The Real New England
Revolution: Part 2
“Perhaps the single greatest desire of any peoples is to have a nation to call their own. They just have to figure out what nation they have first.”- Marian, modern Roman historian on the rise of nationalism in the 19th century.
Prologue
Perhaps the question that boggles the mind of most
American political scientists is how best to describe the United States as “a
nation”. Some, like Joel Garreau, have even written books trying in vain to
describe the overall US landscape. Garreau’s concept- called “The Nine Nations
of America”- described a North America that contained not three nations-
Canada, the US and Mexico- but nine, stretching across the entire continent:
The Foundry (the predominantly manufacturing-centred north-central US and
Southern Ontario), Quebec, Dixie (the South), The Islands (SE Florida, the Caribbean
and the Bahamas), Ecotopia (the very-environmentally conscious region of the
coasts of northern California, Oregon, Washington State, British Columbia and
southern Alaska), New England (which in his concept also includes Maritime
Canada, Newfoundland and Labrador), The Breadbasket (Midwestern America, a
predominantly agricultural area), “Mexamerica” (an area corresponding to Mexico,
SW Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, S California coast that has a high Hispanic
population) and “The Empty Quarter” (which corresponds to most of Canada and
the Western United States west of Nebraska which is sparsely populated in
comparison to the rest of the continent). Since Garreau’s work in 1980, others
have “updated” the map with a few changes, but the general areas still remain
the same.
Now, living in North America, I’ve wondered about this
question myself: the basis for the previous piece on the US- The Fall of the American
Republic- attempted to tackle this very question, but since then I’ve
been doing some thinking. Part 1 of this particular piece dealt with the fact
that New England really wouldn’t be part of Britain after all, but that only
covered NE America- the rest of the continent still needed to be covered. This
is not just to “fill in the gaps” but also because revolutions tend to have “a
ripple effect” that evokes revolutions in other areas. Besides, the thought of
New England, possibly the most revolutionary of any of the American States
today, rising up in a fit of self-determination it will inspire other American
states to do the same. However, not every area of North America will have a “defined”
nation, because, apart from Texas, the South, New England, New York, Alberta,
Quebec, California, Utah and Cascadia, I’m not sure if anyone can really
define set nations elsewhere in North America. This won’t mean that nations won’t
arise in those areas; it just means that it will take a while for the
territories to settle down and figure out their national identities first (a
precursor for any nation to stay together). Also, some nations that were
established in “The Fall of the American Republic” will also be altered for the
same reasons, because no nation can ever be “static”.
Chapter 1: The
Aftermath of Cape Cod
While the New Englanders revelled in their victory over the British, Britain was in a decidedly sombre mood. Kicked out of America a second time, the British decided to launch another invasion of North America. Luckily for the New Englanders, it was badly planned and several British warships failed to even depart from their ports to the proper destinations. Some ₤50 million was lost in the process, and whatever Navy showed up to face the British resoundingly defeated whatever wasn’t lost. It wasn’t a total loss however- the British did capture Belle Isle and the adjacent part of Labrador (which they called “King’s Point”), giving the British a long-desired foothold on the North American continent, but any larger expedition was soundly rebuffed. In fact, the British made “Misery Point” on Belle Isle the capital of the new colony of Belle Isle and King’s Point to highlight Britain’s own misery at failing to secure anything further on the North American continent.
Meanwhile, the New Englanders were happily putting the finishing touches on their brand new nation. Their army was styled along the same lines as the “minutemen” that were present during the First American Revolution[1], a process that also worked so well against the British the second time around in 2003. Each city had its own local militia that could be called into service when needed, and was backed by a competent Navy and Air Force. Other policies were aimed at progressive initiatives such as the August 2003 “Protection of Education Act” that prevented any school from implementing “political” curricula (such as creation science), and “The Right To Know Act” that allowed anyone in the public to view any governmental record (except those deemed “a national security risk”, but even those documents had to have something the public could view and the documents could only be banned for a limited time), including the budget. A culture of debate soon arose in New England, and while that meant that very little was actually done in the government, it did mean that whatever laws the government passed had to have overwhelming popular support. In fact, Thomas Menino, the New England President, was so happy with his system that he called it “the perfect democracy” in a December 2003 speech.
Chapter 2:
California and Cascadia
South of New England, the Californians were making rumblings about throwing off Casaran rule, mostly because they felt they could run their state on their own. Fortunately for them the split was amicable, as Casara did not want a potentially destructive war in an area they had extensive interests in, as the January 1, 2004 Treaty of San Francisco formally established Californian independence and a Casaran-California alliance. A few days later the Californians finalized the sale of Los Angeles and San Diego from the Romans, who also finalized an alliance with the new state. However, the independence of California did not end the problems for the new “Golden Bear Republic”- it embroiled itself in a dispute with the Cascadians over the Kingdom of the North Coast (which corresponded to the former area of Northern California) and the State of Coos. A battle ensued near Coos Bay on January 23, 2004 that ended in a stalemate, but the dispute still raged on. Because of the Battle both Coos and the North Coast declared their independence from both Cascadia and California, calling the two states, “impossible to deal with”.
Meanwhile, the Cascadians were running on the high of successive years of economic growth. Convinced that their success would last forever and that their success would be beneficial to the rest of the North American Continent, Cascadia set out to “conquer the rest of America” and “bring the ideals of the Cascadian Empire” to all. They annexed the rest of Oregon by the end of 2002, and brought almost all of Nevada under their control by the end of 2003. Their advance was checked by the Romans at Las Vegas and by the Utes (who gained a united state with the help of Rome in the middle of 2003) near Salt Lake City (as well as by California near Coos Bay), but that wasn’t nearly enough to sour the Cascadian moral. An early 2004 agreement with Rome and Utah set the new borders of the Cascadian Empire and ensured peace in the area for the time being.
Chapter 3: Trouble
In Dixieland
In Carolina, the problems were much greater than those of California and Cascadia. Their Empire was threatening to fall apart at the seams because of several groups within the Empire who questioned the legitimacy of the State. In 1991, Alexander Drabinsky created the Carolinian Empire as the embodiment of “the New South”, one that was traditionalist but progressive, and enacted several laws- such as the legalization of abortion- to further that aim. However- as can probably be expected in a region known for its extremist attitudes- not everyone in Drabinsky’s Empire was happy. In the western portion of the Empire, Alabama, Kentucky and Mississippi all criticized Drabinsky for being “too moderate”: the Alabamans wanted to have a state religion, while Mississippi and Kentucky both wanted to repeal some of Drabinsky’s policies, such as the legalization of abortion. The Mississippians were the most extreme of the groups- not only did they want to get rid of abortion rights, they also wanted to repeal several civil rights laws, such as the legal protection for minorities and the re-implementation of the slave trade. They also supported collectivization of the farms and of nationalizing several of Mississippi’s industries, such as its chemical and food-processing industries. Meanwhile, in Washington and in Tennessee, areas that have traditionally opposed the South, uprisings occurred criticizing Drabinsky for not being progressive enough, especially in Washington whose cultural ties were closer to New York than to Richmond.
The result was five catastrophic battles in the month of July 2003 for the Carolinians that left their Army in shambles and given no choice but to recognize the independence of the new states: the Battle of Jackson (which guaranteed the independence of Mississippi), the Battle of Montgomery (Alabama), the Battle of Murfreesboro (Tennessee), the Battle of Concord (Kentucky) and the Second Battle of the Potomac (Washington). By the end of August, Daytonian rioters secured the independence of the city of Daytona (which also felt that Carolina was not “progressive enough”) in a bloodless coup as a result of the exhaustion of Carolina’s forces.
Chapter 4: More
Riots- the Storm Before the Calm?
The defeat of Britain by New England in May and the defeat of Carolina by the Southern States in July triggered a new series of nationalistic riots and fervour across the North American continent. Washington wanted to gain Philadelphia and West Virginia to create a state for itself and revive the old American institutions “the way they were meant to be”. They entered negotiations with the New Yorkers in an attempt to buy off that land, eventually striking a deal with New York on August 23, 2003. The transfer went by slowly but smoothly, leading to the February 22, 2004 Proclamation of the American Republic.
However, in the Midwest, there were several riots covering a wide spectrum of political ideals. Some were calling for the creation of a single Midwest state based in the City of Denver, while others wanted the independence of their individual states, as well as the Native tribes throwing in their wishes to “reclaim the lands that they lost”. Only one new state emerged amidst the chaos- Nebraska- with the rest of the cities organizing themselves into many warring city-states and factions, each with its own idea for how the American Midwest should look like. The riots were so bad that Roman historian Marian surmised that the American Midwest was “truly the only place where all hope was lost.”
Epilogue
“In most places, you could be certain that after the storm was a long period of calm weather. Then there is America.” The words of Marian could not better summarize the feelings of many Americans in the years following the Washington Accord. To Marian, the Accord “solved nothing and ruined everything. The naïve belief that the British, Romans and Casarans could single-handedly restore the old North American trading network and stability with just a single Bill was exposed as an overwhelming fraud in the years following the Accord.”
While most believe Marian was harsh, several agreed on his main points. One, the interior had always been traditionally poorer than the coasts, and once they lost their connection to the coasts they also lost stability. The Pact Countries[2], he argued, worried too much about preserving the wealthier coasts and not enough on the poorer interior, creating problems because the interior did not have the infrastructure needed to build a successful country once it needed too. Two, the interior also suffered from “an identity crisis” according to Marian, where he states that “once the state left so did any hope for a nation in those regions”. “To wit,” he wrote in his early 2005 tract, “America Since The Accord”, “we all know what it is to ‘be a New Yorker’ or to ‘be a Texan’, but tell me, does anyone know what it means to be a Wyomingite? Or a New Mexican? We can argue for many years that maybe the Americans cared little for the interior but you can’t deny that the states have no one to blame but themselves for not having an identity. The states gave industries and people no incentive to come, and now they are paying for it.”
The Real New England Revolution Part 1