The Qing Dynasty is about to end

Chapter 701: Fraud! How could Lincoln be elected when there was no Lincoln on the ballot?

On the morning of November 1860, 11, the Charleston Harbor in South Carolina was shrouded in mist. Standing on the balcony of the O'Hara mansion, Emperor Xianfeng looked at the cotton transport ships anchored in the harbor in the distance. He took a deep breath and felt the day that would determine the fate of America - today was a good day to vote in the 6th presidential election.

"Bishop Zhao, it's time to go!" Scarlett's crisp voice came from downstairs. She had specially put on the most formal dark blue dress today and a wide-brimmed hat decorated with feathers on her head. Gerald O'Hara had already harnessed the carriage, holding a cigar in his mouth and stamping his feet impatiently.

The carriage slowly drove through the streets of Charleston. Xianfeng noticed that this most prosperous port city in the South seemed unusually quiet today. Dewdrops were still hanging on the oak trees on both sides of the street. Gentlemen dressed in fine clothes walked to the polling station in twos and threes, some with their wives and some with slave servants behind them.

"Everyone seems very calm," Xianfeng told Gerald. "It's nothing like the tense situation during the election in California."

Gerald blew out a puff of smoke and laughed, "This is South Carolina, one of the old thirteen states of the United States of America. How can it be the same as California in the west?"

So that's it! Xianfeng thought to himself, "South Carolina is the old American flag. It has elected presidents 18 times before. This is the th election. It would be outrageous if we can't make a good choice again."

The carriage stopped in front of a small brick church, which was temporarily converted into a polling station. A dozen people had already lined up at the door, all of them well-dressed plantation owners and businessmen. Xianfeng noticed that there was no black person in the line - they were all standing aside, waiting for their masters to finish voting. There was no poor white person either - in Charleston, poor white people had their own special polling station and would not vote with respectable plantation owners.

The voting process was surprisingly smooth. Xianfeng showed his "naturalization certificate", and a wrinkled red-necked old white man just glanced at him and saw that the tailcoat he was wearing was made of "voile" fabric made in England, so he handed him a ballot and a pen.

"Just put a check mark under the name of the 19th President of the United States in your mind, sign your name and put it in the box," the old man said to Xianfeng with a smile in his thick southern accent.

The election organization of the old American Star-Spangled Banner is really good! Xianfeng praised it in his heart, took the ballot, and then was stunned. Because there were only two names on this beautifully printed ballot: Stephen A. Douglas (Democratic Party) and John Bell (Constitution Party)!
There are three candidates in this election! Where is Lincoln from the Republican Party?
"Sir," Xianfeng couldn't help asking, "where is Lincoln's name?"

The old man narrowed his eyes, looked Xianfeng up and down, and suddenly showed a meaningful smile: "Young man, in South Carolina, no one will vote for that damn abolitionist and high tariff advocate, so we don't need to print his name on our ballot."

Gerald laughed at the side: "If Lincoln can win, it must be because the Northerners are cheating! Because in our South, his votes don't exist at all, not even one!"

The gentlemen lining up around him all nodded in agreement: "Right!" "That makes sense!" "If Lincoln was elected, he must have cheated!"

Xianfeng nodded in agreement, silently ticked Douglas' name, and signed his own English name: Nicholas Zhao Si. When he put the ballot into the wooden box, he heard someone behind him whispering, "What's going on? That Chinese guy actually came to vote."

At the same time, downtown Manhattan, New York.

Rinko walked along Broadway holding the arm of Louis de Montebello, the French consul. Today's New York City is like a boiling cauldron, crowded with excited crowds.

"My country has twice established a republic," Montebello sighed as he looked at the scene on the street, "but now it has returned to the imperial era."

Rinko didn't respond to the Frenchman's words. Her eyes were attracted by the scene in front of a textile factory. About 500 workers in uniform were lining up and moving towards the polling station under the command of a pot-bellied Irish factory owner.

"Listen up!" The factory owner raised a trumpet made of rolled tin sheets and shouted in a thick Irish accent, "If anyone doesn't vote for Lincoln today, they won't have to come to work tomorrow! In addition, after voting, everyone will get a one-dollar tip!"

As soon as the workers heard about the tip, they immediately started shouting slogans: "If you don't love blacks, you love tariffs! If you don't vote for Lincoln, you will lose your job!"

The reason they shouted such slogans was, of course, because of Lincoln's "moderate line" - Lincoln did not say that he would abolish slavery. During the entire campaign, he only said what Republican voters liked to hear. Regarding the "black slave issue", he claimed that it would "not be expanded" and that it would be resolved through legal consultation while respecting "state rights" - that basically meant that it would not be resolved, so white workers did not have to worry about blacks coming to steal their jobs. Regarding the "Chinese exclusion issue", Lincoln claimed that Chinese workers would not be allowed to cross the Rocky Mountains! So white workers in the East did not have to worry about Chinese workers coming to steal their jobs. For those high-quality and low-priced industrial products in Europe, Lincoln claimed that he would increase tariffs, initially saying that they would increase from 15% to 37%, and later increased it to 46%. In short, both white capitalists and white workers in the northern states of the United States are now full of expectations for Lincoln's presidency.

But Montebello frowned: "A dollar tip for each person is a blasphemy against democracy!"

Rinko blinked her eyes and said, "Mr. Consul, didn't you see this kind of thing when you were in the Second French Republic?"

"Of course not," Montebello lowered his voice, "How could His Majesty the Emperor bribe the voters with money? He used the army and the priests!"

They followed the workers to a polling station, where the factory owner had sent a dozen supervisors to stand at the door of the voting room. After each worker came out after casting his vote, he had to report to the supervisor who he had voted for.

"Lincoln! I voted for Lincoln!" a pale young worker said tremblingly, "I swear to God!"

The supervisor patted him on the shoulder with satisfaction and stuffed a dollar into his pocket: "Very good, come to work again tomorrow."

Not far away, a reporter from the New York Tribune was recording this scene, with a look of complete innocence written all over his face. On the Pacific coast, in front of the True Covenant Cathedral in San Francisco.

Hong Daquan stood on the steps, looking at the hundreds of Chinese voters gathered below. Lei Laohu was standing on a makeshift podium, speaking to his compatriots in Cantonese.

"Brothers! The Republican Party is powerful. If we Chinese want to gain a foothold in California, we must stand on the side of the winner! So everyone must vote for Lincoln today."

There was sparse applause from the audience. A thin Chinese shop owner asked timidly, "But Mr. Lei, Lincoln said he would raise tariffs. What will happen to our business?"

Lei Lao Hu showed a sly smile: "High tariffs are good! The higher the tariffs, the more money smuggling makes. We Cantonese people understand smuggling best!"

The applause was much louder this time!

Hong Daquan curiously asked Huang Shiren beside him: "California is so far away from the east, how can smuggling be done? Do we have to go by land?"

Huang Shiren whispered mysteriously in his ear: "We are going to label the silk shirts, silk dresses, silk underwear and so on brought by the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom as 'Made in California', and then the California Customs will issue a certificate, so that we can ship them to the East for sale. Archbishop, you don't know, these silk clothes are very expensive in the United States!"

"Isn't this illegal?" Hong Daquan asked in surprise.

"Illegal?" Huang Shiren laughed. "If it's illegal, shouldn't the court decide it? Four of the five justices in the California Supreme Court are ours, and the local prosecutors in California are also ours!"

It's still possible! Hong Daquan thought: The local tyrants in the United States will be able to cover the sky with one hand!

After the voting began, Hong Daquan noticed that each Chinese voter was followed by a True John "instructor" to ensure that they voted for Lincoln correctly.

November 1860, 11, Springfield, Illinois.

The telegraph office's machines had been running for 24 hours straight. Lincoln's campaign headquarters was packed with supporters anxiously waiting for news. Suddenly, a telegraph operator rushed in, waving a telegram in his hand:

"New York! Lincoln wins!"

“Pennsylvania! Lincoln wins!”

"Illinois"

As Lincoln won the electoral votes of each state, the headquarters suddenly erupted in deafening cheers. By the evening of that day, Lincoln had won enough "key states" and "swing states" to collect the 152 electoral votes required for the election, and as expected, he secured victory. The champagne bottle was opened, and the foam sprayed everywhere. Lincoln stood in the corner with a tired and restrained smile on his face.

Meanwhile, at Douglas' campaign headquarters in New York, the atmosphere was quite different.

"This is blatant fraud!" Douglas' campaign manager slammed a stack of reports on the table. "We have received testimonies from workers in three states that they were forced to vote!"

A Democratic senator said grimly: "What's even more incredible is that in New York and Pennsylvania, those factory owners who supported Lincoln actually gave one dollar to each worker who voted for Lincoln. This is vote bribery!"

The next afternoon, in Charleston, Xianfeng and the O'Hara family sat together looking at a copy of the Charleston Courier that had just been delivered. When Gerald saw that the Republicans had declared Lincoln the winner, he angrily threw his glass to the ground.

"Damn those Yankees! They cheat!"

Scarlett asked worriedly, "Father, what should we do?"

Xianfeng looked out the window at the white sails of the cotton boats in the harbor and whispered, "War is coming."

(End of this chapter)