-??	Successors unnamed	1869-1942	Unknown	Unknown

Southern Victory[]

For most of the history of the United States between the end of the War of Secession and the end of the Great War, the presidency was held by a member of the Democratic Party. This came in response to Abraham Lincoln's status as a Republican. Aside from Republican James G. Blaine, who served from 1881 to 1885, every president from 1865 to 1921 was a Democrat.

After U.S. victory in the Great War, Upton Sinclair became the first Socialist Party president. The Socialists had their most successful period over the next generation, winning five of the six elections between 1920 and 1940, though usually by very narrow margins. Neither party dominated the political cycle the way the Democrats had in the 19th century, as each party was able to capitalize on the failures of the other.

Following the Second Great War, Democrats successfully laid the blame for the Confederate States' initial successes on the comparatively lighter foreign policy of the Socialists. They parlayed this blame into victory in the 1944 election, electing Thomas Dewey to Powel House and also taking control of the House of Representatives.

It had been the custom since George Washington that the a president was only elected to two consecutive terms. Theodore Roosevelt ran for an unprecedented third term in 1920, but was defeated, thus leaving the custom intact.

Calvin Coolidge holds the distinction of being the only person elected to the office never to serve. After winning the 1932 election, Coolidge died of a heart attack the following January, just under a month before he could take the oath of office.

Al Smith was killed by a Confederate bombing raid in 1942, the first and only time a president was killed during war time.

Officially the presidential residence was the White House in Washington, DC. During the Second Mexican War, Washington was evacuated by the Federal government due to its location within range of Confederate heavy artillery. The government relocated to Philadelphia where the president set up residence and office space in the Powel House. After the war, the Federal government remained in Philadelphia due to Washington's continued insecure position, and though Washington remained the capital of the US de jure, for all practical purposes, Philadelphia became the permanent capital and Powel House the permanent executive mansion. The White House was periodically used by the incumbent president for certain formal functions, such as inauguration ceremonies and state funerals.

№	President	Term	Party	Vice President
16	Abraham Lincoln	1861-1865	Republican	Hannibal Hamlin
17-19(?)	Unknown	1865-1877	Democrat	Unknown
Unknown, possibly 19 or 20	Samuel J. Tilden	1877-1881	Democratic	Unknown
Unknown possibly 20 or 21	James G. Blaine	1881-1885	Republican	Unknown
Unknown, possibly 21 or 22(?)	Unknown	1885-1889	Democrat	Unknown
Unknown, possibly 22 or 23(?)	Alfred Thayer Mahan¹	1889-1897 (?)	Democrat	Unknown
Unknown, possibly 23 or 24(?)	Thomas B. Reed¹	1897-1902 (?)	Democrat	Unknown
Unknown, possibly 24 or 25-27(?)	Unknown	1902-1913	Democrat	Unknown
28	Theodore Roosevelt	1913-1921	Democrat	Walter McKenna
29	Upton Sinclair	1921-1929	Socialist	Hosea Blackford
30	Hosea Blackford	1929-1933	Socialist	Hiram Johnson
31²	Herbert Hoover	1933-1937	Democrat	Office vacant
32	Al Smith	1937-1942	Socialist	Charles W. La Follette (Ascended to the presidency)
33	Charles W. La Follette	1942-1945	Socialist	Office vacant
34	Thomas Dewey	1945- Incumbent at series' end	Democrat	Harry Truman

Literary Comment[]

In The Center Cannot Hold, Hosea Blackford is specified as the 30th person to serve as president. Mathematically, this implies that two presidents did not complete their terms at some point between 1865 and 1913 for this to be possible.

The text does not identify all presidents between those years. Only Tilden, Blaine, Mahan, and Reed are named as such for the relevant time period (1865-1913). The exact terms of Mahan and Reed have not been revealed; circumstantial textual evidence supports Mahan serving from 1889-1897, and Reed serving from 1897-1902 (which would make him one of the two presidents to die in office).

1=Presidents identified in the series canon, but their terms are not given.
2=Calvin Coolidge was elected to be the 31st President, but died before taking office, so his entire term was served by his elected Vice President Hoover.

"Vilcabamba"[]

With the arrival of the Krolp and their military domination of the planet, the United States was reduced to a rump state that ran among the Rocky Mountains and the Wasatch Range, combined with a small part of Canada. The offices of President of the United States and Prime Minister of Canada were combined in one person. The office also became hereditary.^[6] The last duly elected president was Harris Moffatt I. His lineage continued to rule the rump U.S. until the presidency of his grandson Harris Moffatt III from the de facto capital of Grand Junction, Colorado. However, with the final defeat of the U.S., 50 years after the Krolp arrived, the presidency was abolished and Harris Moffatt III was forced into exile in the Krolp's North American capital of St. Louis.

Known Presidents:

Harris Moffatt I
Harris Moffatt II (killed by a renegade Krolp)
Harris Moffatt III
Office abolished

Worldwar[]

In the aftermath of the Race invasion of Earth, the American presidency saw two critical interruptions. The first came in 1944 with the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Vice President Henry Wallace had been killed in January of that year, when the Race's explosive-metal bomb destroyed Seattle while Wallace was visiting. Secretary of State Cordell Hull succeeded Roosevelt per the Presidential Succession Act of 1886.

The second came in 1965 when President Earl Warren committed suicide after agreeing to allow the Race to destroy Indianapolis. The Race had learned that Warren had ordered the secret attack on the Race's Colonization Fleet in 1962, and the destruction of Indianapolis was the only way to avoid war and to ensure the U.S. remained a global power.

With Washington destroyed by the Race in 1942, the capital was moved to Little Rock, Arkansas after the Peace of Cairo of 1944. The executive residence was the Gray House.

№	President	Term	Party	Vice President
32	Franklin D. Roosevelt	1933-1944	Democrat	Henry Wallace January 20, 1941 - 1944 (Died in office)
33	Cordell Hull	1944-1945(?)	Democrat	Vacant until 1945
34-??	Unknown	1945-1961	Unknown
?	Earl Warren	1961-1965	Republican	Harold Stassen (Ascended to the presidency)
?	Harold Stassen	1965-1969(?)	Republican	Vacant until 1969
?	Unknown	1969-2021	Various	Unknown
?	Joyce Peterman	2021-2025 (estimated)	Unknown	Unknown
?	Unknown	2025-series' end, 2032	Unknown	Unknown

Other Presidents[]

In addition to the above, Harry Turtledove has written several works of speculative fiction in which the presidency plays a prominent role or, at a minimum, in which the incumbent president is referenced. The following presidents were in office during or after the points of divergence of various alternate history works, or in speculative stories which are not alternate history.

John Quincy Adams is referenced as the incumbent president in "Hail! Hail!"

"Lee at the Alamo" is set from February to March 1861, during the transition from James Buchanan to Abraham Lincoln. Buchanan is referenced, and Lincoln directly appears.

"The House That George Built" references Woodrow Wilson (in office at the POD) and Franklin D. Roosevelt (incumbent at story's end, February 1941).

In the State of Jefferson Stories, the 1919 POD does not seem to have affected the list of presidents as of 1981, when the most recent installment "Tie a Yellow Ribbon" takes place. Referenced post-POD presidents include Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, and Ronald Reagan. Carter appears via television in "Always Something New," with Reagan being the incumbent during "Tie a Yellow Ribbon".

In addition to the above, Franklin D. Roosevelt is president in the "Cayos in the Stream", Days of Infamy series, "News From the Front", Or Even Eagle Flew, and The War That Came Early, all of which end during FDR's third term. "News From the Front" ends with Congress preparing to impeach Roosevelt in 1942; he would have been succeeded by Vice President Henry Wallace if convicted and removed from office. FDR is also president during the early scenes of The Man With the Iron Heart, and is referenced posthumously later in that novel.

Harry Truman appears as president in The Man With the Iron Heart and The Hot War, being a POV in the latter.

Dwight Eisenhower is referenced as the incumbent president in "Hindsight".

John F. Kennedy is the president and central POV character in "A Massachusetts Yankee in King Arthur's Court", a fantasy set in OTL. In The Valley-Westside War, whose POD came no later than 1961, Kennedy appears to have been assassinated on the same schedule as OTL; his successor is unnamed, and the presidency ceased to exist as a result of the Russian-American War of 1967.

Kennedy is also president in the unfinished work Winter of Our Discontent, initially co-written with Bryce Zabel, wherein Kennedy survives the attempt on his life, and is subsequently re-elected in 1964, but faces impeachment in 1966. Zabel completed the novel on his own and it was published under the title Surrounded by Enemies: What if Kennedy Survived Dallas? in July 2013. As Turtledove withdrew from the project while it was in progress, the final book is not in the purview of this Wiki.

Lyndon Johnson is referenced as the incumbent president in "The Fillmore Shoggoth", set in H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos. His only interaction with the story's speculative elements is ordering a military presence in San Francisco to guard against shoggoths.

In addition to the above, Donald Trump appears in the guise of the "Terrific Leader" in the short work of the same name. He reigns over an authoritarian regime several years after his initial election. The story is set in the then-future of OTL.

An unnamed incumbent president is referenced in Supervolcano: Eruption. As the series takes place over a period of eight to ten years, this person has probably left office before the end.

In Alpha and Omega, the incumbent president appears briefly. Unlike other world leaders in the novel, he does not seem to be modeled after anyone in particular.

In "Elder Skelter", an unnamed incumbent president is the POV character.

Historical Presidents in Non-Presidential Roles[]

Several historical presidents have appeared in the alternate history works of Harry Turtledove but never assumed the office for any number of reasons. In some works, the story is set well before the historical figure took office, or the historical figure is killed before taking office. In other works, the office does not exist. Stories set in the past of OTL may reference a historical figure who later became President; unless the story is one of speculative fiction, such references do not belong here.

George Washington plays significant posthumous background roles in The Two Georges as Governor-General of the North American Union, and The Disunited States of America as a great general but not as a political leader.

John Adams is posthumously referenced in The Two Georges as the namesake of a brand of ale in the North American Union.

John Quincy Adams plays a posthumous role in The Disunited States of America as the leader of the independent state of Massachusetts after the United States dissolved in the early 19th century.

Andrew Jackson is referenced in The Two Georges as a Governor-General of the North American Union. In "Hail! Hail!," he is referenced as presidential hopeful, but the story ends before the campaign.

Abraham Lincoln is referenced in "Hail! Hail!" as a backwoods adolescent, who is too young to run for President at the end of the story.

Andrew Johnson appears in "Must and Shall" as Military Governor of Tennessee in 1864, and the remainder of his life is not discussed. In The Guns of the South, Johnson plays a background role as a losing candidate for vice president, and the novel ends before the next election.

Ulysses S. Grant appears in The Guns of the South as the Commanding General of the Army, and the novel ends before he has had a chance to begin a political career. He appears in How Few Remain as a retired failure, and later volumes of Southern Victory confirm that he never became President. In "Must and Shall," he is referenced as a victorious general, but there is no indication that he was ever president.

Rutherford B. Hayes is referenced in The Guns of the South in his OTL role as a soldier, and is killed during the Second American Revolution in 1864.

James A. Garfield appears as a U.S. Senator in How Few Remain, and is never mentioned again in the rest of the Southern Victory series.

Benjamin Harrison is the Secretary of War in How Few Remain, and is never referenced again in the rest of the Southern Victory series.

William Howard Taft appears in Southern Victory as a congressman who never becomes president.

Woodrow Wilson appears in The Great War trilogy as President of the Confederate States.

Franklin D. Roosevelt is not president in two works. He seeks the presidency in Joe Steele (both the novel and the short story) but is murdered before he can win the Democratic nomination. He features prominently in the Southern Victory series as both Secretary of War and Assistant Secretary of War for the United States cabinet, but never seeks the presidency.

Harry Truman appears in Settling Accounts: In at the Death as Vice President at the end of the novel.

Dwight D. Eisenhower appears in his OTL role as a general in The Hot War, Joe Steele (and its source story), The Man With the Iron Heart, and Worldwar. In Joe Steele, he specifically refuses to seek the office. There is no indication in Worldwar that he was ever president. In The Man with the Iron Heart and The Hot War, he is mentioned as a popular candidate, but both works end before the next election.

John F. Kennedy appears in The Two Georges as a magazine publisher who bitterly opposes the North American Union's form of government. He appears on the cover of the first edition of Colonization: Down to Earth, operating a "futuristic" personal computer, but he is never mentioned in the actual text of the Worldwar Franchise.

Richard Nixon appears in Colonization: Second Contact (as a Congressman), The Two Georges (as a used "steamer" salesman), Settling Accounts: The Grapple (as a soldier), and Joe Steele (as an Assistant Attorney General). He plays background roles in The Hot War: Armistice (as a Senator) and "Hindsight" (as Vice President). In The Two Georges he never entered politics, while the Worldwar Franchise (of which Second Contact is part) skips ahead in time and leaves his biography undiscussed. All the others end before he has had chance to run for President.

Jimmy Carter appears briefly in Settling Accounts: Drive to the East, as a Confederate Navy sailor during the Second Great War in 1942, where he is promptly killed in action.

Ronald Reagan appears in American Empire: The Victorious Opposition as a sportscaster and The Man With the Iron Heart as a movie actor; both timelines end before he can enter politics.

The story "Bedfellows" involves George H. W. Bush (referenced) and his son George W. Bush (appearing directly). The office of presidency is not mentioned. As the story is a satire, taking the plot literally is not the best approach to the material.

Donald Trump appears directly in "Election Day," a story predicated around his failure to win the presidency. Trump's OTL role of tycoon and pussy-grabber is occasionally referenced in stories "set in the future of OTL" but written well before his election as President; e.g., The Disunited States of America and Supervolcano: All Fall Down. Trump is also referenced in Alpha and Omega; he was incumbent at time of publication, but it is unclear whether he was ever President in the novel's universe.