Indicus's maps, wikiboxes, &c thread

[Indicus]

The University of Inns of Court, usually known as Inns University or simply Inns, is a university of law in the British Isles, and it is the premier university of law in the nation.

This institution is ultimately rooted in the medieval institutions of the Inns of Courts and the affiliated Inns of Chancery, guilds where students were taught the law of England and certified to serve as lawyers. These were collegiate institutions where students were educated in the practical customary law of England, in a field which excluded theory; this is likely partially responsible for the perception of Anglo-American law as based in precedents rather than on theory and set principles. Initially, students first learned at the Inns of Chancery and then moved to the Inns of Court, but this process was discontinued by the seventeenth century. During the Puritan Revolution the Inns lost many students, but they nevertheless regained their stature after the Stuart Restoration; it was only during the eighteenth century that they gradually deteriorated. Of the Inns of Court, only Lincoln's Inn gave a comprehensive legal education, and the Inns of Chancery grew so totally and utterly detached from teaching the law that they became little more than places for lodging and food.

After the Popular Revolution, reform of the law quickly became a goal of the government, and under Justice Minister Henry Brougham, in the 1830s, various law codes were passed which not only dramatically reformed and codified the law, but also introduced certain legal principles for judges to consult when making their decisions. While this recourse to principles was not new - Lord Mansfield (1795-1793) also introduced legal principles into English law - they now covered most of British law. This served to further weaken education of the law within the Inns of Court. As word came of this bad education of the law into Parliament, it constituted a committee to monitor the education of the law, and in 1836 reported that either its education was severely bad or non-existent, depending on the Inn. This influenced the government to pass the Inns of Courts Act 1837, which constituted the Inns into a single university - though they kept their property and continued to hand out certifications for the bar, they were to be affiliated with the university. [1] More controversial was how neither students nor professors would have to pass religious tests, in the same impulse of the era which resulted in the establishment of the non-denominational London University and the eradication of religious tests for students in Oxford and Cambridge.

Over the following decades, the institution of Inns University resulted in the Inns themselves hosting lecturers from the university, while increasingly the Inns grew to resemble dormitories rather than educational institutions. Furthermore, law was increasingly taught at other universities, though law degrees must be certified by an Inn of Court to this day. The education of law grew increasingly complicated over time.

Today Inns is a vast, diffuse university. It exists primarily in London, but there is one campus located in Dublin, owing to the historic institution of King's Inns there in 1541. Many great lawyers and politicians come from the university, including seven Prime Ministers and numerous other chief magistrates and heads of government all around the world.

[1] In OTL, a similar proposal came in 1854 and a few other times in the nineteenth century, but they were refused. Instead, legal education flowed out of the Inns, and today the Inns of Court serve as lawyers' associations.

 

[Indicus]

Following the Popular Revolution, there were a string of fights between the Lords and Commons. While the fear among many Lords after the events of 1827 led to mass abstentions of Tory peers, after it became increasingly clear that the Popular Revolution was not another 1793 many of them returned to sit in sessions. Nevertheless, the Lords felt nothing but disdain towards the new regime, and they desired the restoration of the Guelphs at every opportunity. Furthermore, they opposed bills proposed by the Commons, and this only added to the tumult of the Headless State era. After the Radicals' attempts at municipal reform were blocked in 1833, the resulting 1833 and 1834 elections brought the Radicals to power with a strong majority; the subsequent Municipal Reform Act was passed through the ennoblement of 20 Radicals over the veto of the Lords. It disturbed many, who viewed this as an usurpation of the power of the Lords and the emergence of a "Jacobin" style assembly government; it was here that the first talk of reforming or abolishing the Lords emerged. The two chambers would be brought into crisis again in 1846, after the rise of Wilfrid Lawson to the premiership. When he declared his support for the creation of an Irish Legislature, this resulted in mass defections of Radical lords and the defeat of the Irish Legislature bill, but when the Radicals gained a strengthened majority in 1847, it resulted in the mass ennoblement of 150 Radicals, and this enabled the passage of the Irish Legislative Bill. Furthermore, as part of the disestablishment of religion in 1851, the Lords Spiritual were removed from the Lords. However, the Lords had been reduced to a mere joke, a shell of its former self, and its power was effectively gutted by the success and intense popularity of the Lawson administration. To Lawson, this was to be celebrated; he believed the democratic element of the British constitution had to be strengthened, and to him cutting down the Lords was a part of that.

But this angered many Moderates. It seemed with the power of the Lords gutted, with the old tripartite model broken, that any hope of averting the destruction of the constitution had failed. Though the Moderates under John Russell would attempt to restore the old constitution by enthroning the Duke of Cambridge as monarch, this Second Enthronement Bill proved a failure after the Commons voted it down, causing the collapse of the Second Russell Government. Its defeat and the collapse of Russell's administration caused the rise a new Moderate ideology, one which accepted that restoring the monarchy was impossible. In 1864, the Moderates under George Grey came to power, and they were determined to restore the Lords' power not through cutting down the power of the Commons, but rather by making the Lords more representative of the nation, to thus gain its trust. The Frame of Government (Amendment) Act 1867 thus changed the composition of the Lords dramatically. Half of its membership was to become representative peers, elected by the peerages of England, Scotland, and Ireland through bloc vote. Beyond that, lords were to be elected by various bodies; ten universities, 18 from electoral colleges consisting from county councils, twenty from large cities, 15 by the outgoing Commons, 25 by the Crown (and thus the ruling ministry), and finally 12 Lords Agent-General by the colonies. Beyond that, various Moderate peers were ennobled, in order to undo the effects of the previous mass ennoblements. These components were to be replaced upon every dissolution to Parliament. This composition would be retained until the Aberdeen Gifting Scandal, which subsequently caused the abolition of hereditary peerages.

In the Lords election of 1867, the Moderates won a decisive plurality of the Lords thanks primarily to strong support for their uncontroversial governance and the general failure of the Radicals to compete in the new system. It served to strengthen the party, enabling their strength in an increasingly democratic era.

 

[Indicus]

Hampden House is an office building which is the seat of the Cabinet Office, as well as the Prime Minister's Office. As such, it is the headquarters of the British government.

Unlike many, many buildings, public squares, streets, and towns named after John Hampden, a building on this site was named Hampden House well before the Popular Revolution, as it was owned by the very same Hampden family. It was later purchased by George Downing and torn down to be replaced by townhouses; a legacy of this is that the street which Hampden House faces is Downing Street. Designed by Christopher Wren, they were completed by 1684. One of these buildings, at number 10 Downing Street, would shuffle around in ownership, and by 1733 it reverted back to the King. He then gave the property to Robert Walpole, the first Prime Minister, in gratefulness for stabilizing the nation's financial system, though instead Walpole suggested giving it to the person holding the position of the First Lord of the Treasury (that is, himself), and he subsequently enlarged it. Subsequent prime ministers, however, took much less use of this property, instead using properties they already owned in and near London as their residence. As such, the building instead became dilapidated and there was little appetite for spending the money for repairs. Two prime ministers did use the site as their residence: Lord North and Pitt the Younger. After Pitt lost power, 10 Downing Street was again mostly uninhabited, merely used for certain.

Following the Popular Revolution, it continued to be uninhabited and fell into further disrepair. Samuel Whitbread's ministries (1831-1833 and 1834-1837) would see the rise of plans to demolish the Downing Street houses and replace them with various offices, but this project collapsed after Parliament burned down and suddenly the government had far more important things to build. It was during Wilfrid Lawson's long tenure as Prime Minister from 1846 to 1856 that these plans were revived. Lawson's tenure saw the rapid growth of governmental bureaucracy, as his tenure was dominated by Britain's intervention in the New Granadine War of Independence (1848-52). Existing buildings ceased to be enough to house them. At the same time, flaws with executive administration were exposed, and rationalizations were desired. And so, in 1854, the Downing Street townhouses from Number 1-12 were unceremoniously torn down, and a new Hampden House - named after the old structure on the site - was established in 1858. In general, Prime Ministers used their own personal residences in London to live in, and this would remain the case until Number 3 Carlton Road was turned into such a residence in 1899. Subsequent expansion of the governmental bureaucracy in Whitehall resulted in ever-expanding government buildings, and these were later connected to one another. The rise of mass media subsequently connected the Prime Minister and his cabinet to Hampden House rather than their residences, and as a result it is viewed to this day as the centre of the executive branch of the British Isles.

 

[Indicus]

The National Exhibition of the Works of Industry, also known as the National Exhibition, or simply the Fox Palace exhibition, was an exhibition of industry held from 1 May to 15 October 1849 to showcase British industry around the world. It was organized by the British government, led by Prime Minister Wilfrid Lawson, in what was and is generally viewed as an attempt to showcase British strength to the rest of Europe after the tumult of the Headless State era (from 1827 to 1847) after the Popular Revolution. It proved vastly popular and today it remains a symbol of the era of Lawsonian radicalism.

In France, exhibitions of industry had first been held in 1789 during the Directory era to showcase industry, in what was an attempt to push the message that the root of the French Republic was not the Reign of Terror of its first few years, but industry. This exhibition proved a grand success, and was repeated through the Sieyesian era and beyond to push much the same message and generally to promote the development of French industry.

The idea of such an exposition was taken up by the British government after the Popular Revolution, when it suffered legitimacy issues owing to its "provisional" non-monarchical head of state, and indeed the British Isles faced the political violence and parliamentary instability that marked the Headless State era. This violence began to dissipate following the institution of the secret ballot, and the parliamentary fully dissipated when the charismatic Wilfrid Lawson became Prime Minister in 1846 with a sizeable majority. His reforms proved popular, and the intervention in the New Granadine War of Independence (1848-52) dominated his premiership while giving his government vast amounts of popularity as the Isles fought for the cause of liberty half a world away. This enabled him to be prime minister for ten years, from 1846 to 1856, and though he did eventually fall, his tenure as prime minister is generally viewed as stabilizing the British state, enabling the survival of the young reluctant republic. Though the idea of an industrial exhibition was proposed during the 1830s, the various events of that decade it was put into practice during the stability of the Lawsonian era.

Furthermore, 1849 was a momentous year for the Isles. Charles James Fox (1749-1806), one of the great heroes of the British pantheon of liberty, was born a century before that year; his belief in parliamentary reform, strengthening the rights of the people in Commons, disdain to royal power, and famed opposition to the authoritarian attitudes of Pitt and Addington made him a hero to Radicals and Moderates alike, and indeed make him a national hero to this day. His birthday of January 24 was celebrated well after his death, and the Charter, that great achievement of the Popular Revolution, was given assent on January 24, 1829 in his honour. As such, this year enabled the British government to look to its heroic past and celebrate it, while looking ahead at a future of liberty and stability.

And so, in preparation, a vast palace, made with the new technologies of glassware, was constructed; characteristically, it was named Fox Palace and a grand statue of the great Fox was placed within it. The very fact that glassware could now be used to cover a grand palace is considered emblematic of the great progress of the era, and it was met with a combination of disdain towards the "modernity" it represented as well as wonder.

As such, six million people in total from across Europe visited the Exhibition. At its peak, about one hundred thousand people visited it, and it proved massively profitable, allowing Lawson's grand reductions of taxation.

But at the same time, there were fears it could cause a revolution. Charles James Fox, after all, was a radical figure associated with the sovereignty of the people - some feared his commemoration, along with the vast crowds near Whitehall, and members of the working classes visiting, would inspire rebellion. But, importantly, it didn't, demonstrative of the stability of the era.

At this exhibition, much was featured, most famously Wedgewood prints, enabling the capture of images onto prints with fairly high quality. Other such stuff was featured - new instruments, railways, telescopes, and diamonds from the empire.

By the time it was over, it was a grand success. Fox Palace would be moved to Kensington, where it stands to this day, acting both as a monument to the Lawsonian era as well as a place for exhibitions and grand events. The exhibition would in turn inspire a similar event in Prussia after the war, with similar grandeur - but nevertheless, the British exhibition is remembered best.

 

[Indicus]

The Chief Magistrate of the British Isles is the head of state for the British Isles. They are elected for ten year terms, though these can be extended by Declaration of Parliament and Chief Magistrates may resign or be impeached. They serve a ceremonial role representing the state abroad and at home, and though all executive power is exercised in their name, in practice it is exercised by the ministers, responsible to the House of Commons. Emergency powers such as dismissal of ministers or extraordinary dissolution of Parliament is vested in them, though the former power has never been exercised by any Chief Magistrate and the last time the latter power was exercised was in 1927, during the Defamation Bill Crisis.

This position is rooted in the old monarchy of the British Isles, to the extent that they have been called "elective monarchs". In 1688-89, during the Glorious Revolution, the Convention Parliament issued a Declaration of Right declaring the throne vacant and announced it was now vested in William III; many understood this to be a form of monarchical election, though others stated that this was a form of abdication. Nevertheless, in 1827-29, after the Popular Revolution, the new Convention Parliament dug up this precedent to declare it had the power to vest the monarchy in any individual it desired. Due to total deadlock on the person to pick, however, fears of its legitimacy falling to a London mob led it to vest the Crown in the person of Lord Folkestone on a provisional basis until it could decide on a true monarch, through the Declaration of Grievances; subsequently he certified the Charter of Liberties and Securities and the Frame of Government, establishing the British Isles' modern Constitution.

Lord Folkestone was referred to as "Lord Chief Magistrate", Chief Magistrate being the generic term for a head of state, and Parliament had every intention to declare an actual monarch. The instability of the Headless State era (1829-1847) made this impossible, and by the time that era were over, the Radicals under Wilfrid Lawson declared the established form of government far superior to any system dependent on hereditary legitimacy. After Lord John Russell's famously bungled Second Enthronement Bill in 1860, this came to be accepted by the Moderates as well. In 1862, Lord Folkestone resigned from office, citing tiredness from the role, and Parliament declared Charles Ponsonby Lord Chief Magistrate. Not being a member of the aristocracy nor a member of the House of Lords, Ponsonby dropped the "Lord" from the title, giving the modern name for the title. Over time, as Chief Magistrates served for around ten years due to the stress of role, an unofficial ten year term limit was established, although it was only fixed when in 1957 there were calls for impeaching Chief Magistrate Charles Pelham when he implied he would serve for longer than ten years, forcing him to resign.

By established practice, Chief Magistrates are nominated by the ruling ministry, and they are established by a Declaration of both houses of Parliament, acting as Estates of the Realm. This declaration has a set form and includes the name of the person being established as such. These Declarations are voted like ordinary bills, debated in both Houses (though generally with low debate, as Chief Magistrates are generally seasoned uncontroversial backbenchers) with the ordinary three readings. However, such Declarations do not require any magisterial assent, as the Houses exercise their constituent power in this case.

In the 2015 Chief Magisterial Declaration vote, a Moderate backbencher in the Lords, Mary Jones, was nominated by the ruling Moderate ministry. A generally inoffensive pick, she faced little opposition (despite some controversy for some past political statements) and quickly the Declaration of Parliament vesting her with the Chief Magistracy passed through both Houses of Parliament. On 18 September 2015, she gave the formal oath in Westminster Hall surrounded by both Houses of Parliament, thus officially becoming Chief Magistrate.

 

[Indicus]

After seeing this article, I was reminded that I made a couple wikiboxes about Kenya under Indian-led apartheid a while back. The flags I made for them were shit, so here's a better version of it.

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The history of Indians in Kenya is an old one. Even before Portugal's conquest of Goa, Gujarati sailors regularly made trips to Kenya's coast serving under Arab traders, and did the same under Portugal and later Britain. Yet, the history of a large Indian population in Kenya really begins with the attempted creation of the Cape Town-to-Cairo Railroad by the British Empire in the late nineteenth century, a vast project created in part because it would open up British Africa to whites and in part to demonstrate the size of the British Empire. As part of the creation of the railway system, millions of Indians were taken as indentured servants, with their contracts freely bought and sold by British overseers, and exported to Africa. However, even Indians died en masse in disease-ridden parts of Africa, despite the British belief that Indians would be immune. This was an important reason why the project failed. Yet, massive demographics shifts had already taken place and many Indian indentured servants couldn't afford to return to India on their low wages. Therefore, they were forced to make a home away from home so far away.

Temples and mosques were created, Indian communities formed around colonial forts, and the civil service became dominated by shades of brown. In 1898, following cues from the homeland, the Kenyan National Congress (KNC) was created, campaigning for furthering the status of the Indian community. In the First World War, Kenyan Indians signed up for the war effort, strengthening the imperial nature of the Kenyan Indian identity. In 1920, therefore, the Indians were granted seats within the self-governing Parliament. Further political campaigning ensured that Indians gained eight seats compared to eleven white seats, even though in population Indians greatly overshadowed whites. Campaigns by the KNC to enlarge these seats proved failures. Subsequently, radical Indian nationalist parties such as the Ghadar Party saw their support enlargen before they were suppressed by the government. Even after the Second World War, Indian rights were denied. This follows the pattern of other African countries with large Indian minorities, and like them, the KNC began to look for African support. However, this process was reversed by the Mau Mau Rebellion (1952-1960), which saw many high-profile attacks on wealthy Indians by Africans. The result was that Africans became seen by Indians as the "other", and the KNC began sucking up to the whites again. The policy of alag-alag, by which black people could not enter Indian or white areas and black people couldn't even move to other districts without passports, was instituted.

Ultimately, in 1962, full enfranchisement of Indians became law, and in the following year, Kenya became a dominion of the British Empire ironically led by its Indian minority. Subsequently, Jawaharlal Nehru, the Prime Minister of India, influenced by a profound sense of "brown guilt", denounced the new Kenyan regime as a fundamentally colonial one, and was joined in this by ethnically Indian leaders in Africa, who generally aligned themselves with the African majority. To Indians in Kenya, this was a severe insult which implicitly compared them to the same British imperialists who arrested and murdered innocent Indians. Nehru signed trade agreements with other African states with substantial and empowered Indian minorities, forming the Erythrean League and the Congress International to further India's interests with East Africa, but was firmly opposed to Kenya's "brown supremacist" government. Thus he worked to isolate it, and it was under Indian tutelage that the Kenyan Democratic Association (KDA), an organization fighting for a fully equal Kenya through peaceful protest, was established. India's isolation of Kenya caused a severe recession, which resulted in the Socialist Party led by Makhan Singh taking power in 1968, which nationalized sectors of the economy in an effort to stop the economic bleeding. This policy proved tremendously unpopular and did little in relieving the economic contraction. Subsequently, his party lost and was replaced by the KNC, led by Chunilal Bhusri, who re-liberalized the economy, resulting in sluggish growth, and attempted to suck up to India, a policy which failed - Nehru's successors Shastri and Indira were both just as, if not even more, opposed to the Kenyan regime than Nehru. Believing republicanism and a new constitution could relieve the trade restrictions, a constituent assembly was assembled in 1976 just prior to the scheduled election. The constitution they ratified was almost identical to the Indian constitution, with some exceptions - it made no reference to equality of races, and it created the classification of a "Kenyan subject", who were denied voting rights and even habeas corpus, which was distinct from the status of "Kenyan citizen". Not surprisingly, all black Kenyans were Kenyan subjects. And with that the Dominion came to an end



However, India wasn't enthused about its constitution inspiring a blatantly racist regime, and its efforts to isolate Kenya were redoubled. And so, Bhusri established ties to fellow African states ruled by small minorities, such as South Africa, Rhodesia, and the Mozambican State. This helped keep the nation aloft for the rest of the period of minority rule. The Indian-funded protest movement was firmly opposed by the Kenyan government, which worked hard on clamping down on such movements, infamously firing upon a multiracial protest in 1987. Attacks on India became a mainstay of the regime. Bhusri subsequently gave power to his protégé Abdul Majid Cockar, who attempted to satiate Africans with a few black seats, but they were all won by abstentionist KDA candidates, further reducing his regime's legitimacy. His rule proved more dictatorial than before with the passage of an amendment that centralized power in the Prime Minister, as well as the execution of KDA leaders. The result was that the KDA discarded Gandhian protest as a strategy in favour of launching armed resistance, at one point even bombing the Kenyan Parliament (albeit with a weak bomb, at a time when no one was in it - it served more as a display of force than an attempt to murder). In 1997 the KNC ceased to hold confidence in Cockar, ordering him replaced by Iqbal Murumbi, a half-black advocate for universal suffrage. Subsequently, in 1998, he passed a constitution which turned universal suffrage into a reality, and he gave the country a new flag. A few hours before the constitution was to come in effect, Murumbi gave a speech where he paraphrased Nehru, saying, "At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, Kenya will wake to new life and freedom".

 

[Indicus]

The 2016 Indian presidential election was held on November 3, 2016.

In the 2016 Loktantrik Party presidential primaries, to the astonishment of many, the controversial flamboyant billionaire tycoon Vijay Mallya became the nominee of his party, despite his vastly controversial career as a seller of alcohol as well as his lack of any government experience whatsoever. He ran on a populist platform with the motto "Sara Jahan se Accha" and opposed "anti-national" sentiments as well as illegal immigration from Bangladesh. Despite facing widespread accusations of xenophobia as well as sucking up to Russia, he nevertheless won the primaries. The 2016 Samata Party primaries were won by Rabri Devi Yadav, the wife of former president Lalu Prasad Yadav, who faced off a strong socialist challenge by Bhim Singh, and she advocated the continuation of incumbent President Chouhan's policies; however, she was dogged with serious accusations of corruption as well as improper use of government assets.

Despite leading in virtually all presidential polling, and despite Mallya's campaign being dogged with controversies left, right and centre, Rabri's lead gradually narrowed, and she herself was dogged with serious accusations of corruption which dented her polling. Being a well-known quantity, she had already faced many attacks and a substantial portion of the Indian population hated her already. Ultimately, Mallya won in the Electoral College despite losing the popular vote.

 

[Indicus]

The Majlis-i-Dharam is a consultative assembly, as well as a house of legislative proposal, in Punjab.

The Majlis was founded in 1888, as part of Prem Nath Kaul's formation of the Punjabi Republic. The dead Kingdom of Punjab previously had Sikhism as its established religion, with the Akal Takht and its Jathedar having vast amounts of influence, but at the same time Hindu temples as well as mosques were given patronage, and vassal states had their own established religions. The Punjabi Revolution was quickly succeeded by Prem Nath Kaul leading an army to crush the vassal states, and he also forced out opponents from their houses of worship; the subsequent Sannyasi Rebellion was quickly crushed. Being a secularist, he nevertheless believed that state's control over religion would have to be tightened; as a result, in a system inspired by the French Concordat, he made Sikhism, Hinduism, and Islam co-official in Punjab. His belief was that Punjabi secularism would not be the separation of religion and state, but rather the union of all religions and state.

As such, he made houses of worship part of the state administration and their membership were now salaried members of the state who required accreditation. Though it was possible for houses of worship to opt out, in practice intimidation as well as the financial advantage made this rare. Upon the promulgation of a civil code based on the French code, Prem Nath Kaul appointed religious councils full of supporters, for them to argue that his abolition of polygamy and other such reforms were in accord with Islam, Hinduism, and Sikhism. These assemblies quickly issued long arguments in favour of the new civil code which, while failing to stop a new rebellion against the new imposition, nevertheless made it smaller than it would have been. Furthermore, in 1888, he assembled them together in proportion to their numbers to issue a formal report of support for Prem Nath Kaul's reforms; this is considered the first meeting of the Majlis-i-Dharam. It was later formalized as an institution in 1892. Being a Kashmiri Hindu, Prem Nath Kaul felt extreme respect towards the ninth Sikh Guru, Guru Tegh Bahadur, who famously martyred himself resisting the persecution of Kashmiri Hindus; as such, the institution was given a motto quoting Guru Tegh Bahadur - "Sacrifice your life, but relinquish not your faith". Today, this great expression of religious freedom remains its motto.

Later, in 1912, the makeup was reformed further so that it had a set membership to be drawn from lists of eligibles drawn up by electoral colleges of house of worship leaders. Furthermore, in addition to its consultative powers, it was now given the power to request endowments, or waqfs, from the Legislative Body, thus making it a council of legislative proposal. Furthermore, conventions were now established - the Grand Mufti, the Grand Mahant, and the Jathedar of the Akal Takht are by convention to always be appointed - and one other member was now to be appointed, to represent other religions (typically this member is Christian or Jain). In addition, five extra members are appointed, to be appointed and dismissed at the leisure of the government. As such, at times the Majlis-i-Dharam has been at odds with the ruling government, though it typically attempts to take a neutral position to prohibit being associated with any one party after non-neutrality has caused waves of anti-clericalism.

Further proposals have emerged for reform. One has been the institution of separation of religion and state, including the disestablishment and/or abolition of this chamber. Another has been separating out members - one proposal has been to create seats for the untouchable caste, which exists in all religions of Punjab; however, this has been opposed for potentially enlargening the caste divide, and Sikhs in particular oppose it because in theory Sikhism opposes the caste system (in practice, it is alive and well). Some have proposed creating separate representation for the Udasi sect of Sikhism, a sect which downplays the line of the Gurus in favour of the line from the son of the first Guru, Guru Nanak, which has resulted in widespread accusations that the Udasi are simply Hindus who feel reverence towards Sikh Gurus or a separate religion altogether. Other proposals exist for making it truly an elective body, either by the people or by the electoral colleges. Nevertheless, all attempts at reforming this body have failed, and it appears it shall maintain its makeup for years to come.

 

[Indicus]

Following the overthrow of the Sikh Empire by General Prem Nath Kaul in 1883, the Punjabi Republic was created. As such, it now needed a new flag, one which would define the new state. The flag, was created in 1884 by a commission while Prem Nath Kaul was out conquering and integrating the hill states into the new republic. Prominent was the use of blue - previously it had seen much use by the military, and was strongly associated with it. According to Prem Nath Kaul's pet political theorist Fateh Singh Rakia, as it included Punjabis from all stations of society, the military was the political institution most representative of Punjabi society and therefore it alone could express the general will of the nation. As such, blue quickly became the national colour, earning a prominent space on the flag as a result. Within the blue portion of the flag is two swords, and between the two is written, in Perso-Arabic script (as was standardized for Punjabi in this period), "Deg Tegh Fateh", meaning "Cauldron, Sword, and Victory"[1]. This is an originally Sikh expression referring to the Sikh duty of protecting and feeding the needy and oppressed; due to the long period of the Sikh Empire, this concept (and many other Sikh concepts) had effectively become secularized and spread to all quarters of Punjabi society; the people behind the new regime sought to spread it further.

On the side of the flag is a tricolour. Originally these colours were streamers tied to the flag, but they were later made fixed. These colours originally referred to the three largest faiths of Punjab: red, to Hinduism; yellow, to Sikhism; and green, to Islam. However, mere colours were chosen to represent these three faiths with the intention that they could be redefined; as such, many have claimed connections between these colours and more abstract principles; recently, the government has stated that red represents hard work, yellow represents wealth, and green represents Punjab's great farmlands.

The flag's usage is regulated by a section of the Civil Code. Originally, its use was restricted to the government, but this was later abolished; today it is very much a national symbol representing the nation, the Constitution, and the people.



[1] At least, that's what I hope it says.

 

[Indicus]

The Chhatrapati of Maharashtra is the "true" or "primary" head of state of Maharashtra. The first Chhatrapati was the warrior-king founder of Maharashtra, Shivaji I (typically simply known as "Shivaji"), who ruled from 1674 to 1680. A member of the House of Bhonsle, Shivaji carved out a state in the Deccan while launching various hostilities with the Deccan states, Portugal, and the Mughal Empire. He rapidly gained widespread admiration in his own time; after his death, he has since been raised to godlike status in Maharashtra; some even worship him as a form of Shiva or Vishnu. His status in local folklore and culture makes him comparable in this regard to Charlemagne or Shaka Zulu. Many of his successors also proved capable, and after a tumultuous Mughal invasion, Shahu I (ruling from 1702-1749) saw Maratha power expand across India. However, at the same time the old Maratha Empire fractured and real power was increasingly vested in his prime minister, the Peshwa. After Shahu I's death, the Chhatrapati became a weak irrelevance in Maharashtrian governance, relegated to governing the grand palaces in Satara and nothing more, unable to regain this deep influence. Nevertheless, as the direct successor to Shivaji, the Chhatrapati of Maharashtra holds a lot of cultural influence across the nation.

The Peshwa of Maharashtra is the de jure head of government and de facto "secondary" head of state of Maharashtra. The first Peshwa was appointed by the great Shivaji in 1674 as part of his legendary Ashta Pradhan council, and they were decisively second in command for the first quarter-century of the Maratha Empire's existence. This only changed during the tenure of Chhatrapati Shahu I; his young age led Peshwa Balaji Vishwanath to accumulate influence over governance. This position became hereditary, and following Shahu I's death in 1749 the Peshwas were effectively the real rulers of Maharashtra. Nevertheless, many Maratha lords did not accept this, only begrudgingly accepting the Peshwas' authority as prime ministers. This is generally believed as being a reason why the Maratha Empire fractured. Following the disastrous defeat at the Third Battle of Panipat in 1761, under Peshwa Madhavrao the Empire made a recovery, spreading its influence over India once more. However, after his death in 1772 as well as the assassination of his successor in 1773, real power accumulated under Nana Fadnavis. As Maharashtra increasingly fell into British orbit in the nineteenth century, the Peshwas' power diminished yet further. Today, the Peshwas are secondary heads of state of Maharashtra, though following the institution of the Charter of the Federation in 1886, they have also become the heads of state of the internal state of Puna and they head meetings of sub-national princes.

The Fadnavis of Maharashtra is also a de jure head of government, while being the de facto "tertiary" head of state. This position grew in importance under Nana Fadnavis in the late eighteenth century, when along with Peshwa Madhavrao he helped to rebuild the broken Maratha Empire, raising it to vast heights. Following Madhavrao's death in 1772, his successor proved a bad leader, and Nana Fadnavis had him assassinated. The young age of his successor meant real power was vested in the "Barbhai" regency council, headed by none other than Nana Fadnavis. The Marathas increasingly faced a worse position following the fall of all French influence in India, while Nana Fadnavis was very suspicious of rising British influence. Nevertheless, the invasion of India by the Afghan Zaman Shah in 1800 led the British and the Marathas to form a reluctant alliance against him; this Afghan army was turned back at the defeat of Zaman Shah's army at Lucknow, and at the Fourth Battle of Panipat they were defeated for good. Simultaneously, a British-Maratha-Hyderabadi alliance defeated Tipu Sultan of Mysore, giving Maharashtra much territory while reducing Mysore to a British client state. While Nana Fadnavis kept the British at arms length, after his death in 1802 his successor of brother did not and Maharashtra became a British client state, signing a subsidiary alliance treaty in 1805. The British Resident now gained a sizeable amount of influence.

The fall of the Marathas to British suzerainty, in many ways, represented the completion of British hegemony over the subcontinent for all that Maharashtra did retain considerable internal independence. Following the British Isles falling to revolution in 1827, commanders of British armies in India attempted to remain loyal to the deposed family only for their white troops to mutiny against them. Many princes used this opportunity to attempt to break away, and though the Fadnavis did not, he did extract considerable concessions from the much-weakened British Governor-General. No longer was Britain to keep an army at Puna for "protection"; instead, the Marathas would train an army to be run by a British-appointed commander, with the threat of mutiny implicit. Indeed, thanks to this, Maharashtra would keep much of its independence intact. Nevertheless, Maharashtrians enlisted in British armies, and the fearsome Maharashtrian warrior with his turban became an important part of the British Indian Army. Following the formation of the Federation of Maharashtra in 1886, however, the Fadnavis increasingly lost power to the new representative assembly, and instead, the Daftardar responsible to it, gained power. Following the 1925 recognition of Maharashtra's independence (though in practice it remained very much a part of British India until its final end), yet more power fell into the hands of the Daftardar, and today the Fadnavis has become a "tertiary" head of state. Unlike the Chhatrapati or Peshwa, the position of Fadnavis has no grand history, nor does it originate from decree of the great Shivaji; as such, it has seen repeated calls for abolition. No such call has succeeded, at least, not yet.

 

[Indicus]

Well, uh, this took way too much work.

Spoiler

 

[Indicus]

The Buckingham Museum is a museum dedicated to art, history, and culture. A central landmark of Westminster and London, the Buckingham is a symbol of the British Isles abroad. It is the most visited museum in the British Isles, and after the Louvre in France and the National Museum of Italy, it is the third most visited museum in the world.

This site was originally known as Buckingham House, a townhouse established for the Duke of Buckingham in 1703. It was purchased by King George III in 1761 for his wife, Queen Charlotte, though in practice it was also an unofficial residence for George III, coming to be nicknamed Buckingham Palace. When George IV became king in 1820, he planned a renovation, which quickly ballooned into an opulent and vast palace. It was still under construction when, in 1824, George IV died and his brother Frederick took the throne; despite the war effort with France, he still wanted a vast palace, and so construction continued. In 1827, during the Popular Revolution, King Frederick was in Buckingham Palace when he heard of the storming of the Tower of London and the freeing of imprisoned Samuel Whitbread; fearing the mob would come to Buckingham next, he fled to Hanover. In the wake of his flight, a mob stormed the partially-completed Buckingham Palace, turning much of it into ruins.

Immediately after the Revolution, many feared that the Buckingham Palace ruins would serve as an inspiration for more radical mob violence, which many feared would ruin the legislative achievements they admired; thus, in 1830, Prime Minister Samuel Whitbread decided to rebuild it, but as an arts museum originally focused on paintings. This museum, he felt, would also rival the Louvre. Despite opposition to using public expenditure, construction began in 1830, and by 1838 construction was complete enough that it was opened up to the public. This proved a grand success, and by 1844 the Buckingham Museum was finally complete. The Museum further expanded in the 1850s, as it expanded its collections into works of antiquity as the more general British Museum got increasingly cramped. In the 1890s, to expand the Museum yet further, the courtyard in its middle was covered up to allow the use of the space below for collections. By that point, Buckingham's position as one of the world's largest museums was unbreakable, as it remains to this day.

Today, despite controversy over artifacts gained through imperial conquest, the Buckingham Museum is unmistakably a world-class museum few others can rival.

 

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The House of Bourbon-Bhopal is the ruling house of Bhopal, one of the constituent states of Rajasthan. Along with the Spanish branch, it is one of the last branches of the House of Bourbon which still reigns over actual territory.

The progenitor of the House of Bourbon-Bhopal is Jean-Philippe de Bourbon, a French noble who was exiled. Making his way to India, he ingratiated himself with the court of the Mughal emperor Akbar, marrying the sister of his Christian wife. Jean-Philippe and his descendants served as Governors of the Imperial Seraglio until Nader Shah's invasion of the Mughal Empire in 1739, after which they fled and became the Rajas of Shergar. After an invasion by neighbouring Narwar, they fled to Gwalior and then to the court of the Nawabs of Bhopal. In their new home they gained much influence, becoming extremely wealthy and second only to the Nawabs themselves. In this court they also gained the new tradition of having an additional Persianate name, in recognition to the culture dominant in the court. As the Maratha Empire expanded northwards, Bhopal increasingly fell under Maratha and specifically Scindia influence, following them into their subsidiary alliance with the British. It was here that first East India Company officials were first made aware of the existence of a branch of the Bourbon in India, to which they could only react with astonishment. [1]

In 1827, after the British government was overthrown, the East India generals attempted to stay loyal to the deposed King Frederick; instead this caused a mutiny by white soldiers in their ranks. While this crisis was decisively won by the soldiers aligned to the new British government, it causes many princes to use the opportunity either to renegotiate their treaties, or rebel from the British entirely. The Nawab of Bhopal was one of the people to rebel, but this was crushed by a united British and Scindia army in 1830. In his place, Balthazar I, who opposed this rebellion, was made the new Nawab of Bhopal, forced to swear an oath of fealty to the Scindia dynasty.

The sudden enthronement of a Bourbon in an Indian princely state caused shock in Europe itself; in France, the fact that a Bourbon ruled Bourbon while none ruled France inspired widespread mockery; one pamphlet alleged that the Bourbons of Bhopal had a stronger claim to the throne under the hereditary rule than the Bourbons of France. At the same time, the Bourbons who formerly ruled France openly despised the rulers of Bhopal, viewing them as presumptuous fools. Some descendants of French emigres made their way to Bhopal, where they inspired its ruler to be coronated in old French style, with a direct replica of the old Bourbon crown. The city of Bhopal's famous Rococo architecture and the "Indian Versailles" of Shaukat Mahal originates in this era. All the same, the rulers of Bhopal served as fairly weak monarchs, lying within Scindia and British rule. Nevertheless, they learned of the fate of their French brethren, guillotined due to their own attraction to power; due to that they proved reluctant to assert themselves.

The Great Indian Famine of 1876-78 caused widespread discontent; while it was concentrated in the Deccan, its effects were felt as far as Punjab. Along with this discontent it caused reformist waves. In Maharashtra, it led to caste tensions and the establishment of representative government; in Punjab, it led to the overthrow of the monarchy itself. With his Bourbon heritage, Salvador II of Bhopal was deeply aware of how this reformist wave could lead to the loss of his head, and so he sought to preempt it by promulgating a constitution establishing a parliament in 1881. He also reduced the pomp of his position and cancelled coronations in favour of a small inauguration. In 1896, after Parliament tried to assert itself, Salvador II accepted the institution of responsible government. Bhopal became one of the most liberal Indian princely states, caused almost entirely by its rulers' fears of ending up like their French cousins.

But by rendering themselves figureheads, the Nawabs of Bhopal maintained much popularity. The Hindustani War of Independence in the 1930s saw the failure of a Bhopali uprising; instead, in 1937 the Nawab of Bhopal signed on to the Union of Ajmer formally unifying Rajasthan under the Scindia rulers. As the British Raj collapsed under lost prestige in the 1940s, Rajasthan became independent, and with it Bhopal did too.

In the following decades, with most of the fundamentals of parliamentary government achieved and the elitist pomp of its rulers long abandoned, Bhopal proved to be very stable relative to the rest of Rajasthan, and this spurred much development; today it remains an industrial centre. The Nawabs of Bhopal, despite being the only Catholic (or for that matter Christian) rulers anywhere in India, maintain high levels of popularity for being figureheads above politics and party. The head of the leading line of the Bourbon dynasty continue to disregard their distant cousins; however, the head of House of Bourbon-Bhopal has a throne, and the head of the House of Bourbon-France does not.




[1] In OTL, the House of Bourbon-Bhopal remained a fairly influential family within Bhopal until later losing favour in the court of the Nawabs. After independence, their land was redistributed, and they became "mere" citizens of India even if ones with a fairly unusual history.

 

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The Constitution of the British Isles is the highest law in the British Isles. It consists of two statutes - the Charter of Liberties and Securities, and the Frame of Government. Both of these statutes originate in 1829, passed by the Convention Parliament as part of the Popular Revolution. The Charter, however, refers to a great number of prior legislation in its long preamble; though the Charter either copies verbatim these statutes' language or broadens it, these laws may be considered pseudo-constitutional in a sense. The Charter enumerates the rights of British citizens and their Parliament, while the Frame of Government describes the organization of the branches of government of the British Isles.

The Charter has never been amended, while the Frame of Government has been amended forty-three times. Initially both of these laws could be amended like ordinary laws, but since the entrenchment of the constitution in 1982 the amendment process requires a referendum of confirmation. These amendments have, over time, disestablished the church, established universal suffrage, and abolished the aristocracy. Representative of the rights-based focus of British constitutional thought is that the Charter is longer than the Frame of Government. The entirety of the Constitution is written on parchment, stored in the National Archives.

Other supplemental legislation, organizing subnational legislatures, county councils, and borough corporations, while constitutional in scope, are ordinary statutes which may be amended through Act of Parliament; as such, they are standard stuff

This constitution is one of the oldest in the world. Only a few constitutions exceed in sheer age, and this age has created a deep amount of widespread admiration. Many constitutions take many elements from it.

History

The idea of the Constitution first emerged over the course of many centuries; the beginning of British constitutional thought is usually regarded as the Magna Carta of 1215, which established a baronial assembly viewed as the first Parliament. Over time, this Parliament grew wider in its base of support, most notably growing its power under Edward III, and in strength until by the sixteenth century it came to be regarded as a powerful authority in state affairs. It is here a conception of the "constitution" emerged as a type of organic conception of law which could be found within the unwritten "common law". This "constitution", some alleged, consisted of the perfect balance of King, Lords, and Commons. By the seventeenth century, this conception strengthened, as Sir Edward Coke claimed that this "perfect balance" was rooted in the pre-Norman era and re-declared in documents such as the Magna Carta. In the eyes of this conception, all Acts of Parliament simply revealed the portion of the unwritten common law, which included constitutional law within it. Parliament passed the Petition of Right (1628) which declared a variety of rights while claiming they existed in already-ratified statutes. While this at the time wasn't a formal law, it would be regarded as such by future generations.

Over the seventeenth century King Charles I proved increasingly tyrannical; when he called a Parliament, he got into conflict with it, spiraling into the Puritan Revolution which ended with Charles I's execution in 1649 and the declaration of a republic under Parliament's authority. In this revolutionary period, very radical theories on the rights of freeborn Englishmen were enumerated, while people like Hampden and Vane became heroes of liberty. In 1653 a written constitution was issued, the Instrument of Government, which weakened Parliament and made Oliver Cromwell king in all but name; the later Humble Petition of 1657 further strengthened his position, only confirming his position as an absolutist and traitor to the constitutionalist cause. His death in 1658 caused the rapid collapse of the republic and restoration of the monarchy, resulting in the revival of the conception of the constitution as the balance of King, Lord, and Commons. Towards the end of the seventeenth century, the absolutist designs of the Stuarts resulted in conflict with Parliament. In 1679, this conflict caused the passage of the Act of Habeas Corpus, establishing security of the person. In 1688-89, it caused the overthrow of the monarchy and its replacement with that of William III. The Bill of Rights, enumerating the rights of the subject while claiming their lineage from the medieval era, was passed, along with the Toleration Act which gave limited freedom of religion to non-Anglican Protestants.

This constitutional settlement became regarded as the "perfect constitution" over the stable eighteenth century, the final completion of the organic British constitution. The American Revolution, to its supporters, was viewed as the exportation of this great constitution with adjustments for differences in society. During the French Revolution, when it became increasingly clear that the French constitutional model was to be dramatically different, the idea of the British constitution as an organic uncodified thing, immeasurably old but growing over the ages, was enumerated by traditionalist thinkers such as Burke in opposition to the codifications and constitution writing in France. Yet, those like the great Charles James Fox defended French constitutional thought, arguing that it was very similar to their (radical) view of the British constitution as a Lockean social contract. Yet, as Tories dominated British political society in the early nineteenth century, it was the extremely traditionalist model of the constitution which maintained political dominance. As Radical organization grew in the 1810s and 20s, it was suppressed, and in 1827, the government was overthrown.

A Convention Parliament was called, and by 1829 it finally wrote a Charter expanding upon the rights violated by the previous government as well as a Frame of Government establishing the radical conception of the Constitution into law. The preamble to the Charter included a very long reference to old legislation, which was aimed at showing that the Convention Parliament didn't want to import foreign French constitutional models but instead purify the existing constitution, adjust it for modern society, and prevent it from being overthrown again. It was aimed at showing that its makers were patriots, in full claim of their rights as freeborn Britons won over the ages. Yet, during the chaotic Headless State period, it was the older organic conception of the constitution which continually emerged. Orangemen and Scarletmen, and traditionalist opponents of the new regime, alleged that indeed the Charter and Frame of Government did destroy the true British constitution of the ages and replace it with an evil "Jacobin" constitution. Calls to return to the "Magna Charta, the true Constitution of this Isle" were commonplace. These calls only really dissipated as the new regime grew entrenched and secure. The idea of the Constitution as within the mysterious unwritten "common law" was later overthrown after the writing of the various law codes by the Brougham Commission, which codified large amounts of British law in five codes; even as this was attacked, it supplanted the idea of the common law.

Over time, during the Lawson administration, its stability enabled amendments to the constitution, expanding suffrage and disestablishing the church. Yet more elements of the "ancient constitution" were amended out of existence; the House of Lords was made partially elective, and suffrage was made universal under the Martineau administration. With the passage of time, the Charter and Frame of Government looked ancient in its own right and love for them grew across the entire political spectrum; it became less important to look beyond them. These two acts came to be regarded as a constitution in their own right, founded in 1829 and much superior to anything which had existed before. Ultimately, its perceived violation led to its entrenchment in 1982; now the Houses of Parliament could only propose amendments which required a referendum to be ratified. Since then, constitutional amendments have become relatively minor in scope, but despite that referenda over them are often complicated affairs which threaten governments.

 

[Indicus]

East is a British department store chain active all over the former British Empire. It is the main brand for the British East India Company, one of the oldest companies in the British Isles.

Originally founded as a trading company under state patronage, the British East India Company became a major power player in the eighteenth century particularly during the Seven Years War. It grew to become what was essentially a state; this became a major issue in Britain proper when the Fox-North Coalition attempted to pass a bill in 1783 to create a commission to govern Indian holdings. This bill was defeated and with it the Fox-North Coalition; the new prime minister Pitt subsequently passed a weaker bill which split governance between the state and the Company. Under Governor-General Richard Wellesley, over the turn of the century, it grew to dominate India after a string of wars and alliances, though afterwards the high cost of these wars led to a period of relative calm.

Following the overthrow of the British government in 1827, the revolutionary administration aimed at stripping the East India Company of its power. This initially saw some opposition, but following the publication by renowned scientist Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1854) in 1830 of a book mostly on Indian geography and plant life, but also containing vehement criticisms of Company rule, the East India Act 1833, stripping the Company of any and all role in Indian governance and even stripping it of its trade monopoly, got passed through Parliament. Immediately afterwards, the East India Company fell into dire financial straits.

It was now forced to diversify. In 1843 it opened a store in London to directly interface with customers. This store sold Indian goods, as well as facsimiles created in British factories. These goods were sold both to consumers and to other businesses. It quickly expanded across the British Isles; in the late nineteenth century, it expanded its trading networks across the British Empire. In 1903 it was reorganized into its modern organization. By the early twentieth century it proved to be a booming business.

But this was threatened following the Hindustani War of Independence in the 1930s and the subsequent collapse of the British Raj under fallen prestige. East India Company-associated places in Hindustan faced attacks during the War of Independence, and even afterwards by Swatantrik groups. The East India Company was forced to vacate Hindustan as a result of this. Even in the rest of India, the Company's deep implication in the atrocities of the British Raj made it enormously unpopular, and this led it to be forced to purchase Indian goods through a series of middlemen. It focused on goods from the East Indies, where it wasn't quite as synonymous with murder. Furthermore, it focused on facsimiles of Indian goods. In 1958, its stores were renamed The East India, which they were already unofficially called; in 1991, following protests over its role in British Raj atrocities, it was simply renamed "East". While this new name received widespread mockery, its sales went up, no doubt as its history was now masked.

Today, East is a highly notable British brand. Despite all the skeletons in its closet, nothing can change that.

 

[Indicus]

The flag of Upper Canada was initially the Union Jack - it had no other banner. This banner continued to be its flag during the disastrous 1818-1831 union with Lower Canada, and even after the British Popular Revolution this status did not change. It was in 1846 that, finally, Upper Canada gained a flag that was its own. The White Ensign, standardized as the sole flag of the British Navy in this period, defaced with the Upper Canadian coat of arms surrounded by a laurel of maple leaves, became Upper Canada's unofficial flag after its use as a gubernatorial standard. By 1881, however, this flag was deemed wholly unsuitable for national use; with Upper Canadian particularism stoked after the acquisition of the Red River District in 1863 and the Saskatchewan Valley in 1874, a mere gubernatorial standard seemed wholly unsuited for general use. Instead, a new flag was adopted, one displaying the Big Dipper - known locally as the Plough - defacing the White Ensign.

As Upper Canada grew yet larger, acquiring land up to the Arctic and Ungava, and as it attracted immigrants to the Plains over the 1880s with the Homestead Act, it became what was known internationally when people referred to "Canada". This led to Upper Canada renaming itself "Canada" in 1901, to much irritation to Lower Canada, which only finally saw the writing on the wall and finally renamed itself Laurentie in 1934. By the 1960s, there was an increasing movement to finally end the remnants of the colonial links with the British Isles, but inevitably this drew eyes to the Union Jack on the Canadian flag. After much dispute, the Union Jack was replaced with an elaborate star representing the North Star, while the red on the flag was turned green in what was a reference to Canada's vast Irish-descended population. Thus, with that Canada gained its modern flag.

 

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The British Chamber of Labour is an organization which represents the interests of 30 million British employees. Every employee in the British Isles is a member, with a right to elect its members, and thus it is distinct from the labour unions. The Chamber of Labour represents British workers in talks with government with a right to special audiences with the cabinet, and it also elects 35 Lords known as "Labour Lords", which are allocated by legislature area and put up for election with every general election.

The Chamber of Labour first emerged out of discussion on reforming the House of Lords to remove hereditary lords. Discussion already existed for representation of chambers of commerce ever since the 19th century, but it only intensified with the rise of the commercial classes. However, the late nineteenth century also saw the rise of workers' unions and the sudden emergence of clashes between labour and commerce. With it came the rise of new, radical ideologies which threatened the nation. It seemed that there was a need for some sort of settlement between labour and commerce, to avoid this. This caused the rise of talk of an "industrial parliament" among many of the leading thinkers of the early twentieth century, in which labour and capital could talk out their differences. With the revolutionary election of 1903 and the rise of the great Martineau, who advocated exactly that sort of forum, a Chamber of Labour to correspond to the Chamber of Commerce was instituted. This, he hoped, would spin away the representative claims of the unions to enable bodies closely associated with the government. This body initially contained layers of election - regional Chambers elected a Central Committee to negotiate matters - and indeed, candidates affiliated with the Radicals dominated the body. It served, well enough, to drain legitimacy from the unions in combination with the great social legislation ratified by the Martineau ministry.

Following the Aberdeen Gifting Scandal and the great 1927 crisis, the legitimacy of the Lords was terminally weakened. Such grave corruption intensified existing calls for reform, and in 1929 the peerage was finally abolished. No longer would people have the right to sit in Parliament by birth alone. And replacing representative peers in the House of Lords were to be representatives of the Chambers of Commerce and Labour, where they would hash out their differences through discussion. Over the next many years, this utopic dream of resolving differences through discussion failed. Unions strengthened nonetheless and fought for their demands through strikes. Yet, the Chamber continued to represent workers and claim legitimacy with some level of success. Attempts to turn election of Chamber representatives into party fights largely failed; instead parties propose candidates for elections of Labour Lords up with the Chamber Councils, who elect members by secret ballot. Nevertheless, Labour Lords are infamously disloyal to the party, and independent Labour Lords are often elected. For all that Chambers of Labour have been a bane for many governments, they have been all but entrenched by convention.

 

[Indicus]

God Save our Liberty is a national song of the British Isles. The author of the tune is unknown, but the current song was composed in 1850.

This song's first version emerged as "God Save the King" in 1745, following the defeat of the Jacobite Rebellion of that year. In the subsequent euphoria, a song commemorating King George II was written, celebrating the defeat of Britain's enemies. In subsequent years, the anthem came to be regarded as a royal anthem only second to Rule Britannia, though a verse on the crushing of Scottish rebellions was left out. Following the anti-revolutionary backlash of the 1790s, God Save the King's overt royalism appealed to many, in contrast to Rule Britannia's liberty-focused lines. As a result, it came to become Britain's unofficial anthem in this period.

During the Popular Revolution in 1827, Rule Britannia was sung by the revolutionaries during the storming of the Tower of London; in its wake, it came to be promoted as the British Isles' national anthem. The National Symbols Act 1835 made Rule Britannia the British Isles' national anthem, while in contrast God Save the King was now the song of Hanoverian restorationists and other advocates of enthronement. It was sung by Orangemen during the burning of Parliament, as well as by other opponents of the ambiguously republican revolutionary state. During the crisis over the First Enthronement Bill, Russell and his men sang God Save the King in reference to the Duke of Cambridge, and its defeat led the song to fall into increased abeyance.

In 1846, Wilfrid Lawson became Prime Minister, and he was far less willing to entertain dreams of enthronement than his predecessors. "To-day", he said, "we are freer than we have ever been. Even in the glorious days of William the Deliverer, the Tree of Liberty did not nourish the British people as it does in the nineteenth century". In this period, God Save the King fell further into disuse. In 1836 William Hickson had already written a "peace version"[1] more suited to the anti-war climate of the time, and in 1850 it was preceded by a verse which replaced references of the Queen with liberty to create a song as follows:

Spoiler

God save our Liberty,
Our freeborn Liberty,
God save Liberty.
Send her victorious,
Happy and glorious,
Ever to bless us,
God save Liberty!

God bless our native land,
May heaven's protecting hand
Still guard our shore;
May peace her power extend
Foe be transformed to friend
And Britain's rights depend
On war no more.

May just and righteous laws
Uphold the public cause
And bless our isle
Home of the brave and free
The land of liberty
We pray that still on thee
Kind heaven may smile.

Not on this land alone
But be God's mercies known
From shore to shore.
Lord, make the nations see
That men should brothers be,
And from one family
The wide world o'er.

This song rapidly attained a level of popularity. Its verses appealing to a sentiment peace appealed to a people exhausted with the French wars which led to the Popular Revolution, while its focus on liberty suited liberty-centric British nationalism. Its references to international brotherhood and a spread of liberty appealed during the British intervention in the New Granadine War of Independence. Despite the Second Enthronement Bill crisis in the late 1850s, it continued to gain steam, becoming increasingly prominent. It spread further among British volunteers in the Buenaventura War of Independence, and opponents of intervention on the Secessionist side during the American Secession War sang it. During the Hindustani War of Independence, it received new meaning. Supporters of decolonization ironically sang its verses on brotherhood and liberty to reveal the hypocrisy of British policy with the colonies, creating new foes where it should instead create ties of friendship. Since then, as part of the reckoning with the atrocities of colonialism, this song has received some support as an alternate anthem in contrast to Rule Britannia with its exhortation for Britons to "rule the waves" which strikes many as colonial. Despite its popularity, no proposal to make God Save our Liberty the official anthem has received mainstream support; today it simply remains a popular national song.

[1] He wrote some verses as part of a "peace version" in OTL, but it didn't receive much popularity. Personally, I think its verses have aged quite well.

 

[Indicus]

The 100 pound bill, also known a Sidney or simply a Sid, is a banknote issued by the United Bank of the British Isles, for British pounds. These bills are legal tender in the British Isles. It is the highest-value bill for the British pound.

The United Bank first had a monopoly over issuing money bills in 1855, after its main competitors the Bank of England, the Bank of Scotland, and the Bank of Ireland were driven to near-bankruptcy by various bank runs and the post-Popular Revolution regime refusing to give them any official backing. In 1921, the British tradition of issuing bills with the portraits of iconic leaders was first created when the portrait of Charles James Fox was printed on the 50 pound bill; in 1926, the 100 pound bill was given the portrait of the seventeenth century republican martyr Algernon Sidney. This gave it the nickname of the Sidney or Sid. Later redesigns kept the portrait of Sidney, helping to give it an iconic status in places like the media.

Today, the bill is prominently red in colour, and it contains a quote from the great Sidney on the purpose of governments. It is equipped with security measures such as holograms, as well as invisible ink, to prevent counterfeiting.

 

[Indicus]