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Indicus's maps, wikiboxes, &c thread

Cape Republic: Election of 1858
The Batavian Republic's views on the white people of the Cape Colony were, from the very beginning, wholly negative. Influenced by travel literature, its first Commissioner-General Jacob Abraham Uitenhage de Mist, who ruled from 1804 to 1819, believed the people of the Cape to be barbaric. He believed the whites were rapacious, who desired to crush the Khoikhoi and Xhosa like wolves, and the existence of slavery was something he viewed as an immense evil. Their language, a creolized patois of Dutch, was barbaric to his ear. He believed the white population of the Cape needed to be civilized and turned Dutch, and be made to love the Rights of Man and the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity.

As such, he believed them incapable of self-government and refused to establish any sort of legislature. When the Governor, Janssens, proved too amenable to planter interests, he requested the Asiatic Council dismiss him, which they did so. Thus, he established a number of comprehensive reforms. He established educational institutions which spoke Dutch, including a day and boarding school in Kaapstad. Here the roots of Kaapstad University emerged. He also invited massive numbers of clergy from the metropole to educate. On slavery, he established new laws which prohibited the Indian Ocean slave trade and regulated their treatment; yet, he believed slavery was something which needed to be phased out over time, and so he sought to phase it out through liberty of the womb. He established new taxes, some of which funded his educational system, but much of which was centred around funding the migration of indigent Dutch women, who he believed would civilize the Kaapenaars through intermarriage. This brought him into immediate conflict with the white Kaapenaars. Immediately they resisted his attempts to turn them Dutch, and many of them were quick to promote their Huguenot heritage in an attempt to push their separate identity. De Mist's attempts to teach science in educational institutions led many to view science as un-Biblical; most infamously, attempts to teach children the roundness of the world resulted in immediate discontent by white Kaapenaars who felt that the Bible declared the world to be flat. The new taxes were met with scorn. But it was the laws on slavery which met the most hate. When the colonial charter of 1807 declared liberty of the womb from 1810, there was mass discontent, though generally it was voided by slaveholders simply backdating slave births when reporting to authorities; nevertheless, in Kaapstad and district cities it did help create a large freedmen population with their own culture influenced by Malay and Khoikhoi culture. When in 1812 De Mist declared the disarming of settlers on the frontier with the Xhosa to prevent expansionism, this caused a rebellion, the Uitenhage rebellion, which was swiftly crushed by the military; subsequently many settlers moved into the Transgariep region where authority was nonexistent, and those who remained saw their firearm advantage over the Xhosa destroyed, which is credited for stopping settler encroachment on the Xhosa lands.

Yet, despite this unpopularity De Mist continued on. The colonial charter declared all people born in the Cape Colony were citizens, slaves excluded, and this included bruinmensen and black people. Of course, self-government was wholly denied and continued to be as such, and this enabled more reforms along the same enlightened despotic lines. Prisoners were brought from the Dutch East Indies, including Salafi Muslims from the Padri War and Sultan Diponegoro of Yogyakarta along with his loyalists. New people were brought in onto the frontiers, including Catholics from the Flanders region of France. This immediately caused conflict with the extremely Calvinist frontier settlers. With religious toleration the law of the land, the Catholics were nevertheless allowed to practice their religion with some state funding. Even the madrasa in Kaapstad, constructed by Cape Malays who were recently slaves, saw a level of state funding if only because De Mist viewed education as a fundamental good which would "civilize" the former slaves. By the time De Mist left in 1819, he felt his project to turn the "barbaric" Cape into a true Dutch outpost was successful. Ultimately, though he did have some good intentions, he was racist in his own manner, and he was wholly willing to tolerate the tyranny of slavery. The subsequent war with Britain in the 1820s saw a British invasion of the Cape, with the Batavian Republic sending in bruinmensen and white regiments against them, but they were defeated.

Following the collapse of the British government in a revolution in 1827 and the return of the Cape to the Batavian Republic, the new Commissioner-Generla Godert van der Capellen brought about his own new schemes into the Cape. He believed that the racial mixture of the whites and Khoisan created a greater race combining the best features of them both, and he found the bruinmensen an admirable race. To that end, he promoted the migration of Dutch men, who he believed would inevitably intermarry Khoisan women in the absence of any white women. Indeed that happened, but many also married Christianized Xhosa women, creating a distinct bruinmensen culture in the east. With slavery weakened by the end of the slave trade and liberty of the womb, van der Capellen sought to end it once and for all and declared universal emancipation, and this ended the backdating loophole. It was the last straw for many, and the Transgariep region declared its independence as a republic; van der Capellan swiftly had it occupied. Yet, he also saw a flow of colonists including army deserters into the Transvaal region, where they established the Transvaal Republic over the native Ndebele through the firearm advantage, and seeking to stem the flight he established the first real elective institution beyond Kaapstad's municipal council - the Councils of Citizens in districts, with a liberal franchise. These were small enough that they could be dominated by the landdrosten, but large enough that they enabled political divisions to manifest. Most infamously, in Uitenhage they caused a string of Catholic-Protestant rioting in Uitenhage. The secret ballot was adopted to stem this rioting, and this helped justify the government denying further progress in establishing repesentative institutions. By the time van der Capellen died in 1851, the Cape remained an autocracy.

But the 1850s saw the Bandjermasin War in the East Indies and this brought large numbers of prisoners. While prisoners from the East Indies as well as neo-Orangist conspirators from the metropole were brought as prisoners and this had long been an issue, this suddenly burst it onto the stage, and the government under Commissioner-General Jan Alexander Gogel desiring to expand penal labour further annoyed many, who felt it demonstrated how the government knew nothing about local matters, and caused mass petitioning for representative institutions. In 1858, the Dutch government allowed it, creating the Colonial Councils capable of issuing Resolutions which the executive branch would be forced to follow. The franchise was the same as the broad franchise of the Councils of Citizens, which enabled nonwhite participation, which was justified on the basis that this would pacify rebellions, it would "civilize" the nonwhites, and . Quickly there emerged four factions. First, there was the government faction, supportive of the Commissioner-General. Beyond that there was the Cape Party, headquartered in the West and in defence of liberal institutions. In contrast, in the East, there emerged two parties, on the confessional divide, although in truth they were both very factional on the town divide. First, there was the Protestant party, founded by Protestant settlers who desired expansion and supported broadening the franchise for bruinmensen if only because almost all of them were Protestants. Second, there was the Catholic party, which desired expansion equally but also wanted religious equality for white people. In the ultimate election, deputies were elected on hyper-localized platforms and the Commissioner-General was able to bribe enough newly-elected deputies, both outright and with patronage and constituency funding, that he ensured his control over the Colonial Council. Yet, the era of Commissioner-General absolutism was over, and the parties now had a platform from which to make themselves known.

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Revolutionary Britain: Loyal United Church of England and Ireland
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The Loyal United Church of England and Ireland is a church active in the British Isles.

The Loyal Anglican Church originates following the Popular Revolution in 1827, deposing King Frederick from the British throne. Exiled to Hanover where he was its Elector, he officially declared the Convention Parliament illegal while hoping for some sort of restoration; when instead the Convention Parliament declared him a tyrant comparable to the Stuarts, made the theoretical Whig principle that Parliament had the power to make heads of state official, and established a provisional regime, Frederick declared that him and his loyalists were the true government of the British Isles. The union of church and state in place therefore meant that accordingly, the "true" Church of England was that which formed around him, and as most of the bishops in place in England and Ireland fled to Hanover with him, this meant that he had its leadership behind him. In the British Isles, many remained fully loyal to him and the deposed regime and his role as Supreme Leader of the Church of England, and Loyal Anglican activities proved constant. The "official" Church of England, endorsed by the provisional government, increasingly proved cash-strapped following the abolition of the tithe, and it therefore auctioned off much of its property. Many of the people who purchased property proved to be Loyal Anglicans, and as such they sold it off to a corporation representing the Loyal Anglican Church, which sought to use the new guarantees of religious liberty established by the Charter to serve as a veil to its activities seeking restoration. And so emerged new chapels and churches, whose priests and pastors declared their loyalty to the Supreme Governor, Frederick, who they regarded as their "King Over the Water" in more private spaces.

This quickly received the ire of supporters of the revolutionary government, who feared mass conversion in an era in which many were converting away from Anglicanism and into Nonconformist creeds. They despised the role of the Loyal Anglican Church, and the unsubtle manner in which it was clearly a space for loyalists. The Loyal Church was clearly very much High Church tradition due to its aristocratic sympathies, and the Low Church and even Dissenter sympathies common among supporters of the revolutionary government meant that they immediately regarded it as "popish" and un-Protestant. This, combined with the manner in which Frederick was clearly the driving force behind the Loyal Church, meant that it immediately became regarded as a crypto-Catholic church despite its anti-Catholic attitudes, and though the Charter's expansive guarantees of religious liberty meant it could not officially stop services, they immediately went on the offensive. They called the Loyal Anglican Church "popish", "Jacobite", "Bourbon", and every other insult under the sun. "We believe in religious liberty for all, even pagans who worship foreign princes as living gods", one controversial supporter of the government declared, "be the foreign prince the Pontiff of Rome or the Elector of Hanover". In Hanover itself, the Loyal Anglican Church immediately got into conflict with the Lutheran population of Hanover as even there it was accused of crypto-Catholicism, though its separation from the Church of Hanover reduced conflict from what it would have been otherwise; the brewing movement for the establishment of a presbyterian structure within Hanoverian Lutheranism was quickly suppressed by a government which regarded presbyterianism as only one step from Cromwellianism.

Within the British Isles, the first great moment of political Loyal Anglicanism emerged within the Orangemen, which expanded from its Irish roots across the British Empire in the name of defending Protestantism, specifically Loyal Anglicanism, from its opponents. But when Orangemen burned Parliament in 1834 in political protest, the controversy caused its total collapse as many felt this an act of pure terrorism against the embodiment of the British constitution. Many Orangemen were found to be directly linked to Loyal Anglican circles, and its leadership in the Isles was subsequently thinned. In this period, therefore, the Loyal Anglican Church fell into infighting, and the rise of the massively unpopular Ernest Augustus as Elector of Hanover and pretender King of Britain weakened it further. The Loyal Church would only rise with William Gladstone's political career, when in the 1840s he successfully unified the rump Tories behind him as Traditionalists in the name of Throne and Altar. His fire-and-brimstone speeches in Parliament declaring his opponents "Jacobin destroyers of the Constitution" and the Radicals "forces of the Antichrist", made him popular among loyalists. Then came the long premiership of the popular Radical Wilfrid Lawson, and his popular intervention in the New Granadine War of Independence led even Loyal Anglicans to support his war against "Popish Spain". The definitive separation of Church and State in the 1850s, however, led to the Loyal Anglicans rising in popularity slightly as they no longer had to compete with a church with state endorsement. But when the Pope restored the Catholic hierarchy in Great Britain, the subsequent rise of anti-Catholic attitudes was one which Moderates who were members of the official Anglican Church were able to ride back into power, and Traditionalist and Loyal Anglican attempts to use the same anti-Catholic wave to their advantage were sidelined. The Traditionalists would later cease to become a political arm of the Loyal Anglicans when some Moderates, under the official Anglican Church, joined it in protest of the Moderate government's support of conservative reforms of the House of Lords.

In the 1860s, rising Anglo-Catholic attitudes were reflected the most among members of the Loyal Church. They stressed how, unlike most Protestant churches, the Anglican Church originated as a direct breakaway from the Catholic Church for purely political reasons, and as such they sought to reintroduce Catholic grandeur and ritualism into the Loyal Anglican Church. Such attitudes were wholly circumscribed within the official Anglican Church, with its firmly Low Church attitudes, but they thrived in the Loyal Church, even if it caused some to leave due to this blatant "popery". Some of these Anglo-Catholics went on to become full Catholics, but most stayed, and they made the Loyal Anglican Church very firmly High Church. A spirit of rapprochement emerged in the pretender's court in Hanover, who being forced to accede to Lutheran demands in Hanover now became tempted to compromise with the government which controlled the land they still claimed. Yet, voices in the pretender's court refused any co-operation with Jacobinism. Then came the War of German Unification in the 1880s, in which Hanover allied with Austria and later joined with it to create modern Germany. The British Isles' pro-German neutrality, opposing Prussian and French subterfuge, helped in some ways to allow for the eventual German victory. The new German government sought to ensure Britain would be even more pro-Germany, and so it sought to ensure a settlement finally resolving the dispute over who ruled the British Isles. In truth this was hardly a dispute; in the British Isles, the de facto republicanism became accepted by conservatives who wanted stability above all else, and the Elector of Hanover only made token protests maintaining his pretense as King of Great Britain and Ireland. But the eventual Treaty of Oldenburg (1888) finally ended the dispute definitively, as the elector of Hanover dropped all pretense once and for all. The Loyal Anglican Church was organized into the Anglican-Evangelical Church of Hanover, a church most common among the elite and separate from the Lutheran Church of Hanover despite both being headed by the elector; and the Loyal United Church of England and Ireland, which was in full communion with the Anglican-Evangelical Church of Hanover without being headed by the elector. The exilic "Archbishop of Canterbury" and other British "bishops" who controlled Loyal Anglican activities in permanent exile, were released from their positions and a new episcopacy was appointed from among British citizens, to lead the Church from the British Isles.

Today the Loyal Anglican Church is alive as well. In the highly religious nation that is the British Isles, it has an awkward position, being nominally Protestant while being in many ways theologically close to the Catholic Church. Its roots in loyalism have not been forgotten. It still celebrates the restoration of Charles II in 1660 with full services, and most of its members are avowed Traditionalists in politics. Yet, it is fully British today, and no longer is it loyal to a King Over the Water.
 
Maharashtra: State of Janjira
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The State of Janjira is a state within Maharashtra.

According to legend, Janjira was founded in 1498, after the Ahmadnagar Sultanate sent a Sidi (ethnic Ethiopian, descended from African slaves) admiral to conquer a well-placed castle. Here, he founded a state with assistance of other Sidi people, one which was nominally suzerain to but in practice aligned with whatever Sultanate ruled the Deccan. Uniquely, the state's Nawab was elected by a council of sidi notables, and this system survived. This therefore gave the state freedom of action to ally with other states, and in the late sixteenth century, it allied with the Ottoman Empire in its wars with Portugal over the Indian Ocean trade. But it was in the late seventeenth century that it gained its first great threat. With the rise of the modern state of Maharashtra in 1680 under Shivaji, it sought to takeover Janjira, but despite Shivaji's legendary stature on the battlefield, he was stopped. Other leaders repeatedly failed, until in 1733 the Marathas invaded it once more, and was able to force Janjira to become suzerain to Maharashtra. Even here it had some degree of freedom of action, using the collapse of the Mughal Empire to its advantage and taking over Jafrabad, on the coast of the Gujarati peninsula, and placing it under personal union.

Yet, it began to face threat. Its mode of royal election, in which an assembly of sidi sardars could make and unmake kings, began to face strain over the nineteenth century, when the Maharashtrian-British alliance and the new rise of trade resulted in the creation of a middle class, in the Janjira area which was both Hindu and Muslim, and it was Marathi-speaking. This was in contrast to the Sidi elite, all of whom were Muslim, and spoke a Hindustani dialect. This new middle class clamoured for admission into the council of sardars, but tradition meant this was refused. The Great Indian Famine of 1876-78 and the major deficiencies in the Maharashtrian state exposed by it resulted in the formation of the Shivaji Sabhas across Maharashtra in the name of administrative reform and centralization, and in Janjira the local Shivaji Sabha became an assemly of the excluded middle class. With the establishment of the Federation of Maharashtra in 1886 as a constitutional state, Janjira was forced to become a constituent state despite aversion to the loss of its autonomy. Subsequently, the federal government forced Janjira to establish reforms, creating a formal legislative body, and this legislative body was quickly drawn into a fight over power with the Nawab and the sardars. After a decade of infighting, the Janjira Constitution of 1921 formally established an indirect election process of the council of sardars, and put an end to the sidi elite's domination of the state.

Yet, the Marathi language now became the language of all administration with the rise of the new government, and speakers of Hindustani dialects now felt sidelined. They created a Hindustani language movement, and the Hindustani War of Independence, in which Hindustan rose up against British rule in a bloody manner, only emboldened this movement. Following the establishment of the State of Shivajinagar in the 1940s, the codification of its local Hindustani dialect as "Dakhni", and this language becoming co-official in this new state, the government of Janjira finally conceded, but only in a way. Wanting to separate Janjira from Hindustan, Dakhni was made co-official in Janjira; in any case, it was closer to the Hindustani dialect of Janjira than the Hindustani of Hindustan was. This was considered acceptable by the Hindustani language movement, which ceased its agitation.

Today, with its long history, Janjira stands. The exclusively Sidi character of its monarchy has come to an end, though in practice many Sidi people are elected to the post of Nawab regardless. In a strange arrangement, Janjira is in personal union with the state of Jafrabad on the coast of the Gujarati peninsula. Jafrabad itself is a territorial dependency of Maharashtra and is not run under the same laws. It lacks tariffs and duties, which has made it an important location for trade between Gujarat and Maharashtra, and it is a tax haven. The strange feudal arrangement Jafrabad has with it has given Janjira an importance it, as a small port, would not regularly have. Yet, as the state with the fort so well protected that even the great Shivaji couldn't conquer it, it has attracted a large and steady tourist revenue. And that has been a boon to its great economy.
 
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Revolutionary Britain: Loyalist Nova Scotia
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In the wake of the overthrow of the British monarchy in 1827 and the flight of King Frederick to Hanover, one question which was immediately up in the air was, what about the colonies? The East India Company acceded to the new regime after a string of (white) army demonstrations in favour of it. Natal and Australia acceded, its colonies really not being in any way self-sustainable. In Buenos Aires, the British colonial administration was overthrown by republican revolutionaries. But British North America remained in doubt. The unpopular union of Upper and Lower Canada, forcibly adjoined together in 1820 as the colony of Canada, consisted of near-constant infighting between the Governor-General and an alliance of Francophones and reformist Anglophones dominating the Legislative Assembly, in what seemed almost reminiscent of England's seventeenth century struggles. In Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Cape Breton Island, and Prince Edward Island, a reformist movement was beginning to emerge onto the surface, as it was in Newfoundland. To ensure accession, the British government sent a number of commissioners to each colony. In Canada, after a series of armed demonstrations, the colonial administration acceded reluctantly to the revolutionary government, bringing about the Age of Revolutions there. Newfoundland saw the writing on the wall and acceded as well. But what is now Nova Scotia disagreed. There, descendants of Loyalists continued to dominate all facets of society, save for the Acadians and some small numbers of American settlers, unlike in Upper Canada where more recent Patriots overwhelmed the prior Loyalists. And so, an assembly of administrators and military members in Halifax declared their continued loyalty to the deposed King, establishing what has been known as "Loyalist Nova Scotia". They arrested advocates of reform like Joseph Howe, despite they also feeling loyalty to the former King.

Originally, the junta felt the king was soon to return. They thought the revolutionary state was soon to collapse. And so, when the inevitable economic collapse thanks to the end of relations with the metropole occurred, they thought they could weather it. Illicit trade routes with the United States emerged, for timber and fish, and this was somewhat tolerated despite the extremely warm relations between the US and the revolutionary British Isles. But then the Convention Parliament ratified a Charter, and a Frame of Government. And the economic collapse got worse. And so did discontent, with even Loyalists feeling that Nova Scotia was truly incapable of self-administration at this point. And the Acadian French felt they had no place in this conflict of loyalties, and felt the feelings of disdain harshest of all. Nevertheless, despite the chasm of relations, Nova Scotia did accept new immigration waves of Protestant Highlanders, though refusing Irish Catholics fleeing the Famine. And thus, while Upper Canada became, as one historian put it, the union between the Loyalists who loved the Crown and the Irish who hated it, the same was not true for Nova Scotia. But yet, eventually, Nova Scotia was forced to accede, declaring for the revolutionary government. But with concessions, of self-government and continued non-immigration of Irish Catholics - thus why Gaelic-speaking Scottish Highlanders dominated immigration in the nineteenth century. Yet, with New Brunswick in particular ultra-loyalist, to mute it the revolutionary government forcibly merged all the colonies into a single union - and thus emerged modern Nova Scotia. Feelings of loyalism, however, continued to be common, only lessening with the death of King Frederick and the ascent of the ultra unpopular Ernest to the pretender's throne, and with the blunting aspects of time. Nonetheless, Nova Scotia is in part due to this period quite separate from the rest of Boreal North America and is culturally a great deal more "British" than any former colony except Columbia, so to speak.
 
View attachment 37558

Apne Kranti = Our Revolution
Rashtriya Morcha = National Front

I think that in this scenario Irani wins Gujarat, a state which has had a long history of Hindu Nationalist tradition, such as it being the state in which the first BJP seat was won and where Modi comes from. Also this:

Conversely, she would lose Nagaland, a state with a 90% Christian population. Assam seems like a state she would win if she plays up anti-Bengali immigrant feelings, though.
 
I think that in this scenario Irani wins Gujarat, a state which has had a long history of Hindu Nationalist tradition, such as it being the state in which the first BJP seat was won and where Modi comes from. Also this:

Conversely, she would lose Nagaland, a state with a 90% Christian population. Assam seems like a state she would win if she plays up anti-Bengali immigrant feelings, though.


First of all, this wikibox isn’t that serious nor deep, it’s a simple “India as France” analogue based on the Macron-Kejriwal comparisons that often pop up. This is a wikibox in which India has a very different history. Here, Gujarat lacks a Modi, an Ayodhya, and for that matter even a BAPS. It really is a very different place.

Second, I imagined Smriti Irani’s campaign being above all anti-immigrant. Thus, she gains many votes from Northeast India on the basis of its long-standing fears of being “swamped” by Bangladeshi migrants. I imagined she would win lots of votes in Jammu as well on the basis of xenophobia against Kashmiri Hindu refugees, though that obviously doesn’t show up on the map.
 
Hindustan: Red Fort
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The Red Fort is a historic fort in Delhi, Hindustan that served as the residence of the Mughal Emperor and continues to serve as such for his descendants; it also serves as a hotel and museum today.

Constructed from 1639 to 1648 as the residence of the Mughal emperor following the move to the capital of the empire to Delhi by Shah Jahan, it was carefully planned to include Persianate and Indo-Islamic materials, and it influenced other architecture in the Deccan, Punjab, Rajasthan, and Bengal as well. It served intermittently as the Mughal capital in the 17th and 18th centuries, and in 1739, following Nader Shah's invasion of India, it was plundered and left as a hollow shell. But in 1760, the Durrani emperor Ahmad Shah Abdali invaded India and, in the Third Battle of Panipat, took over the Red Fort and the Emperor fled to the Maratha Empire; he only returned in 1772, although not before recognizing the Maratha Scindia lord as regent of the empire. This state of affairs lasted until 1800, when on invitation from the Sultan of Mysore, the Durrani Emperor Zaman Shah invaded India. His army rapidly tore through Maratha-controlled Delhi and occupied it, turning the Maratha puppet administration into an Afghan puppet administration. This army was only stopped after it ransacked Lucknow, and at the Fourth Battle of Panipat an Anglo-Maratha army deflected it from Delhi and forced it back into Afghanistan; the wealth it got proved insufficient in stemming the Durrani Empire's massive issues. With that, the Mughal Emperor became a British puppet and in 1829 he was forced to reduce his official title to "Padishah of Delhi" and drop all claims outside the city; although a British garrison continued to be hosted in the city for his "protection".

In this period of British domination, the role of the Mughal Emperor began to change. He became a cultural leader for the city and beyond, and in this period he promoted Hindu-Muslim unity, with Akbar II establishing the Phool Walon ki Sair festival. As Delhi shrunk from India's greatest city to a mere border town against Punjab, the Mughal Emperor turned further into a moral authority with soft power. Under Bahadur Shah II, the role changed once more, as he spent more time being a poet and Sufi leader than governing at all. As Salafi beliefs rose to the surface, the Mughal Emperors denounced it as heretical and un-Islamic, helping to reduce their prominence while promoting those Muslim leaders who followed Sufi-tinted beliefs. Though few went as far as to agree with the Mughal court's eclectic opinion that Hinduism and Islam were of the same essence, nevertheless they were viewed by many as the Caliphs of Indian Islam. Bahadur Shah II's son Shah Alam III continued this tradition, as did his son Akbar III and his own son in turn Alamgir II, but this was cut short when, in 1936, Hindustan revolted against British rule. The Azad Fauj was intent on independence, and in 1937 their battalions were on the outskirts of Delhi. It was here when Emperor Alamgir II declared himself for the rebels, gave up all royal pretensions, and ordered the British battalions out. However, this proved a misstep when the Azad Fauj was forced out of Delhi and the battalions quickly pointed their guns at the Red Fort.

Though the Mughal family fled, the Red Fort was taken by British India forces and the crown prince was shot and killed. The remaining Mughals fled into Azad Fauj lines, where they declared themselves for the Provisional Hindustani Republic, and despite the revolutionaries' fierce republicanism, they decided this was with great symbolism, of Old Hindustan declaring itself in favour of the New Hindustan. Following the signing of the Peace of Cuttack, the Mughals were given back the Red Fort - but as property owners, of a palace run under the laws of the Confederation of Hindustan. When the Peace of Cuttack collapsed in 1938 and the Confederation of Hindustan fell into violence, Mughal custody of the palace was never seriously threatened. Instead, when refugees came fleeing the great maelstrom of violence of Haryana, the Mughal emperor famously decided to convert large amounts of the palace into a refugee camp. When the camp suffered under malaria and cholera epidemics, the emperor gave aid and treatment to the refugees; famously, one of his daughters died treating the ill. This immediately received massive plaudits from republican circles, who applauded how a clan formerly known for absolute monarchism became good citizens, and after the decisive defeat of the British Empire and the establishment of a unitary Hindustani Republic with no British influence in 1939, the Mughal family retained massive moral authority. In 1940, Alamgir II was elected to the House of Representatives of the First Congress of Hindustan, though he retired after one term in office after finding the political atmosphere too chaotic for dignified monarchs.

Yet, the Mughal family was cash-strapped; the Palace had been thoroughly raided, and what wealth they still retained was used to aid the refugees. Quickly, they turned most of the Red Fort into a tourist attraction and numerous buildings within it into a hotel with a restaurant attached, as did many former royal families in Hindustan. This quickly gave a stable line of revenue. At the same time, the would-be emperors continued to serve as religious leaders, with their eclectic but nevertheless influential brand of Sufi Islam. Though they have made some attempts to push into politics, ultimately they found it too worldly and un-dignified, and they are content with mere moral authority. Today, the descendants of Timur, Genghis Khan, and Akbar, continue to sit on their Peacock Throne - and even if they have lost all hard power, they still have their chair.
 
Sanjay Raj: 1986 IDRP / INC (D) leadership election
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Jagjivan Ram's premiership was a most difficult one. When he came into power in 1982 on a broad coalition containing the near-entirety of the anti-Sanjay Gandhi opposition, many were hopeful he would institute their reforms, in the manner they wanted. Yet, after amending out the Emergency amendments to the constitution and restoring parliamentary government, the coalition's internal contradictions immediately began to spin out of control. When, in 1984, Jagjivan Ram declared the institution of caste-based reservations in university and government jobs, the result was a wave of student self-immolations which horrified the nation. The Indian Democratic Revolutionary Party split into multiple parties, and though the sheer scale of the 1982 landslide meant that the IDRP retained a large majority, it lost legitimacy. To regain it, Jagjivan Ram had Parliament dissolved in 1984.

The result was, after a long and dirty campaign, the IDRP retaining a majority of a mere two seats - and the Sanjay Congress, under the competent leadership of Sanjay's wife Maneka, won well over one hundred seats. Most horrifyingly, the Sanjay Congress petitioned the courts to have them recognized as the true Congress faction. The IDRP, unwilling to let the legitimacy of the Congress party go to a dictatorial front, immediately declared the formation of the Indian National Congress (Democratic), a party consisting of 119 IDRP MPs. It was, at the outset, a party which shared all organization and leadership with the IDRP. This faux-split was enough for the courts to refuse to recognize the Sanjay Congress as official. This proved yet another gnaw at Jagjivan Ram's leadership. For the next two years, he established a firm economic policy, one that was pro-business but albeit statist and not pro-market. The result was an economic boom. The rising Khalistan movement established waves of terror across Punjab, killing political opponents and those Sikhs it deemed "heretical", but it broke up in infighting after Jagjivan Ram revealed connections between Sanjay Gandhi's dictatorship and the Khalistan movement leader Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale - Bhindranwale would end up dead in 1985. It was into this atmosphere, calming but still tense, that Jagjivan Ram died in 1986.

And so, the 1986 IDRP/INC(D) leadership election was held. The acting leader was Karan Singh. He had a long career, serving as first, the crown prince of the British Raj princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, and then after its accession to India as its Sadr-i-Riyasat and later Governor until 1967, when he resigned to join the Indira Gandhi cabinet. Here, he swore off his stipend as ex-monarch and assented to the abolition of all ex-monarch stipends. He continued to serve in the Congress cabinet even after Indira's death in 1976, only resigning in 1977 in protest at Sanjay Gandhi's desire to make the authoritarianism of the Emergency permanent. He later joined with the defectors to the opposition in 1982, becoming the Foreign Minister in the Jagjivan Ram cabinet despite suspicions at his alleged Congress sympathies. He served this role well, and brought India's reappearance onto the international stage. With him becoming Acting Prime Minister and leader of the party after Jagjivan Ram's death, he used the position to negotiate the endorsements of numerous would-be leaders - all except for one. Chandra Shekhar had been in the "Young Turk" faction of the Congress party, advocating socialistic reforms, and initially supported Indira Gandhi. However, he supported the anti-Indira JP movement, and thus despite being in the Congress party he nevertheless went to jail as a political prisoner during the Emergency. In its wake, he had a desire to lead, becoming a cabinet minister, and he found Karan Singh, an ex-monarch, fundamentally suspect and anti-reform.

Yet, Karan Singh's canvassing proved effective, and he successfully got most of the party on his side. In his acceptance speech, he spoke of conciliation. He spoke of national unity. To those suspicious of his aristocratic birth, he understood that, and he noted that, yes, his father was borne of luxury. But he also spoke of his mother, born in a poor Patiala household, and screwed by the feudalistic system. He spoke of his desire to end feudalism and establish a truly egalitarian republic. But many remained suspicious of an ex-monarch heading a republican government, and when Karan Singh asked Chandra Shekhar for conciliation, Shekhar refused, and instead walked out of the party caucus with his supporters and formed his own IDRP (Shekhar). With the IDRP/INC (D) having had a razor-thin majority, it now lost it, and this meant new elections. Karan Singh wanted to be prime minister - now he had to win a majority in an election.
 
Cape Republic: Transvaal Republic
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The Transvaal Republic was a Boer, later Anglophone, republic east of the Vaal River, which existed from 1852 to 1934.

Boers first moved into the area as trekboeren looking for further land in the eighteenth century, but this flow only became sizeable following the Dutch Cape Colony's reforms of the nineteenth century. The Dutch government, influenced by the Enlightenment, proved hostile to settler interests, disarming them, prohibiting expansion, centralizing the administration, and banning slavery, all factors which led boeren to rebel against the government, and when this was crushed in the 1840s they moved across the Orange River; with the region going through massive ethnic movements due to Shaka Zulu's expansion and the disarray of the mfecane, they were able to establish an independent republic, however, it was one which was swiftly conquered by the Dutch army. Settlers subsequently moved further beyond the Vaal River, and the Dutch were opposed to further expansion. Instead they signed a treaty with the settlers beyond the Vaal, releasing them from citizenship and establishing their independence as a buffer state.

When these settlers entered the region, it was already going through chaos. A Zulu army led by Shaka's lieutenant Mzilikazi broke from the Zulu nation overall and established a state in the region using Zulu military tactics, causing heavy chaos and warfare in the region. When the boer settlers came, they subsequently were able to counter Mzilikazi's attacks with their guns, forcing him to migrate north where he would found the kingdom of Mthwakazi. With the region in disarray, the Boers then established a series of republics around new towns. Francois Pretorius, the State President of the centrally-located republic of Lijdzaamheid, sought to unify these republics, and after a series of complicated wars and agreements with other Boer republics, he established the first constitution of the Transvaal Republic by the 1860s. This republic was marked by a rejection of the Enlightenment ideals followed by the "godless" Hollanders.

As such, like an old oligarchical republic, citizenship was only extended to the (white) elite, old-fashioned honorifics were used rather than the French Revolution-inspired address of "citizen" dominant in the Netherlands, and the Dutch Reformed Church was made the only legal religion without authorization. Nevertheless, it immediately began with a program of state-building. It minted its own rijksdaalder for currency, gave itself a flag reminiscent of the old oligarchical and quasi-monarchist Dutch Republic overthrown by the Batavian Revolution, and the State President travelled in circuit around the republic like a medieval king. To avoid dependency between either the Dutch in the Cape or the British in Natal, an agreement was made with the Portuguese to establish a road to the port of Lourenço Marques. Beyond that, the Transvaal immediately initiated wars with native kingdoms, with the Pedi to its north and the Ngwane peoples to its southeast. However, here it faced issues. Slowly, the Pedi adjusted their tactics to Boer guns, and under their King Sekoekoeni I, they began to go on the offensive. In 1877, the Transvaal seemingly teetered on defeat. This already bad situation got worse when the Zulu kingdom to the Transvaal's south declared war. With the Transvaal government fearful of Zulu troops in Lijdzaamheid, it immediately sued for peace with the Pedi, recognizing their independence and giving up the Zoutpansberg region. This was not enough to stop the Zulu onslaught, however, and as the Zulu armies marched north, the party calling for peace strengthened, and finally in 1880, it sued for peace with the Zulu, ceding large amounts of the Transvaal to them.

This Transvaal, teetering on collapse, frantically attempted to centralize and modernize its administration, to prevent further defeat. But this got worse when, in 1886, gold was discovered in the Witwatersrand region of the Transvaal. News of this spread across southern Africa and indeed beyond. The result was a great wave of prospectors and miners, looking for gold. The new town of Goudfontein emerged near the site of the gold discovery. While people from around the world moved to the Transvaal for gold, most of them came from British Natal, or from other English-speaking countries. They bristled at the sole legality of the Dutch language, of the Dutch Reformed Church. And the Transvaal government quickly noted that, at the rate of immigration, uitlander migrants, and English speakers, would make a majority of the white population in the near future. And so the domicile requirements for citizenship were immediately lengthened to fourteen years, and the English language was banned with children forced to go to Dutch schools - or more precisely, in the irregular rustic taal of the Boers. Beyond that, the Transvaal created a new class of randheeren who exploited the gold rush. Some of them were Dutch, having already tapped into the Paulustad diamond rush, but most of them were English-speaking - from Britain, the United States, and Australia. And this new class hated their exclusion from the halls of the Republic, forming the Goudfontein Reform League to petition for suffrage expansion. The Transvaal Republic would attempt to close off immigration, they built a railway with the now-French port of Lourenço Marques to avoid dependence on Natalian ports, but to no avail. In 1891, the Transvaal government established a municipal administration in the Witwatersrand elected by uitlanders in an attempt to satisfy demands for reform. Yet, they continued, and in 1896, the government of the Witwatersrand declared the abrogation of the Transvaal constitution and declared their desires to march on Lijdzaamheid to force a new one which would expand suffrage to all white people. This caused a brief civil war; under the new constitution of 1898 which ended it, citizenship requirements were relaxed and the Transvaal was decentralized between four provinces - Witwatersrand, Lijdzamheid, Uysberg, and Zuid-Nassau - to avoid Anglophone domination of all sectors of government. Stability was achieved.

And this changed everything. While many Britons recognized that the Transvaal had become the new centre of the region and advocated its annexation, they would be surprised at the extent of it. British Natal became a mere dependency and its economy was driven by its use as a Transvaal Port; likewise with French Lourenço Marques. In 1905, Transvaal, British Natal, and French Lourenço Marques signed a customs agreement establishing common institutions to ease trade. British beliefs that the Anglophone Transvaalers now dominant would look to them proved wrong when, instead, they proved far more independent-minded. The state scrapped the medievalism dominant in the past, and became a modernizing white supremacist state. Thus emerged the Transvaal of the early twentieth century, the beating heart of white southern Africa, dominated by a class of randheeren which ruled over a white elite, with black people wholly disenfranchised. But the white miners of the Witwatersrand resented this domination. They hated the randheeren with a passion; but they also hated black labour, regarding them as an economic threat. Thus, white supremacist labour unions emerged, and though racially inclusive labour unions also emerged they weren't large enough. In 1922, when the randheeren attempted to employ cheaper black labour in gold mines, the result was a wave of strikes among white workers. These strikes were brutally suppressed, but this was hotly opposed, and in the 1924 Transvaal elections, the Labour Party won a majority of seats in the volksraad and took control of the State Presidency.

And with that they established a white peoples' associationist state. They established welfare programs for white people and ensured that the mines would be dominated by white people, not by black labour. They attempted to sponsor white supremacist labour activity in other parts of south Africa, but this failed; in the Cape, labour evolved on racially egalitarian lines and likewise in Natal, while in French Lourenço Marques labour almost entirely consisted of Tamil and Javanese indentured servitude. They also served to alienate neighbours; the constitutionalist movement in the Zulu Empire regarded the Transvaal as synonymous with tyranny, while the conservative Boers who made a majority of white people in French Lourenço Marques looked down at the dominance of rough Anglophone workers. In Natal, the mixed-race and Indian populations in particular hated Transvaal white supremacy, and similarly, in the Dutch Cape, the Transvaal was viewed as the antithesis to its liberal franchise. The result was that, in 1929, the Labour Party was defeated in no small part due to the alienation of its neighbours. The victors, an alliance of Boers and middle-class Anglophones, sought to prevent them from taking over again. Accepting much of the labour legislation, they nevertheless sought to enfranchise upper-class black people if only to stop the Labour Party from coming back. By the new Native Rights Resolution of the Volksraad, those black people who could read and write Dutch or English and passed a property requirement could now vote. More revolutionary, however, was the municipal legislation. Black municipal governments were established, with power over black neighbourhoods. This was more an attempt to satisfy the growing movement for racial equality than anything else. And ultimately these measures of small racial inclusivism, intended to strengthen white supremacy, would fail as instead black people used these opportunities to force racial issues to a head through the tactics of obstructionism and oppositionism; the dispute over racial equality was only strengthened by these reforms. But at the time, seemingly more important was the discussion of union between the Transvaal, British Natal, and French Lourenço Marques. The strong economic ties between them resulted in there already being talk of it, and the Transvaal government quickly forced the issue in the Customs Union assembly. In 1931, it forced through the creation of a popularly elected Customs Union Assembly, and after unionist victories in Natalian and Laurentien elections, both France and Britain were ultimately forced to the negotiating table. As part of the agreements for union, the federal Transvaal system was extended to Natal and Lourenço Marques, and both France and Britain would retain basing rights as well as offshore islands. And so, in 1934, the Transvaal Republic was dissolved and replaced by the Lijdzaamheid Republic.
 
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Punjabi Republic: Sale of the Koh-i-Nur
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The Koh-i-Nur is a diamond. It is thought to have been mined in the Kollur Mine, in Andhra, in about the twelfth century. From there, it enters the annals of written history in the time of Babur, the founder of the Mughal Empire. In his epic the Baburnama, he declared it already famous, having been in the hands of the Delhi Sultanate after an invasion of the Deccan. When Babur conquered the Delhi Sultanate, in 1526 he received it in tribute. It would later become part of the Peacock Throne, and according to legend it was carelessly cut by a Venetian visitor in whose care it was collected. After the massive, disastrous 1739 invasion of India by the Persian emperor Nader Shah, the Peacock Throne and the Koh-i-Nur with it was taken with him. Famously, upon witnessing it, Nader Shah proclaimed Koh-i-Nur, or "Mountain of Lights", when seeing it, giving it its name. After Nader Shah fell, the Koh-i-Nur fell into the hands of the ruler of Afghanistan, Ahmad Shah Durrani, and it remained in the hands of the Durrani Empire until 1813 when, after losing a succession dispute, Shuja Shah Durrani fled to Lahore and gave the diamond to the ruler of Punjab, Ranjit Singh, after it gave him asylum.

Quickly, Ranjit Singh grew to love the diamond. He attached it to his turban, particularly when meeting European visitors. He grew paranoid about the possibility of it being stolen, placing it in a high-security fort; if it was to be transported, it would be put in a convoy, consisting of one camel with the diamond and 39 camels without it, and the camel with the diamond was a secret. After Ranjit Singh died in 1843, its custody became a dispute. The chief Brahmin in his court declared he had willed it to Jagannath Temple in modern-day Utkala, while his sons declared it state property which could not be willed; ultimately, it fell into the hands of the victor of the succession dispute, Nau Nihal Singh. As the Punjabi Empire sought to build itself as a nation, the Koh-i-Nur became a symbol of Punjabi valour, victory, and the monarchy.

But increasingly there emerged voices which looked at the Koh-i-Nur not as a symbol of valour, but of opulence. They viewed it as an example of how the Sikh ideals of equality were being betrayed by the monarchy. These voices were first notable within the Sikh religious hierarchy, the Akal Takht. When the king entered the Akal Takht wearing the diamond in his turban, he was condemned by the Jathedar and forced to take it off if he wanted to worship. This was a clear example of the clash between king and khalsa emerging in this time. Yet, such denunciations spread further. They emerged among the new intelligentsia, among court officials, and among the army.

These feelings reached a head during the Great Indian Famine of 1876-78. While this famine mostly affected the Deccan and forced Maharashtra to reform and establish a constitution, their effects were felt as high as Punjab. Voices called for immediate state aid, but the monarchy's reaction proved sluggish; instead the king marched, had feasts, and wore the Koh-i-Nur in his turban, all while the people risked starvation. Even after the Famine was resolved, criticisms rose and rose, and the head general Prem Nath Kaul seethed as he witnessed an opulent, useless kingdom. In the 1882 coup, Prem Nath Kaul overthrew the king and replaced him with a puppet, and the old Maharaja Jawahar Singh was stripped of his turban, of the Koh-i-Nur itself, before being forced into exile in the British Raj. When the new Maharaja Dalip Singh seethed at his puppetry and tried to retake power, Prem Nath Kaul overthrew him in turn and established a republic. Dalip Singh too was humiliatingly forced into exile. And now the state had to decide what to do with the Koh-i-Nur, a hated symbol of monarchy and opulence.

It would take until 1887 for the Punjabi Republic to finally deal with the diamond. Prem Nath Kaul was angered at how he was viewed as a replacement king, how citizens touched his feet like they would a statue of God, and he wanted the mythology of the monarchy dead forever. He declared that the crown jewels, among them the Koh-i-Nur, would be sold off, and the proceeds would contribute to a program of anti-malnutrition. This act, the Punjabi Republic selling symbols of the elite to help the people, had an impact on many, and it remains an important part of the republican mythos and Prem Nath Kaul's cult of personality; for all that he has been criticized as a military dictator today, few Punjabis lament its sale. The empty case it was sold in remains prominent in the national museum. After many rounds, the Koh-i-Nur was sold to the wealthy British Lupton family. In their family it was kept in many generations, until in 1924 it crossed the shores to the United States to a relative across the pond. He willed it in turn to the National Institute to Washington, DC, where it remains displayed to this day.
 
Revolutionary Britain: Henry Brougham
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Born within the middling orders in Scotland, Henry Brougham was influential at birth. He was educated in a prestigious school and at the University of Edinburgh he learned the sciences and mathematics. Though he initially went into the sciences, in 1800 he changed his mind and went into law, spending a lengthy period of time in the Scottish and English legal training systems. To gain money which he needed, he created the magazine the Edinburgh Review in 1802. This magazine contained from the outset a variety of topics, and Brougham was one of its foremost contributors; however, it also showed Brougham's deficiencies in the sciences as he viciously ridiculed and temporarily discredited the wave theory of light. Despite this, for all of his career Brougham had a keen interest in promoting science and knowledge. Furthermore, he gathered a circle of moderate radical Whigs around him who advocated modernistic and scientific reforms of British institutions, but from a perspective which drew from the Scottish Enlightenment.

The Edinburgh Review proved a success, and when he moved to London in 1806 he quickly formed links with the Foxite Whigs. He quickly became drawn into politics, and during the brief Moira ministry in 1813 he received a public appointment. He quickly became known as a forceful speaker, associating himself with the radical-leaning Mountain Whigs led by the middle-class Samuel Whitbread. He decisively spearheaded such causes as legal reform, advocating that the chaotic state of English law be tidied and made to resemble Scottish law in character in the tradition of his fellow Scotsman Lord Mansfield, as well as abolitionism. He also continued to practice law, and most famously he defended radicals when they were tried for treason for being at St. Peters' Field during the infamous Manchester Massacre. During the 1820s repression he continued to resist the repression of political opposition, and after Samuel Whitbread was imprisoned in the Tower of London he served as the parliamentary leader of the Mountain Whigs.

Then in 1827 the repression reached a breaking point and then came the Popular Revolution. During the Convention Parliament elections, he ran for an Edinburgh constituency and won, and he played a massive role in the writing of the Charter of Liberties and Securities and Frame of Government. As fundamentally conservative documents which owed much to the Scottish enlightenments, his fingerprints are all over it; he also ensured the formation of the Scottish Division of the Supreme Court, preserving Scottish legal distinctiveness. He was also influential in the creation of London University, the third university in England (excluding the complication of the Inns of Court). And finally, in 1829, he ran for the revolutionary parliament, and he quickly became an influential Mountain Whig frontbencher supportive of the government. He was at the front of the effort for abolishing slavery and he joined the law reform commission of the era. In 1831, with the collapse of the Whigs and formation of the embryo of the Radical Party, he became the Legislation Minister, an official responsible for looking after the law and continually revising it.

In this position, he advocated the formation of law codes and the abolition of the common law, on the continental model true to his Scottish roots, and as reactionary judges continued to use the looseness of the common law to effectively nullify Parliament's will, calls for codification increased. In the 1830s he wrote the Criminal Code, the Procedure Code, and the Commercial Code; the first two laws perhaps had the most dramatic effects and swept aside the harsh penalties and the long procedure that marked the old law. He was also instrumental in the reconstruction of Parliament after its destruction by Orangemen on neoclassical lines, and he fought to popularize education among the working classes. In 1843, however, he achieved his greatest impact: the writing of new Civil Codes, ending the confusion of the common law at once. One existed for England and Ireland, and the other for Scotland, as a sop to Scottish legal distinctiveness, but both were almost identical and largely based on Scottish reform traditions. But it was this which also received the most scorn. Here was a Scottish man, advocating the end of England's much cherished common law! But he promoted the civil code, how it continued existing legal traditions, and he called it the pinnacle of the common law, not its end. He successfully forced it through. And in his honour, the legal system practiced by the British Isles and beyond has been known as the Brougham system ever since.

Yet, he increasingly broke from his Radical Party. As the Radicals grew more pro-democracy, he increasingly wanted out. Democracy was never his goal; he wanted a more democratic British Isles, but not a fully democratic one. When the Young Britain movement led by Wilfrid Lawson took over the Radical Party, took power in 1846, and rammed through an Irish Legislature Act the following year, Brougham finally had it and attempted to use his position to weaken Lawson's position, and in reaction in 1848 he was kicked upstairs and made Justice Minister, to serve as President of the Supreme Court in a purely judicial role.

Yet, in this position, he continued to push his reforms. He established a system of small arbitration courts on the French model. He fought for expanding the school network. He worked with the Chief Magistrate to establish an order of merit, the Order for Natural Philosophy, to recognize scientific achievement, and he erected statues to his scientific heroes. Thus he died in 1868, much admired for his lifetime fighting for reform, but not truly liked.

Today, Brougham is considered a British national hero. The Brougham Codes are considered highly important laws in the British Isles, only second to the constitutional documents itself, and they have been much emulated. His legal defence of the radicals after the Manchester Massacre remains legendary and much beloved, and his Order for Natural Philosophy remains prominent despite occasional calls for abolishing orders of merit for being un-republican. Today, it is for all of these achievements that his fame remains secure.
 
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Flag of the Hungarian Republic
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Hungarian nationalism emerged on certain lines. Historically, the Hungarian Nation in medieval times referred to the elite upper-class, which was multicultural if largely Magyar in character, as represented in the Hungarian Diet; the common people, living as serfs, were wholly excluded from it. This nation was symbolized by the Crown of St. Stephen, then the great symbol of the nation. Fundamentally, this nationalism was centred around the "ancient rights" of the feudal elite. As the Habsburgs took control of the whole of Hungary by the eighteenth century and forced the elite to accept it, the eighteenth century "nationalistic" rebellions against them were often done by feudal lords who were typically Protestant in contrast to the Catholicism of the majority. Furthermore, when in 1780 the Habsburg ruler Joseph II tried to impose the German language and centralize administration, this caused cultural revivals among the elite. This changed with the French Revolution. The anti-aristocratic and anti-feudalist characteristics of it led to feelings of both horror and optimism across Europe, among them in Hungary. The period saw the creation of the Hungarian Jacobins, a group of highly rebellious and egalitarian aristocrats who wanted to establish a republic founded on liberty, equality, and fraternity, but in 1795 they were executed on charges of planning revolution. In general, the aristocracy of Hungary was fully against the French and their radical ideals, and supportive of the war effort which gave them new opportunities to export grain to the Habsburg armies. French attempts to incite a war for independence failed for the same reason. And so, in the early nineteenth century, Hungary was securely a feudalistic state.

This was only threatened by the reformist nationalist magnate István Széchenyi in the 1820s. He supported the creation of a Hungarian nation led by the Magyars, by the elite, but with partial participation by the common people on the model of the British monarchy. He also supported fostering the Magyar vernacular as the lingua franca, but with full toleration of Hungary's many linguistic minorities. He also supported modernization of the economy and industrialization. For a time, his policies were quite popular among the elite, but this came crashing down when the British monarchy he idolized fell apart in 1827 in a revolution. Suddenly, his policies were viewed as the inevitable path to revolution, and in the Habsburg Monarchy, at war with France and ruled by the infamous Metternich, this led him to be viewed as a crypto-Jacobin. He was imprisoned for a time, and when he came out he lost much of his popularity. Other nationalists, who came predominately from the gentry, were also harassed by the secret police and found little support from the gentry. The cholera rebellion of 1831 only secured Hungarian magnates' hatred of the nationalist and liberal movement and their desires to collaborate with the ruling Habsburgs to stop revolution. And so such sentiments brewed beneath the surface.

In the 1850s, a new cholera outbreak and subsequent government mismanagement caused new peasant rebellions; this time they were supported by a number of county diets, controlled by the gentry rather than the magnates. The Habsburg army subsequently crushed the county diets with the full support of the Hungarian Diet, which expelled those members who were sympathetic to the rebellions and accepted their arrest by the secret police; subsequently, the Diet also increased the property requirements for the county diets to prevent subversive elements from taking them over. However, the cholera outbreaks also inspired panic, which inspired reforms aimed at public health. Railways were also laid out in the 1850s and 60s, mainly to export grain to Germany, but they nonetheless inspired the creation of a new middle class wholly excluded from power. When famine in the 1870s caused discontent, this new class attempted to take over Pest and establish an independent state, but they lacked true support, their conspiracy was half-baked, and they were defeated, with many killed in the streets.

This inspired the creation of the Young Hungarians by Hungarian emigre circles in Paris. Here, they planned for the circumstances to take over Hungary and establish its independence once and for all with liberal institutions, and they assured that the various minority cultures of Hungary (as represented by related emigre grouos) that they would see protection in any independent state. When the Habsburgs declared war on France with the goals of consolidating Germany under their headship in 1880, in Hungary there were palpable feelings of betrayal. The general feeling was that the Habsburgs which ruled them were now intent on turning them into a German colony, and when instead the magnates negotiated with the Habsburgs full and total autonomy of the feudal Diet in the wake of the German victory instead of declaring independence, many saw blood. The late 1880s saw a string of attacks and assassinations across Hungary by angry nationalists, and when in 1890 the new German Emperor sought to crown himself King of Hungary (in Pest in person, in an attempt to increase public support), he was stopped by a great number of nationalist mobs which attacked his convoy, and as a result he was instead forced to have his coronation in Vienna. Under traditional Hungarian constitutional thought, without a coronation, the kingdom was "orphaned" and in a period of interregnum; this was used to support a concurrent series of national revolts led by the Young Hungarians. They subsequently took over Pest and provincial capitals, and they declared the Hungarian Republic. The subsequent result of the Hungarian Revolution was a war with Germany, which France immediately joined in; after years of warfare, in 1894, Germany accepted Hungary's independence as a republic including all of the traditional kingdom of St. Stephen except Croatia. Its subsequent constitution assured universal male and female suffrage and rights for the linguistic minorities who made (and make) up a majority of Hungarians, while leaving the door open to the radical measures of land redistribution that shaped its early days as well as other measures aimed at ending the position of the magnate elite. Despite severe troubles with the military, with nationalism, with associationism, and with other issues, particularly during much of the early twentieth century, Hungarian democracy has stood strong.

The flag of Hungary represents this. Its overall design is as a tricolour, consisting of the traditional colours of Hungary, representative of the republican values the nation is founded upon. The coat of arms is also representative of this, with all the traditional symbols of monarchy removed and replaced by the republican symbols of the laurel wreath and the Phrygian cap. The latter symbol is often associated with extreme radicalism and France today, and it became a Hungarian national symbol in reference to the much-idolized Hungarian Jacobins of the 1790s and their great struggle against both the elite oligarchy and the Habsburgs alike.
 
I’ve been wondering but in a Radical Britain could you see Nottingham become the second major city of Britain?

Given it’s connections to the 1831 Reform Riots, it’s history of Non-Conformism, connection to early Trade Unionism and Radical Tendencies, you could see it become a hub of the Industrialising Nation etc.
 
I’ve been wondering but in a Radical Britain could you see Nottingham become the second major city of Britain?

Given it’s connections to the 1831 Reform Riots, it’s history of Non-Conformism, connection to early Trade Unionism and Radical Tendencies, you could see it become a hub of the Industrialising Nation etc.

You’re right that it would be a major hub, yes, and it would definitely be larger, but I don’t think it would be the second city of the nation.

This has to do with a number of factors. The growth of great industrial cities like Manchester and Leeds is a trend which occurred pre-POD, and it is a trend which I imagine the Revolution massively weakening the aristocracy and strengthening the commercial classes would accentuate. Beyond that, Nottingham is not a port city, unlike Liverpool, Manchester and the like.

The revolutionary state, I imagine, would see the overcrowding, lack of sanitation, and the other issues Nottingham faced in the era as important, and it would be driven to resolve them by a mixture of idealism and a fear of a second revolution. It would also be able to resolve them better due to obstacles to reform toppled by the Revolution. Such issues being resolved earlier would result in a larger and more prosperous city. But would that make it the second city? I don’t think it would.
 
You’re right that it would be a major hub, yes, and it would definitely be larger, but I don’t think it would be the second city of the nation.

This has to do with a number of factors. The growth of great industrial cities like Manchester and Leeds is a trend which occurred pre-POD, and it is a trend which I imagine the Revolution massively weakening the aristocracy and strengthening the commercial classes would accentuate. Beyond that, Nottingham is not a port city, unlike Liverpool, Manchester and the like.
Good points, so Nottingham would likely become something more like Birmingham? Important but not a major hub of Trade and Industry like Manchester etc.
The revolutionary state, I imagine, would see the overcrowding, lack of sanitation, and the other issues Nottingham faced in the era as important, and it would be driven to resolve them by a mixture of idealism and a fear of a second revolution. It would also be able to resolve them better due to obstacles to reform toppled by the Revolution. Such issues being resolved earlier would result in a larger and more prosperous city. But would that make it the second city? I don’t think it would.
Good points, an interesting thing would be the state of Cooperativism and the Guilds as Nottinghamshire place as one of the big Liberal-Labour strongholds was due to those influences.

Also this seems like a scenario made for Jesse Boot becoming the Joseph Chamberlain of Nottingham.
 
Good points, so Nottingham would likely become something more like Birmingham? Important but not a major hub of Trade and Industry like Manchester etc.

Smaller than Birmingham too - Birmingham has quite a long history of industrial development, and it was a large centre of the Enlightenment and general political radicalism. The Revolution would be the sort of thing giving Birmingham yet more notability and development. But Nottingham would be a notable hub nonetheless.

Good points, an interesting thing would be the state of Cooperativism and the Guilds as Nottinghamshire place as one of the big Liberal-Labour strongholds was due to those influences.

Also this seems like a scenario made for Jesse Boot becoming the Joseph Chamberlain of Nottingham.

Jesse Boot sounds interesting indeed, and he (or his “analogue”) would certainly be the sort of person with more notability with a revolution weakening the aristocracy and strengthening the commercial classes.
 
Smaller than Birmingham too - Birmingham has quite a long history of industrial development, and it was a large centre of the Enlightenment and general political radicalism. The Revolution would be the sort of thing giving Birmingham yet more notability and development. But Nottingham would be a notable hub nonetheless.
True, true. So probably more like York in the grand scheme of things, would it have an important functions in Nottingham or same as it was?

Nottingham would probably be the main hub of Lace Industry, Cooperativism, Transportation hub and seeing the beginnings of Coal Mining so there’s that.
Jesse Boot sounds interesting indeed, and he (or his “analogue”) would certainly be the sort of person with more notability with a revolution weakening the aristocracy and strengthening the commercial classes.
The Boot family would probably find themselves prominent particularly in the fields of health and well-being given the fact they were some of the widespread chemists in the UK.

Could maybe find themselves in the same league as the Cadbury’s maybe? This is me also pondering on how Nottingham could have been bigger than it actually is culturally and physically.
 
Punjabi Republic: Dalip Singh
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Dalip Singh was the first and only Maharaja of the Punjabi, ruling from 1882 following the overthrow of his son in a military coup, to 1883 following a second military coup.

Born in Lahore, Dalip Singh lived with his mother Jind Kaur. Following Ranjit Singh's death, the court at Lahore turned into a centre of intrigue, and as a result for much of the 1840s they lived faraway in the small hill town of Jammu, where they established ties with local elites, and after Nau Nihal Singh ended the intrigue in Lahore they returned in 1847. There, Dalip Singh had a stringent education in the Sikh education system. He also became increasingly disgusted by court intrigue, finding it a bloody affair. But as a very young child in contrast to his many half-brothers, he was consistently sidelined, and when it came time for appointments, he was given military command relatively insignificant in contrast to the titular governorships his brothers gained. It was also amidst all this that he came into contact with the French envoys to Punjab, who were there as a result of French-Punjabi military ties. He also came across translations of Enlightenment works, spreading from Indian reformists in the British Raj, and he believed they could be the cure to many of the ills in Punjabi society. As such, in the 1850s and beyond, he gathered a circle of liberal and radical intellectuals around him, discussing how best to achieve Punjabi liberty and attempting to lobby for it. While initially this circle was viewed as consisting of harmless quacks, following the rise of Jawahar Singh to power in 1864, due to fears of rebellion in 1871 he forced Dalip Singh into internal exile in Jammu, where the governor kept a close eye on him.

For a time he accepted this. But then came the Great Indian Famine of 1876-78. The response of the Punjabi state proved sluggish and intemperate, though it eventually resolved the issue. This, Dalip Singh proclaimed, could be resolved by a number of reforms - industrial development, increase of trade, and the creation of a parliament. These were certainly striking reforms to advocate. Gradually, the state of the Punjabi Empire grew more chaotic. It repulsed an Afghan invasion, most leading generals were implicated in a planned coup (though most historians today believe it was faked), and in 1881 the new leading general, Prem Nath Kaul, sent army troops within the capital for crowd control. It was clear that change was needed. Thus Dalip Singh moved back to Lahore, where he and his liberal circle got in contact with Prem Nath Kaul for a takeover. Dalip Singh assured Kaul that he would have a firm position on his side in the new Punjab - privately, he regarded Kaul as nothing more than a glorified court pandit, like the rest of the Kashmiri Pandits, who would follow his orders without being a threat. In 1882, Prem Nath Kaul orchestrated a coup d'etat in Lahore, removing Jawahar Singh from power and forcing him into an exile into the British Raj, where he was mysteriously killed a few years later. In his place Dalip Singh became king, with the title of "Maharaja of the Punjabi", a more popular one than what had existed, and he threw out most of the arbitrary long titles which Punjabi rulers formerly had. It was a symbol of his reforming liberal tendencies. And he immediately afterwards convened a popular assembly to serve as a constitutional convention. It was the first genuinely popular (to a degree) elections in Punjabi history.

However, it was here he hit his first snags. The assembly viewed itself as the supreme authority, with full power as it saw fit. But Dalip Singh disagreed, and he viewed it as an advisory assembly he could freely dismiss. His positions, once liberal and radical, now fell behind the rapid pace of reform. These differences slowly but surely came to the surface. Beyond that, Prem Nath Kaul did not want to be sidelined, and he saw right through Dalip Singh's plan, and he quickly ingratiated himself with assembly members while giving Dalip Singh the impression that he was nothing more than his pet pandit. These differences came to a head when Dalip Singh gave a speech in person to the assembly - this alone required wrangling, as many members believed the king should be prohibited from doing this - where he laid out his positions to the assembly and laid out his desired constitution in extensive detail. The assembly immediately grew suspicious, viewing this sort of dictation as pure and unabashed absolutism, and its contents left much to be desired too. After the assembly adjourned, Prem Nath Kaul heard of this, and he condemned Dalip Singh as a reactionary. Flying the flag of revolution once more, Prem Nath Kaul declared the removal of Dalip Singh from his throne. In his 1883 coup, he personally marched into the royal palace, ripped off Dalip Singh's royal turban, and carried him to a train which would take him to Karachi, where he would be allowed to choose his exile. This he did, moving to Europe. He proved an ardent critic of Prem Nath Kaul, accusing him of being a Caesar or Cromwell, and in in the eyes of some these criticissm were proven correct when Prem Nath Kaul overthrew the Majlis in his 1890 coup d'etat - though Kaul never became Maharaja as some desired, instead famously declaring the constitution the true head of state. Dalip Singh died in 1893 in Germany.

In his own time, he was initially viewed as a liberal and then as a reactionary. The attitudes of the time moved too swiftly and left him by. His overthrow in 1883, dramatic as it was, is an important part of Prem Nath Kaul's cult of personality, and as such he has received much hatred. With the advent of historical revisionism in the mid to late twentieth century, he has been held up by some for his allegedly prophetic claims of Prem Nath Kaul being a dictator, although in truth there were many accusing him of this. Some view him as a lost opportunity, who could have turned Punjab into a liberal monarchy. But ultimately he is mostly a footnote in the history books.
 
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