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Springtime of Freedom: A Guns of Old John Brown Riot Quest

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Scheduled vote count started by notbirdofprey on Jan 16, 2023 at 3:40 PM, finished with 38 posts and 34 votes.
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    • Scheduled vote count started by notbirdofprey on Jan 16, 2023 at 3:40 PM, finished with 38 posts and 34 votes.
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    1877 Election Results
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    Coalition negotiations proved tense and dramatic, taking far longer than anyone expected. While the International Revolutionary Party and the Freedmen's Party were both willing to work with anyone, their potential partners were not willing to accept the same. The Radical Republicans refused to work with anyone but the Freedmen's Party and the Worker's Party, while the Worker's Party was willing to work with the Freedmen's Party and their left-wing splinters.

    Despite the multiple possible governments that could have been formed, a common interest in electoral reform saw the Worker's Party, the Socialist Worker's Party, and the Socialist Party manage to form a government, albeit one dependent on supply and confidence from the International Revolutionary Party, who wholeheartedly embraced some of their comrade's platforms, enough to accept ones they had no real interest in.

    The first business of the 16th National Assembly was electoral reform. While the principle of recall was enshrined into law without any problem, there was significant debate about what method to use. The Socialist Party officially favored party-list proportional representation with a single at-large district for the nation, while the Worker's Party favored single-transferable votes across the district. Despite bitter personal rivalries, the Socialist Worker's Party eventually backed the Socialist Party and supported the transition to national proportional voting.

    Next came a series of economic measures, aimed at improving standards of living and rates of growth. A Social Planning Committee was established and given broad powers to coordinate and regulate government-owned businesses, while cooperatives and private businesses could be induced to accept its directives through a variety of incentives. One of the Committee's first acts was to nationalize all banks and seize their assets, provoking widespread outcry from those who had invested significantly in those enterprises. In addition, there was a small bank run in some regions, although the government was able to respond effectively.

    Similar treatment for trading enterprises provoked more unrest and protests from former owners and investors, triggering a campaign of criticism in the press and accusations of tyranny. In a number of cases, business records and contracts were deliberately destroyed, and there was at least one case of murder motivated by these sweeping nationalizations.

    However, a broad array of other government initiatives and the tireless defense of these actions by the Republic Report kept discontent to a relative minimum. The welfare program was greatly expanded to provide better care for veterans, including an expanded healthcare program. At the behest of the International Revolutionary Party, the existence of military unions was formalized.

    The Ourvy was put to work dredging rivers and digging canals, while utilities such as sewage systems and the beginnings of an electrical network were established, with priority given to heavily populated urban areas. A number of major ports, including New Orleans and Miami, were both expanded, a round of grants was distributed to co-ops for the purchase of labor-saving equipment ranging from tractors to vacuum cleaners, and similar grants were distributed to a variety of cooperatives.

    A series of laws to reduce corruption, including the expansion of the anti-corruption bureau and the formalization of broad transparency laws, were passed and immediately began seeing usage.

    Finally, more investment went into the expansion of the schooling system, including the introduction of mandatory bilingualism.

    But all these measures were merely part of the preparation for the Assembly's planned campaign to crush one of the last remnants of the old tyranny of the United States. Secret messages were sent to the Turtle Island Confederation and the Worker's Republic of America, proposing a declaration of war. The modernization plans of the military were adjusted, prioritizing the 1st Army in order to get it ready as fast as possible.

    All the while, the various party organs were beginning their own efforts. The International Revolutionary Party encouraged its voters and supporters to enlist and cooperated with the Socialist Party and Socialist Worker's Party to establish the American Revolutionary Bureau in New Orleans (the original name was modified to mollify the mutualist and anarchist wings of the International) in order to help support and coordinate between parties across the two continents.

    A party-wide Propaganda Bureau was also started, distributing equipment ranging from phonographs to printing presses across the nations and rallying support, including their own calls for enlistment and support of the military against the reactionary stains still blotting the continent.

    The Socialist Worker's Ourvy was founded as well, for the purpose of providing support to poor communities throughout the nation, and perhaps eventually the world. Their first task was a small enterprise helping repair and expand a reservoir and groundwater system for an Appalachian community, a small but highly publicized effort.

    The Worker's Party, meanwhile, focused on supporting the expansion of cooperatives as the expense of private businesses, either by acquisition or reorganization, relying on the Social Planning Committee's incentive schemes to back their efforts as they established strong ties between their own party organs and various economic enterprises.

    The Freedmen's Party, meanwhile, launched a backroom campaign, taking responsibility for many rural grants in a bid to shore up support in their strongholds while contesting urban areas by taking advantage of greater experience with backroom maneuvering.

    Finally, the Radical Republicans centralized their new party line and began creating their own party organs, including "cooperative unions" designed to meet the needs of both workers and owners and "recovery associations" for those harmed by government interference in their business operations.

    In foreign affairs, a railroad speculation scandal of some kind in Eastern Europe shook the Prussian economy, with aftershocks that began to damage the deeply intertwined Russian economy and then slowly spread west. Almost immediately, a wave of immigration to both the Freedmen's Republic and Worker's Republic began, as Germans, Poles, Jews, and more sought to flee poverty and repression.

    And six months into the year, a formal declaration of war was issued, and troops boarded a vast number of barges to make their way to the north...
     
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    The Freedmen's Republic in 1878
  • Informational
    • Government
    Government Type: Parliamentary Republic (National Assembly)
    Governing Document: Freedmen's Charter (civil rights, guaranteed welfare, freedom of conscience)
    Head of State: Samson Stein
    Head of Government: Samson Stein
    Legislative Coalition: SWP, WP, SP
    Election Types: National Proportional Representation universal suffrage

    Foreign Affairs
    Diplomatic Status: Recognized by Britain, France, German Confederation, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Mexico
    War and Peace: At war with Northern Warlord States, peace treaty with Mexico
    Alliances: Part of Des Moines Alliance with Turtle Island Confederation and Worker's Republic of America, alliance with Haiti
    Trade Agreements: Turtle Island Confederation (Economic Aid), Worker's Republic of America (Economic Aid), Great Britain, France
    Border Disputes: Mexico, Northern Warlord States, Dominion of Pacifica

    War
    Army Type: Volunteer Militia (Freedmen's Army)
    Army Quality: High
    Army Quantity Adequate
    Fort Quality: Critical
    Fort Quantity: Critical

    Navy Type: Coast Guard (Freedmen's Navy)
    Navy Quality: Adequate
    Navy Quantity: Critical
    Seaport Quality: Low
    Seaport Quantity: Critical

    Interior
    National Stability: Adequate
    Regional Stability: Texas (Low)
    Law Enforcement Quality: Low
    Law Enforcement Quantity: Low
    Bureaucracy Quality: Low
    Bureuacracy Quantity: Adequate
    Anti-Corruption Quality: Low
    Anti-Corruption Quanitty: Low


    Finance
    Treasury: Adequate
    Debt Ratio: High
    Tax Income: Low
    Tariff Income: Adequate
    Fee Income: Low
    Expenses: Critical
    Principal Creditors: Britain (53%), Domestic (29%), France (18%)
    Principal Debtors: None

    Pensions: Low, Adequate (veterans)
    Healthcare: Low, Adequate (verterans)
    Financial Regulations: Low
    Environmental Regulations: Low

    Economy
    Economic Output: Adequate
    Economic Growth: Adequate
    Economic Activity: Agriculture (38%), trade (16%), light industry (28%), heavy industry (18%)
    Commercial Output: Low
    Commercial Growth: Low
    Trade Partners: Britain, France, German Confederation, etc. [mixed] (20%), Des Moines Alliance [mixed] (80%)
    Living Standards: Adequate
    Technology: Ideal
    Immigration: Adequate (Prussia, Austria-Hungary, Russia)

    Public Works
    Road Quality: Adequate
    Road Presence: Adequate
    Rail Quality: Low
    Rail Presence: Adequate
    Utility Quality: Adequate
    Utility Presence: Low
    Port Quality: Low
    Port Presence: Adequate
    Waterway Quality: Adequate
    Waterway Presence: Adequate

    Education
    Literacy Rate: 79%
    Literacy Growth: Low
    Education Quality: Adequate
    Education Presence: Adequate

    Stats: [None/Critical] / [Low/High] / [Adequate/Medium] / [High/Low] / [Ideal/Booming]
    Stats in bold are improving, stats in italics are declining.
     
  • Informational
    • notbirdofprey said:
    Bureaucracy Quality: Low
    Bureuacracy Quantity: Adequate
    Anti-Corruption Quality: Low
    Anti-Corruption Quanitty: Low
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    So, our transparency and auditing reforms improved the quality of our bureaucracy but didn't improve our anti-corruption efforts. I would suggest that we somehow formalize the requisites needed to be hired by the public administration and creating a central organ that ensures that said requisites are enforced.

    We should also legislate witness protection laws (both for corruption and other crimes), after all, a lot of people don't denounce out of fear of retaliation.
     
    Hrm, we're gonna need to abolish the two tiers of healthcare and pensions benefits.
     
    How about we let the market handle healthcare and instead give the economy some breathing room by lowering taxes to spur investment? Vote for the RRP!
     
    You damn fools, look at what you did, causing needless unrest by seizing private businesses, the state should have compensated these enterprising people for their lost wealth unduly taken by the state for God knows what!
     
    nachtingale said:
    You damn fools, look at what you did, causing needless unrest by seizing private businesses, the state should have compensated these enterprising people for their lost wealth unduly taken by the state for God knows what!
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    Did we compensate the slavemasters, or did we hang those who survived the bullets of our righteous cause from the gibbet? The usurers and taskmasters of capital, to whom the Son of God saw fit to take a whip, are privileged by our comparative restraint.
     
    Zimmerwald1915 said:
    Did we compensate the slavemasters, or did we hang those who survived the bullets of our righteous cause from the gibbet? The usurers and taskmasters of capital, to whom the Son of God saw fit to take a whip, are privileged by our comparative restraint.
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    You use your flowery words to hide your true intentions, these men of capital are not slavers, they do not use others as property. Their evil is far more benign than what you claim is "privileged", you would hang the business owners then? Or perhaps even the farmers? Do they not have a hand in capital too? Or perhaps you would even like to hang John Brown himself, for he too owned his own capital. After all, you claim that they are no different than the slavers, that the people of the banks and trades should deserve the rope too?

    Such absurdities, such ramblings from a madman of a mad party. We should seek to prevent divisions! Not foment them where there was none before! We did not compensate the slavers for they abused other human beings as no more than cattle, and yet you people of the government treat these bankers and traders as if they are cattle too, you are no more evil than the slavers themselves, by stripping fellow humans of their livelihoods without want or care of their own persons!
     
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